Tag: school

Grossss……Your Kid Has Lice!!!

lice-comb-in-childs-head-of-hairLice, head lice. Just saying the words can give you the gross out willies. Lice are worse than cock roaches and rats for some…and a lot more embarrassing.

A couple of weeks ago I got the dreaded phone call from the mom of one of my son’s friends. Lice!  Sound the alarm…LICE! We went on lock down, washing sheets, spraying couches  shampooing and combing with that wretched little fine tooth comb that is the Scarlett Letter of lice. Comb comb, comb. Then tap, tap tap the comb in the sink and squint to see if any horrible little bugs are visible.  And if there’s one there’s going to be a million, hours of combing and probably tears of frustration and pain.

Even if my family is declared clean and lice free, the simple act of buying lice shampoo is humiliating. I’ll drive across the county so no one knows me in the store.  I wouldn’t want word to get around in our little town. I don’t feel that way when I buy mouse traps or bug spray.

Once, a few years ago we went through a horrible lice week.  There was a student in school who wouldn’t take care of the problem and kept re-infecting an entire 3rd grade class. The school couldn’t force them to fix the problem.  We took care of our family. We washed and combed and combed and combed. Then, that weekend decided to get hair cuts.  One of my children was ejected from Master Cuts cause I’d missed a few.  Hot tears of shame in the mall. To this day my child remembers that as one of the most embarrassing and humiliating moments in life. Screw You Master Cuts! (Not really. Who can blame them.)

My husband has a special problem.  If I have a sore throat he’s sure he has strep. If I have a headache, he has a migraine.  If I say the word “lice” he starts scratching and itching and picking.  During this recent episode I checked his head twice. Nothing. Still he had to give himself the entire treatment two times…and still he was itchy.

Good news for me. I believe my hair has been chemically altered for so long those little buggers couldn’t stay alive on my head.

If there’s a family out there who claims they’ve made it through 12 years of school without a lice episode. I’m gonna say you’re lying you just drove across the state line to buy the shampoo and comb.

Just writing this has me all creeped out.  I have to go now and have someone check my head.

The Meanest bus Driver On The Planet

cobraSchool starts in four days and I have to worry about a lot of stuff for my kids. Will Sandor be alright in the new middle school building.  Will Lexie keep her grade point above a 3.5, will she get all her college stuff filled out in time, will Sandor take school seriously or develop a toxic case of  “boy disease “, will I get a new cowbell for this year’s football season? (the clanker fell out of me last year).

 

Thankfully there’s one thing I don’t have to worry about. Our school bus. For more than fifteen years my kids have had the same bus driver. Coach R. He’s a monster, he’s strict/mean/harsh/scary. And  he’s the best bust driver on the planet. The man doesn’t take &*%# from anybody and rules his school bus like Russian Prime Minister. It’s a beautiful thing.

This summer Sandor and Sam went to day camp. Every morning I waiting in the parking lot for the big yellow school bus to arrive and take them to a day filled with ponies, zip lines, catfish, canoes and bible verses. They loved camp but HATED the bus ride. When I asked them why Sandor said, “The bus driver is terrible, she doesn’t care about anything! So every body screams the whole time, they all throw stuff like pencils, kick the back of the seats and fall out into the isle when we go around a corner and she doesn’t say anything, ever!”

Sam was nodding his blonde head in agreement, “She doesn’t care what we do, Miss Diana. It’s like she’s deaf or something.”

They were two indigent little boys, frustrated by the obvious lack of leadership and adult supervision.

(Sidebar: Adults…most kids want order and supervision. They count on us, the adults in their lives, to make rules and set limits. If you are a lame ass grown up who lets kids get away with anything because you want to be the “cool parent” you are an idiot and you are letting your kids down. Now, some body please help me off this soapbox).

Last year I had to sit in a court room and watch a video from a local school bus. For ten minutes a girl was picked on, smacked, tormented, yelled at and bullied. Kids were standing up, yelling and obnoxious. The bus driver didn’t do a damn thing for twelve minutes.  Her defense? “I didn’t’ want to mess up my schedule.”

That kind of stuff does not happen on Coach R’s bus. Little kids sit up front and are safe, nobody screams or nobody goes home. If he suspects there’s something wrong at a house or nobody is home, he keeps the little kids on the bus with him. there is law and order every day on Coach R’s bus and Everybody knows who the Sheriff is and they know he genuinely cares about them.

I have put my kids on the same bus for fifteen years knowing they would be safe and protected.

I thank the Lord for giving my family the meanest bus driver ever. He’s wonderful