Friday morning roundup

I'm baffled. Really. I don't understand how people can find frozen waffles desirable, much less feed them to their kids. Their kids demand them, you say? My parents may not have had (still don't have) their nutrition facts straight, but meal times in my house went like this: "this is what we're having. Take it or leave it." This is perhaps also why I'm baffled by people whose animals demand certain kinds of food. Gracie gets fed little enough (i.e. just enough) that she eats the Science Diet that she's served; none of this 'kitty McDonald's' food. I was raised not to negotiate with brats. Yesterday, for example, I made only the following concession: you opt not to crap in your fierce pink pleather carrier on the way to the rabies clinic, and you get to live.

I didn't originally post these--cut Desiree Rogers some slack, we all make mistakes--but I'm interested in these columns for how both Robin Givhan and Maureen Dowd parse DC culture and social mores.

Among the themes of conversation between my mother and me, many are not unique: mothers worldwide berate their daughters about weight, career, hair, and so on. Until this morning, I had no idea that television ownership was another common theme.