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Sure, but aren’t the parents supposed to be the more mature ones? And isn’t college exactly when you would expect rebellion in the face of arcane rules?</p>
<p>It’s the permanent quality of tattoos that really bothers me. Right now, I’m watching The Voice. Adam Levine is heavily tattooed. I find it extremely unattractive, and I can’t imagine having covered myself with tattoos in my 20s that I would have to live with for the rest of my life. It’s just gross to me.</p>
<p>Who are you to say whose rules are arcane? Is it “arcane” that I’ll pay for my kid’s plane ticket to NYC but not to Las Vegas? Is it “arcane” that they can use mom’s credit card to take grandma out to dinner, but not to buy beer for the fraternity? These aren’t kids who are being “denied” in any way, shape or form. They just are not being subsidized for everything they want to do. </p>
<p>Years ago, my mother forbid me to get my ears pierced. She said it was tacky. And it was frivolous…and not necessary. Plus she was sure I would get an infection of some sort. She said I had to get my ears pierced by a doctor…and we could not afford that.</p>
<p>Well…on my 16th birthday, my best friend gave me ear piercing as,a gift…and her uncle…a doctor would do it. Well…what could my mom say? I met all of her conditions…no cost, and a doctor to do the piercing.</p>
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I am saying that if the kid doesn’t understand or accept the logic behind the rules (which is pretty common, as most parents seem reluctant to spend the time to adequately explain that logic), then they are for that kid arcane. And you won’t know that your kid finds those rules arcane until you see the tattoo for the first time!</p>
<p>Kids at college are trying to apply the rules they were given (hopefully) against situations often not explicitly addressed by those rules, and to the extent that they do or want to fail to understand that logic, there will be issues.</p>
<p>Adam Levine has tattoos??? I never even noticed. Who’s looking at his tattoos when you can look at…HIM!! :)</p>
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I don’t think that there is a lack of people who find him quite attractive, tattoos and all!</p>
<p>@skieurope - oh, God, no, I would never do it… but I was surprised by how relatively normal they did look - normal in the sense of what they would have looked like if it had been temporary dye or color she put on daily. </p>
<p>I had heard of people doing it for eyeliner, but I hadn’t heard of anyone doing it for brows. </p>
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I think it works for eyeliner, I’ve seen people do it for brows and it is a lot riskier - they work best when they are very thin, light, and textured, but I have seen them where they are thick, heavy, and flat. Nothing like your great aunt looking some kind of death clown to really spoil your birthday!</p>
<p>“Adam Levine is heavily tattooed. I find it extremely unattractive, and I can’t imagine having covered myself with tattoos in my 20s that I would have to live with for the rest of my life. It’s just gross to me.”</p>
<p>That’s a great example. He’s (otherwise) a fine looking, well-built young man, but I couldn’t see past tattoos like that. David Beckham is a similar example. To me, it looks like graffiti on a building. Not that either of those guys are caring what some almost-50-year-old in the midwest thinks, of course! </p>
<p>“I don’t think that there is a lack of people who find him quite attractive, tattoos and all!”</p>
<p>I don’t know what that means. Of course there are people who find Adam Levine, David Beckham, etc. attractive. It doesn’t really matter to me whether there are 100 people or 100,000,000 people who find them attractive. It doesn’t change or cause me to question my own personal taste. </p>
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That was basically the point. All of this stuff is subjective. There are certainly women who could have the most amazing tattoos in the world and I still wouldn’t want to look at them!</p>
<p>sseamom, would not you agree that if the kid found a way to be frugal with the money, it would only be fair for me to put the extra $150 in <em>my</em> savings account?</p>
<p>Imagine that the bank of Mom and Dad goes under, and the kid has to borrow money to finish college. Imagine that there are no jobs available since the kid has to take double load of classes to graduate on time (let’s just assume this hypothetical). Where would the kid get the money for the tattoo or Louboutins? Would the pro-tattoo crowd approve of the kid’s borrowing the money at 15%-20% or would a better solution be to wait until the discretionary budget allows it?</p>
<p>Well, now I’ve heard everything (well, probably not) about tattoos. This is disgusting, unless you’re tattooing pets for identification purposes (we did that with our first dog, before the chip came along):
<a href=“MSN”>http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/offbeat/new-york-state-bans-pet-tattooing-piercing/ar-BBgQpTF</a></p>
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I think that’s a great way to encourage your kids to not be frugal! It’s amazing how much prices can go up year after year, isn’t it?</p>
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I would not consider it prudent to borrow the money for a tattoo, any more than I would consider it prudent to borrow money for anything not genuinely needed. That having been said, I have yet to meet anyone who always does the prudent thing all the time (and to be honest, that would probably be a pretty boring person anyway), so I would not consider the unwise decision to borrow money for a tattoo to be any worse than the unwise decision to borrow money for anything else you don’t actually need. It is the borrowing that is the issue, not the specific expenditure on the tattoo.</p>
<p>Wow. There is a Someone’s Gotta Do It about painting pets. Have not heard about the tattoo trend! Tattooing your hairless dog or Sphinx to please yourself. Yuck. </p>
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Agreed. Not okay on any level.</p>
<p>Another in agreement about the pets. Disgusting. </p>
<p>Though, I guess, not a huge step away from people that buy pets to essentially be fashion accessories. Ugh.</p>
<p>Real example, Bunsen-my older D got an allowance in high school until she was working. The amount we gave her covered her bus pass, lunch at school and a set amount of discretionary spending, with which she could do as she pleased. If she chose to buy her lunch at the nearby Vietnamese shop or the BBQ joint or Taco Time too many times instead of at school, she would (and did) end up having to make PB & J for a week at the end of the month. If she had no discretionary spending one month, she had some leftover for maybe an extra movie or pizza night. We didn’t take it back or give her $10 less.</p>
<p>A few years later, my ex gave her a weekly allowance when she was in college. It was a very small town and too many kids for not enough jobs. While he had to write out the initial budget, he didn’t check to see if she was spending her bus money for coffee or her coffee money for a beer (she was 21 at one point). He didn’t take any back if she SAVED it, and he did have access for deposit purposes, to her account so I know he knew how much she had. </p>
<p>I am NOT TALKING about only tattoos. I am trying to understand how a parent controls an adult child’s spending down to the last penny. Would you really, not hypothetically, take back that $10 and say, “You’re SAVING too much, no extra fun for you. <em>I</em> get it back because it’s MINE!!” </p>
<p>I was honestly not aware that people insisted on that much control over a young adult. Of course if week after week a kid overspent than new guidelines would be needed. But that isn’t what we’re talking about here. We’re talking about SAVING a few extra dollars, not enough to mean the difference between affording school or not.</p>
<p>In the end, I think it’s all about control, not what the kid is actually spending money on or not.</p>
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<p>Seems like both parties would be making way too much of a big deal over a tattoo if it got to alienating each other over it. But it is certainly believable that both parties can be unyielding to that point (perhaps the kid takes after the parent?).</p>
<p>We have never micromanaged our kids’ discretionary spending and do NOT intend to start now (or ever). We have always given them amount that they and we agree is reasonable, which is subject to negotiation, if it turns out that more (or theoritically less) is needed. We do not askf for any detailed accounting and just expect that they will spend and save as they see fit. they have not requested additional funds. </p>
<p>I started with the budget our school FAid office came up with each year amd tried to spend very carefully. It worked well–at the end of 4 years of college & 3 years of law school, I had saved up as much as I owed in national direct student loans–just about $3,000. </p>