Parenting's New Magazine For *Moms Like Me* (uh, not so much like me really)

I just got an offer today from Parenting Magazine. (no I am NOT having another baby) They have a new magazine that is just for parents of school-age children. The letter they sent to try to get me to buy it cracks me up. Here are some choice quotes: ....you know very well that school changes everything......New priorities. "Finish your homework first and then you can play the Wii. WAIT! You have a diorama due tomorrow?... New challenges. She said what to you on the playground...
Actually some of this offer makes me a bit sad when I think back on certain things. For example it talks about how to handle when the teacher calls about a problem and your child swears it is not his fault. In first grade Nathaniel had a teacher that I had heard was just wonderful. So I was all excited about him having her. Summer before Nat heads off to the "big school" for the first grade the teacher gets really sick. They were not even sure if she would be able to go to work. Well, she did get to go to work. Only, because of her illness she was not the wonderful teacher we had heard great things about. She was crabby. REALLY CRABBY Little side note here: Kindergarten Nathaniel had to have tubes in his ears. Still was having some problems, but not as many as the year before. When we went to the school to fill out all of the paper work we stressed that he had problems with his ears. If he ever complains about his ears PLEASE contact us immediately at ______(phone number in blank) This was underlined and in bold letters. Ok, as year went on, Nathaniel would get into trouble over things like stopping in the hall to empty playground gunk out of his shoe, like playing with his pencil, like hitting or pushing (when sometimes he fessed up to doing it, and others he said that somebody else was doing the hitting yet he got blamed) Let's just the poop hit the fan when in the course of a few days he comes home with a note saying that he kicked someone. He tells me that he did not kick so and so, that kid kicked him. He then pulls up his pants leg and shows me a FOOTPRINT on his leg. I ask did the other kid get in trouble. NO. I sent a letter. The next thing was that he came home crying with an ear full of dirt. Somebody had pushed him off a piece of playground equipment. He landed on his ear. He told the teacher he needed to come home. She told him no. Did I mention that he still had dirt in his ear??!?!?! When we got home from picking him up I called the teacher to schedule a conference the next day. I was determined to be nice but to let her know that I was sooo not happy. During the conference she assured me that Nathaniel was not the only one who got in trouble on a regular basis. (gee, ya think maybe it is you not them, missy?) I told her that what I was most concerned with was the fact that so often he said it was other kids who were misbehaving, not him. Not always, mind you. He was quick to fess up when he did something. (that has disappeared over the years. Everything is done by "not me" now) I let her know that earlier in the week he came with a FOOTPRINT on his leg-the day that he got in trouble for kicking!! Then I moved on to the ear thing. Would you like to know her response???? Oh, well I am sorry about that. I am not able to read everything on every paper that gets filled out at the beginning of the year. I really wanted to pull him out then and there. Why should we have to fill out papers if they are not even read? Why should send our kids to stay with people who know so little about them? I could not find out how to go about homeschooling. Everyone I had ever known who homeschooled lived in a different area and Iwas not sure how to go about contacting them. (which would have been weird. Hi.You don't really know but, I used to work in your bank.I noticed you mentioned homeschooling your kids. How do I get started?)
Wow I got off topic. Anyway, I think it is a very noble thing that Parenting has new magazine. If they truly wanted solve some of these problems for kids they would make a magazine that would probably not sell very well. They would say things like "Be there for your kids. Don't fall into the trap of believing the myth of kids need quality time instead of large quantities of your time" What selfish moron even though of this anyway? How well would my marriage survive if I only gave Mark little snippets of my focus? How about if tey told parents to stop dressing their daughters like little mini-hookers? Ooh, the fashion people would all pull their advertisements and the magazine would go bankrupt. What about if they had a section of their magazine devoted to teaching Bible lessons to the kids? Wow, they'd lose all their non-Christian audience. What about instead of all the stuff about how to handle peer pressure giving tips for how to help your kids make good friends-the kind that do not try to get your kids to do bad stuff? So, how do they think that this magazine is "just for moms like you" when talking to me?