blaming mary jane

My dad drives me nuts. Every time we talk (and that isn't often lately despite him living in the room across the hall from me), he goes on about how out of control the teens are in the town. They really aren't, but Meagan left a couple weeks ago and hasn't come back. She does what she wants when she wants to. I know where she is; I'm not worried about her.

The thing that bugs me, though, is that he blames all of the problems--the way teens act, their partying--on the fact that Washington legalized marijuana for recreational use. He seems to think this has caused all of the kids to suddenly start smoking pot and drinking. I don't get his thought process. As if the kids weren't doing this before.

It wasn't legalized until 2014. My kids knew where to get the stuff back in 2011. Almost every middle schooler knows who to go to get some. Legalizing it didn't suddenly cause a boom in teen pot use. It's still illegal for anyone under 21. The fact that my dad thinks legalizing marijuana is somehow different than alcohol baffles me. Alcohol is legal for those over 21, but that has never, in the history of the country, stopped teens from drinking. I don't get why he thinks legal pot use has suddenly changed the dynamic. Kids are still getting it illegally like they always have. The only difference is many adults are now buying it legally.

I finally go to tell him today that other states are now legalizing it, too. There have been announcements on the radio all week that on July 1, recreational marijuana use will be legal in Oregon State. I get tired of him criticizing the state, the town, the teens, and everyone else because of pot.

on a writing note...

While I've been binge-watching That 70s Show, I started looking for some of the fic I remember reading 10 years ago. That made me think of the fic I wrote myself. I have two rather long stories posted--they were the first two fanfics I ever wrote. I decided to reread them, but before I got done with the first chapter of the first story, I was cringing. There were so many mistakes--spelling, punctuation, grammar, word usage. Ugh. I decided to revise. The farther I got, though, the more I realized there were serious problems with the story itself. Namely, the plot was convuluted and stupid. Ten years ago, I loved stories like that--whatever got the most angst out of the characters. But I've grown up and gotten better at writing.

I'm trying to decide how much of it I want to rewrite because I'm embarrassed to put the story back up with just the grammar/spelling mistakes corrected. The story is so badly written. *shakes head*

That's just the first story. The second one is slightly longer and has just as many problems.