origin_5024062378 Hey! No, don't worry, no original content here today. But I wanted to alert you to stuff I've written other places. Today, over at Today's Parent, I'm talking about denial — you know, the kind of parental denial that has you willfully ignoring your kids' illnesses. Not to mention your own:

This isn’t a new pattern. Back in the fall, Rachel and I remained blissfully unconcerned for good week about a rash on Isaac’s face—even when it began to spread. At one point, I joked out loud that maybe he had leprosy. Actually? It was impetigo, diagnosed casually by a physician friend of ours with kids in the same class. There was that memorable winter a few years ago where the kids were fine but Rachel and I dragged ourselves to the doctor only after weeks of illness to find out that I had a massive double ear infection while she actually had pneumonia. We just thought that we were run down, that we’d get better on our own, and who really had time, anyway, for the hassle of getting to the doctor? We were busy parents, after all, with stuff to do. In any case, we were still (barely) functional.

And over at VillageQ, I talk about a not-so-hidden perk of being in a same-sex union, one that involves subterfuge and sneakiness:

And that benefit is this: you can pretend to be your spouse.

I don’t just mean for fun at parties. Anyone can do that. I mean, you can impersonate your spouse — and vice versa — in situations where it is mutually convenient for you. [...] You know you’ve done it. In our house, it’s usually me impersonating Rachel, who breaks out in hives if she has to talk to the bank to deal with anything remotely financial. So, I call up the bank and say I’m her. Security questions? No problem. Of course I know her date and year of birth. Her mother’s maiden name? Check. Social Insurance Number (that’s the Canadian equivalent for Social Security number for you Yanks)? Memorized. Employee number? I’ve got it in my files. Every so often, I like to tell her that I could easily move all of our assets to some kind of offshore account and she’d be left with nothing and she just laughs, because, well, half of almost nothing isn’t very much anyway.

Please to enjoy! And next week, I promise the three of you that are still reading this an actual blog post, right here.

FEATURED PHOTO CREDIT: GINGERPIG2000 VIA PHOTOPIN cc