The word of the day is mombat....

I recently heard the term mombat,  a very close cousin to the word combat, which by definition is a purposeful violent conflict meant to establish dominance over the opposition, or to kill the opposition, or drive the opposition away from a location where it is not wanted or needed.  Mombat refers to mothers engaged in such conflict, in all likelihood without causing physical harm.

I experienced mombat first hand when my children's preschool was nominated in a local Patch poll to determine the best preschool or daycare in town.  

It was a heated race that had parents all over town voting, commenting, and cheerleading for their preschools and daycares.  Actually, mainly just the preschool parents got carried away, the daycare parents were clearly too busy with other things like WORK to comment.  The online commenting got a little ugly even necessitating the local editor and publisher to moderate at times!  One commenter advised everyone to stop getting their "panties in a bunch!" It was mombat.  It was pretty entertaining.  

Clearly something like preschool is a sensitive topic for mothers.  It's one of the first major choices you make for your child, and to imagine that you may not have chosen "the best" could make some suburban moms resort to mombat.  I've heard that kindergarden lotteries and sports tryouts evoke similar instances of mombat, but I'd bet you've already seen that for yourself.