Ethan:
We had fun this morning with Tai Chi and
breakfast for six, but then Ehlana and I had a chores day after that; none of
that work was exciting-enough to write about here; and we kept busy with that
through until dinnertime except for a couple of breaks and lunch. We ate late; watched a show with Mom and Dad
in the living room; and headed for bed fairly-early – starting with long baths
or Jacuzzi time.
I’m going to get some sleep now; and leave
the rest of this update to Ehlana – because she really wants to have fun with
that for the dinner, movies, and sleepover stories.
Ethan – out!
***
Ehlana:
You’ve likely guessed that the news
highlight from last night involves Ethan and Naomi, so in a back-handed way; he
still managed to write about it while skipping the details.
Let’s start with the understanding that we
do not get away with anything thanks to our links with Mom and Dad. They also have nothing to worry about from
four kids and our sleepovers; so letting Ethan and Naomi ‘get away’ with a sofa
sleepover is really only a cute story – and an opportunity for some of our
favorite people to tease them about that when it happens. No, Aiden and I did not have a sofa sleepover
too, but we reserve the right to use the precedent in the future. We did end up camping in the lounge too –
just not cuddled together. We also
watched our entire last movie while Ethan and Naomi slept; and it should be
funny that the quieter couple stayed awake longer while the most-fired-up
member of our little group ran out of energy.
Our family and friends dinner-and-a-movie
night was great too – and we didn’t even have any major trouble with Zack at
dinnertime. That was entirely thanks to
Grandpa’s stories and entertainment.
Zack can still be a bit scary even when he’s eating normally for him,
but that isn’t on the same level as when he’s trying his best to be gross and
disgusting. The dinner was pot-luck and
in the dining room, so that was a contributing factor to the civility; and our movie
was Halloween-themed and a favorite for all generations. Yes, even Brianna has had a spell put on her
by Bette Midler! ;^)
Our guests headed home soon-after the end
of that movie; we helped with the clean-up; and then we moved up to the lounge
with snacks, drinks, and plans for two more Halloween movies. Ethan and Naomi stayed awake and we had fun
through the first one; they fell asleep early into the second; and then Aiden
and I had fun watching that one with the added entertainment of getting to
tease the sleeping couple in the room.
We cuddled together for about half of that show, but Aiden got into a
sleeping bag on the floor while I took what had been ‘our side’ of the sofa;
and we only held hands until the end of the movie. Yes, we could have cuddled all night too, but
we’re just not there yet; and that’s okay with us.
Ethan’s right about the chores day and lack
of any exciting news, but I will note that we got a lot of work done with one
exception – we’re not really losing many leaves from the trees yet this fall
because of the extended warm weather.
That’ll be changing in a big way now, but with the fall festival next
weekend; it’ll be two weeks before we really get into that part of the annual
clean-up – unless Dad gives some or all of that work to Ryan and his buddies to
go along with mowing the lawn. He might
do that for the bigger parts of that job; since we do have all of the attachments
for the lawn tractor that make that work comparatively-easy – especially for
the twins in the family that wouldn’t have as much work to do instead! We did pretty much get the gardens put to bed
for the winter and the storage barn is cleaned out and nearly-ready for winter
too. Dad and Ethan did some work on the
generator too, but while we haven’t needed to use it since the Solar-Wind farm
went online; we’ll keep it ready for an emergency anyway.
While I’m thinking about that, we know that
there are other options for back-up power, but there are environmental costs
that go along with other choices like battery back-up systems big-enough to
power a house for days if needed, and since those systems also have re-charging
limits; it would be a waste to use up the entire life of those battery back-ups
without ever actually using them for an emergency. There are cases when new technology doesn’t
actually make sense at all for certain applications. This is going off-track from there, but my
favorite recent example of this sort of thing is the story about the test
race-track in Europe that Tesla uses for its cars – and the diesel-powered
super-charging station they use to charge the test cars. Seriously, people-in-charge-at-Tesla? Yes, I’m a junior Magi Master and working on
my unofficial doctorate in genetics, but the math on that one shouldn’t be too
hard for you! Burning fossil fuels to
generate electricity is less-efficient than just burning them to operate the car!
I am not suggesting that electric vehicles
don’t have a place in the big picture of energy usage in our future, but it
really is worse for the environment if that electricity is not generated
through renewable sources. I’ll save the
rant on how bad the entire mining industry is for getting the minerals and ores
needed for those all-important batteries for another time, but that is
something that we’ll want to fix some day if we’re ever in a position to put an
end to human exploitation.
That should have been a lesson we
collectively and permanently learned a few millennia ago; since there is a
rather-famous bible story or three on the subject!
Okay, I’m ready to wrap this up and get
some sleep – so I will.
This is Ehlana Proctor; coming to you live
from what is now my past!
