parental denial.

Last week, two 19-year-old girls colluded with a convicted felon and a bank teller to lift a fair chunk of change from a Bank of America branch in upscale suburban Atlanta. They were caught with said convicted felon three days later, and all four are now in the Cobb County klink, facing charges of felony theft and drug possession.

The parents of the two darlings come on record as "shocked" (naturally!), but the degree of their reactions is quite instructive. Little Miss Heather Johnston's dad said that "God gives us free will and it's up to us what we do with it," and "any adult has to make decisions and live with them -- good, bad or indifferent." That sounds like dad has no problem with the concept of "do the crime, do the time," even (or especially) when it's his own offspring. (He also hasn't bonded little Heather out of jail.)

Little Miss Ashley Miller's mom, on the other hand, has a full case of "he was such a good boy/she was such a good girl" syndrome, where parents of miscreants adamantly refuse to acknowledge that their offspring might be capable of doing naughty things. She has stated that the two are just "little girls that made a bad choice", and shrugs off her daughter's admission to police of being a drug dealer with "she is taking the blame for the boy who has the drugs, 'cause she's a sweet girl with a big heart."

Ashley's mom hasn't bailed her out, either, but it turns out that in her case it's due to the fact that she violated her probation for a 2006 DUI conviction, which makes her ineligible for a release on bond.

Oh, and it turns out that both "little girls" were working for an Atlanta strip club called "Shooter Alley", where they apparently have been gyrating around poles for the last few months. Not that there's anything wrong with working at a strip club, or strip clubs per se, but the combined list of "oh, really?" factoids in this case makes Ashley's mom look like a bit of a chump.

If Quinn decides to disregard parental advice and upbringing at the age of 19, and I receive a call from the county jail asking me to bail him out 'cause "the bank robbery was just him falling in with the wrong crowd", I think my answer would be something along the lines of, "That sucks, son. I guess I'll be forwarding your mail for the next few years."

And that wouldn't be because I don't love him, but precisely because I do.