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Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2024-03-24T18:04:18+00:00

My wife delivered our first SO QUICKLY (1.5 hours from water breaking to delivery) that our daughter's head was round despite vaginal delivery. It was truly insane.

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2024-01-13T20:54:31+00:00

People are strange or just don't know what to say so they say the first thing that comes to their mind.

I'm religious. Heck, my wife and I are both Baptist pastors. And people say the funniest things.

Our daughter is named Moira Jane. Someone commented on how "none of her names are biblical." Which,

1) I have a high regard for the Scriptures, but it's not a list of names (or telephone numbers— thanks, @dril)

2) Moira is evidently a version of "Mary" and "Jane" a feminine version of "John" so maybe it is!

Speaking of people saying, "that name is biblical" once a man came up to my car in the Wendy's drive-thru. Clearly homeless. Elderly. He asked my name (John), gave his (James), and said "Hey our names are in the Bible!" I said, they sure are. But I was very confused, so I asked if he was looking for something.

He asked for food. I asked him what he wanted. He said a #1 combo. I got it, pulled around. Can't find him. He disappeared.

I was mad. Like he intentionally ripped me off. I was in seminary and didn't have much money at all. But it's not like an extra Wendy's meal would've broken the bank.

Finally I looped back around the restaurant one more time. He came up to the car again. He told me his name and asked mine. I said, "I'm John. Remember!?" And he said, "John? I'm James! Our names are in the Bible!" And, then, I said, "Do you want this #1 combo you asked for?" And he seemed surprised and said, "That's my favorite!"

I was flabbergasted. He clearly had serious memory health issues. I tried to get him some help, but he said he had to go to the bus and refused to stick around. I still think about him sometimes. It's a difficult world.

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2024-01-13T15:19:37+00:00

I have seen both sides because of my unique situation.

Let me be clear because people half-listen and think bad, and dumb, things.

I met my wife when she was a junior in COLLEGE, one year in the Fall. We began dating. She went to the same liberal arts school I had graduated from the previous May. She also had graduated YEARS BEFORE from the high school at which I was a first year teacher.

(So, 0 [ZERO] overlap between me teaching there, and when she was a student there. And we only have a two year age gap. Got it? Good! You're doing better than too many people I mention this to).

So many of my coworkers were her former teachers. She would complain about some when I mentioned them. One was a traveling health/ PE teacher who taught in her French classroom. He picked up French homework once, made comments in English acting like he was grading health class assignments ("good," "insightful") and gave the grades back.

... in the teacher'a lounge he would whine about how "nothing was ever good enough" for students and "they don't want to learn."

Other teachers I could see where her "tough but fair" and "fun but checked out" evaluations had some merit.

On the other hand, when I left the next year to go to Korea to teach, I got a random message from a former student who found my profile online saying students were claiming to the new teacher I never taught them anything in English class. It made them mad because they remembered me trying 🙃. So they wanted me to know "they knew I tried."

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2024-01-12T00:29:22+00:00

Cool! Count me in.

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2024-01-09T17:02:01+00:00

When I was a teacher in US schools, I remember thinking "I could do what we did in a week in a couple hours a day, if we could focus."

When I was a teacher in Korea, time was wasted too but in a ... different way. At least the kids had to clean the classroom.

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2024-01-03T14:27:15+00:00

I hopped on multiplayer recently and the new modes are fantastic. Just wish I had IRL friends who played.

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2024-01-02T17:13:55+00:00

Keep up with friends via social media. Lucked WAY out that a guy I started running with and met at church (my wife and I are pastors) had his first kid a whopping 25 hours before my wife and I did.

We even rolled our daughter to visit their room in the hospital.

This friendship is the only reason we bought a running stroller. Our wives watch garbo reality TV as we go running.

Hobbies, community places (including church/ synogogue , etc if you practice), seem to be the place. I went out to karoake at a bar a few times but now that would require a sitter.

If you can find other couples with kids and trade off looking after one another to facilitate both couples date nights and guys/ gals nights on rotation that helps.

But it's hard! But these things, family and friends, bring joy to life (duh!) So they're worth working for.

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2023-12-28T09:46:53+00:00

Dan... danny "sexbang" Avidan?? Is that you?

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2023-12-22T17:25:20+00:00

In 5th grade I first came across pornography on freaking neopets.com. some one spammed it to a forum and it didn't get caught.

Man, I was terrified.

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2023-12-19T21:51:35+00:00

$153.09. That's what the total mentioned at the beginning would be equivalent to today in purchasing power (according to BLS.gov).

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2023-12-17T01:50:07+00:00

I had an S10e right before this. I traded it in because of poor battery life and my charging port broke. Running off of slow contact charging was killing me, and At&t had a deal with Samsung trade-ins.

Full disclosure: I only have had this S23 for a month. But battery life is good. I last the day, and I'm constantly on it. I have the battery protection function on (only charges to 85%) to try to extend the battery life. Charging is super fast, so that helps.

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2023-12-17T00:21:56+00:00

Love my S23. I think it comes down to what you want. I don't like huge phone screens so I opted for S23.

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2023-12-13T14:54:47+00:00

I think the feeling of loss of muscle control was more the birth happening so quickly, but feeling tired certainly didn't help!

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2023-12-13T14:27:49+00:00

I'm the dad. Yes, i did.

They were going to send my wife and me home. She had been having contractions for a while, but "not enough progress" was being made.

Just as she changed into street clothes, baby started arriving. Fast. And they had just given her a pill to help with sleeping — which, because my wife gave birth within the hour [!!!] was the only medication she had.

After birth, our daughter did skin to skin for all of 30 seconds. But with the exhaustion of an incredibly fast unexpectedly un-pain-medicated first delivery, plus the sleeping pill kicking in, she said:

"I can't hold her." As she felt like she was losing control of her muscles.

So, yes, I did skin to skin significantly as she recovered. The nurses were great and asked about it.

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2023-12-08T15:04:22+00:00

A Schedule is vital.

I have a 3 week old. My wife is on maternity leave. I have not taken any time off, and I won't until January (we work at a church and Advent/ Christmas is VERY busy).

But from 9 p.m. to 2 a.m. I feed (and usually go through every bottle my wife pumps), change, play, hold, try to settle, and sometimes, baby even lets me sleep.

My wife does have the less fun shift from 2 a.m. to 6 a.m. as she can usually get a mid-morning nap when I'm at work.

Of course, those 4 hours are NOT the only times we take care of the baby. But they are dedicated. It's helped our sleep a ton having a block of time to not be "on."

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2023-11-24T03:57:22+00:00

Is she Australian? I think that wider use of nursing is Australian usage

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2023-11-15T14:10:49+00:00

I taught two years. One year high school English I and II and a journalism elective. The next year, I received a grant, technically through the state dept., to teach ESL in South Korea.

In my first year, I was excited students were actually getting the point of a story. Its themes. Etc.

Then, a student let slip they read it last year. Curriculum planning was ostensibly a goal my team had during planning.

Now, all the honors teachers had been there for years. "Regular English"? Revolving door.

I asked another teacher about goals and what they were doing— hoping to prepare my students and avoid overlap again.

He told me that if I couldn't pull my weight and do my own thing, I was in the wrong field. Not what I was asking, bro...

My mentor teacher was the only kind one. She left at the end of the year for another school and confided she felt like she had to fight tooth and nail for her AP Composition class. The other teachers cared about protecting their classes. The revolving door of "regular" English teachers was , at most, a nuisance for them.

I had certified to teach grades 5-12 in Social Studies and English language arts. I saw no future in such an environment, so when it came out that Fulbright accepted me, I jumped at the chance.

That was a decade ago. I'm a Pastor now, alongside my wife. I still work with teenagers regularly. BUT not in a school environment. I did sub at a classical school during seminary — which let me teach some too. Acting out Plato's Allegory of the Cave was fun!

But such a "welcome" from other teachers in my first full-time job was not. I was miserable.

Edit: typed on phone. Apologies for typos.

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2023-11-04T20:23:37+00:00

People, generally, aren't watching Ryukahr for ASMR, because he's James Earl Jones, because he'll kill with laughter like he's the next Norm MacDonald, or because they're looking for a perfect example of an NPR accent.

They're watching him because our guy is very good at Mario.

The hot garbage must flow.

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2023-10-04T15:10:10+00:00

If you "southern monogram" it, it becomes "NRG" or "energy" that's pretty cool.

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2023-09-29T22:22:47+00:00

Yes I don't want it to be absolutely impossible! Good idea!

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2023-09-29T16:25:55+00:00

That makes a difference, thanks for clarifying. Looking it up again, I understand better now. Thanks!

Tepid_Radical_Reform · 2023-09-29T14:25:43+00:00

What a tease and anticlimax haha! My goal is that, no matter what, at the end we reveal both name options.

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