The Average Blogger

Odds and Ends

Because it is winter and we are, for the most part, in hibernation mode and just watching endless hours of television (Downton Abbey, Justified, Arrested Development), I don't have a lot to report.  Work continues to be work.  School seems to be proceeding apace -- at least, I haven't gotten any reports to the contrary from the Powers That Be and the kid keeps bringing home papers with A's on them, so I'll assume all is well.

By the end of last week, I suspect I had several people ready to call the SPCA on me.  First, I complained on Facebook that Miss Amy Pond barks like mad when we crate her up for the night.  Now, yes, we could just not crate her, but there are issues with that.  We have to shut off the downstairs to enclose our cats, one of which has a terrible penchant for peeing on our upstairs rugs.  If we close Amy down there with them, no only will she go bonkers chasing them around all night, but she's also a chewer and there's no telling what our house would look like in the morning.    If we let her sack out with us upstairs, that means I have to get her up and outside and fed at 4 a.m. -- and she is not a quiet child.  She is high-energy, and upon being let off the leash is about as likely to follow me downstairs as she is likely to jump on the bed and attack my sleeping husband with claws and kisses. So, no.  I am full-on ready to go Shock Collar on her, but thought there might be cheaper/less nasty avenues.  Well, I was half-right.  Apparently there are collars that are motion sensitive and spritz the dog with something stinky (citronella, lemon, essences vary,) when they start yapping.  These cost about as much as a shock collar, and I wondered about their efficacy.  Nobody who responded to my Facebook post had tried one, but they all had opinions about what I should do instead.... which, well, thanks, but that's not really what I was asking about, now was it?  I am perturbed by this.  If I ask you, "What is your name?" I don't want to hear that you were born in Pago Pago. 

After that bit of amusement, I then went home and took her out for some exercise.  Because she is a strong little thing, but also rather obstinate and much more interested in barking at the deer than in chasing the tennis ball, it occurred to me that one way to wear her out would be to weigh her down before walking her.  So I fashioned a harness and hooked her up to the Young Prince's wagon, then told him to park himself in it and let her pull.

It was rather amusing.  We walked three blocks and she was just fine, trotting along, keeping up with me, la la la.  Then we went to turn the corner, and I could actually see the realization dawning in her little black face that OH MY GOD THERE IS SOMETHING ATTACHED TO THE BACK OF ME PANIC PANIC DANGER.  I made her sit. She sat, staring at it warily.  I made her walk. She started shimmying sideways to keep an eye on it.  I made her walk faster, and she broke into a run, trying to get away from it.  Well, of course, you can't get away from something that is hitched to you, so the noise scared her more.  The Young Prince tumbled out, and for once laughed it off instead of adding to the problem, which earned him several brownie points from me.  I made her sit again.  She did.  We walked home without further incident.   Once we got to our yard, however, I had Thomas get out,  and the change in noise sent her all bucking bronco terrified. 

So we have dialed that back a bit.  I am now dragging the (empty) wagon myself, to get her used to the noise.  After a few minutes of that, I hook it to her on a longer rope and make her walk.  I believe that eventually she will be well-suited to haul firewood and other assorted stuff.  And hopefully be too tired at night to kick up her Infernal Abandonment Racket. 

On the other insubordination front,  the YP hit a milestone over the weekend when we busted him looking at nudie pics on his DSi player.  A bit of prodding led to the expected (and highly embarrased on his part) answers of "I was curious/no, I don't do this on school computers/no, nobody in real life has asked me to get naked, nor have I asked anyone else."  So there is that. I think he was most surprised that we weren't angry.  Little does he know that his father had to do the first round of chatfest not only because, well, it's a Boy Thing, but also because I was hiding in our bedroom with a pillow over my head trying very hard to keep my laughing muffled.

Only other news of note is that Saturday was a Winterfest school event that I got suckered into volunteering for from 10-4.  Imagine, if you will, five hours of Kidz Bop music and one hour of cleaning up.  (Can anyone explain the point of Kidz Bop to me? Why not just have compilations of the real songs? I mean, these aren't kid songs, and they aren't particularly kid-ified.  Seriously, how do you make Put a Ring on It or California Gurlz relevant to a 9-year-old? You don't! So why make a 9-year-old record it, rather than just letting all the other 9-year-olds lip sync along in their own hairbrushes? Do I sound old lady curmudgeon here? Or sane?)  Still, the kids seemed to have fun, and the Young Prince showed valor during the raffle drawing by consoling a kid smaller than him who started crying about not winning a Transformers prize. 

He's growing up, that one.  Shudder.

 

Hibernation

Even though the temperatures have been veering between Cold and Not Cold, I am now officially in Indoor Mode, with no yardwork, a reluctance to go out and run errands, and an overwhelming urge to lie buried in blankets on my couch and not move.  I will read, I will watch TV, I will knit.  I generally don't fiddle around online because my laptop is usually in my purse and it would just require far too much effort for me to get up and retrieve it -- although it does help keep me warm, I grant you that. 

(Add to this, NeighborGirl and I went to see Devil Inside on Friday night and it was such a dreadful production -- I mean, bad writing, bad shooting, bad production value, just BAD -- that I'm seriously reconsidering the theater as a bad risk and possibly not paying gobs of money to see anything there ever again. I reckon this resolution will last until the next time the Young Prince begs me to take him to some new release.)

But I love this aspect of winter, y'all.  I get caught up on so much of the slothful "free time" things I like to do. This weekend I finished the Dark Materials trilogy this weekend, which was an interesting read, both in a writerly educational way and from the "Wow, dude's got an ax to grind" perspective. 

NYAB was kindly indulgent and joined me in watching a lot of British stuff on Netflix.  Several hours of Father Brown mysteries with Kenneth More, based on stories by the inestimable GK Chesterton.  You want a study in incongruity, blast through some Chesterton and Pullman in rapid succession.  (You'll also probably feel like a blundering neanderthal when it comes to manipulating the English language, but que sera sera -- see what I did there?)

The kid spent much of his time apart, watching his own DVDs and being astonishingly self-sufficient -- even more astonishingly,  he was downright helpful and good-natured about wrapping up chores and pitching in when we did pull him away from Tron or Peter Pan or whatever he was doing. I like that boy, you know?

Life is good, y'all.

That Time I Dropped the Ball

So, when I was decorating for Christmas, I was doing up the guest room and I felt lazy.

"We aren't having any company, right?" I asked NYAB. "I can just put on the Christmas bedspread but leave the usual everyday sheets?"

"Yep," he said.

Last week, we were sick and short-staffed at work. Congress stayed in all weekend and I worked both of those days, with a lovely break Saturday night to attend a friend's party (where I got to fulfill a bucket list goal of giving Helen Thomas a withering glare, though I imagine she's so old and blind she thought I was a piece of furniture,) followed up by a grownup dessert date with NYAB. 

And work continued into this week.  I had my vision trained on Thursday and Friday, when I would finally only have to work from 5-8 a.m., and then Do My Own Stuff. 

And then I got a message from my dear college friend on Tuesday morning: "Hi! Looking forward to seeing you! I'll be on this afternoon's train!"

Uh. Whoops.

So my sweet pal Cynthia is in town til tomorrow, and she very nicely entertained herself in DC yesterday while I worked, and even more nicely overlooked the fact that when she arrived, her bed was buried under the contents of my linen closet. In fact, she helped me uncover said bed. Bless.

Today we are waiting for the dryer delivery man, the contractor to fix our shower, and the kid to wrap up his last half-day.  I don't know what we're going to do when all that's taken care of, but it better be fun, dammit.

That's life in our fast lane.  Perhaps tomorrow I'll work on my writing.

Stop and Go

So, I figured things would slow down a little bit this week, with no parties/plays/etc. to prepare for.

So far, it's been at a dead stop.

Saturday's party was lovely.  The place looked nice, the food was served, the guests were wonderful.

Sunday was productive. I got the garage cleaned and put together my new not-rusted-out wheelbarrow that my parents gave me for Christmas. It's so nice, y'all.

Yesterday, I woke up feeling lousy. But I went to work anyway. Where I felt REALLY lousy.  Got an email that the kid was also lousy.  And another copy editor. 

Good lord, I thought, I've poisoned us all.

Well, no. But some kind of nasty stomach bug did make its way through a few of us.

So yesterday the Young Prince and I were on the SAD diet (Sick As Dogs) and we both slept a lot.

The stress was more than Not Your Average Blogger could take, apparently, as he does not have our affliction, I don't think, but he also hasn't gotten out of bed yet today.

Perhaps our regularly scheduled lives will resume tomorrow. Right now, I think I need a nap.

And then I need to wrap gifts/go shopping/pick up the drycleaning/help the kid with his projects/write my books/lalala.

Yes. Definitely a nap.

Cookies, Carols, Curtness

I'm in 50th place on my "writing" contest.  Eh, whatevs.

We had a fantastic weekend, y'all.  Saturday started with a peppermint milkshake and Christmas tree decorating and wrapped up with the traditional lobster and chowder dinner. Omigod, the dairy. Yum. 

Sunday was the Wolf Trap sing-along, and it was much more fun at a balmy 40-50 degrees. Much easier to eat dinner afterward when you can feel your fingers. The Young Prince sang along more than he did last year, and he didn't get really nuts about wanting to jump around and dance til halfway through, so I count that a success as well. I hope that if we keep going, it will wind up being one of the annual events the kid remembers fondly as a perennial part of the holiday season. I would like that. It's like caroling without the exercise or the panhandling. What's not to like? 

This week has been given over to baking for our party on Saturday and to working with the kid on assorted gift projects he is tussling with. Excellent, reasonably creative-not-cribbed ideas.  We'll have to see how he does on execution.  I'm trying to be Nice Supportive Helpful Mom, and not No, Stop, You're Making It Hard On Yourself Mom. 

I haven't really learned this lesson very well, though you'd think I would have by now.  It's just so frustrating to watch the kid do math with his fingers -- and in the wrong, longer, time-wasty-er direction; if he has to add 8 and 4, he'll start at four and count up 8 EVERY SINGLE TIME. But he gets the right answer, and I guess I should just lay off and figure that someday someone will shame him into memorizing them or flunk him on a timed test and he'll just do it when it matters.

It does make me wonder, though.  He is (well, he was, I assume he still is,) certifiably diagnosed with borderline ADD.  I'm not certifiably diagnosed but it's pretty clear I'm desperately afflicted with full-bore IMD (Impatient Mom Disorder, dontchaknow.) And I wonder if maybe they're not a bit related? I've spent countless hours jabbing at him to hurry up, come on, get it done, JEEEEZZZZZUSSSSS!!!  He's spent countless hours resisting, trying, arguing.  Maybe I should see what he does if I say, "Know what? I want you to work on this, but I want you to stare at the page for a full minute before you write a sentence. And then I want you to take 45 seconds to write each letter. No. You're going too fast."  Hmmm.

(The argument also could be made that impatience stems from my having ADD, I guess -- I'm ready to be done with this shoe-tying nonsense. Let's go! Something shiny! Time's a-wastin'!)

So for those of you who will be receiving a gift from the Young Artist, I can't promise a delivery date. I can only hope it will be worth the wait.

Anyway, this is all the long way around to saying it's business as usual at Casa Blogger, and we're all having a lovely time waiting for the year to end.  Hope y'all can say the same!  And if you're in the area, come to our cookiefest.  We take all comers after the hour of noon!

Another Mouth to Feed

For starters, my parents visited. While they crammed a lot of stuff into a fairly short time, this probably sums up the high points:

So, yeah. That happened.  Tree removal was pretty exciting, and we've got all the stuff sorted and moved now -- logs to a new logpile in back, stump-ground mulch augmenting a path to hopefully circumvent my annual Getting the Riding Mower Stuck in the Snowmelt Swamp Event.

The big addition to our family is a half-lab, half-shar pei, and arrived via my niece, who had named the black bundle Yoshi -- which the Young Prince later explained is the name of a videogame character.  (Hi, I'm old. I was still trying to figure out why a half-Chinese dog had a Japanese name.) The YP took it upon himself to rename her, and she is now Miss Amy Pond.  Because when he walks her, he says this. 

It's been an interesting adjustment, since the YP alternates between utter frustration that she is untrained and jumps all over him and badgers him and nips his fingers, and complete affection and friendliness.  I alternate between utter frustration with his losing patience and his flailing around trying to get away from her when she chases him, and complete joy at watching him when they work. 

And she's a cute little thing, isn't she?

With her one white paw.

In other happy news, our friends who came out for Thanksgiving last year were not frightened off by the experience and will be rejoining us.  Hopefully those chuckleheads in Congress's deficit committee will not have ruined my week by going to the 11th hour -- hahaha! Who am I kidding! Of course they will! The good news is that such nonsense is at least predictable nonsense, so I can work around it.

Otherwise, work remains work.  Drama, agita, understaffing and overanxious. La la la.

The YP has been off school for the past two days (They say "conferences," I say "Union sweetie deal to get teachers to the voting booth,") so we have made great strides in getting the house back into semi-presentable shape after the mayhem wrought by a Halloween party, a puppy and a boy, and in getting the lawn to look like a lawn despite autumn.  I've also resumed my efforts to make home-schooling augment the kid's real schooling -- right now he's writing a screenplay called The Space Circus.  So far he's written the chatter that comes before the credits. Hey, it's a start.

So all that's really left now between today and Thanskgiving is the kid's Monster Epic Time Sink Dramatic Production Thing That Eats Time. We missed last night's rehearsal because my Camaro's clutch fell out in the drive-thru at Taco Bell -- and boy, if you ever want to see a cashier look highly alarmed, tell her your car's stuck in front of her window.  Hahaha.  Fortunately, it was on a grade and I could get the car rolling enough to steer it into a parking spot.  Still waiting for the phone call that gives me the checkbook damage.

But yes, the play. Rehearsals every night this week (lawd,) running til 10:30 and 11 p.m.   Rawr.  Then two performances on Saturday that basically have us locked in a school from noon til 10 p.m.  Rawr, again.  They get Sunday off, thank goodness, then two more performances the next weekend. Factor in, of course, that the parents are expected to ride herd on kids, props, snacks, etc., etc., etc.  and I think we will ALL need a nap at the end of this hootenanny.

(And I can't promise any posts because they're insanely hardcore about this stuff -- no parents with cameras, no photos during the performance, no saving seats in the auditorium ACH TUNG!!)

I'm more and more glad every day that I didn't let him try out for the second of their three season performances.  (Of course, it was Annie, which either means he wouldn't get a part at all or he'd wind up with the lead role in a wig. Chortle.) 

Here's what I have to say about that:

See y'all in another couple weeks, I'm guessing.

Out of Sorts

Do you ever have days where you feel like you should be getting a lot done, but you've expended so much energy being stressed out and overthinking things that action is out of the question? Yeah, that's me right now. 

The kid's play is driving me nuts. Lots of shuttling for rehearsals, lots of parental involvement that I'm resenting. The latest is that I thought I signed up to put together a program but apparently signed up to sell ads. I HATE THAT SHIT. If I wanted to sell ads, I would not be on the editorial side of my business. I don't think they will kick my kid out if I don't make quota, though.  I'll give it a good faith effort and hope for the best.  Then there's a rehearsal tonight at 6, but a props meeting at 6:30.  Really? We can't just all start at the same time? Thpt.

Even the book is stalled. I'm 5 chapters away from being done with the second rewrite, but I couldn't look at it this weekend.  I was hoping to get back it tonight while the kid was at rehearsal, but no, 6:30 p.m. meeting about props.  Snarl.  Maybe I can work on it pretending to take notes while someone else blathers on about baskets and swords.

I have lots of stuff I should be doing around the house but I can't bring myself to care enough to get up and do them. It's basically been raining for 2 weeks, so doing yard work is a relative non-starter. We did manage to kill a nest of yellowjackets that I had a serious grudge against after getting stung two weekends in a row. A belt on my vacuum broke, so I need to replace that before I can do anything along those lines indoors. I should really clean my basement, but jeez, that involves walking down a whole flight of stairs before I even do any actual work and I need a nap just thinking about it.

Congress was supposed to be gone this week, but no, that couldn't happen, so the Senate is still in and we have to do regular news reporting work on top of our recess project work, which pisses me off. And other stuff's going on that is making me nervous. I'm told all will be explained this week. So glad I did my nails last night; maybe flecks of polish in my teeth will lead me to stress eat and gain 10 lbs instead of chewing my cuticles.

Then there are other personal things bothering me that are none of my business. As such, I can do nothing about them. It's a messy, irrational place, this brain of mine: I tend to be most bothered by things that I can't do anything about, which is of course the absolute biggest waste of time ever, since fretting about things that can't be changed isn't going to change them. Then again, if I did have the power to act, I would probably wind up punching someone in the mouth -- maybe several someones -- so it's just as well I'm hobbled.

But then, see, there's my boys.  NYAB has been plugging along and getting things done. He's taking care of all the must-do stuff that I can't bring myself to look at.  We're all fed and clothed and things are still running on time, no thanks to me at all. And the YP has been stellar. He stayed out of trouble this week. He's having a blast with this play on his end of things; learning a lot about production and about being a member of a team. He got into the gifted program last week -- though what that means is still a little unclear to me. He's reading and asking some relevant questions. He didn't take my initial rebuke well, but he did seem to hear what I said and claims to be doing a better job of writing in class.  I've definitely had to do less thumping on him at home. 

So, yeah, when I'm with them, all the rest sort of melts away and I can't even remember it. I'm lucky. I'm blessed. I wouldn't trade what I've got for anything.

All that agitation and stress will be there later, I'll get back to it. And the sanctum has its weak spots, of course. I'm sure the kid will do something to make me crazy angry, or the hubs will do something I find incomprehensible, and I'll do something completely stupid and irritating to them.  But you know what? That's fine too. I think everyone is giving and getting what they need for us drag the cart over the next hill, and that's what counts.

Grains of sand, letters on a page.

Another day at the beach this weekend, a greater desire to move there.

Kid begins his third drama camp this week. I must heap praise on Not Your Average Blogger, who rearranged his hours so he could shuttle back and forth to drop off and pick up while I'm buried in Work Stuff this week.

Not losing weight. Ascribing this to the vast amounts of summer junk food I've been thoroughly enjoying.

Not gaining weight. Ascribing this to the adrenaline I expend on writing, cos it sure as hell ain't from exercise.

At the end of next week, we go on vacation. Looking very forward to that. And to more not losing weight.

Proceeding apace on the book. Pondering going on hiatus from all social media until I finish it. On the other hand, everything I read tells me I'm an ass if I do this, because the best way to get an agent/published/attention/any sort of official-type validation is to join writing groups and participate in writing blogs and it's all word of mouth and nepotism and lalalala I hate it. I'm not saying I don't crave feedback and respect criticism. I'm saying I hate the long-established fact that publishing is a lottery/networking gig, and merit is a distant second. 

And I will cop to the fact that while I like people to read my stuff, I am less hot on the quid pro quo, not in small part because I can be highly critical and that is not always well received. I've been in writing groups before. Sometimes they're useful. Sometimes you can find one person in there who's got a good feel for things. But more often I've encountered great big circle-jerks of dangerously fragile egos. Nobody wants to hear anything negative, nobody takes anything to heart -- and of course, nobody has been published. Perhaps I'm just finding the wrong groups. I need a group that can look at a manuscript and say, "yeah, that sucks. Fix that. You'll never get anyone's interest doing this, take it out. OK, done? Here's what you do now." 

The Internet has been great for this because there are now kajillions of writing blogs and find-an-agent blogs and indie/vanity publishing blogs. I can see them, they can't see me. This does nothing to advance my ultimate ambition, of course, but it is easier on my soul for the time being.

Ugh. See what I mean? Ditching social media while I finish my first draft would probably be doing the world a favor.

The beach has spotty Internet access.  And it's too windy and sandy to really do much writing or critiquing. Perhaps that is why I love it there so much.

Itchy, Scratchy

Saturday: Do a bunch of yard work. Overhaul a large portion of my flowerbed, feeling very industrious and pleased as I pull out weeds and install rock-lined mulch paths to prevent such a huge need for future weeding.  (Speaking of rocks, my grandfather has cleared up the Virginia vegetable garden rock mystery: "Rocks grow deep in the earth, and when they are big enough, the devil pushes them up to the top for us to deal with." I don't doubt it for a second.)

Sunday: Wake up with itchy arms and one eye swollen shut. Sigh. Groan. Apply ice packs and cortisone. Realize I'm a little late this year. Develop plans to further reduce growing space for evil weeds by installing a tiny patio in one corner of the flower bed. Talk to grandfather, who assures me it will be a huge amount of hassle and work. Sigh. Groan. Apply ice packs and cortisone, and go to bed. 

Monday: Get up at 4 a.m. for work. Wince at the ghastly reflection I see in the mirror, but suck it up, apply more cortisone and go to work anyway.  Leave work at 1:30 p.m., pick up kid from camp, go home and doze from exhaustion of itching while he watches Harry Potter Part 5. Wake up enough to feed him and apply more cortisone.

Tuesday: Get up at 4 a.m. for work. Horrified by spread of crud. Stop at drug store on way in to office and drop a ridiculous sum of money on assorted snake oil. Delighted to find that something appears to be helping, as itching decreases. Rashy face is still disgusting, however.

As a PSA, here is my experience:

Long sleeves and pants probably help. This has not been my experience, however, because in the process of getting undressed and/or throwing those clothes in the washer, I still get the crap on me, which means I sat outdoors in the blazing sun in winter clothes for naught.

All that business about showering as soon as you can after getting it on you may be sage advice. My problem is, I barely know a tree from a shrub and certainly can't pick out good weeds from bad ones, so knowing exactly when to go hose off is problematic.

I don't know if Ivy Off works. I bought some once, then we had 2 years of rain and by the time I was in a position to use it, the stuff had expired and I never bought any more.

Once you are afflicted, if at all possible, I strongly advise jumping into a 50-gallon vat of calamine lotion, getting very drunk, and remaining asleep for a week. Perhaps even an induced coma, if means allow.

Not possible? Yeah, not for me either. 

Cortisone lotion works for me, but it doesn't last very long, and all those warnings telling you not to use it more than 3 times a day have served to freak me out. I also don't like that stuff on my face.

Ice packs? Don't do jack.

Running impossibly hot water over the rash? Ohhhh, that feels really, really good.  However, the time I tried it, I also wound up in much worse shape for the long run. The rash got much worse, blistered, lasted forever and looked like I had a flesh-eating disease. I do not recommend this, though it was, indeed, a pleasant itch-killer.

This time around, I have taken an allergy pill and used this stuff called Tecnu Rash Relief. I don't know which one did the trick, but I'm feeling much better. I figure the allergy pill won't hurt anything, even if it doesn't help.  The tecnu is wonderful stuff, but it is very oily, so keep tissues and stuff around and maybe wear sleeves to keep it off counters, desks, laptops, etc.

I don't know how much validity there is to this, but it does seem like a logical move to try to keep your contact with linens to a minimum til you know the oil is gone or til the rash is clearing up. This means changing the sheets, using different towels, etc. It also means a lot of laundry, which is a bummer.

That's what I've got -- anyone else got any good Old Wives remedies out there?  Happy to try them out!

Summer Vacation, Part 1.

I am so ready for a vacation, y'all.  Fortunately, I only have to get through two more days before I get one.

But first, where I've been. So, Sunday was Father's Day.  To celebrate,  the Young Prince and I decided we would let Not Your Average Blogger make us breakfast.  He obliged, with pancakes which were quite lovely.

Then we went for a 3-hour hike in the Bull Run Mountains Conservancy, a lot of it uphill.  It was a lot of fun, I'm pleased to say.  Before we left, the boy and I had negotiated a bribe/promise of a whine-free outing, and he came through on his end beautifully.  He ran ahead for big parts of it, lagged behind looking at rocks and plants for other parts, and only mildly mentioned his feet once and his desire for lunch once.

We tried to tell him a couple Civil War stories, since the Battle of Thoroughfare Gap took place up there, but he was much more interested when I started telling him about the summers I spent with my grandparents as a kid. Virginia has a lot of quartzite, and every time he finds some of the shiny sparkly he's just fascinated by the "crystals."  I remember feeling the same way when I was about his age and I'd find that stuff in Leesburg, so I started telling him about how my job when I'd visit my grandparents was to get all the rocks out of their vegetable garden, and how I was supposed to throw them into the bucket scoop on my grandfather's tractor, and how occasionally my grandfather would hit me instead of the bucket, or one would bounce out and hit me, and I decided gardening was all hell and the minute I was grown up I'd just be buying my damn peas at the store, thank you very much.

(I still don't understand part of that story myself.  The vegetable garden was in the same place every year, yet every summer there seemed to be just as many rocks to get rid of as the year before.  I half-suspect my grandfather pitched them all back in at the end of the growing season just to give me something to do when I came back.)

That segued into other stories, and it didn't seem like all that long before we were at the top of Bull Run Mountain and it was time for lunch.  Going down was a lot easier, of course, and on the way back we cheated and went off the trail and along the railroad tracks instead, getting closer the ruins of Beverly Mill and some homesteads. The train tracks were a story in its own right -- the YP was utterly grossed out by the (days afterward) aftermath of when a train connects with a deer.  It was pretty nauseating, I admit. The smell alone could have knocked you over, and I've never seen so many maggots so busily at work. But, you know, teachable moments and all.  Not least of them, "don't get hit by a train, duh."

This week is the boy's first week off school, so he has been coming into the office and lounging around waiting for me to get done and take him home.  I'd feel guilty about this, except I know that sitting in my office reading, watching TV and playing video games is about as close to paradise as he gets. If I could get streaming Netflix in my office, he'd never leave, so I figure I'm indulging his idea of a vacation. 

With a few minutes out for math and writing, of course.  I'm not a total debauch.Yet, anyway.

After this week of office-dwelling, the three of us are packing up Friday and taking off for a wedding in Rhode Island. ("We've known this guy for ages, and we absolutely love the girl he's marrying. Seriously, how often does that happen?" asks NYAB. Answer: Almost never, if you are us.) When we get back, Good Friend Katherine will be blowing into town for a few days of fun and baseball, so I am working mornings and running wild with her in the afternoons. And then it will be July Fourth.  Huzzah for summer break!