Subsidization of the Stay at Home Mom/Wife

This is an issue I've been thinking about for a while, and I'm not entirely sure how I feel about it. The scenario goes like this: a couple decides, for religious reasons usually, that the woman should not hold an outside job. In the case of a mother, she takes care of the children, and perhaps even homeschools them.

The family's income, based on solely the man's income, is low enough so that the woman/children qualify and use governmental programs that pay for all or part of their housing, medical care, food, other needs, etc. If the woman exercised her ability to work, the family would earn enough money to cover those needs on their own, and still pay for child care. Should working wives/mothers subsidize those who choose not to work as a lifestyle choice?

I, generally, am for subsidies that promote societal well-being. And I think that at least in the case of the mother, there is perhaps an argument to be made that a mother at home full-time can devote more resources to ensuring the children are getting what they need to become productive citizens. And I certainly think that subsidies for child care for working parents should be more available to those who need them (think working mothers coming off of welfare, for starters.)

On the other hand, to be frank, to work or not work outside the home is in very many cases, a lifestyle choice, perhaps inspired by religion. Why should I, as a working mother/citizen, subsidize the religious/lifestyle choices of others in society, especially when I do not personally subscribe to the religious interpretations that back up that choice? Shouldn't we be responsible for how our individual lifestyle choices impact our family's well-being?

So, I could lean either way on this issue. One thing I do know for certain: I get very tired of stay-at-home women preaching that it is wrong for women to work outside the home.....and then proceed to explain that you too can afford to stay home if you apply for this service, and that program, and so on. Those services exist, at least in part, because of working women's tax dollars. Tax dollars that wouldn't exist if everyone heeded their commandments and stayed at home.

One thing I sometimes see is the belief that if all women stayed at home, men's salaries would rise. That may have been true in the past, but I don't think it's true now. Tell Corporate America "Okay, you need to fire the lowest-paid half of your workforce, double the salary of the remaining half, and pay double to anyone new that you hire." I'm guessing that most companies would respond "Gee, I here that Mexico/India/China has bunches of folks dying to work for $1 a day. See ya, suckers!"

I'm interested in hearing others' thoughts on the subject.

Pwned! Baby Shower Games

First of all, for those of you not quite as geeky as me, pwned is computer-gamer speak for owned, which is slang for describing the kicking of something's ass, literally or figuratively.

I was at a baby shower on Saturday, and we played the "get the safety pins out of the bowl of rice while blindfolded" and the "guess the baby food by appearance only" games. I won both. Hee hee! I feel the need to brag only because I never win at games like that, so it was really unexpected.

The baby shower was very nice - the food was pretty good, and everyone was friendly. The bride is due in less than 2 weeks, and she looked ready to pop. I was almost afraid to hug her for fear I'd kickstart her contractions if I pressed on her tummy.

Family BBQs in the rain

Every summer, my extended family has a BBQ to celebrate all of the summer birthdays for the year. Normally, my parents host this BBQ, and I host Thanksgiving. This year, my parents are remodeling their kitchen, so I agreed to trade "events" with them.

Dh and I picked the date for the BBQ as yesterday, after coordinating everyone else's schedule on a calendar and choosing from what was left. We weren't really concerned about rain since MN is in a drought and we've had barely any rain all summer.

Cue rain. All. Week. Long. Including yesterday. Which explains why I was outside on my deck, in the rain, hunching over a smoking gas grill cooking ribs and burgers. The ribs, which were mostly cooked in the oven, then just finished for taste on the grill, were delicious.

The burgers were way too rare. Between grill smoke, grill steam, and actual rain on my glasses, I couldn't see them very well and I misjudged when to take them off. Anyone that knows me knows that all meat products must be very obviously DEAD before I will eat them (NO pink!) so my microwave came in handy.

Tip for heating/reheating burgers in the microwave: Put them on a plate, and pour enough water on the plate to cover the bottom. The burgers will cook evenly (in fact, I can attest that you can take a medium rare burger and cook it to well done) and they will NOT dry out. You won't lose any delicious burger taste this way either. YUM!

So, family members were supposed to bring things to the BBQ, which was to start at 2 PM. My parents were 1 hour late! And they live only 10 minutes away! I was pretty angry.....I mean, all the rest of us were starving. I have a pretty high tolerance for tardiness as I am not the most prompt person myself, but an hour! And they didn't even call to let us know when they'd be there.