Weekend update

The schools have their hands constantly out and I'm getting sort of tired of it. However, this year I feel that I've set boundaries on school demands and that they weren't unreasonable.

We start off the year with the paper and candy sales - earlier every year as we play the fund raising game of "hit your coworkers up before the other schools do". We did that one. Then came something else. Then came another something else. We said no to them this year. By the way, they don't allow birthday celebrations at school, but if you want to "donate" a book to the library in your child's name then they have a handy supply of books right over here, all you need to do is "buy" the sticker that goes in the book. Oh, and there's box tops for education, grocery store affiliate programs, Office Depot and Staples affiliate programs, and so on. Now another fund raiser for the arts, and I'm willing to bet on at least one more before school ends.

On Saturday I was extorted out of donated $35 to son's school district for an arts program that we have yet to take advantage of. (Another aside - they didn't pretend very hard that they were collecting donations from the community for an arduous 10k or semi-arduous 5k walk. They just expected parents to cut a check for the minimum $35 amount.) There was a short walk (the event was billed as walk around the block) as the "fund raiser activity" followed by a simple carnival which Mr. 8 year old had free run of courtesy of his gold plated $35 wristband. Instead of making himself sick on dance dance revolution or going on the slide until he vomited, he found a friend and they hung around and ate candy. With hot dog lunches and silent auction (I got a framed mirror for $16), I figure it was a $60 day. Musical highlight of the event: The Compromised Principals, a band made up of school administrators who play mostly 80s rock.

We then went over to the Cabrillo Butterfly Garden and weeded and watered. I plan to blog more on the garden later - I installed it (with help) when we attended Juan Cabrillo school last year.


On Sunday we went on a night hike at George F. Canyon on the PV peninsula. We didn't have reservations and it wasn't a problem, but we were told that later in the summer it could be. We saw a Great Horned Owl, city lights views, black widow spiders, and generally had a good time. The hike went pretty late (it started later than the web site advertised), but I thought it was worth it, and so did my eight year old son (the next day, after apologizing for being so crabby the night before).

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