Running & Biting Part 2

A few months ago, I wrote about Running & Biting.  Both both topics came up again today so I thought I'd write about them again.

Running

When I was a young swimmer every once in a while there would be a kid who was really, really slow (physically, not mentally) competing in race.  The kid would struggle to finish and every other kid in the race would be out of the pool, dried off and eating a snack by the time the slow kid finished.   All the spectators would watch as the struggling swimmer (they weren't drowning or anything, just slow) touched the wall and then the audience would break into applause.  

I am that slow kid (adult) in my running group. 

Today, I had about 15 people tell me "great job" or "way to run" as they lapped me for the umptenth time.  My coach actually told me that she thought I was getting faster.  Which is to say, I'm now more of a slug than a turtle. 

Today's workout was identical to the one we did a few weeks ago.  I enjoyed it and was supposedly faster than last time.

Biting 

Cub got another incident report at school today - although again - they were very sweet in how they worded it.

Apparently, Cub was playing with a friend when the friend crawled between Cub's legs and  (teacher's words on the paper) "Cub got scared so he bit his friend on the hand" (I'm still at a loss for how Cub managed to bite the hand of a child who was crawling between his legs on the hand, but I'm not a flexologist so what do I know.)  Cub's teacher and I had a mini-parent/teacher conference to discuss being consistent with home/school discipline.  

They're so very understanding (not the right word here, but I'm not sure how to describe it) at Cub's school.  The head teacher (she's new) said that she thought he was biting because there were some new kids in the classroom and because he misses the old head teacher and he's just going through some adjustments.  They would never just come right out and say, You're a bad parent and your child is a bully.  

Of course, we don't really think Cub is a bully (or that we're bad parents), but we do need to escalate the "NOs" a little more when Cub bites.  I guess telling Cub, "teeth are for eating" or "we don't bite our friends" isn't really cutting it.

Buttin says that Cub is just a really good teeth-kisser. 

Here's the little bully today - obviously trying to attack me with the hose.