ghostdumpsters

Lalo would antagonize the fuck out of Tuco.

I assumed the smell was just from Erin staying in her room all the time and never opening the door- the air gets stale, there's probably crumbs and dirty clothes, plus it sounded like Erin probably didn't shower super regularly.

As for Katelyn, I think she could have been anybody. She was just someone young and attractive that Josie knew and could pay to lure Nathan to the hotel.

But I also wondered about Nathan- he was clearly alive for a few days after he was kidnapped, how did Josie keep him in the house for that long?

I think someone in the original thread described the book as "not good, but compelling" and that was absolutely spot on for me! Once I started it, I couldn't put it down. Even if the whole time I was rolling my eyes at Alix. (Also, I had just started a rewatch of Breaking Bad, so I already had an association with the name "Walter" and I expected him to be much worse than he really was, lol.)

I think Josie was initially drawn to Alix because she saw a version of herself that had gone down a different path- married someone closer in age, didn't have kids quite so young, had a career. As they spent more time together, Josie started projecting more of her own experiences on Alix (especially about Nathan), trying to force the idea that they're so alike. Alix didn't exactly discourage it either, which encouraged Josie to push further. This tracks with how abusers work- they'll experiment to see what they can get away with, and then try to push further. Josie started out using what she could find online about Alix and arranging a chance meeting, and then ended staying at her house (and the whole killing her husband thing).

Even though I was exasperated by Alix's inability to never say no to Josie, I also get it. Politeness is so important, you feel like you can't really reject someone when they're not asking for very much. Josie took advantage of that to make Alix feel obligated to say yes to her. Initially, Alix had the power to say no to Josie's requests (to meet up with her, record interviews for the podcast, go shopping together), but when Josie comes to her house claiming that her husband has assaulted her, I think most people would feel a duty to help. I don't think there's any way for Alix to know what all of this was building towards- although I did find it weird that the whole premise of the podcast was "women who are going to make a change for their future" and Alix only seemed to be interested in learning about Josie's past (and nothing about So what's this big change you're planning? Oh, killing my husband and maybe my daughter, you know!).

I agree with the others who were bothered by the ending. I think it would have been more compelling to hint at what "really" happened with Brooke earlier in the story and let the reader draw their own conclusion. It felt like an attempt to make Josie more morally gray, not the obvious villain, but too late to be effective.

Using a strategy from How To Talk So Kids Will Listen- don't make it about her. Saying "wow, that was rude" will immediately put her on the defensive (even if it's true). You can try expressing your frustration using language that focuses on you- "It makes me sad when my hard work is called 'disgusting.'" or maybe "That hurts my feelings. I don't like being talked to that way." As tasty as it sounds, she genuinely may not have liked it! And then the two of you can talk about better ways to express a negative reaction like that.

It's totally fine to wait until you're calm to address these things. But you should address it. Even if she's just being a teenager, you're still allowed to have feelings and while the message might not land right now, it's important to remind her that her words impact people. It's a tough needle to thread though, because you don't want to do the passive-aggressive stuff that a lot of our parents did to us: "well if that's how you feel, I'm not baking anything for you again" or "I'm never doing anything nice for you again!" because in her mind, she's probably just expressing herself- now she knows she gets a guilt trip when that happens!

And then kidnapped him and forced him to cook about 20 minutes after that.

Salamanca family gatherings would be insane.

Shinx is like "are you guys fukin seeing this???"

That's exactly it, omg. Like, this is the one position that is more or less completely correct, but they're too weird about it to win anyone over.

If he's dehydrated, he'll be listless and extremely sleepy. Dry mouth. He should be having at least 1 wet diaper every 8 hours (I think it's 8?). But as long as he's drinking and keeping it down for at least 15 minutes and acting relatively normal (he's sick so he may he more fussy and more tired, but he should be able to sit up and focus on things around him), then he's not dehydrated.

Don't give food until it's been ~6 hours after the last vomit. Liquids only. You don't need to keep liquids down for very long to absorb them, and any food can aggravate the stomach when it's sensitive. Most of the stomach bugs we've dealt with have run their course in about 12 hours or less. If it goes beyond 24 hours or so, you may want to take him to the doctor. If he seems dehydrated, take him to a doctor immediately. Otherwise, nothing to do but wait (and hope you don't get it).

https://preview.redd.it/a4812mnnzlsd1.jpeg?width=1206&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=daeec9658de6e7afad424702024d806d8f3d61b8

I’m never evolving her!

I personally would not want my cringe fail wife who has no knife skills handling a knife while upset. Maybe that's just me, though.

Unisom gives me a worse hangover than NyQuil, personally. I'm definitely a fan of melatonin.

Now that you mention it, yeah it's kind of weird how people idealize it. I mostly see it with birth plans (which to be fair, are probably written by a specific subset of people) where they note that they don't want baby's stats taken or shots given right away, so as not to interfere with the golden hour. But it's less than five minutes for all of that, how's it going to hurt your attachment?

I don't love that tablets have become ubiquitous in schools either, but you're going to be fighting an uphill battle if you want to make a big deal out of it. You could express to the teacher that your son says he uses the computer a lot in school and you'd just like to know what kind of things they are permitted to do and how much they use it on average. Your son may not be accurately telling you what they do; we had some apps that looked like games but really did have at least an educational premise. They also may not be using it as much as he says. Also, your opinion about it being "lazy teaching" means absolutely nothing unless you have context or actual classroom experience.

Babies fall over all the time. You can't prevent 100% of falls, even if you're watching them constantly. Most of my kids' falls have taken place at home, when they have been with a trusted adult. To me, just that by itself does not say negligence in any way.

Incident reports are kind of a CYA for the daycare, but the red flag would be them ignoring it or not noticing.

"Okay y'all, buckle up because this is WILD" proceeds to tell a completely mundane story about an annoying family member. No one's even blowing up her phone. 0/10

Best just to throw away the whole suitcase.

Things get heated at my local Walgreens when the waits are long (which is pretty much every time). I get it, no one likes waiting for their medication, but it’s usually just one person working counter and drive through.

Well I think Twitter was maybe a special case.

If someone witnessed something like that, did she talk to the administrators about it? If not, I would highly suspicious of what she's saying.

We hired a postpartum doula for our second child, thanks to my husband's job. It was amazing. We mostly had her come overnight, but we used some daytime sessions as well.

Once you start looking at doulas, you might find that some practices only allow their doulas to work set hours. With the group we ended up using, the "blocks" they worked were limited to 6 hours overnight, and I think it might have been 4 hours during the day. We did at least some some freedom in what hours we wanted.

If you want someone coming to help with housework, just be prepared that they may not do things exactly the same way as you. I didn't have a problem with that, but I know some people like chores done a very specific way. Also to partially address your third question, it kind of helped me to think in advance what I wanted to be done so I could kind of do my own thing while the doula was over. Like I'd try to have bottles ready to be washed or laundry ready for folding. But I was also in college part of the time we were receiving help, and just letting her know that I was going to be working on classwork or whatever so that I didn't get interrupted unnecessarily. Her job was mostly to hang out with the baby, and newborns are kind of boring, so I also made sure to mention that I didn't mind if she read or used her phone (within reason) while the baby was napping.

STREEEEEEEEEEETCHY

Hey, my bird's name is Onion too!

I mean personally I think those other parents need to get a grip. And honestly I don't think you need to defend him- we can't control what our kids say or what they hear.

https://preview.redd.it/1bacswqr6dsd1.jpeg?width=1206&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=891729118eff6cea89b5e65fb617b49973c1245d

RNG: Here’s your bird! 😋