We’ve got signs at work in all the bathrooms that (1) remind us to wash our hands and (2) show us the areas of the hands that get missed. The areas that get missed are basically the entire hand (I don’t know how you can claim to wash your hands when you miss 2/3rds of your palms). Winslow’s solution sounds pretty sound, I just don’t know how feasible it is for the rest of you…

I am a connoisseur of Diet Coke. A gourmand. A maven. Even a snob. My palate is supremely refined. What a sommelier is to wine, what a nose is to perfume, I am to Diet Coke. I drink it every day. All day. Some days it’s the only beverage I drink. Diet Coke is my wake up call, my “Hello world,” my “I’m ready to interact on a sentient level.” I drink Diet Coke with burgers, with pasta, with salad, with pancakes and eggs, with bagels and lox, with croissants and scones. I don’t drink it with cereal, but I don’t eat cereal.

You remember that weekend you decided to build your partner a dining room set inspired by the work of William Morris? How you went to the National Gallery to do archival research and found the original designs? There were the ladderback chairs made of oak that you cut down and milled yourself and the rush seats you taught yourself to weave. And the reformed gothic style table you knocked together, the one with mahogany and walnut inlays—you were pretty sure he was going to flip when he saw it. Especially since he was always quoting Ruskin and going on and on about the glories of the arts and crafts movement.

If I say so myself, this comic is . . . a-maize-ing.

Your child’s mind is her most valuable resource, and until she is old enough to become a gestational surrogate, that won’t change. But school cutbacks are a fact of life now, and though you didn’t sign up for it, you need to be prepared for the responsibility of having to teach your kid stuff.