Naomi, Ethan, Ehlana, Aiden, Sophia, and
Aaron:
This update is coming to you from Cassie
and Michael’s house; and we are all here while my future mother-in-law is in
Crystal Springs for the night. I am
writing this instead of Ehlana because I can, and you’re welcome, future Magi
reader; since I am a much-better story-teller! ;^)
Since I wasn’t there for Ethan and Ehlana’s
Tai Chi by the river and breakfast with their Mom; I’ll instead advise you that
I do my own morning workouts; that happened in my back yard this morning; and
then my breakfast was standard school day fare while I tried to ignore the
younger brother next to me while he demolished half a box of cereal; a pack of
Pop Tarts; and three drinks before he took a snack to go and went to meet up
with Zack for the walk to school. Yes, I
know that Ethan needs to eat a lot too – especially now that they’re into
football season and he is burning a ton of calories every day, but he doesn’t
look like a ravenous wolf while eating; and uses his manners even when nobody
else is around.
Moving along, my academic adventures in
Grade Eleven are only different from Ethan and Ehlana’s because I have more
optional classes; and I’m not doing everything with Aaron this year either;
since we’ve picked a few different classes.
Part of that change for us is interest-based, but I’m also looking to go
to college for International Business to help Ehlana so that we can be future
billionaires while Aaron is looking toward government management – which for
our little town and district requires a skill-set that is related to what I
want to do, but without the billionaire prospects! Aaron thinks that’s funny and wants me to
mention that President Trump is a billionaire; so I could be wrong about
that! Getting back to my point, I am
taking the maths and sciences that will get me what I need for my future
college programs; Aaron is doing the same; and then we’re each taking classes
that we like and want to learn about for the rest of our optionals. We like the variety this year; and I am
never, ever going to take biology classes ever again – and yes, that is
entirely because I do not want to even see something being dissected ever
again. I will leave that kind of
studying and learning to the future doctors and scientists and animal experts
to learn all about while I focus my future expertise elsewhere!
Ehlana, Sophia, and I had our cheer squad
practice at noon so we could also attend the first school band practice of the
year. That’s where our top news story of
the day happened; and we are officially going to start another marching band
and start preparing and raising money for a band trip to Disney World for early
2028. We won’t get that date until we
apply for a spot and get invited again, but we’ve been told that is much-easier
after the first approval – at least for the bands that do well in that first
parade. The first steps are going to
happen fast; we’re going to start an evening practice for the marching band
starting next Tuesday evening; and open invitations have been sent out this
time not just to Maple Valley, but also to Brookbridge for students interested
in joining our marching band for that trip to Florida. We’ll see how many other students join right
away, but they should want to start with us fairly-soon; since the fundraising
is going to take time; since the costs per person will be significant. We’re all very happy that we are going ahead
with the plan; and I’m sure that Ethan and Ehlana will keep you posted on band
news as it happens. For tonight; I’ll
only add that we will be starting the monthly fruit and vegetable boxes fundraiser
orders by next week; the deal has already been worked out with the Bassetts;
and we’re brainstorming for other fundraisers that will be added in the coming
weeks and months. All records from the
last trip to Florida are available; so we also know what we need to do; and
what did and didn’t work for raising money last time.
While the girls in our current little group
were at band practice after school; the boys were at football practice; and
they had to deal with a bit of rain and took a break while a thunderstorm rolled
through town. We were all done around
the same time; split up to go home and round up overnight bags; and then we met
up here for dinner with Cassie and Michael.
We still have time before their next trip, but we’ve also all been very
busy; and haven’t spent as much time together as we’d all like – including right
now as they are working downstairs and doing a couple of video conference calls
along with the computer work. We had fun
with that meal; the teens took care of the clean-up; and then our evening
entertainment included some live music; a movie; and lots of chat time as we
traded stories about school, band, football, work, and more through until
Cassie and Michael needed to get to work again.
We’re winding down toward the co-ed nap time that we’ll get to
eventually, but we are comfortable; happy; and enjoying the teen chat time; so
let’s get to my version of the world news report; and then I’ll get back to
helping Ethan out with our personal co-ed cuddling fun!
The majority of our world leaders are
either insane, idiots, or both; they continue to cause the vast majority of
problems in the world; wars are bad; genocide is worse; and all of the bad and
evil guys – and girls – need to be stopped!
Yes, I am including Gwyneth Hathorne in that group; and she does not get
any mitigating points for having good taste in guys when the one she seems to
like the most is mine and she can’t have him!
Since I do want to be a future billionaire business expert; I’ll focus
the rest of my comments on the economic consequences continuing to develop
because of the wars and destruction.
Most of those same leaders are oblivious or intentionally-ignore the
reality happening all around them. That
isn’t unusual for politicians, and neither is the need to blame anyone and
anything other than themselves for consequences to their actions, but both are
becoming blatantly-obvious to everyone that wants to pay attention and see what
is really happening. We certainly see
the problems in a small farming community like ours, and we’re adapting and
working together to deal with the challenges.
Thanks to Sophia, we know that her father is getting together with other
businesses and farmers to start an official co-op to consolidate their collective
buying power for fuel and other products like fertilizer and petroleum-linked
products. That will take time to build
and schedule for efficiency and cost-effectiveness, but that is one way we’re
dealing with the increasing prices affecting our farms and stores; and other
communities would do well to emulate us.
The biggest risks to the world economy in
the coming year might prove to be food supplies; since problems for growing
food extend beyond fuel and fertilizer prices in a lot of places around the world. The heat this summer has led to lower crop
yields; the Ukraine war is hitting exports of farm products from two of the
world’s largest food exporters; and food insecurity is a potential flash point
for new conflicts and migration as people get hungry and desperate. While food is a major near-future risk for a
lot of the world; I’ll add that the world economy is also at risk from
ridiculous levels of debt; mal-investment that is often caused by lies and
false information and greed; and by wasting so many resources of all kinds on
all of the pointless wars.
I feel the urge for a rant coming on and
don’t want to go there when cuddling with Ethan is a much-happier place to be;
so I’ll stop here and have fun with that instead! Stay tuned for Ehlana’s and Ethan’s next
report; since I’m sure they’ll have more to write about that I don’t want to
even think about tonight – like the report they were looking at tonight about
an admission from the American Secretary of the Air Force that ‘we’ have
military weapons in space. We apparently
aren’t doing enough stupid things here on earth; so our leaders think it a good
idea to take our wars into space where it is so-cluttered with man-made junk
that one stupid mistake in the wrong place could cause a chain reaction that
would take out all of the tech that we rely on for everything from communications
and the internet to keeping track of our transportation systems and supply
chains.
I really don’t want to go anywhere else
except closer to Ethan now; so I am out of here right now.
Until next time, live with love, fellow
Magi of the Light!
