<p>My hs daughter seems to have lost her vocal cords. Her only method of communicating with her friends is via text message. We have a zillion unused roll-over minutes, free nights & weekends, free member-to-member calling… but we’d rather spend 3 minutes texting Rachel about tonights plans, then wait 3 seconds for Rachel to reply, then text again… when texts cost money! First she was going to pay me back per message, then I caved and got the 200 messages/month for $5… now we have the 1500 messages per month for $15 and DD thinks she “might” go over it. That’s over 50 texts per day! I said, “Do none of your friends have vocal chords? Isn’t it easier to TALK to them?” She said, talking is awkward, you have to figure out how to end the conversation.</p>
<p>So not only has IM ruined this generation’s ability to write; now texting has cost them the fine art of speaking on the telephone. </p>
<p>On the plus side, the land-line is never busy…</p>
<p>SBMamacita - we told you there was light somewhere in that testosterone tunnel:). Congratulations.</p>
<p>And since you brought up test scores, I am going to throw my hat into the ring. Given that we are all protected by the flashing blue light that turns on any time a parent needs to brag. Aluson scored a 35 on the ACT. Hooyah. His reading score was 36. Math 33. Still can’t figure out how he went from speaking all of 16 syllables a day to scoring 800 on his SATI Verbal and 36 on the ACT verbal. If all you read is Sports Illustrated, Rolling Stone and the New Yorker, how do you learn what you need to know? Certainly not from test prep since he did about 3 hours total. But I won’t question the gods. I should have had faith, atheist faith of course. This is the kid who when applying to his high school started his essay with the following sentence. “I love word games.”</p>
<p>And of course, god knows what this will bring him in the college application sweepstakes but it does warm his mother’s heart, influenced as she is by the child-rearing practices of her English professor father. Spelling bees at the dinner table anyone? Equating of verbal prowess with virtue anyone? Group discussion in which we wonder when “luminous” became the term of choice for New York Times reviews of homespun novels? This was and is my family of origin.</p>
<p>So grant me this small moment of pride. I will elsewhere feel lots of shame for having pride (ain’t post-modernism great?) and remind myself that I need to have better values etc. Remind myself that this matters hardly at all in the scheme of things. Remind myself that he probably cares more about the fact that his skin is clearing up and that he just hit 5’ 11" in the all-important American male height derby…But not here in the Alley. Here I will just go throw myself dramatically into the booth opposite SBMom and offer to pay for take out Vietnamese food for all. Pho anyone?</p>
<p>Yay aluson! Sounds like a gentleman AND a scholar. :)</p>
<p>My son who is doing computer animation this summer for airport publicity purposes is all fired up by this field now (animation, not aviation.) Says he wants to work for Pixar when he “grows up.” That wouldn’t be bad!</p>
<p>Hey no one who works at Pixar is really “grown up”. If he has talent they will probably take him now:).</p>
<p>Thanks for the congrats. Appreciate it. Pho is delicious BTW if you are ever near a pho shop go in and get #1 or whichever bowl is just thinly cut steak in broth with basil, bean sprouts, lemon, chilis to add as you like. So good.</p>
<p>You will know it is a pho shop because its name will be something like Pho Nam or Pho Saigon etc.</p>
<p>Congrats alu and sb!! That is WONDERFUL news! I am also doing the happy dance, except for the fact that ds is now absolutely insufferable, and thinks that he now has to do absolutely nothing for the rest of the summer! </p>
<p>Warning- obnoxious mommy bragging about to follow…</p>
<p>(He got straight 5’s on his APs again. Totals 4 APs so far)</p>
<p>John (WashDadJr) was in a similar situation, except that his cruel parents told him he was responsible for his own spending money next year in college. It took him two days to land a job at Fatburger, where his native-English skills were in hot demand. The bad thing is now that whenever he is not at work he is playing computer games. “I found a job, I’ve been accepted to college, what else do you want from me?” “Well,” thinks I, “you could do the dishes.”</p>
<p>Thanks, sluggie! I confess that I got tired of waiting for snail mail and succombed to “the man”-- paid the !@#$$$%%% $8 to hear the scores over the phone. Glad I wasn’t disappointed. </p>
<p>I hope to see lots more shameless bragging and happy parents here as the mail arrives!</p>
<p>ALU that is heap big ACT score. Bravissimo!!! And sure, I’ll go for a Pho.</p>
<p>momof2inca, my background-to-the-brag is that this is The Junior From Space, who-- while brilliant and charming-- is (due to raging ADD) NOT at all good at cram-style studying. Really quite poor at big huge factoid tests. He can do fabulous essays, his questions are insightful; like Aluson, he’s very verbal. But tests are his achilles heel. However, he dutifully worked his way through the AP prep book (imagine me with big bull whip standing at his side) and apparently enough stuck in his brain for a 4.</p>
<p>Good job SB. I bet your son feels pretty damn good at this moment.</p>
<p>FWIW, Aluson ain’t so great at those put a lot of info into the head tests either. At least comparatively. Let’s hear it for smarty pants boys who can’t remember which way is up! And hope that they make it to manhood able to provide for their families and themselves as required:).</p>
<p>Remember I am still hoping that SluggS is looking for additional talent at some point in his sure-to-be-illustrious career and calls upon some of our little guys…</p>
<p>Well, congratulations to us all. Let’s get out the chicken baskets and dance around. And pretend there will never be essays to be written or applications to be filled out. </p>
<p>And you know what? My total most top hate in the world is filling in forms. Aluson is on his own there.</p>
<p>Oh and by the way I would put up my (corp atty) Dad’s dinner table tutorials against anyone’s… Maybe that’s when I learned to eat really fast irrespective of my level of hunger, just so I could get out of the laser beam of his quizzing.</p>
<p>My Dad was also the athiest who read us the Bible as literature when we were about 9 or 10, so we wouldn’t miss any of the biblical allusions when we got to Milton, Shakespeare, etc. My Dad whose letters to me at summer camp and college (which were read-out-loud-hilarious, by the way) were typed by his secretary on firm stationery right down to the “Love,” but signed with a big huge messily-scrawled “Dad.” Many of the letters were idiosyncratic fatherly Cliff’s Notes on things he felt all educated people really ought to know more about, especially me. My Dad who as late as my 20’s was giving me books on Physics for Christmas (“Thanks, Dad-- but you realize I will never read this.” “I know, I just want you to own it.”)</p>
<p>Nothing new to brag about (that never stops me from bragging about the old stuff), but a round of drinks on me to celebrate all the happy stories of today!</p>
<p>You ask. We do. And we bow down to you and Slugg as the moms who lead the way. That’s SA for you. And don’t forget the hot tub with the IV is out back. Hey, astrophysics, there is no statute of limitation on mom-bragging…</p>
<p>Ditto to what Alu said and might I add jmmom and mootmom as wise moms of sons.</p>
<p>This kid is the total reverse of my D. Brand new thing. Littlest son also brand new and different from both elder sibs. Arrrrgh! Keeps you humble.</p>
<p>My space-time continuum challenged son just missed his dental appointment…Well, I guess I can celebrate…um…wait, it’ll come to me…Oh, yeah!! He’s moving into his own apartment at the end of this month. Whoopeeeee! :)</p>
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