How do they do it? Working mothers spend as much time playing with and reading to their children as mothers who are not in paid jobs. And, according to a new study, they manage it by doing less housework, sacrificing their leisure, spending less time on their appearance, and putting the children to bed later. Indeed, I admire Lauren as she manages to do so much in terms of working full time and also spending all her free time with the girls. Life was tough, but it is getting even tougher for the young families. The incredible working mum's time warp
As if working long hours and juggling different contracts was not bad enough, to actually leave your children in a care of reckless childcare centers is heart wrenching. Real, fullsome, democracy is supposed to be about choices, about freedom and all that, but even back in 1990s is was difficult to establish good centres in many areas despite demand. The land cost skyrocketted and parents were held to bizarre randsom like hostages by the culture called child care centers. The story is long, too long, however, only after we took our daughter second time to the hospital did we, as parents, take her out from that awful place... By the time Alex was four years old she underwent two general anasthetics at the hospital due to the falls inside the childcare at Five Ways Paddington. To me 33 Heeley doubles up to an evil place. It was St Stephens Anglican Church at Bellevue Hill that gave us safer environment for our two girls. St Stephen's Child Care Centre was the best gift to us as were the child carers - Shauna and Edwina. The Interest rates were looming at 17% and the Paddington child care even ruthlessly demanded that we pay the child care fees for Alex for the time while she was in hospital. There seemed to be amazingly heartless characters in that industry ... Same week when we left another mother took her boy out when he was found wondering along the busy intersection of Five Ways. [We never sued the childcare despite the physical damage done to our baby ...]
I read the following story and all those memories of powerlessness came back. Child-care centre death
Eye on Politics & Law Lords: The Drama, a Tragedy or Farce
Sean Maher, an American marine, was due home from Iraq on Friday. He died in an ambush on Wednesday, the 687th day of the US-British occupation. Maher was shot driving a Humvee near Falluja, in Iraq's north. He was 19. He was the 1442nd American soldier killed in Iraq and the 1613th to die among all forces, cajoled or coerced, of what politicians in Washington, London and Canberra insist on parroting as the coalition of the willing, like some April Fool's Day joke.
The additional dead since the invasion 22 months ago, according to Pentagon figures, are 86 Brits and 85 "others" from 14 countries, among them 20 Italians, 17 Ukrainians, 16 Poles, 11 Spaniards, seven Bulgarians and three Slovaks. Other client countries with troop deaths are Denmark, the Netherlands, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Kazakhstan, El Salvador and Thailand.
• The one death that made us sit up [Alleged underworld figure Carl Williams was charged this week with the murder of the Melbourne drug dealer Mark Moran Last woman standing ; Philip Ruddock continues to accuse Mamdouh Habib of terrorist crimes despite these charges being tainted by torture allegations; What you have got here is a classic case of a federal-state stuff-up Missing persons mistake; The two lives of an undercover policeman blurred into one wretched existence Just shoot me ]
• · The Government's plan to allow transcript evidence to be used in pack rape retrials did not go far enough. But, Mr Tink said that on May 11 last year Mr Debus refused to adopt the Opposition's proposal to use video evidence for sexual assault victims in retrials, saying it was legally unworkable. Sex retrial video vital says Andrew Tink; A wave of gang rapes perpetrated on young Sydney women is prompting at least one recent victim to seek counselling every week Party rape - the rise of a disturbing new trend ; Opposition police spokesman Peter Debnam said there had been 208 knife attacks and robberies in metropolitan areas in the past six months and a 40 per cent increase in 10 years in armed robberies not involving guns. Bloody knife fight in city Bear Pit series: Premier of NSW Bob Carr usually practices his German with Roger Wilkins, the bow-tie chief of the Cabinet and his long time partner Sue Cato. This weekend the Premier is practicing his second language on the harbour of heavenly views with Joschka (my Mamka called me Joschko when I was good once:-) Fischer, the highest ranking German visitor to Australia for almost a decade. Are the German Greens here to sell more Mercedes busses? Mark Duffy, the Director General of NSW Department of Transport, is confident that a buyer could be found for Westbus, which went into voluntary liquidation last week.
• · · Britain surfed a wave created by Tony Blair's politics of choice. But now, after a tough year and with an election imminent, he takes his cues from how history will judge him Their School Master's Choice ; Critics of modern education often ask what's the matter with kids today They would be better off asking children what's the matter with schools
• · · · Webdiary has a regional rorts reporter, Craig Rowley: Patron Country MLCs, Patron Saints and Patron Senators ... Bigger than all of us': our last chance to lift the regional rorts veil ; Taxpayers pay Hilary Penfold $192,000 a year, plus add-ons (car, a 20 per cent superannuation loading, etc), to head up the 975 bureaucrats (769 full-time, 206 part-time) employed solely to keep the nation's Parliament House functioning as an agreeable workplace for our 226 federal politicians A destructive refurbishment
• · · · · Britain's attempt to forge a new international accord on Third World poverty relief began in earnest yesterday with the aid of the former South African president, Nelson Mandela. Mandela urges a generation to fight poverty ; First they organised 25 new cots, 20 nurses and a fleet of cars. Then, in a convoy with the police, they drove to a big cream-coloured house in Jakarta where, upstairs, the babies were kept Indonesia is mismanaging its abandoned and homeless ; Love and altruism, not money, drives people to commit the ultimate act of devotion - the donation of a kidney to save a partner or relative from a lifetime of dialysis Love - not money - drives people to donate their organs
• · · · · · At the height of the Cold War the United States was flexing its muscles and the Menzies cabinet was nervous Once more, dear friends ; Australia's most famous seaside suburb, Bondi, may soon have a ban slapped on the expansion of fast-food shops, cafes and restaurants - all in the name of preserving the local corner store. Bondi set to protect its charm ; A stylish dresser known as "Designer Don" and accused of involvement in a bloody Mafia war that has left 50 dead in the port of Naples has become an unlikely teenage heart-throb Mafia accused wins hearts of the mob