So, on Tuesday, Not Your Average Blogger bailed on the Young Prince and myself for a trip to the Tucson Festival of Books (on the University of Arizona campus, where he spent a happy freshman year), so he could talk on a panel and promote his book. It sounds like he had a lovely time; he stayed with his brother and had a nice family visit; apparently the festival was terribly crowded and he saw people walking around with his book who weren't at his panel, and he met plenty of smart and fun people at the event. So, yay.
I am happy to report that the news was very nearly as good on the home front. The YP and I both tacitly subscribed to the "go along to get along" plan; I tried not to shriek and he tried to hurry up. Mornings were fairly pleasant. I gave him freedom to dork around during my absence in the afternoons, but once I got home it was time to saddle up and work hard. I proved I'm not a total Tiger Mom, since we had a late night on Thursday and when I woke up Friday I decided we would take a mental health day: sleep in, stay home, do a little old-time homeschooling in terms of math and writing. It was, in fact, rather pleasant. We made each other laugh a lot more than we made each other crazy. I think that's the definition of success.
Saturday saw a little more friction. We had to get up and go to the last session of his bowling league, and he didn't do as well as he could have. We had a couple spats about heedlessness on his part and overreaction on mine. But they didn't last long and smoothed over quickly. And Sunday was another good day; we got up and did all kinds of work outside, picking up bazillions of sticks and cleaning up the back yard, then taking a nice drive to Fredericksburg where we ate at Steak and Shake (twice!), I did about 30 minutes of library research, and then we went and visited a couple sites related to the life of the dad of one of my book characters. When we got home, we both worked more on writing, watched the Walking Dead, and called it a night.
There was some flurry of emotion over the fact that next weekend is the end-of-bowling-league party and the YP is going to miss it because of another book event (one that we are all going to.) I am not so fond of single-parenting that I want to do it in perpetuity, especially since the weekends after that will be spent with just me and him driving to and from Illinois for spring break. (Man, that kid is going to miss a lot of piano lessons.) Plus, I've already signed up a dog sitter. So, yeah. He'll just have to bowl again next year. When his dad is home to take him, and I can sleep late!
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