[Coda]

I mean, it might be nice to meet some other parents, but... I dunno, something seems different than when I was that age. There's rarely anything that would have parents in the same place at the same time. Also, my son goes to a magnet school in the next district over, so I wouldn't expect anyone in this area to go to the same school.

But I did talk to my wife. She challenged me to try to put together a schedule to organize my time so I could make sure I had time for everything... but what that revealed is that I actually DON'T have time, if I'm honest with my time and do everything I'm supposed to do -- 8 hours of sleep + 8 hours of work + 3 hours in the car + 1 hour to get my son out of bed and ready for school in the morning + 2 hours to make/eat/clean up from dinner + 1 hour to help my son with schoolwork + time for shower/brushing teeth/feeding cats/cleaning up after cats/getting ready for bed... Assuming I can maintain peak operating condition 100% of the time, this leaves no time to do anything to relax or even to keep up with anything else that comes up. Heaven forbid I have a doctor's appointment...

Once we saw all of this in black and white, she offered to start picking our son up from school. That'll give me back two hours in the afternoons to get work done so I can actually spend time with my family in the evenings.