Congratulations, Aunt Leanne and Uncle
Adam; and happy belated birthday, Aunt Leanne!
This news won’t hit the town grapevine for
another week or so, but Mom was first to find out today that Aunt Leanne is
pregnant; which means that there is a very good chance that her baby is going
to be a bonus birthday present that won’t be delivered until next July. While I do not need any details about that,
it is going to be a really cool story for them, and for my cousin –
particularly when they also have Zack as a days-early birthday gift for Aunt
Leanne too. She’d tell you that the days-early
part of that was the gift, since going through that on her birthday would have
sucked; but I digress.
That was the top story of the day for me –
and our family; but there was a lot going on in addition to that. It was cool but nice out this morning, so we’re
really enjoying the bonus days we’re getting for Tai Chi by the river. Michael went back home for breakfast after
joining us for that, and it was fairly quiet at our house while I got ready for
school and had breakfast with Mom, Dad, and the twins. The top stories at school today included
Halloween, football, and in our grade; Michael and Tim’s trip to see Kyle’s
football game. Let’s start with number
three on that list.
I hadn’t seen Tim yesterday after they got
back because they’d dropped Michael off at home with his luggage and then
Michael had walked over to the Inn. That’s
why I didn’t get to see how Tim was handling what had happened to him and
Michael while they were away. From my
perspective, knowing what I do from last night; it was tough not to laugh at
his avoidance techniques – especially once his weirdness started to get Rowen
both suspicious and annoyed. We had a
little bedtime chat tonight – Rowen and I – so she’s okay now; and we’re
expecting to have the weird kind of fun continue until the boys get up the
nerve to tell us the big story whenever they figure out how to do that.
On the football front, Tim was a hero among
the younger guys today thanks to his big plays in the game on Friday night, and
with two games left to go in the regular season; there’s some real excitement
building at the prospect of being in the playoffs again this year – especially since
nobody expected that we would be. Yes,
we have six wins and just two losses, but our last two games are against
division rivals, so that could change very easily; and I really hope that the
guys ignore all of the hype and just concentrate on the games. Our offense is making the difference right
now, but Coach Robinson can’t be happy with our defense giving up points on
every drive in that game – something that just didn’t happen during the last
few seasons.
The Halloween news was mostly about the
dating scene for the teens, and the pairings for the dance this Friday
night. That isn’t a big deal for Rowen
and me because we don’t expect to have time for more than an appearance at the
dance if we get back from the football game in time to do that. The Haunted Halloween Walk on Saturday night
was getting a bit of attention too, but the younger kids were more excited
about that since they won’t be involved in the dance at all. There was lots of talk about costumes for
Halloween too, but Michael, Tim, Rowen, and I haven’t even really talked about
whether we’re going trick-or-treating yet, let alone what we want to dress up
as for the school party or if we do go out.
On the actual school work front, we’re
doing some testing this week and working on projects that will be due by the
end of the month before we move into new study modules for the weeks between Halloween
and Thanksgiving. The testing is causing
a bit of stress with some of my classmates, and Michael, Rowen, and I get asked
for help sometimes, but since we’re all busy with everything else we have on
the go too; those requests don’t come very often. I should try and do better helping some of my
friends with that – especially now that we’re in high school; and it’s way more
important than anything extra-curricular that we’re doing.
That said, cheerleading practice was still
near the top of the list for school-time fun – especially since we had such a
nice afternoon for being outdoors. Rowen
and I stayed after our practice to wait for Michael and Tim, but Michael and I
needed to get to his house for dinner by then; so we didn’t get any time to
hang out together. Dinner with Michael
and his family was as awesome as always, and then Rebecca did her homework at
the same time that Michael and I did after we finished the kitchen
clean-up. I had a guitar lesson with
Michael after that; we practiced our music for band and the praise team too;
and then I needed to get home so that I could catch the tail-end of our family
business and future plans meeting already in progress.
Hearing about Aunt Leanne’s news then was
great, and there was a pause in the meeting while I got to hear that story and
spend some time doing hugs and kisses with my aunt and uncle; but then they got
back to the meeting while I spent a few minutes catching up on what I’d missed
by having Ethan and Ehlana flash me the report so far telepathically. To keep that fairly short, the med center
construction is a bit ahead of schedule; Uncle Adam and Ehlana are continuing
their research into weather-resistant crops at the lab; the outdoor side of
construction for the second apartment building and new houses is already
starting to wind down to get ready for winter; and there are a few high school
seniors being helped out with future education and career planning to help meet
some of the needs we’re going to have here by the time they start graduating
from college in five or six years.
I’d better add in just a little more detail
than that for a couple of those things.
Ehlana is working on the crops, starting with wheat, because she knows
how critical food supplies are – particularly in the poorer countries; and the
severe droughts in particular are going to be a problem if they continue for
extended periods of time in places where big crop harvests are counted on to
meet global demand. While that work is
still in its infancy, we do have some advantages over other researchers; and
Ehlana will get results. I’m admittedly
biased; but my little sister really is off-the-charts brilliant. She thinks that it’s funny that I think that
about her when other people think the same thing about me, but I know the
difference; and so does Ehlana.
Yes, Ethan is brilliant too, but as with
me; his is in a different way that either Ehlana or me.
An easy way to think about the difference
between us, Ehlana can dream and create; Ethan will quite possibly know it all someday;
and I can understand and do things better than most. There are reasons why we’ve been given our
respective gifts, and I won’t get into them; but I can assure you that it’s
going to make for an awesome combination – and come in very handy in the
future!
Moving along, Uncle Adam, Uncle Mark, and
Aunt Deborah are looking forward to when their new medical center will be ready
to open next June, and while they still have lots of time; they are starting to
plan for that move – and all of the work that will be involved to do that. They will be getting mostly all-new
equipment; but there will still be some things that they’ll keep – particularly
the antiques and the medicine-related family heirlooms. Uncle Adam’s healing gift likely comes down
to him through a distant Palmer relative; but the doctors in town have been
from the Johnson family for centuries now.
Some of those antiques may seem strange in an ultra-modern medical
center; but I’m sure that Aunt Deborah will find a way to make it work.
I should also mention that the timing for
the medical center opening will work out pretty well for her too. She’ll be busy with that at the same time that
Uncle Nick will be off for the summer and able to help out more with the
kids. Speaking of that, I already did a
baby update for Aunt Grace and Aunt Deborah, so I won’t do that again; but some
planning for their respective maternity leaves were talked about again
tonight. We will have everything ready
to go for dealing with that at the lab and clinic by the end of this month; so
we’ll also be able to adjust if either of my aunts need to stop work early or
have any other issues.
The new housing being built now is mostly
to get ready for new needs we’ll have next summer, and while we won’t need all
of the apartments in the new apartment building next summer; those buildings
are important – particularly for both younger and older adults. We already know from the first apartment
building that the seniors there really appreciate having elevators and other
amenities they can’t have in older houses; and the younger singles and couples
like having their own places without either the work that goes along with
owning or renting a house or the inconvenience of the walk-up apartments above
the stores on the main drag. I don’t
know if I’ll ever want to go back to living in an apartment again or not. That worked for Mom and me when we needed it
to; but I love having a yard and all of the other advantages of having a house –
even though it really is a lot more work.
Let’s keep this update rolling along, or it’ll
be time for me to just get up and started on my Tuesday by the time I get this
done. On the non-family side of the
future plans news, we had two main items.
The second-hand charity store remodel work will be done by the end of
the month; and the owners will be able to start setting up their shop the first
week of November. They will have it
ready to open the week of Thanksgiving; which should make for a great start to
their first year of business. Our only
involvement in that is that Mom, my aunts, Ehlana, Leah, and I will all be
going through our wardrobes and putting together donations to give to
them. Since I can’t wear any of my
clothes from last winter, and won’t be able to wear any of my current summer
clothes by next summer; I’ll probably have the biggest donation. I’m sure that Mom will weed out her closet
pretty thoroughly too – and then need to go shopping with Abby to pick up a few
new replacements.
The other business we discussed tonight was
the Inn. It’s time to start seriously
talking with Miranda and with Nathaniel Ayres about moving the Haberdashery so
that Jacob and Miranda can take over that building and expand the Inn to
accommodate their growing business and be ready for when they have a second
world-class chef available to really help them to handle all of that new
business. I know, Jake and Stephanie are
only in their second year of college, but they’re doing four-year programs; and
we’re talking about a major remodel that will probably take a year and a half
or more to complete – and that can’t even start until after the Haberdashery is
moved. There’s a good chance that will
be hard for Uncle Nick’s father, since their store has been there as long as
the Inn and Emporium have been; but it solves several other problems –
including the lack of need for the apartments above his store that can be used
for more hotel rooms instead. I don’t
really want to get into what Ethan, Ehlana, and I see for the future of the
Haberdashery, but I hope that when you read this someday in the future, Mr.
Ayres; you’ll be okay with the reasons we have for knowing this is something
that is as important for you and your family as it is for the Stones.
There were lots of little items that we
covered tonight, but I won’t get into everything – though now that I think
about that; I’m overdue for an update on the solar-wind farm project. Mr. Sheldon is doing a great job with that,
and while the work will move indoors for the winter; we’re looking at
mid-summer to be ready to go online. The
best parts of that project is that we’ll usually produce way more energy than
our town needs; the extra power will be sold into the grid; and we will have
very little to worry about anymore with losing power during a storm because a
lot of the new infrastructure between the power farm and town will be
underground. That’ll be nice for all of
us, but particularly good for the lab and medical center.
Okay, enough of the meeting news, or I
really might as well just stay awake until tomorrow night. Our guests didn’t head home until after
eleven; I helped Mom with getting Ethan and Ehlana off to bed; and then she did
my Magi lesson with me before giving me my archive homework and sending me off
to bed at twelve-thirty. That was more
than three and a half hours ago; and I’ve been working and studying hard since
then. That’s included an hour of
language study, another hour and a half on that archive homework; and an hour
of family business work that could’ve been two easily enough if I’d wanted to
keep working. Yes, I did get a lot of
work done, but that sometimes feels never-ending – and I’m trying to work ahead
knowing that I have a couple of very busy weekends coming up that won’t leave
me with time for much family business work or studying.
I’m sure that my Tuesday is going to be
just as busy – especially with cheerleading, band, and praise team
practices. That should be interesting to
get through on a couple of hours of sleep.
I’ll predict that a Magi-powered self-healing for fatigue will be in my
future – in about two hours. The nap
time is still important, though, so I’m going to get to that right now.
May the Magi Force be with you!
