Happy 12th Birthday, Patrick!
Michael and I had a birthday present for
him, and we saw him at school a couple of times today; but that was pretty much
the entire extent of my involvement in his big day. While he was having a birthday party at home
that was mostly chaperoned by his grandparents; I spent most of my late
afternoon and early evening at the Inn with Michael and his family. Rowen and Tim helped out with Patrick’s party
too, and I chatted with Rowen on our computers a little while ago, so I know
they had fun tonight; but she’s also glad that Scott’s the only other male
tween still at the house now after hours of way too much guy tweird for one
day. Yes, Patrick and Scott have been a
lot better than they used to be, but even they backslide now and then when part
of the gang with the rest of their buddies.
Moving along, the daily rain is getting old
fast, but the continuing warm is nice; and we were able to be outdoors for Tai
Chi this morning even if it was a bit too wet for much outdoor fun at
lunchtime. Weather does bring down the
mood around school, so I’m looking forward to that improving sooner instead of
later – no matter how much the farmers want the rain after not getting as much
snow as they wanted over the winter.
That sentiment would likely sound funny to anyone from regions in the
country that had record snowfall this year; but then I’m sure the states that
have drought issues would have settled for the snow and rain we’ve had – and dreamed
of getting feet of snow to fill near-empty reservoirs.
That’s gone a bit off-track, and my point
was only meant to be about the emotional effect of weather on kids and teens. We’re basically a self-centered group; and
prefer our weather sunny, hot, and conducive to outdoor fun that also allows
for summer-weather clothing. Sure,
winter is okay for playing sometimes too, but even then; we prefer sunny over
stormy any day. Since I seem to be
rambling, I must be more tired than I feel – which is really tired; so let’s
try to get back to the actual news from today.
We are definitely back to lessons as usual
at school, and I suppose it’s’ possible that the lower enthusiasm level around
the place today is partly caused by the lowering sugar levels in most of the
students as the Easter candy supplies run out.
Whatever the reason, though, I’m sure that our teachers are glad that we’re
actually getting some work accomplished – something they’ll be pushing us to do
pretty much through until the end of the school year with a short pause for the
Memorial Day weekend.
Since Rowen and Tim were busy tonight,
Michael and I went straight to the Inn and did our homework there. We weren’t alone for that because Rebecca and
Jenny were there too. Michael heard way
more than he wanted to about Jenny’s break up with Lance while we studied
together; but Jenny just thought that it was funny every time she could get him
blushing. I haven’t mentioned Jenny at
the Inn very often for months now because she’s pretty much only helped out
there when it was convenient for her dating and social schedule, but she did
stay and help out tonight; and plans on doing that more now – and wants one of
the summer jobs there too this year. I’m
glad that we’ll be spending more time together again; while that news seemed to
scare Michael just a bit.
It wasn’t a very busy dinner rush tonight,
so neither Jenny or I really needed to be there to help out, but that did make
the work a little bit easier for everyone; and Michael and I were also able to
take a longer break for dinner too before helping out with the clean-up while
Rebecca and Jenny got to do game night set-up in the dining room. The gaming turnout was light too, which
definitely had something to do with why Michael and I won the junior title
tonight. Not having the normal crowd
allowed us to finish up with the games a bit early too; though we didn’t really
get home any earlier because we helped with the clean-up and had a little visit
with the Stones before Mom, Dad, Ethan, Ehlana, and I walked home with Michael
and his family too.
Getting teased about our goodnight hug and
kisses was an entertaining little cameo moment that wrapped up the play time
part of my night; and then it was time to get to work once we were home – at least
for three out of five of us. Dad needed
to get right to work, so Mom and I took care of getting the twins into bed for
the night; and then she did my Magi lesson with me in the living room so that
we wouldn’t bother Dad with a combo telekinesis and elements lesson that
involved fire, water, and multiple moving objects.
Yes, it was a fairly cool lesson; though it
was real work too. While the cool – or hot
– was in the what Mom had me doing; the lesson was actually all about
developing my ability to juggle multiple Magi talents simultaneously with
increasing levels of difficulty. If
there were actually any non-Magi reading this someday in the future, trust me;
what Mom has me doing is tough. Try
juggling a couple of dozen balls; lighting them as you toss them in the air;
putting the fire out and cooling each of them down before grabbing them to
throw them into the air and repeat the process.
Then, while you’re at that, if you miss and get burned; administer first
aid to yourself while continuing the hot and cold juggling. Add in doing all of that while walking across
a bed of hot razor blades; and you’re getting close to the kind of
multi-tasking that Mom’s coming up with for me these days.
Fun, right? ;^)
Okay, maybe that analogy was over the top,
and my lessons are usually a lot of fun; but I’m sure you get my point. That Magi play time was also the last of the
fun for me because I came up to my room and got to work after that while Mom
joined Dad in the office to do some of her own family business work. The text-chat time with Rowen was an
entertaining, but I can’t really call that a break in the work because I kept
up with my language studying while doing that with her. I’m sure she’s been sleeping for hours by now
since she was heading off to sleep when we ended that chat more than three
hours ago. After about seven hours of
full-immersion into tween guy land, though; I’m only surprised that she managed
to stay awake until I had my computer fired up and was online too. The studying, archive research, and family
business work has been fairly normal for a weeknight, but I did work a bit
harder tonight because I had things to get done ahead of the weekend that I
didn’t want to leave until Sunday night or next week sometime.
That’s why I used a bit of extra Magi power
to get all of that done – and why I’m running on empty now. I don’t have anything else to add to this
report, though, so getting to the sleeping part of my night is an option now –
and one that I’m going to choose starting in about two minutes.
Until next time...
...May the Magi Force be with you!
