A Busy Day

I have a dental appointment at noon today.

I stopped at Dr. Barta's on the way home from Independence yesterday and bought flea meds for Missy. I told Paula that I sure missed Slinky and I teared up again. He was bad about waking me all night long but he was good company and I hated to have to put him down. It makes me sad every time I think about it.

The Ministerial Alliance meeting went well. We had a great speaker. She had thirty years experience as a child development specialist. She said the reason we have such troubled children anymore is because whereas we used to have an extended family to share the care of the child, children are raised in daycare anymore and have limited access to the extended family. Most troubled children she deals with have single moms and the mother comes home from work...sometimes two jobs...exhausted and has little time to share with the child. Thirty years ago, when she began her work, she had two case workers and now she has dozens and never has enough. Children are exposed to too much violence and too much sex way too early. She says the average troubled child age used to be 9 through 14 but now they are dealing with two and three year olds who are so violent that they have been expelled from five or six day cares. It was a very interesting program but also extremely troubling.

On another note:

Last evening I called my brother-in-law and asked him if he wanted to go with me for chili at Braums. He did..so I picked him up. They have pretty good chili there and we also had a good visit. I took him home and went home myself and attempted to watch TV but could not stay awake. I went to bed at 8:00.