Ehlana's and Ethan's Journals - August 28, 2026

 

Ehlana and Naomi:

My best friend is sitting in for Ethan today while we have the afternoon off from cheer squad and he’s still working with the football team to get ready for the game tonight.  We’ll mention that they are not doing any major physical training this afternoon, but they are doing meetings to go over game plans and plays; they’ll do more of a run-through of those plays before the end of the afternoon; and then they’ll get a break before needing to be back at the school for the home game rematch of last season’s championship game!  Naomi and I had our workout this morning; we’re ready for the game already; and we’re enjoying another sunny afternoon without the extra work – though we might do a few chores if our parents want the help.

As for the rest of our day, we weren’t together for Tai Chi by the river and breakfast, but we did have lunch with Ethan and Aiden and some of our friends; and now we’re doing this update early because we’re going to be busy for the rest of the day.  Along with the game, Ethan will be hosting what we hope will be an after-game party here at our house; and then we’ll keep our four best friends for a co-ed sleepover – not a camping night.  That choice is mostly because we don’t want to do that extra work, but we’re also saving up for the holiday weekend when camping is likely if the weather cooperates.  We’ll host dinner here before the game too, but that will be early and with a smaller group than Mom and Dad will have for family and friends ahead of the game but after we’ll need to be at the school.  That’s about all we have for our own news so far, but Naomi wants to take the opportunity to include some information that Ethan and I don’t mention about ourselves in our journals very often.

Ethan is my brother, so my opinion is different, but Naomi assures me that he is the hottest player on our team this year.  I’m tempted to get her list for hottest players for the past few – or fifteen – years, but maybe she can add top-ten lists to her own journal in the future.  One of us has mixed feelings about Ethan being taller than us now, but then that’s true for Aiden too; and I don’t mind that so much – and Ethan likely prefers being taller than I am now compared to the recent years when I was taller than him!  For the record, Ethan is currently five-foot, eleven inches; Aiden is an inch shorter; and Naomi and I are currently five-foot, six-inches and significantly slowing down on our annual growth rate!  I still have some catching up to Mom and Cassie, but Naomi is happy that she’s already taller than her Mom!  I’ll also concede that Naomi isn’t wrong about Ethan being handsome, but then she’s a bit inconsistent on that; since she also doesn’t want other girls to notice that fact while appreciating him a lot!  He is going to be a future librarian, though, so that might offset the attention he is sure to get during the football season!  We don’t want to spend too much time on this update; so here’s the world news of the day and then we’ll get back to the fun parts of our afternoon and the rest of the day!

Naomi is going to dictate that for me today; and she is going to keep this short because she can!  Being very specific, Naomi would like all future Magi reading this to know that our current National and World leaders are insane idiots, narcissistic, power-hungry, billionaire crooks – or both!  They don’t care about anyone else; and the solution is for us to take care of ourselves and show everyone else how to do that and create happy, joyful lives full of love instead of the selfishness and hatred that our leaders use to divide and steal from the rest of us!  As for all of the bad news we see every day – including with our check today; Naomi wants me to report that life is amazing here in our little corner of the world; we do not have any wars or tariffs or economic sanctions or blockades here; so the rest of the world should look at what we’re doing right and do the same!  She’s right and that won’t happen; so let’s stop there; be grateful for what we do have here at home; and get back to enjoying some of those blessings – including the time I get to spend with my amazing best friend! ;^)

Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!

Ehlana's and Ethan's Journals - August 27, 2026

 

Ehlana and Ethan:

The football team picks have been made; and nobody was surprised that Ethan, Aiden, and Aaron all made the cut!  Miles, Joshua, and Seth all earned spots on the team, but then there were more of our classmates that included a couple of surprises.  Steven Cassidy, Blair Benton, and Nolan Parker rounded out the Grade Ten guys; and that’s a fairly-large contingent.  There were Grade Nine surprises too, since we rarely see more than two make the cut; and we had three this year.  Brandon Green, Mike Morris, and Collin Sparks all earned Coach Robinson’s approval; so they are very happy tonight!  We don’t need to list the rest of the returning players, but will mention that Craig Robinson has been named team Captain, and while he is the coach’s son; he is also the most-qualified to take the job and all of the guys like him as much as they like his father!  Those picks were announced first thing this morning; the other hopefuls were sent on their way – though many of them stayed to watch the practice anyway; and the team workout was all about getting ready for the game tomorrow night.

While Ethan was busy with that; I still had a full day of cheer squad practice.  We have our routines chosen for tomorrow night and we’re pretty much ready to go too – though we are going to do a half-day of practice tomorrow morning and then rest up for the game.  The weather was again great for our practices with sun and warmth without too-much heat.  After being set free from the school this afternoon, we took the time for a cool-down swim with cousins and friends; and then we got to work on some yard chores that we might not have as much time for this weekend.  We worked through to a late dinner break; did a bit more after that until near-dusk; and then we have been wrapping up our day with a short Magi lesson with Mom; bath or Jacuzzi time; and this update and bedtime computer checks and twin chat fun.  Mom wants us to get the extra sleep tonight ahead of the big game, so let’s do the quick world news report; and then we’ll move on to nap time!

Our top story for today is from the Nepal-Tibet border, and as news gets out; the scope of the disaster there is becoming clear.  The most-cited explanation for the massive mudslides and flooding that have wiped out entire villages and towns is that there was a major glacier collapse.  Whatever the cause, hundreds of people have been killed; thousands are missing; and the region has been declared a disaster zone.  Ethan and I haven’t helped out with directing help to the region through our charities and family businesses, but Mom and Cassie have been doing what they can to help.  From our perspective, we wish that world leaders would pay attention to the real problems we have without the man-made disasters and choose to stop the wars and use those resources to help and build instead of destroy.

That isn’t happening today, and nothing has changed for the better in either of the \top’ wars of the year – or decade.  Tensions are definitely rising between Russia and the western countries; and Russia is seriously fed up with the direct involvement in the attacks on them that everyone knows Ukraine couldn’t do without systems basically being operated by western militaries and personnel.  The warnings are being ignored; so we can only hope that Russia does not retaliate directly on United Kingdom targets or anywhere else in Europe beyond Ukraine.  For the record; doing that would be within their rights of self-defense; and our military and leaders wouldn’t have waited this long if the same attacks had been done to us!

We’re going to stop there.  Ethan and I really do need to get the sleep while we can; so we’re out of here and off to dreamland right now.

Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!

Ehlana's and Ethan's Journals - August 26, 2026

 

Ehlana and Ethan:

Happy 1^st Birthday, Dane Wildes!

We had zero involvement in Dane’s special day, but he will be part of the future school gang for some of our favorite next-gen kids; so we hope that he, and his future friends, all have fun today!

Our adventures weren’t that exciting – or maybe they were better; and we won’t write about that part of our co-ed sleepovers last night! ;^)  The Pizzeria pizza picnic and ball practices last night were good; we went for a river swim to cool off after that; and some Magi healing was used to help us recover from the various workouts and practices of the day after we got home.  Mom did a group Magi lesson with us; bath or Jacuzzi time followed that time and a bit of family business work in the office; and then we wrapped up our day with quiet co-ed cuddle time that included some teen chat and music videos.  The two teen couples in the house split up for a while for a little bit of fun that we aren’t going to report here; and then we eventually got around to the co-ed nap time.

The top news from tryouts today is that Naomi, Samantha, Sophia, and I are back on the cheer squad this season; and the Grade Nine additions include a Burroughs’ cousin that we don’t know very well and a ‘new’ girl from one of the construction crews’ families that we’ll get to know better this fall.  The ‘new’ part of that sounds funny, but we do have quite a few families that have moved here since the start of the major construction projects; some of them chose to stay; and upwards of fifteen years now isn’t yet long-enough to count them the same as the families that have been here for centuries!  Ethan and I should probably get half-counted for that, since Mom and Cassie have only been here for a few years longer than that, but the last name changes that for us; and maybe that will be true for some of those new kids if they start marrying into the ‘old’ families!  For the record the cheer squad adds are Cindy Wilson and Tina Burroughs; we like what we’ve seen from them so far; and they are definitely fired up and happy to have made the team!  Those picks were made this morning; and we spent the rest of the day working on the routines we’ll be using during the game and half time on Friday evening.

As always, the football team tryouts take a day longer; those picks will be announced tomorrow; and then the boys will focus on getting ready for that game too.  They had a good workout; we brought our four best friends home with us for dinner and a round of Magi healing; and then we headed to the church for another teen praise team practice.  We still have one more practice to go before the holiday weekend, but Ethan and I need to find some time to practice that music too; since we’re starting to lead more of the music with Naomi and Aaron – and Aiden and Sophia too; so we really should do our best for the holiday weekend congregation!  We had fun with the music and the rest of the service skits, readings, and more that we worked through from start to finish; Ethan and I walked Naomi and Aiden to their homes with supervisory help from Silkie; and now we’re winding down fast toward bedtime after our bath or Jacuzzi breaks and the short visit with did with Mom and Ad on our way up to the third floor.  That’s all we have for our own news; so let’s cover the world report and then we’ll get started on the nap time that we’ll need to be ready for another busy day of football and cheerleading practices!

Our pick for top news of the day is from Israel, where their leaders are not just terrorizing and killing people in the West Bank, but now they are openly claiming that the entire West Bank will only be Israeli territory.  That’s basically declaring that they are going to get rid of all of the Palestinians – extending their genocide plans to include another three million people.  It really makes us sick to watch the world leaders stand by and do nothing while this is happening; and the Israeli people should be ashamed to have forgotten their own history and become the oppressors of millions of innocent people!

While that story is being ignored in western countries, the national media frenzy has been all about ‘Operation Outcast’ and the plan to destroy Iran’s economy, which ‘we’ somehow still need to do despite the fact that we won the war and have full control of the entirely-open Strait of Hormuz!  We are also, apparently, giving the rest of the world time to comply so that we don’t destroy the global economy by immediately cutting non-compliant countries off of the dollar system because it is much better to wait a week or month or two and then destroy it all then!

In the Ukraine war, Russia continues to pound Ukrainian ports, transportation and power systems, and manufacturing sites; the front lines are a mess for Ukraine; and in retaliation, Ukraine’s leaders and drone operators can be very proud of themselves for attacking a daycare center and killing toddler and hitting a civilian bus and killing and injuring a lot of the passengers.  Yes, that is sarcasm, and yes, there are civilian casualties in Ukraine too, but that’s happening more-often now because Russia is hitting back harder now because of all of the attacks on civilians in Russia that have obviously been intentionally targeting women and children.  One story that we took note of was from a Ukrainian village where evacuations were ordered due to a massive explosion that destroyed quite a few homes, and while details are not getting out yet; the video clips we saw strongly suggest that one or more of those homes might have been used for building drones and bombs; since there were a bunch of smaller explosions before the big one that caused most of the destruction.

Finally, for tonight, we want to mention the CIA Director’s visit to Moscow.  The truth for the reason behind that visit won’t likely get released anytime-ever, but considering all of the awful things our CIA has done or tried to do to Russia; that really seems like a pointless trip – especially if he went there with a list of demands and threats.  Russia certainly has no reason to trust any of our leaders – and that’s especially-true for any of our intel agencies.

Okay, that’s enough for tonight.  We’ve had a long day; we need to recharge to be ready for another busy day; and that’s why we’re off to dreamland starting right now.

Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!

Ehlana's and Ethan's journals - August 25, 2026

 

Ehlana and Ethan:

Day two of our football and cheer squad tryouts has been awesome, and this update is early because we need to get to the park for our Pizzeria pizza picnic dinner and ball practices; and then we’re going to bring our best friends home with us for the rest of the night and a co-ed sleepover.

Tai Chi by the river and breakfast with Mom and Dad had our day off to a great start; the weather was perfect again except for a short afternoon shower that we actually appreciated for the cool-off opportunity; and I’ll report that Ethan was the top player at the football tryouts – to the minor annoyance of the older players.  The cheer squad tryouts were good too; and we’re sure about the picks that will be made tomorrow morning.  That is pretty much all we have for our news so far, but we’re expecting the rest of the day to be really great too.  We don’t have much time left to get to the park, though, so let’s do a quick world news report and then we are out of here.

Tariffs and economic sanctions continue to be the story of the week, and while the threats escalate to include cutting countries off from the U.S. dollar systems for any country that defies our demands; the markets fluctuate on every news report whether true or not; and it is like watching bad jugglers trying to keep all of the balls in the air and waiting for the total collapse.  The trade war with Canada is escalating fast; President Trump added fifty percent tariffs on Canadian-assembled cars; and he is apparently clueless because doing that will do as much damage to American parts suppliers; since that industry is integrated to a high degree with our own auto industry!  Customers certainly would not be interested in the price increase at the dealership level, and while that production could be transitioned to American factories eventually; it would literally take years to resolve that one issue; and that doesn’t get into the retaliatory options that Canada has available to them.  One threat that already has been voiced is shutting down electricity transfers to the United States; and that is a significant; comparatively-inexpensive energy source that helps to power the north-eastern States and cities.  Shutting down oil sales would be bad too – and we are sure that China would be more than happy to buy those millions of barrels per day from Canada instead!  We don’t need to get into any details, but will point out that it really is getting hard for our allies to distinguish the difference to how they’re treated compared to America’s enemies!  Before we move on, though, let’s add that Canada also holds a notable amount of our government debt; so selling that off would be an option for them too and a serious fiscal danger to our government finances.

The wars in Ukraine and the Middle East haven’t changed very much, but in Ukraine; they’ve been celebrating their thirty-fifth birthday since gaining independence from the former Soviet Union.  We couldn’t watch those reports with any seriousness; since the supposedly-independent Ukraine is entirely dependent on their western backers because they are bankrupt and spend around one-hundred billion dollars per year – or a lot more – of funding from Europe and the united States; they’ve taken on huge debts that they will never repay; and even if the war ended today; they would then need trillions more to rebuild their country and decades to do that work.  Compare that to when they were ‘set free’ by the Soviet Union when they left without any debt on the government books because all Soviet Union debts were forced on Russia.  How is siding with the west looking for the people there now?

Okay, we really need to get to the park and I took that further than planned – as usual; so that’s it and we’re out of here and back to all of the fun and adventures with our family and friends!

Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!

Ehlana's and Ethan's Journals - August 24, 2026

 

Ehlana and Ethan:

Football season is here; and that is our top story of the day.  Most of the Grade 10 boys showed up for tryouts today – along with a smaller gang of Grade Nine guys, and while most of the younger boys won’t make the team; Coach Robinson could be in for a very good year for our class!  Ethan and Aiden were definitely the fastest players on the field today with Aaron very close behind them; while Miles and Joshua are further in the pack.  Miles is aiming to be the team quarterback, though, and while he might not be the fastest player; he does have some talent for throwing the ball accurately.  As for the cheer squad, the Grade Nine girls have the majority for new hopefuls, and while we do get some competition to defend our spots in the higher grades; that is really mostly for the girls that want the training and workouts to get ready for the basketball cheer squads that we don’t do too.  Danielle Sheldon is our squad Captain this year; we like working with her; and expect to have an awesome season!  The weather was good all day with just a brief shower this morning that rolled through and didn’t slow us down at all and it didn’t get so hot that our workouts became grueling at all.  We did still work hard, though, so we brought our four best friends home with  us and helped them out with a round of Magi healing so they wouldn’t be sore and stiff later tonight.

While hanging out with our friends would have been awesome for the rest of the day, Ethan and I didn’t do that – we sent them on their way after the healing and a chat with Mom; we eventually had dinner with Mom and Dad; and then we headed to the lab or archives to play with our books or beakers for a few hours – or more like nine if you include the time phasing!  We need to keep working when we can; and that will get harder to do as we rush toward the end of summer and the start of school.  We wrapped up at the lab at eleven o’clock; came home to a short visit with Mom and Dad followed by bath or Jacuzzi time; and now we’re winding down fast toward nap time.

The world news continues to be bad from the Middle East and Ukraine war zones; and the consequences from around the world continue to build and become more unpredictable beyond the surety that more trouble is coming.  Instead of going into the details for the fighting in either region; let’s cover a few stories that did get our attention – while being ignored by western leaders and media.  Verifying the stories is challenging, but there are indications that the ‘Middle East NATO’ that was supposedly aimed at Iran might have a different purpose; since the story we’re seeing is about Pakistan sending a military leader to Iran to invite them to join that pact with Pakistan, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia.  If true, then that deal isn’t about Iran – it is about an alternative to dealing with America and Israel.  Details include more than just joining the pact – there might be economic partnerships; and China could be part of the trade side of that offer.

That leads into the talk that is building for the upcoming visit to the United States by the Chinese President next month.  ‘Our’ leaders and media are talking that up as a major event, but we expect it to be nothing more than theatre; since President Xi has no reason to trust President Trump – especially when we are constantly threatening them and imposing trade sanctions and restrictions – not to mention the warmongering and never-ending military build-up in Taiwan and the entire Asian region.  China is not going to change their long-term plans that definitely include diversifying their trade partnerships to move away from dependence on American and European customers; and they are definitely focused on advanced technologies.

Our final story for the day connects there because we’ve kept an eye on China for tech; and they’ve been holding humanoid robot games that make our focus on A.I. data centers look stupid by comparison.  Chinese robotics companies are leading the way for this tech; and the results are astonishing from faster-than-human one-hundred meter speeds to humanoid robots that play sports like tennis.  For some context, the World Humanoid Robot Games were held for the first time last year, and in just one year, they’ve expanded four-fold to more than two-thousand humanoid robot ‘athletes’ competing in more than a thousand different challenges.  These humanoid robots set better-than-human world records not just for funning races, but also for other activities like the standing high jump – and not just by small amounts!  The fastest robot for the half-marathon destroyed the human record by around six minutes!  We are not suggesting that robots are about to take over the world, since those games also showed how far the tech still needs to go, but it is amazing; and we are sure there is a place for humanoid robots if we use them as tools for helping humanity and our planet and don’t turn them into tools for doing evil – like fighting our wars for us!

Okay, that’s enough for today – though just for fun; let’s tuck in a long video from those robot games so you can see for yourselves where the tech was in our now and your near or distant past.  This should be a quaint, nostalgic look at ancient history for Magi readers a century or more from now – with the good news being that we do expect there to be Magi of the Light reading our journals in the coming centuries and Millennia!  Have fun with that while we go and get some sleep!

 World Humanoid Robot Games – China 2026

 

Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!