Conferences

ARG. I hate this time of year, and it comes twice a year. I always always dread it. I spend days obsessing about the terrible things parents are about to accuse me of. (of which they're about to accuse me?)

And it's not the parents (mostly) that turns out to be the horrible part. It's the long ass long ass long ass day, the talk talk talk for three hours straight, the having to shift gears every six minutes and know on a dime how little Tina or little Charlie are doing as soon as the parents sit down.

Worse is the parents who sit down and assume you remember which child they go with because they met you back in October. Because, yeah, I can totally do that. OR NOT.

This time, of course, I did get one set of parents who said it was my fault their daughter wasn't doing homework--because I was so straightforward with her. Yes, you read that correctly, because I was straightforward with the daughter ("I won't let you go to the library if you haven't done the homework") it was now MY FAULT that they're little angel wasn't doing her work. "I'm not saying you're wrong," the dad kept repeating, "but that's why she won't work. Because you were so direct. She won't do the work now."

At that point I decided to just keep nodding and smiling, because clearly, there was no more to communicate in that conference.

And I only had two more hours to go after that.

I called Emily as I was driving home. "Go home," she said. "Make someone bring you food." So I got a pizza delivered. My ankles are elevated (and LORDY are they swollen) and I'm in my pajamas.

Two more days til the weekend. 7 more weeks of pregnancy.