Open Letters

[mommyatty]

Dear Asshat CEO of the Company We are Helping:

When I fly four hours EACH WAY to help you figure out how to pull your project out of the shitter, I expect you to attend the meeting in person, not on the phone. And I expect your main lawyer handling it to get off her fat ass and walk the three blocks to attend the meeting in person as well. 

And btw, I'm telling the law firm representing your parent company about this too. They aren't going to be impressed. 

Signed, Not Impressed By Your Title

Dear Asshat Counsel to the Asshat CEO:

You want me to testify for you in two weeks. You have zero time on my calendar to prep me. If that doesn't change by Friday, I'm going to provide written testimony and not show up in person. Because this is absurd. 

Signed, Lawyer Who Has Never Failed To Prep A Witness

[k3am]

Dear company,

You know I like you, right? And I appreciate that in past, you've chosen to cut costs and not people. But. BUT. I know for a fact that my division is very, very, very profitable. We've got an extra high six figures of net income compared to budget for the year so far. So you can afford to spend a couple grand and get me a computer that works properly, not this beast of a laptop from 2009. Which is constantly having issues. And some I don't even realize like... like the fact that in all the things you've done to try to fix it in the last two weeks, you've also removed my ability to work remotely. Which I found out... while I'm trying to work remotely.

Signed,
Your unproductive employee who can't afford to take today as a vacation day but isn't going to get much done if I can only access emails...

[mustardseed2007]

Dear DH,

I get how you are feeling and I feel awful about it. Basically the writing is on the wall and you need to move on from your current job. That is scary and crummy and not fair. However, your buddy who got the job you were angling for, lets be honest, the new boss is just keeping the old staff. That's not personal. And it's not personal that she can't afford to retire like she originally planned. You need to be nice to her. You need as many allies as you can get. You've had a full 48 hours to sulk, lets move on and start planning your next move.

Signed,

Wife who wants to help you

[erinshelley21]

Dear DH's BFF,
Thank you for taking the time to come talk to me about DH last night. I like that you and I can have open conversations about him. I like even more that you and I are on the same page 99% of the time. Thank you for being a good friend to both of us.
Signed, your BFF's wife

Dear DH,
I wish I could make the decision to stay or leave your current fire department. I think you're making this thought process too complicated but that's understandable. It comes down to this: you like fighting fire and right now you aren't fighting fire. In the 18 months you've been there the department has had TWO fires. Also, I'm not okay with you being on a department that will not adequately staff it's department. I've never really worried about you at work and its been nice, but if they keep this up I'm going to start and I don't want to do that.
Love, your concerned wife

Dear Asshole,
If you're going to throw a fit can you just get it over with already?
Signed, still not convinced that you took that news without any issues.

[Covergirl82]

Dear DH's grandpa,

Do not ever again make decisions about child care for my children, especially without discussing it with DH. You aren't around children much anymore, I get it, but my 6 and 8 year olds are capable of entertaining themselves for a little while during which time DH is helping you move. If your move is so "stressful," then don't be a cheap ass and hire a damn moving company.

Sincerely,
Your grandson's wife

[rere]

Dear people I report to,

Yes I realize we are a business. We usually close at Christmas. However we have now decided to stay open. Whatever, your call. But most departments are dead, including mine. It is a good time for us to take off, so don't give me bs about it.
Yes, it's nice to have office time, but I'm not sitting here staring at the walls for a weekend and a half. It's my leave time, and professionally and personally, I'd rather take it when my calendar is empty.

Signed, you agency jargon is not reality.

[Covergirl82]

rere, I used to work for a K-8 school system, and it drove me nuts that we didn't have an office shutdown for at least a few days around the holidays, when all the schools were closed. It just seems like an easy win for employee satisfaction, not to mention savings on utilities.

[saraml13]

Dear DH
You need to step up your game. I am working again now. I can't really take time off right away, whereas you have a bunch of political capital and unlimited vacation time at your job. So why am I the one stressing about childcare arrangements for sick kids? We're fortunate that our families can help out, but it's asking a lot for them to take multiple full days of caring for a sick, fussy baby. I don't know why you are acting above WFH or flexing your schedule to go in late or come home early.
Signed
Stressed wife

[186momx]

Dear PTO Meeting
Thank you for only going for an hour last night. I know the point of PTO is to raise money so teacher can use it for field trips and stuff for the kids but wow there were more staff at the meeting last night than parents and each one wanted something. From K needing $120 for pumpkin patch to the education committee wanting 2K for assemblies. I'm glad we made $2600 from the jog-a-thon but we spent that all last night. Now we are doing Butter braids and are now adding in a BINGO fundraiser night in 2 weeks. Can we give families a break from all the fundraising especially with holidays coming up.
Signed parent who wanted to shout out about all the $$$ but kept my mouth shut
PTO = lots of info but gets me frustrated too
Me

Dear Common Core Math for Grade 1
You suck!!! DD and I are failing 1st grade math. Homework pages coming back graded with all the answers corrected is making me frustrated. I spent 30 minutes watching video clips on Number Bonds after asking the teacher for a lesson who sent me a video clip. I understand where to plug the numbers in but I don't get why we are learning this and what it is used for later on in life. Plus the entire time I was watching these videos I was thinking atoms and molecules and want to jump to biology instead of math thinking. I'm so happy this week they are moving on from number bonds and doing missing numbers. Example sent home was 5+__=10 which is just baby algebra.
Accountant who can't do 1st grade math

[judyblume14]

Dear erinshelley21,
did I miss somewhere that you told Asshole that you're selling?

[waverly]

saraml13, I anticipate this battle tonight when I ask him to take the kids to get their flu shots tomorrow.

186momx, Luckily we haven't run into this yet- DS is also in first grade and so far it's just been regular addition, but probably soon...

Dear H- You need to make dinner tonight or do DS's exercises or both. Also, I haven't been sleeping well with you traveling and it is catching up to me.

Dear WP- how many of you miss your children when you are at work, pick them up where they promptly start fighting and then wonder why you missed them? Repeat 10,000 times.

Also same with H when he travels except he isn't annoying as often as the kids.

Dear Halloween- you are again starting to look crazy busy. I don't understand why Halloween a little holiday by all intents and purposes has gotten so stressful, well yes I do because of the kids, but still when I think about that day I cringe. Also slightly regretting signing up for the Halloween party in DS's classroom. This must be a pattern for me, sign up and then regret. I do like getting into their classrooms though.

[erinshelley21]

Oct 18, 2017 12:35:06 GMT -5 judyblume14 said:

Dear erinshelley21 ,
did I miss somewhere that you told Asshole that you're selling?

Yep! We told him yesterday afternoon. It's in the Monday thread. I couldn't wait until Thursday to talk about it.

[Covergirl82]

186momx, I had to laugh, because DD (who is also in 1st grade) just had a homework worksheet last night that was two columns of math problems like 5+____ =10. My thought was, shouldn't they just become proficient with 5+5=___ or 10-5=___ first?

[waverly]

Covergirl82 , I lied- DS did have that same worksheet. He does know 5+5 and 10-5 though, but I don't think all the kids in his class know that especially since they haven't "done" subtraction yet in 1st grade. They had some in K.

Right now they are doing + (a number each week). This week is +8.

ETA- not related to math.  Dear customers- they are limits to what I can do for you.  I have told you these limits and other people have over and over again the last 8 years.  So please 1. stop trying to go over the limits. 2. Act surprised that the limits are what they are- you have known this for years. 3. Keep trying to send things anyway in hopes that you can again go over the limits. 4. Make me continue to explain said limits to you yet again because you don't understand the concept of 5 (see it did circle back to math).  You get 5.  When the 5 are done- you get 5 more.  Not you get 5 every day.  Or 5 three times a week or 5 whenever you feel like it or or or or whatever combo you come up with. 5 the end.

[phdmomma]

waverly, Covergirl82, 186momx, DS just started K, but this has me fearing helping with math homework. I can do calculus in 4 dimensions, but elementary school math is going to kill me.

Dear Week,
You are killing me, I just barely got my grant proposals in. And now onto grading a whole backpack full of exams.
Signed,

Come on weekend

[186momx]

waverly, Covergirl82, I really want to know what was wrong with the common sense math of 5+5=10 and having sheet long pages of 2+4, 5+3, 8+2, etc. No wonder when DD did this giant page of mommy made up math 26+35, 19+17, etc. and showed it to her teacher all proud that she can do big kid math and she didn't even get a good job because it isn't even part of the curriculum anymore.

[waverly]

186momx, no clue because I have asked DS those same problems that you made. I didn't know I wasn't supposed to....

[186momx]

waverly, I did them to challenge her. She is so bored at school we make up math to challenge her and do science stuff at home since they don't get to do it at school. I'm trying really hard to show her that school stuff can be fun and interesting she just has to wait for her peers to catch up and do what she is asked to do. I'm going to be asking her teacher about TAG (talented and gifted so a program that forces the staff to give her work at her level) during PTC as I'm so tired of her saying she is bored or when I tell her to have fun at school she goes "yeah right" with so much sass. I have a feeling TAG is going to be a hard sell since her attitude towards learning is negative and she doesn't want to do stuff because she sees it as boring baby work.

[Covergirl82]

186momx, waverly, phdmomma, I also am worried about later elementary math, as DD's 1st grade teacher said (admitted) she had to watch the parent help videos to help her 3rd grader with math because math is taught so weird now...

[2chatter]

Dear Universe,
I really wanted to have a good day because for once there are no kid activities this evening. Instead all my meetings moved and prevented me from ever going to the gym, DD is sick so she can't field her siblings, so no gym and no errands. It's days like this I really miss DH being around.
Trying to embrace a lazy evening and getting nothing done

[waverly]

186momx, I kind of have the same problem only the school doesn't do talented and gifted. They do differentiated learning, but I am not seeing anything differentiated.... And I used to be a teacher, so I know how hard it is to differentiate, and how easy it is to just not do it and teach to the middle. But he loves school, so hopefully that will continue.

And I did mention it in his IEP, but nothing was written about it since he is doing great, they aren't going to do anything more to help him except the speech/ hearing loss part of it. So even having an IEP didn't yield anything in the TAG direction.

[2chatter]

Don't even get me started on this district's bizarre TAG. It's not targeted to the gifted kids anymore. It's a whole separate program for "out of the box" thinkers. Essentially, the kids who prefer Chicago Math to traditional algorithms. After first grade they stop pulling the gifted kids and instead pull the kids who score well in that kind of thinking. So my traditionally gifted kids are bored and some of the kids they would pull they can't because they can't afford to miss the classroom material.

It's the one thing I truly loathe about our district.

[2chatter]

I'm on a roll:

Dear BIL,
I'm excited you are getting married! Your brother isn't excited about your future bride. He's even less excited about the crazy timetable of wedding festivities that involve us giving up 5 out of the next nine weekends for wedding related events. I have to say you also lost me at "no kids" and "except these kids who they don't use babysitters". WTF. Oh, and these kids because they are older. You do realize DD is 13 and the kid who isn't a kid is 14? I realize we are the ONLY ones close to you with kids but why can you tell us no and not tell others? Oh, and if your bachelor (bizarre BTW - second wedding in your 50s) weekend ends up being the week of Thanksgiving, yes, I am going to be frustrated because taking the kids and my mom with dementia to the beach alone doesn't sound fun. So while I'm just so happy you scored the perfect venue and country club and all that - cramming all of this into one season is a little over the top. And when I say a little I mean it's obnoxious. And annoying.
SIL who will skip 1-3 events, last minute, due to kid related emergencies

[waverly]

2chatter, I was just going to say skip some. good choice. I like the last minute kid emergency angle.

[erinshelley21]

Dear DD,
You may not sleep worth a shit, but you made my hair curlier than ever before and I think that's awesome.
Love, your mom who also likes sleep.

[supertrooper1]

Dear DS,
Thank you for being so awesome when you got your flu shot today.
Love,
Mom

Dear HS acquaintance,
Please be an awesome house cleaner. Your price is right and I know you well enough that I trust you to be in my house alone so I don't have to worry about my uniforms being stolen.
Signed,
Soon to have a clean house I didn't have to clean.

[shakinros]

Dear 186momx,

What is a butter braid?

Thanks for the PTO education,
Shakinros

Dear erinshelley21,

Omg I can't believe you told the asshole you're selling. YAY. I'm running off of the Monday thread to read about it.

Dear boss,

Thank you for the sympathetic ear about how difficult it is to get my job done when everyone else misses their deadlines. Thanks for saying you would send out an email to lay down the hammer about meeting the next round of deadlines. Please actually do that.

[shakinros]

Oh and Dear WPs,

Guess who's got two thumbs and tickets to Harry Potter on Broadway... THIS GIRL!!!

[akafred]

Oct 18, 2017 20:23:28 GMT -5 shakinros said:

Oh and Dear WPs,

Guess who's got two thumbs and tickets to Harry Potter on Broadway... THIS GIRL!!!

I can be your +1. So jelly!!!

[sandandsea]

Dear Den Leaders,
I really really really appreciate that you took on this volunteer role. I know it's hard and a lot and we are all learning this together. But, please stop asking 8 families to coordinate dates to find a time that works for everyone. It's not going to happen. And don't try to make meetings during normal business hours. We are working parents, we need to work. And please talk less during the meetings and let the kids do more of the activities so they like Cub Scouts. Spending 35 of the 60 minutes with them sitting in chairs listening to you babble isn't going to cut it. They've 5-6 year old boys. They need movement.
Thanks,
Concerned parent who has to resist taking over to make it better because I don't have the time to do so, if I did, I would have from Day 1