The sign says pay by app. There's a machine right there. It's got a garbage bag over its head like it's being kidnapped.

No letter this week. This one's mine. I want somebody to tell me when leaving my car in a rectangle became a relationship. The dentist has a portal. Your kid's school has four apps. The menu is a sticker on the table and it wants to send you notifications.

The password that can't be one you've used before, and I've used them all. Pressing "I agree" to God knows what. Typing sixteen digits with a wet thumb while a guy in a pickup waits for your spot. The dollar ninety-nine convenience fee, and whose convenience that is exactly. "How was your parking experience?" It was a rectangle. Sal, the man in the booth who used to be the app. And the scammers putting fake QR stickers on parking machines, which works because the real ones already look like a scam.

And I'm in this one. I have an app. Every sponsor discount on this show lives in it. I could just say the code into the microphone. I'm not going to.

Then the part that actually gets me. Do all of that at seventy-five, with coins, holding a toonie up to a machine that hasn't had a slot in years. Next time you see her, don't point at the sign. Put her plate in your app. You already work there.

This episode is brought to you by Tommy Gun's Original Barbershop in Maple. Ten percent off your first visit: grab the code in the free BTC Magazine app (App Store or Google Play).

THE DAD DIARIES, my memoir, is out now. It's the story of how I became a father to my girls and everything it took to get there. Signed copies at thedaddiaries.com, also on Amazon and Indigo.

This is Joseph Tito, and I bitch so you don't have to.

Got a mess of your own? Send it to info@jeopublishing.com.

More at betweenthecoversmag.com, or read the magazine free in the BTC Magazine app, iOS and Android.

Bitch Fest is a Between the Covers production.

Nine years on social media. Two hundred thousand followers, mostly women, mostly moms, almost no gay men. Joseph has thoughts about that, and about the other seventy percent of what all of us do online.

The nail tapping. The "everyone's been asking" when nobody asked. The fit check nobody requested. The seven-part series about a brunch invitation. The grocery montage that takes more editors than a feature film. The motivational speech filmed in a parked Hyundai.

And the confession: he has walked into his own house more than once, because the first time he entered his own home it wasn't natural enough.

Underneath the roast, the actual point. Social media paid his bills and let him stay home with his girls when he was a single father, and he will never shit on that. What he hates is the moment the content becomes more important than the thing that was actually happening. Dinner can just be dinner.

This episode is sponsored by Glitz Jewellery, 2396 Major Mackenzie Drive, Unit 8, Vaughan. Ask for Lina. Fifteen percent off through the BTC Magazine app.

BOOK SIGNING: this Sunday, October 18, 2 to 4 PM at Hillcrest Mall in Richmond Hill. Joseph will be signing The Dad Diaries and reading a passage. Come say hi.

Joseph's memoir THE DAD DIARIES is out now, published by Cormorant Books. Signed copies at thedaddiaries.com, also on Amazon and Indigo.

Got a mess of your own? Send it to info@jeopublishing.com.

More at betweenthecoversmag.com, or read the magazine free in the BTC Magazine app, iOS and Android.

Bitch Fest is a Between the Covers production.

There's one at every school. She parks in the fire lane like it was built for her. Her daughter is an angel. Just ask her. In the office. At full volume.

Last week I asked you which moms you wanted roasted, and my DMs have never filled up that fast. So this week it's Brenda. Not one woman. A franchise. There's one in every plaza, like a Tim Hortons.

The four-minute voice notes that start with "I'm not trying to start anything." The second group chat, the real one. The birthday party that invited one twin, and the day I called a mother like a talent agent, with a rider. The concussion that turned out to be a brush, caught by the only school security camera in history that actually worked. What saved Brenda in the parking lot that day (it wasn't growth, it was a gummy). And what the school really means when it says "try to ignore her if you can."

And I'm in this one. I've been Brenda too. For about fifteen minutes. The difference is, I let the tape play.

Plus what to actually do if it's happening to your kid: write it down, ask the school what the plan is for the kid doing it, and when somebody tells you something about yours, say "okay, I'll talk to my daughter." Then actually do it.

This episode is brought to you by Jova Medical Aesthetics in London, Ontario. If you're in perimenopause or menopause, Dr. Alicia Smith treats hormone imbalance, and the consult is online. Your first consultation is free: grab the code in the free BTC Magazine app (App Store or Google Play) and give it to them when you book.

BOOK SIGNING: Sunday, October 18, 2 to 4 PM at Hillcrest Mall in Richmond Hill. I'll be signing The Dad Diaries and reading a passage. Richmond Hill, Aurora, Woodbridge, Oshawa, come say hi.

THE DAD DIARIES, my memoir, is out now. It's the story of how I became a father to my girls and everything it took to get there. Signed copies at thedaddiaries.com, also on Amazon and Indigo.

This is Joseph Tito, and I bitch so you don't have to.

Got a mess of your own? Send it to info@jeopublishing.com.

More at betweenthecoversmag.com, or read the magazine free in the BTC Magazine app, iOS and Android.

Bitch Fest is a Between the Covers production.

A guest who brings her own dish, eats only that, and pulls a face at yours. So the host sends her home with a doggy bag of the food she wouldn't eat. A mother-in-law who has claimed the good holiday for ten years running. Two letters from Vaughan, both about the same thing: who gets to decide.

Plus the holiday group chat. The longest message you've ever seen, a reply to a question from nine messages ago, and one uncle who sends a thumbs-up. To what, Frank? What have you agreed to?

Joseph reads both letters, torches neither woman who wrote in, and admits that one disappointed "oh, okay then" on the phone and he'd offer to host both families, cook two turkeys, and pick everybody up. And bring back his container.

This episode is brought to you by Savor Us Catering in Vaughan. Elvira and her team cater across the GTA. Five percent off your first order, code in the free BTC Magazine app, App Store or Google Play, search BTC Magazine.

BOOK SIGNING: Sunday, October 18, 2 to 4 PM at Hillcrest Mall in Richmond Hill. Joseph will be signing The Dad Diaries and reading a passage. Come say hi.

THE DAD DIARIES, Joseph's memoir, is out now, published by Cormorant Books. Signed copies at thedaddiaries.com, also on Amazon and Indigo.

Got a mess of your own? Send it to info@jeopublishing.com.
More at betweenthecoversmag.com, or read the magazine free in the BTC Magazine app, iOS and Android.
Bitch Fest is a Between the Covers production.

I opened a bag of chips on Saturday and it exhaled. Half air. And on the front, in a little yellow starburst, it said NEW LOOK. Girl, the look is the same. There's just less of you.

This week we're going to the grocery store. Not to yell at the people who work there. Leave them alone. The kid on cash did not decide what butter costs. We're going after the people who decide what things cost, how much of it you actually get, and what the store knows about you when you walk in.

The Competition Bureau just opened a call for information on grocery pricing. Shrinkflation. Skimpflation. Loyalty programs. Algorithms. In my grocery store. I go in for milk, I come out analyzed.

The ice cream tub that stopped talking. The toilet paper hole that keeps growing. Brenda from product, who got a bonus for making your lasagna sadder. Why a discount has to be "loaded" like a dishwasher. The digital price tags on every shelf, and the law Manitoba actually had to pass so a store can't charge you more because of what it knows about you.

And I'm in this one. I've done food campaigns. I've stood in my own kitchen and told you something was a great deal without checking the grams. I've never been in that meeting. But I've been the ad that came out of it.

Plus what to actually do: answer the Bureau, read the small number on the shelf tag, take a picture of the price, and stop yelling at the cashier. She's on your side. She's just wearing their shirt.

This episode is brought to you by Cheekbone Beauty, an Indigenous-run brand founded by Jen Harper. Get 20% off Cheekbone through the free BTC Magazine app (App Store or Google Play), and read our interview with Jen while you're in there.

Send me your shrink. The product, the before, the after. I want the worst one in Ontario.

BOOK SIGNING: Sunday, October 18, 2 to 4 PM at Hillcrest Mall in Richmond Hill. I'll be signing The Dad Diaries and reading a passage. Come say hi.

THE DAD DIARIES, my memoir, is out now. It's the story of how I became a father to my girls and everything it took to get there. Signed copies at thedaddiaries.com, also on Amazon and Indigo.

This is Joseph Tito, and I bitch so you don't have to.

Got a mess of your own? Send it to info@jeopublishing.com.

More at betweenthecoversmag.com, or read the magazine free in the BTC Magazine app, iOS and Android.

Bitch Fest is a Between the Covers production.

A five-year-old told his teacher he was going to rip her face off and eat it. She said, "Do you want salt with that?" That's the episode.

A teacher wrote in anonymously, because legally she can't tell you what happens in your kid's classroom. The daily meltdowns. The kicking, the biting, the scissors. The twenty-four other kids told to ignore it. The ten minutes of paperwork for a two-second incident. And the code teachers speak because it's all they're allowed to say: "He had a big day." "We're working on regulation." "Your daughter was very patient today."

Joseph decodes the code, refuses to roast a five-year-old, names the real villain (one teacher, zero assistants, and a gag order), and confesses to being Summers-Off Steve, the guy at the barbecue who says "must be nice, two months off." He said it to a teacher's face. She smiled like a hostage.

Plus three things to actually say: at dinner tonight, to the teacher, and at parent council.

This episode is brought to you by Mathnasium of Newmarket, run by Maria Elisa, a former teacher who found a way to make kids do math on purpose. Two hundred dollars off through the BTC Magazine app. Newmarket. Not Aurora, not Vaughan. Newmarket.

Joseph's memoir THE DAD DIARIES is out now, published by Cormorant Books. Signed copies at thedaddiaries.com, also on Amazon and Indigo.

Got a mess of your own? Send it to info@jeopublishing.com.

More at betweenthecoversmag.com, or read the magazine free in the BTC Magazine app, iOS and Android.

Bitch Fest is a Between the Covers production.

Three weeks into the school year I got an email saying my daughter was being switched to another class. So I went into that school like I was about to personally replace the Ministry of Education. No training. No experience. Just a daughter and a fucking opinion.

Then they told me why. Funding cuts. A class being cut. The secretary now splitting her time between two schools. The vice principal, same thing. Half here, half there. I'd come in to complain about the mess. They were the ones trying to make the mess work.

This one is about the school office, where every parent starts with "sorry, just a quick thing" and it is never a quick thing. About a woman being "shared" like a plate of cookies, when putting her name on a second schedule does not create a second woman. About who's doing the other half. About the new sign outside the school that gets more adults than the problem it's standing in front of. And about the appreciation mugs, when what she actually needs is a job posting.

And I'm in this one. I was the parent who walked in at full volume. Apparently my interest in education funding was waiting for a personal invitation, and it arrived in my inbox.

No school named. No board named. On purpose.

Teachers, EAs, secretaries, parents: tell me what's happening. Send it through the free BTC Magazine app (App Store or Google Play). I will not name your school and I will not name your board.

THE DAD DIARIES, my memoir, is out now. It's the story of how I became a father to my girls and everything it took to get there. Signed copies at thedaddiaries.com, also on Amazon and Indigo.

This is Joseph Tito, and I bitch so you don't have to.

Got a mess of your own? Send it to info@jeopublishing.com.

More at betweenthecoversmag.com, or read the magazine free in the BTC Magazine app, iOS and Android.

Bitch Fest is a Between the Covers production.

A woman writes in about a husband who has appointed himself Head of Loss Prevention for their marriage. He supervises her at the self-checkout. He audits the grocery bill. He announces to an entire restaurant that he is not tipping.

None of these places employ him.

Joseph calls him Dave, because this is Dave behaviour, and because Dave has been radicalized by a debit terminal. The trouble is that Dave isn't wrong. Tipping screens are out of control, the cereal box is a pamphlet, and they made the toilet paper narrower and thought nobody would notice. Being right about the problem still doesn't entitle you to become the town crier at a sandwich counter.

Also: the Italian mothers of Woodbridge who drove to three stores with a flyer and a pen and were right about all of it, a confession involving a twelve-dollar item on a patio bill, and sixty-eight thousand loyalty points being guarded like offshore money.

Next week: the coworkers who are not your friends, and the birthday card that proved it.

Joseph's memoir THE DAD DIARIES is out September 26th. Signed copies at thedaddiaries.com, or pre-order anywhere you buy books.

Got a mess of your own? Send it to info@jeopublishing.com.

More at betweenthecoversmag.com — or read the magazine free in the BTC Magazine app, iOS and Android.

Bitch Fest is a Between the Covers production.