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<p>You forgot KEILEXANDRA? Or however you spell her name.</p>
<p>You know you’re addicted to CC when… your Asian friend with no legacy is applying ED to Wharton with a 1900, and you don’t have the heart to comment. Or your other friend is applying OOS to UCLA with an 1800… or when your school cheers because its first student ever gets over a 2000, and then proclaims that student is going to Harvard.</p>
<p>Sinner’s Alley is a very long thread that has been going on forever, a “virtual” bar where you can just post about your day or concerns, as though you are stopping in after work at your neighborhood bar or cafe. Sometimes people say what kind of drink or treat they would like. Just scroll down on the list of threads on Parent Cafe and you’ll always find it.</p>
<p>My screen name is bookiemom, which I chose because my whole life is wrapped up with books–the printed kind. The first time I posted there in Sinner’s Alley, the next poster wrote:</p>
<p>“Oh, we’ve been waiting for a bookie!” (as in the betting kind)</p>
<p>Re CC addiction, I have been here since 2003, the year my D graduated from high school. She is now in med school. (And there is a med school-related board that is also very addictive, but almost all student posts, so parents really aren’t welcome. Just read, don’t post.)</p>
<p>Hey, bookiemom, now you have made me curious. Where do all these screen names come from? I will start a separate thread, so as not to hijack this one.</p>
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<p>Lol you must mean SDN… there is actually a parent section on there that no one posts in. And since SDN is a little laxer in moderation than CC and has that college student attitude there are some things posted on there that parents wouldn’t want to read. X></p>
<p>yabey, I am addicted, but I unglued myself from CC for a few hours ;), so I am glad that bookiemom was able to fill in and explain Sinners Alley. Here is the link to thread that was strarted in 2005 and it it is still active:
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parent-cafe/62644-sinners-alley-happy-hour.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parent-cafe/62644-sinners-alley-happy-hour.html</a></p>
<p>sueinphilly, Awwww. That was so sweet!</p>
<p>When both your children are in college now but you still browse CC during your lunch break.</p>
<p>When you post in the parent’s forum (even though you are in high school) because you’ve already posted on everything worth posting for in the high school forum</p>
<p>When you think with regret, that had CC not appeared in your life, things would be more organized, the house cleaner, the yard more impressive. But you’re don’t care because your heart is warmed, and your perspective widened. You’re also far better informed on a very wide range of subjects than you might be otherwise.</p>
<p>I refer to the vast knowledge I have obtained from CC by vaguely saying, “I read online…”</p>
<p>I knew I was addicted when…</p>
<p>I knew of other parents IRL who could definitely use the advice here, but I didn’t tell them about it because I was afraid they would figure out who I was and see all my whining.</p>
<p>When my first reaction to something really irritating is to go to the “Get it off your chest” thread and type it up. Half the time I don’t even hit submit - just the typing it makes me feel better. </p>
<p>When I have a question that has nothing to do with college, and I think, “Maybe I’ll put a post in the cafe and see if anyone has advice.”</p>
<p>I like CC but no one has answered any of my questions:(</p>
<p>Having now posted replies to each of Corley’s questions, you know you are addicted when, after thinking that if your son gets in ED you can stop spending so much time on the Parents Forum, exvept to help others, you find yourself on the Parent Cafe because they moved your thread and you think, “This has some interesting threads on non-college topics…”</p>
<p>You’re afraid to tell your IRL friends about CC – not because of the “competition,” but because you’re afraid they’ll recognize you!</p>
<p>When you feel guilty for meeting someone from here for lunch, when that is PRECISELY the kind of thing you tell your kid not to do – meeting online strangers!</p>
<p>…the only reason you’re not hanging as much on this CC is because you’re constantly on the other CC because of an upcoming cruise.</p>
<p>I like Parents Cafe because it is like chatting with good neighbors over the back fence, and I don’t like the neighbors on either side of my back fence. (On one side they cut down large lovely trees ON the property line that shaded our bedroom, after I had said I didn’t want to cut them down, and on the other side is a huge problem druggie.) But on CC, it is almost all nice, kind, helpful, well-educated, and well-meaning folks. It is kind of like stopping in a big, friendly coffee shop where you can participate in the conversation at each table.</p>
<p>I knew I was hooked (so to speak) the other day when I found myself saying: “I know someone that happened to” and then realized it was a CCer and said “Not from here, from x, I mean, I know OF someone that happened to…” You know, reality blending.
I think I like the “invisible friends” method better, now that I think of it.</p>
<p>I know!!!^
I was having a little “discussion” with H and brought up an example of someone I “know” on CC. He smirked and asked, “…that isn’t one of your little college friends, is it?”</p>
<p>(whata jerk)</p>
<p>^^that’s ok…both my husband and my daughter think I am having a “cyber affair” with someone on this site…interesting, though, since I have no idea if most of my “friends” are male or female…</p>
<p>I guess I could always make fun of my daughter by saying that this is my version of Facebook…</p>
<p><<…the only reason you’re not hanging as much on this CC is because you’re constantly on the other CC because of an upcoming cruise.>></p>
<p>Cruise critic is a good board. I haven’t posted there in a year because that is when my last cruise was. I’m sueinphilly over there too :-)</p>
<p>You know your addicted when you’re sitting in the admissions office and the counselor asks how you found out about the school and your daughter answers, “My mom talks to strangers on this college internet web site.”</p>