I was told I was stacking, and that it would kill me if I let it.

Oil disaster at the bottom.
The little guy's recent bad behavior at school atop it.
The suggestion by his teacher that he be tested for ADD/ADHD.
The fact that he wasn't put in to play in his first baseball game of the year.
A nice chat with the school social worker, at which point I became a basket case.

It got to be too much for me, all the things that my son was going through that were causing such major anxiety in me. I felt like a failure. I felt like I was going to tear that poor social worker's head off, and I was grateful for his calming demeanor and for the opportunity to chat with him.

I'd give anything and everything to either start this week over or go back and spend it in a hidey hole someplace, but that's just not possible. I need to get with my health care professional who specializes in helping with folks' sanity and possibly get on something else, as I haven't had a crazy-in-the-head-and-outside-myself episode like that for a long while. The school social worker said that the body can develop a tolerance to what I'm taking, and I'm probably already long past that. Helloooo, placebo effect.

The bright side? At least we are past the point where any effective medications for treatment of depression do things to your body like prevent you from going to the bathroom, as Mike Wallace said about early depression meds in this panel discussion.

Until the retooling of the serotonin to my brain, this is pretty much where I am:




Oh, and people? Just 'cause I'm out of my mind doesn't mean you can all be a buncha slackers.

Big thanks to the yaller blogger for the link to the nifty oil disaster counter that's now in my sidebar. Yes, this is still happening. Via one of Maitri's links, a nifty BBC article tells the story thus far of the spewer from down under the Gulf, noting that the oil has already reached Louisiana's Chandeleur Islands, a wildlife refuge here. Check this post of hers for how the containment dome is supposed to work (really, though, I pictured something like this). Keep in mind it's only going on one of the sources of leakage - we won't be out of the gunk yet if it does work.

This would be the perfect time for a timely and bitingly satirical Suspect Device comic - except the Gambit has decided to can Greg Peters' bimonthly visual commentaries, ostensibly for business reasons. Register your protest of that sorry state of affairs through writing and emailing Gambit Communications, the addresses of which can be found through Loki's post here. He's also set up a Facebook page in support of SD, which you can join here.

Lost in the insanity of our recent news on news on more news riches was progress on state Senate Bill 240...

Since 2007, the retired employees and the local board have petitioned the state to help pay for the teachers’ health coverage and to address other legacy issues. The results have been spotty. State lawmakers, led by state Sen. Ed Murray of New Orleans, got state funding for 25 percent of the health benefits for two years. That money supplemented 25 percent paid by the board each year. Last year, however, the board got no help. The retired employees have had to pay the difference, which averages about $670 a month right now.

This year, Murray introduced Senate Bill 240, which carves out $6 million from the Orleans Parish public education property tax millage and dedicates it to all legacy issues. The bill is supported by the local board and many education reform advocates. It won’t cover all the retired employees’ health insurance costs, but with the local board’s share it should cover about half — putting the employees back where they were before last year’s cuts.

The Senate Education Committee unanimously approved SB 240 last week. It now awaits action by the full Senate, and it must still clear the House.

BUT...and there's pretty much always a but...it would be nice if we could all be sure that the money wasn't going to contractors overcharging the hell out of the schools for work and repairs that should cost nowhere near what the OPSD is being charged.

I'm gonna go line up the arrows and get my head back on.