We still have Easter to go between now and
then, but the top news at school today – at least for the Grade Eight students
– was the upcoming trip to Washington that’s now just three weeks away. Uncle Nick had information packages for us
today that included everything from flight and hotel details to our itinerary
for the week. That information has all
of us getting fired up about our biggest school trip ever so far, and for me;
getting to spend that week with Michael, Rowen, Tim, and the rest of our
friends is going to be the best part of our adventure to the capitol.
What we’ll be doing will be fun too; though
the political cynic in me wouldn’t mind skipping the attempts at indoctrination
we’ll be subjected to during some of our activities. I really don’t want to get into that tonight,
or really at all; but here’s a hint for politicians in general – kids and teens
aren’t nearly as stupid as you’d like to think we are. If you think that’s scary, you’d be terrified
to know that you’re about to have a teenage Magi Master in your town with empathic
and telepathic abilities that don’t require overt use – especially when
emotions and thoughts are strong enough.
In other words; I have an extremely
effective built-in B.S. detector; and there is a lot of that going on around
our nation’s capitol. There’s a very
good chance that I’ll need to keep my big mouth shut fairly often while we’re
there – particularly when we’re touring Capitol Hill. If we actually get up close and personal with
very many senators or congresspersons it might be scary for me to find out just
how much more education I’ll get than planned by our teachers; and those
politicians might be terrified if they ever found out that their secrets weren’t
so secret anymore.
There are times when I wonder if my
abilities could make things better in government, but putting that kind of
honesty into politics – at least openly – would probably just be very hazardous
to my health. Hopefully I’ll be able to
do more through our family business and dealing with Dark Magi instead. What does it say about me that the prospect
of confrontations with Dark Magi doesn’t seem as scary to me as fighting the
federal government does? ;^)
Let’s move along to the rest of the news
from today.
We’ve had another fairly decent weather
day, so Michael, Tim, Rowen, and I spent as much time outdoors as we could –
including at lunchtime and after school.
There was some football action at noon and later when we were at the
park before dinner. Rowen and I played
to after having our lunches; but we were only spectators for the game at the
park. Parental tolerance for our study
time shifting is in our favor for now while the nice days are still hit and
miss this spring; but that’ll probably change before much longer so we’ll enjoy
the breaks while they last. Then again,
as the daylight hours get longer; playing after dinner will be more of an
option too – especially once it doesn’t cool of quite so much each night.
I’ve skipped over the class work action, and
this week; we’re doing some testing in most subjects along with ramping up the
Easter-themed lessons and activities.
The Easter fun is still more geared toward the younger kids; but even
themed math problems can be more fun than the standard questions. Going outside for Phys-Ed was an option again
today too; and after going for a run on the track, we ended the school day with
some soccer fun.
Michael came home with me after school and
we hooked up the trailer to my bike so that we could take Ethan and Ehlana with
us for our biking and play plans. He
grabbed his bike too, and then we met up with Rowen and Tim for a construction
site tour before going on to the park.
The guys were already getting together by then for the football
scrimmage, so we did that first. Ethan
got to have a couple of football moments with Michael, and Rowen, Ehlana, and I
sat around on the bleachers and talked with some of the other girls for a
while; but Rowen and I eventually took the twins to the playground so they
could have some fun there while Michael and Tim stayed and played football
until it was time for all of us to head to our homes for dinner. I needed to drop off Ethan and Ehlana at home
first and then take my computer bag with me to Michael’s so I’d have it when we
needed to do our homework; so I didn’t get to his house until dinner was almost
ready to go.
The meal that Jacob made for us was as
awesome as always, and I wouldn’t trade the after-school play time for the
earlier study session; but doing that work after finishing dinner and cleaning
up definitely takes some of the fun out of our usual evenings at Michael’s
house. Maybe we should think about doing
that on the nights we’re at my house instead – then we could use a little Magi
power to shorten our study time down to minutes instead of working at ‘normal’
speed the way we need to when we’re at his place. Michael and I still made time for my guitar
lesson, and we had a short visit with his parents and Rebecca before I needed
to go home; but we didn’t get any alone time.
So far, we’re not having much success with making more time for that in
our schedule; but I’ll keep hoping that’ll work out for us eventually.
By the way, I didn’t mention it on the
weekend, but Rebecca told me about her Saturday night sleepover at Jenny’s when
we had some time to talk without the boys around; and then we heard a bit too
much information about Miranda and Jacob’s kid-free night. That’s again something that gets weirder as I
move into the teen years, and while I’m glad that our parents have romance in
their lives; this is also a case where less information would be okay with me.
Even with the extra study time tonight, I
still made it home early enough to have a chat with Ethan and Ehlana before
tucking them into bed for the night. Mom
did a long shielding lesson with me that included playing around with some
ideas we’ve had about improving different kinds of shields – and layering them
for different purposes. That was fun,
but it also put me behind on my bedtime study and work plans. It was already after eleven o’clock by the
time I hopped into bed with Mandy; and I’ve worked for the past three hours on
my language studies, an archive assignment, and an hour and a half of family
business work that I really needed to get done tonight so that I could take
advantage of an opportunity with a very small window that’s going to make us a
nice little profit while helping one of our charities with some much-needed
jobs for their clients.
I’m ready to wrap this up and head off to
sleep now, but before I do that; there are a couple of changes coming up to my
normal school week plans. Michael has a
Bassett family function to go to tomorrow night, so we won’t be hanging out
together – mostly because boyfriends and girlfriends aren’t on the invite
list. That’s going to work out for me
anyway because Patrick’s birthday is on Wednesday; and Rowen and I are going to
help her mother with getting everything ready for the party before leaving the
house so that Patrick and his buddies can party without us around. Rowen’s staying with me for a sleepover too;
so our usual work day plans won’t be happening for either of us. Since I won’t be hanging out with Michael as
usual tomorrow night; I’ll do my family business work night after dinner
instead.
It’s still going to be a busy couple of
days, though, and I’d better get started on the down time I can get tonight; so…
…Live long and prosper, fellow Magi of the
Light!
