I'm sorry to hear about your troubles. :(

I don't necessarily have any suggestions, but I was once in the reverse situation— my ex-husband used to say that I loved our dog more than him. That wasn't true, but it was easier to show my affection to the dog because I didn't have to be worried about being rejected or looking stupid or anything else.

Just do the bare minimum you need for your department to accept it. You have a TT job! Congratulations!

My son was 5 weeks early, 6.6 pounds, went to the well-baby nursery, had no trouble breastfeeding or anything else, came home with me right away and has been a monster-sized baby pretty much his entire life. And there was no way we got the dates wrong.

We had the conversation in a restaurant— not really a proposal, more like "You know how we've talked about getting married sometime? I was thinking we should choose a date and start making plans." At one point he said as a joke, "Should I get on one knee?" and I was like, "Do NOT draw attention to us" in that sort of…

'As a parent, having a nanny bolt without any notice would be a nightmare. I hope you will reconsider (assuming that the parents aren't mistreating you) and give them a chance to find other help.

Yeah, if someone did say that Bush was horrible or whatever, I would have been the first to agree. So it wouldn't have really bothered me too much if it did happen. After all, I wasn't responsible for him. :)

I wouldn't be surprised if English speakers of all types sometimes get mistaken for Americans, depending on where they are. I was mistaken for a Brit once, and I think it must have been because I was an English speaker in a place that Americans do not usually travel.

I lived in Paris during Bush's second term and expected to hear that kind of thing a lot. Actually, I never did. When people asked where I was from I told them New York, and pretty much everyone gushed about how much they love New York or about how they want to visit. It turned out to be a really strategy to…

I'm not sure if I agree. I have a PhD and was a 3-sport athlete in high school, including track and XC. I always found the discipline necessary for intense mental work came much easier than the discipline needed for physical work. It also really wasn't easy to make time for anything during grad school/the first few…

Yes, I have heard good things about those. One thing that makes me nervous is my boy is really big— he's already as big as most two-year-olds I see and the weight limit on those seats is lighter than the rear-mounting ones. I keep thinking that his growth will slow down but it hasn't happened yet! I would also have to…

So, maybe you have a fair amount of money to cushion you for this move, in which case, fantastic! In case you don't, though, just a word of warning that the area of Manhattan you want to be in is very expensive— average rent for a 1-bedroom in Chelsea is apparently almost $3900. By contrast, $3k covers our mortgage on…

Yikes, that sounds really scary! Thanks for your reply.

Any urban-dwelling parents here who have cycled with their toddlers? My son is a year old and cycling was my main form of exercise before I had him. I don't have the time alone or patience for the gym and I am not getting enough sleep to consider getting up early to ride on my own before my husband leaves for work.…

I have been told that when dogs lick other dogs' faces like that it is a show of submissiveness, which makes sense in this context. I don't know why dachshunds would be more likely to do it than other dogs, though.

Break in those walking shoes before you go! Have fun, Paris is amazing.

One of my friends in college was given the choice to go to our school, where her mom worked and got a discount, for free (parents paid the rest) or go elsewhere and she'd have to make up the difference in cost herself by working. Seemed like a reasonable way to deal with it, although back then it was easier to…

Do you have an academic job? Some colleges offer discounted tuition to children of faculty (and maybe staff?), which I think is a pretty amazing perk. I really think that tuition can't keep rising the way it has been— it is just unsustainable.

I think it depends on the context, but in general it seems like a waste of everybody's time for the recipient to respond with nothing more than an acknowledgment of having gotten the email. That is time away from whatever the recipient was doing to write the email, and time away from whatever the sender was doing to…

Yeah, in the grand scheme of things it doesn't seem like something to get worked up about. Mine were done when I was a baby (incidentally, it isn't just common among people of color, as many here are saying— my mother's family is from Spain where I believe it is/was also common) and I don't think it's a big deal. I…