In California the child support formula factors in each parent’s income and the high net parent (one who earns more) has their amount decreased by the percentage of time that they have with the child. So he’s paying that much because his income is obviously high enough to justify it according to the guidelines even…

Somewhere recently it was reported that Trump truly does not understand that not everyone thinks Ivanka is as amazing as he does. The 3 older Trump children, it is obvious, have NO level of self-awareness. In their own rights, they are wildly unremarkable. I thought Bush was a terrible president, but to his credit,…

Seriously! In the first 3 years, federal employees earn 4 hours of leave time every pay period (26 per year) so, 13 days per year. I worked for the State Department and it was kind of a nightmare to try and take any time off.

A friend was just diagnosed, she was just at the tail end of the 3 year guidelines for pap smear and she has an atypical tumor in that it’s fast growing. Cervical cancer usually is a slow growing cancer, that’s why you can go 3-5 years between screenings and typically be ok. But she had abnormal bleeding and…

Your scenario was pretty much the same as mine with kid #1. Kid #2 was scheduled c-section and I’ll be honest, it felt a bit like cheating because I didn’t have two days of horrible labor. Kid #2 was a BIG surprise pregnancy (years of infertility, miscarriage, and then pregnant at 45), so maybe because I’m an old mom…

If for no other reason than to specify what happens to the “Tommy’s cookies” jar.

Plus no one has really filled that niche of stories about something bizarre happening to a weird rich person since Dominick Dunne died. My mom and I joke that every other issue had a Dominick Dunne article about Edmond Safra. 

So apparently even a shallow dive on Ronan’s instagram would allow anyone to figure this out, I just had a Kayser Soze moment. God am I dim.

One small noise, that’s IT, she’s just lying quietly on the floor, it’s Leo who is the real problem.

You know I thought Lovett was being a bit harsh calling Ronan on “cheap applause” on that episode so I figured they knew each other, otherwise it might have been a bit off-putting to a total outsider guest so it totally makes sense. I sure hope Ronan knows to keep his trap shut during GoT or that relationship is over…

Does your company offer short term disability insurance? My company offers no paid leave for maternity - just FMLA. We have to use sick and vacation time to cover it but we also have short term disability insurance that pays I think 60% of your salary for 6 weeks for vaginal birth and 8 weeks for c-section.

Me too, but here was my “other” response:

I think raising kids to be decent human beings can seem like a small thing in light of everything that’s going on in this world but it’s huge. 

Texas also has the highest rate of maternal mortality in the developed world, is the uninsured (health insurance) capital of the US, ranks in the bottom third of per pupil spending and is generally ranked toward the bottom 20% nationally in education rankings of K-12, and ranks low in terms of equality, economic…

Purely anecdotal, I cook and made all my kids’ baby food when they were little. Kid #1 (now 10) will eat fruits and veggies and will try new foods. Kid #2 started refusing fruits and veggies and nearly all meat at around 18 months. She’s nearly 3 1/2 and won’t try anything new. It’s not isolated to particular tastes…

In large part yes, for a state that professes to not like “big government” they cede a lot of it to the local level but that just creates “more” government. For example, there are over 1200 school districts in Texas. There are literally school districts that have one elementary school, one middle school, and one high…

My husband’s grandfathers were both coal miners in West Virginia and he laughs at the romanticized version of coal mining. The coal company owned the town they lived in - literally - all the houses and all the stores. You know that song 16 Tons? There’s a line in there “I owe my soul to the company store”, it’s …

In 1968, the federal minimum wage would have kept a family of 3 above the poverty line. Since 1980, that has not been the case. And it’s not just fast food jobs that pay this little, childcare workers are among the lowest paid. One year after, Seattle found that the increase to a $15 minimum wage caused minimal price…

It’s been this way since the state constitution was voted on in 1876 the people of Texas weren’t interested in big government and people making a full time job of legislating. I think a lot of them are lawyers and self-employed so they can afford to be gone for 140 days. I’ve lived in TX for 11 years and the govt in…

I used to work for the State Department, in consular affairs - pretty much just passport crap. Everyone who applies for a passport has to be cleared by the FBI database AND the IRS - so if you owe taxes, you can’t get a passport. So, you have to provide your Social Security number. Not infrequently we’d get people who…