does barry manilow know you raid his wardrobe?

the kid got two hours' worth of detention. she served the first half of her time yesterday. heh.

apparently, she got written up for "disrespectful behavior." she actually told me about the incident the day it happened, which was probably a week or so before spring break. and it was really lame - her math teacher was having a shitty day, the kids were probably getting on her nerves, and she snapped at a couple of the kid's classmates for tapping their ruler on the desk.

and what does my brilliant, angry kid do?

mm-hmmm. she picked up her ruler and tapped it on her desk. sheesh.

anyway, she and the other kids had to return to the classroom after school, and when she got there she was told to write a letter of apology to the teacher. she specified exactly what she wanted to read in this letter, and it was due back the next day, with a parent's signature.

she wrote it, i signed it, and she turned it in. and then we had our fun trip and forgot all about it.

then on monday, she got in the car looking like this: :| and then she handed me a slip of paper with her detention assignment on it. she was so bummed and angry at herself, and i could see how she was dreading my reaction. so i kept it light - we talked about what she'd done again, i told her that she really needed to keep her anger in check and that i was disappointed, and mentioned that she needed to keep a book in her bag so that she could get a head start on the next book report for english class.

she told me that when she was sent to the assistant principal's office to pick up the slip, she was really nervous. y'all know she's generally a good girl, so she'd never had to do that before. and the AP looked at her and said "you've never been here before, but i recognize you. you're so not a bad kid! hey, you were the one that gave me those yummy pretzels at christmas!"

bwahahahahaha!

and then she said "okay, take this paper, stamp it, and then you can go back to class." at the kid's blank look, she said "oh my goodness. you don't even know where the stamp is, do you? you really aren't a bad kid. here, i'll show you."

so yesterday she sat for an hour after school in detention, where the teacher kept calling her another name that rhymes with her real name (like, if her name was "monique" she called her "unique") and she had to copy text out of a book. how lame. at least they could let them do homework or something actually useful.

and then after i picked her up yesterday, brought her home to do her homework and grabbed a snack, we went to old navy and did some bathing suit shopping.

talk about punishment.