Got a visit from Child Welfare services last Friday.

[TimBone]

My wife and I both work evenings. When we arrived home from work Friday night, there was a letter on the door saying that Child welfare URGENTLY needed to meet with us. This was extremely odd. We have one son, that is 2 1/2 years old, and I consider him to be taken care of very well. I immediately went into panic mode, as I assume a lot of parents would. I do spank the kid when necessary and use time out with it. Never hard spankings, though. Just enough to get the message through.

So, I ask my wife if he's had any weird bruises(I assume all young kids get a lot of bruises because kids are a bit reckless on their own). She say no.

I next start to worry if some random weirdo driving by didn't like something I was doing in the yard with the kid. Our driveway is off of a highway, but the house sits back about 200 yards. He is outside working with me a lot. He loves riding the mower, so we do that quite often. Sometimes it's spur of the moment, so he's not always wearing his ear protection. We also check the mail with the mower which requires driving right up to the highway. I always make sure there's not even any cars in sight though, so that there's no danger. Anyways, I started nit picking stuff like that to see if there was any way some random asshole reported us as they drove by.

I also worried that maybe the babysitter was under investigation. Maybe he was being harmed there. Lots of crazy shit went through my head.

Like I said, we got this notice on Friday night. Their offices are closed until Monday. We were left to worry about this all weekend.

I called them first thing this morning. The lady who left the note was out in the field, and she didn't call back until 1:30 this afternoon. She casually explained to me that they put the notice on the wrong house.

I was relieved and pissed off all at the same time. I calmly explained to her the worry that note caused and that maybe they should create a policy of not leaving those kinds of notes on the doors of people on Friday afternoons if they have yet to have any initial contact with those people. If it's someone who already knows there is an investigation going, then fine, leave a notice if you want. But leaving us that note left us on the dark and worrying for 72 hours.

Am I crazy for suggesting that?

[Iowanian]

Originally Posted by Sandy Cheeks

you spank your 2 1/2 yr old????

Yeah, if you don't want to bail out your 16 year old, you sometimes spank your 2-3yr old.

[Old Dog]

Originally Posted by Flybone McTimmerson

Glad you understand. It's crazy how easy it is to end up being investigated, especially if they're getting the story from the child, like in your case. I understand they have to investigate though.

Here's mine: (21 years ago) My son, who wore glasses at the time and I were wrestling and I broke his glasses. Thinking it not that big of a deal because he had an appointment in a couple of weeks, I did the "tape them" thing. When I took him to see the doctor he was asked how they had come to be broken and he honestly said, "When my dad threw me on the ground they broke." Things got really uncomfortable REAL quick......
Thankfully the doctor continued to ask questions as to how/why and such and it was funny after that. Right after the question though, it was certainly a "Oh shit" moment.

[Old Sport]

Originally Posted by NewChief

What really disturbs me: how many other private messages about other, non-illegal but equally intimate matters, had the school employees seen from the parents without notifying them of the fact that they could see them.

Imagine if some 3rd party was privy to all the texts between you and your spouse? Jeezus.

Can't the Lord see them? And I think your dead relatives can also see you beating off.

[TimBone]

Originally Posted by NewChief

What really disturbs me: how many other private messages about other, non-illegal but equally intimate matters, had the school employees seen from the parents without notifying them of the fact that they could see them.

Imagine if some 3rd party was privy to all the texts between you and your spouse? Jeezus.

yep....that's exactly where my mind was at when I responded to you.

[TimBone]

Originally Posted by Old Dog

Here's mine: (21 years ago) My son, who wore glasses at the time and I were wrestling and I broke his glasses. Thinking it not that big of a deal because he had an appointment in a couple of weeks, I did the "tape them" thing. When I took him to see the doctor he was asked how they had come to be broken and he honestly said, "When my dad threw me on the ground they broke." Things got really uncomfortable REAL quick......
Thankfully the doctor continued to ask questions as to how/why and such and it was funny after that. Right after the question though, it was certainly a "Oh shit" moment.

lol....my buddy shared a similar story today when we were discussing it at work. He said the doctor noticed a weird bruise on his 4 year old son, and when he asked what happened, my buddy told him he fell off the bed. Anybody who has a kid understands that random accidents like falling off the bed happen. Well, the doctor quickly went into a line of questioning about how high the bed was, was he being supervised at the moment, does he often go without supervision. I understand the doctors concern, but sheesh.

[NewChief]

Originally Posted by Flybone McTimmerson

yep....that's exactly where my mind was at when I responded to you.

The incident was actually published anonymously in the NYT's online edition as the platform for a larger discussion about iMessage:
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/06/08...ment.html?_r=4

Here's the NYT's columnist's reply:

A. The Haggler’s first thought upon reading this email was that it could be a hoax. But our letter writer had saved all of the correspondence from D.H.R., which she scanned and shared.

This is a true story.

The Haggler’s second thought was that this sounded like the sort of tale Franz Kafka would have written had he lived in the age of cloud computing.

The Haggler’s third thought: If this happened to our unnamed mother, it has happened to others. A quick frisk of the Internet found similar stories and an article in The Telegraph, the British newspaper, with the headline “Apple iCloud Sparks Divorce Cases.” In it, an English divorce lawyer discussed new clients he’d met courtesy of Apple software. They included the wife of a guy in his early 40s who, during a night of revelry with some friends, had downloaded the hookup dating app Tinder, contacted a few women and shared some saucy photos over Snapchat. All of the messages and photos were received by the wife, who subsequently filed for divorce.

It would be wiser for these people, and others in similar circumstances, to have their own Apple IDs. But that can get expensive. Imagine a family of five, in which everyone is buying repeat copies of the same app or film, just because they’re worried their private messages will suddenly become family fodder. Shouldn’t there be a way for people to share an Apple account but get a unique Apple ID, allowing them to buy one version of the same app, without risking a catastrophic loss of privacy?

Yes, there should. And let the record reflect that mere days after the Haggler contacted Apple, the company cried “uncle.”

“Uncle!” it cried, at the top of its lungs.

Well, not “uncle” literally. What it actually said, through a spokeswoman, is that the company would soon make it easier for families “to communicate and share purchases, photos and calendars within the same household. Family members can browse and download each other’s iTunes, iBooks or App Store purchases. Up to six members can participate, each with their own Apple ID.”

You see? Total and immediate victory, ladies and gentlemen. It’s called total and immediate victory. If there is a more vivid demonstration of the Haggler’s juice, the Haggler is unaware of it.

Wait just a minute there, you pompous charade of a consumer advocate, the Haggler can hear you say. This change you describe is a feature called Family Sharing and it was in the works long before you contacted the company. It was announced last week at the company’s Worldwide Developers Conference, in San Francisco. It will be part of the new version of Apple’s operating system being released in the fall.

That quote above was not prompted by you — it’s from a news release. By coincidence, you called just as the company was unveiling a solution to the problem you wanted solved. You need to take credit for that? How petty can you be?

The Haggler does not appreciate your tone, dear readers. It’s judgmental. But to address your two questions above, the answers, for the record, are “yes” and “very.”

[TimBone]

Originally Posted by NewChief

The incident was actually published anonymously in the NYT's online edition as the platform for a larger discussion about iMessage:
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/06/08...ment.html?_r=4

Here's the NYT's columnist's reply:

Wow. Once again,crazy all around. I enjoyed the part about the dude and tinder, though.

[ThaVirus]

You really have to be careful with your kids these days. Don't do ANYTHING that could be misconstrued as violent or show a glimpse of your home life being anything other than sunshine and rainbows.

People go from 0-snitch real quick. Real ****ing quick.

[TimBone]

Originally Posted by ThaVirus

You really have to be careful with your kids these days. Don't do ANYTHING that could be misconstrued as violent or show a glimpse of your home life being anything other than sunshine and rainbows.

People go from 0-snitch real quick. Real ****ing quick.

Yeah....for a brief second I thought about what my reaction might be if the babysitter had reported some random bruise. Or if some weirdo from the walmart reported some silly interaction between my son and I in the bread aisle. People love to be outraged and take up a cause.

[digger]

Originally Posted by Flybone McTimmerson

Am I crazy for suggesting that?

Not at all, sounds reasonable.

[Predarat]

One of the many gestapo gubbment agencies that is way out of hand and going to far. It started off with good objectives but has turned into a monster. That would worry the shit out of me for sure.

[Frosty]

Originally Posted by NewChief

Imagine if some 3rd party was privy to all the texts between you and your spouse? Jeezus.

I'm not too worried about someone knowing I'm supposed to pick up eggs on the way home from work.

[Mav]

Originally Posted by Flybone McTimmerson

Yeah....for a brief second I thought about what my reaction might be if the babysitter had reported some random bruise. Or if some weirdo from the walmart reported some silly interaction between my son and I in the bread aisle. People love to be outraged and take up a cause.

Ironically enough, about a year ago, we were walking out of Walmart, my son was screaming because I was carrying him, and he wanted to walk and get into everything, and as we were walking out, he threw his head back and completely obliterated my lips. The sound was very loud my wife said, so some dumb ass was heard saying, "omg, he just hit that baby."

I looked like I had just been stung by a hive of ****ing bees, and this idiot is assuming im beating my kids ass, when in fact, he just two pieced me.

[Hammock Parties]

Originally Posted by Mavericks Ace

Ironically enough, about a year ago, we were walking out of Walmart, my son was screaming because I was carrying him, and he wanted to walk and get into everything, and as we were walking out, he threw his head back and completely obliterated my lips. The sound was very loud my wife said, so some dumb ass was heard saying, "omg, he just hit that baby."

I looked like I had just been stung by a hive of ****ing bees, and this idiot is assuming im beating my kids ass, when in fact, he just two pieced me.

Your kid had the right idea.

[Mav]

And furthermore. Please spank your kids. Now, understand the difference between BEAT, and spank.

I will pop my son on the ass ONCE, if he is not doing what he needs to be doing. he gets the message, and that is that.

They have to learn discipline, and with a limited communication skill set, the way you communicate is with corrective action.

Time outs don't work.