What do you do when your couples-only study group plans that
are primarily meant to be a matchmaking opportunity do not work out because the
target of that matchmaking doesn’t follow the script like he’s supposed to
do? You arrange for two more boys to
join the group to make things even.
The fact that those two boys in question have girlfriends in
other grades was apparently just a technical detail. Talking up the benefits of studying with two
of the class brainiacs – that would be Rowen and me – was all it took to
convince them to at least give it a try for one afternoon, so with the addition
of Gil and Allen; we had an even dozen working in the dining room at Tim’s
house after school today.
Vanessa and Nora were quite happy with themselves when Rowen
and I actually did spend a lot of time helping Gil and Allen, but if they were
hoping that would give Vanessa more time to get some one-on-one tutoring with
Michael; that part of the plan wasn’t very successful at all. It’s not that Michael didn’t help Vanessa to
study – he just made sure that he helped everyone except Rowen and me
equally. He also made a point of keeping
me out of the tweeird zone while we were there by not really doing anything
together with me other than asking the occasional question; or discussing some
of the topics we were studying tonight.
You can imagine how grateful I was not to have any tweeirdness going on,
or even worse – a competing matchmaking attempt directed my way.
We studied until nearly six, and then Rowen and I were first
to leave; mostly because I was going to be late for dinner by the time we
walked home. I wasn’t sure until after
dinner whether I’d be able to skip Mom and Dad’s baseball practice or not, but
Uncle Adam and Aunt Leanne offered to take Ethan and Ehlana to the park so that
I could stay home and work. I decided to
do that in my room; starting out by sitting in the window alcove and working on
the family business for a couple of hours using a little Magi power to speed up
my computing. I wrapped that up when Mom
and Dad brought Ethan and Ehlana home from the park, and not only had Uncle
Adam and Aunt Leanne with them; but Grandma and Grandpa too.
They’d come home too so they could get in on an Olde Bakery
bedtime snack; and we all spent nearly an hour out on the back porch having a
little visit before it was time to put Ethan and Ehlana to bed; and I came up
to my room again to enjoy some Jacuzzi time while starting my bedtime
studies. After my bath, I needed a
little keyboard playing wind down time, and then climbed into bed with Mandy to
wrap up my day with some language studying before getting to my usual nightly
computer checks and writing this journal entry.
I skipped over most of the day, but other than having some
rain this morning that kept us indoors for Tai Chi; there wasn’t much to report
from home or at school – it was just another school day with our teachers
getting us ready for exams. While the
weather was nice enough to cooperate for Mom and Dad’s ball practice tonight,
it still isn’t looking good for tomorrow night – or for our game on Saturday
for that matter. We’ll be doing another
study group tomorrow night, so the weather won’t matter for that, but it
remains to be seen whether I’ll be back in the tweeird zone again or not. That’s because Rowen was nice enough to
suggest that we have our third study session at my house just as we were
getting ready to leave Tim’s house; and that offer was enthusiastically
accepted by the majority; if not unanimously.
Now that I’m thinking about that, I’m going to wrap this up
and give my room and the lounge a quick Magi-powered once-over before getting
some sleep. Mandy and I keep everything
neat and tidy, but I suddenly feel the need to shoot for near-spotless.
Okay, that isn’t really fair to do that when even Magi kids
my age don’t get to use wards and do things like that, but I do want everything
to look good for my classmates who will be coming here for the first time.
I can practically see you giving me the look from where
you’re sitting and reading this some day in the future, Rowen, so let’s just
agree that I’m not perfect; and let it go at that.
That’s all for now, and I really do want to get that
cleaning done so I can get some sleep, so...
...until next time, this is Magi Master Cassie Proctor;
logging out!
