I had to go to Chicago for the day for work, so I had to miss Charles’ school’s costume parade (no costumes at Middle School for Corwin). I just barely made it back in time for the evening activities — I literally jumped a gate to get in to the departure lounge after the last call. The officials started to tell me that I was too late, but then a couple of other people came up for the same train and destination and we were sent on to board.
I missed the first, pre trick or treating party at Andrew’s house. Alice and Charles went out on a campus street instead of the local neighborhood and managed to accumulate an excellent haul in a short period.
Meanwhile, Corwin was at Jack’s for another party. He and his crew had a good haul there as well. I handed out candy to a few groups of kids at our house, but traffic was very slow. So I had Mom, Alice, and Charles pick me up on their way to Jack’s party.
After some serious carousing there, we headed our exhausted way home.
Mom has been working on some knit bunnies for various recently constructed poop machines built by various friends. When she finished one, she handed it around the family for positive re-enforcement. Charles decided that he needed to keep it because he doesn’t have enough stuffed animals to keep him company (none at all, except for Timmy, Dolphiny, Big-D, Puppety, Penguiny, and Sharky). He was a bit disappointed when Mom insisted that his minimal set of fuzzy companions was sufficient.
As a result of this discussion, Alice decided that she needed more fuzzy companions since she didn’t have any. I took her up to her room and demonstrated that she had an entire menagerie under her bed, although she ended up rejecting almost all of them as not sophisticated enough to hang out with a Princess (Grumpy-Pants). We did find pink Dolphiny, who had been missing for a while.
In the end, though, the entire experience did free up the knit bunny for future adoption.
Tonight was the Boy Scout Halloween party. Corwin went by himself because he didn’t want any siblings cramping his style. That turned out to be the right choice as I didn’t see any other younger siblings about. Sadly, it delayed Corwin’s reunion with the Wii but he bore the burden bravely.
Corwin’s costume was as Death, with his companion “Death of Rats”. This was the Mayflower ship rat dressed in dark green silk robe and hood (made from one of my failed thermal undershirts). Corwin actually worked on the rat’s costume more than his own, the latter being some black clothes and my early Renaissance brown riding cloak. Mom I think helped Corwin with the sewing (including repair surgery on the rat). Corwin also made a little scythe out of a small stick and aluminum foil for ‘Death of Rats’ to carry.
As for the other costumes, I was amazed at the lack of color in the group. They were almost entirely black or grey, with a bit of white and brown. Somber bunch, those Boy Scouts.
Alice came in to my office very excited this evening, because she had built this and wanted to show Charles who, unfortunately, was at cello lessons.
We’re hitting the Halloween season at full tilt.
Church in the morning, and then Charles and I went out to sell some more popcorn. We did better this time around, selling about 12 boxes in 90 minutes, which is quite reasonable. It was a very nice day so there wasn’t too much moaning. We took the car this time, the bikes not having worked so well. I had to carry the full carton of popcorn while Charles carried the very light money bag. In the end, we have about a third of the original consignment left which is good progress I think.
The late afternoon activity was the church “Trunk or Treat” event. The parents park cars in the church parking lot and hand out candy to kids who wander by. Attendance was a bit down this year, possibly because it was a bit colder than normal with a strong wind. Corwin was too old to go as an attendee so instead he was off on a five mile orientating hike with the Boy Scouts but Charles and Alice had a good time. They collected their candy from outside and then enjoyed, sort of, the games inside the church. Charles was not in the best mood for some reason but he tried a few games. Alice wouldn’t do anything except the cake walk because she wanted some cup cakes, which she got on the third try.
Charles did enjoy the crafts. Or craft — he spent a lot of time putting together a spider on a spider web kit. Alice did a lot of coloring because she didn’t want to wander around without Charles (without Dad, fine, but no brother? Oh brother!).
This evening was the Halloween party for Charles’ Cub Scout pack. It was originally supposed to be a camp out but it rained all day Friday and a good part of today so it was decided to have a party instead. Except for a bit of a key problem in getting in to the meeting area, everything went well until it was time to eat, at which point Alice completely melted down because we didn’t get in line early enough. Mom took Alice away after she had eaten, then the boys and I partied!
Today was Corwin’s and Charles’ last officially scheduled games. Naturally they were at different locations and the same time. Because Corwin’s game was farther away (and departure time was therefore earlier) Mom sent me there. The only report I got from Mom was that
Corwin’s game was another blowout. The offense was ramped back by half time and by the last quarter it was “headers only” for goal shots. There were actually a couple of half decent attempts at that but sadly no actual scores.
The opponents were one of the better teams Corwin has played, with one very fast player, but I really noticed the better coordination of Corwin’s team. The other coach nearly went hoarse shouting “spread out!”.
Corwin had some good returns but the other team didn’t get over much and most of the time were fast breaks that tended to go right by Corwin. He did run to keep on the attackers. At least a couple of times he did such a good job that one of the other defenders was able to sneak up and knock the ball away.
Still, Corwin’s team did get lucky a couple of times when the other team should have scored but didn’t quite make it. I don’t think it would have made any difference but I felt kind of bad for the other team.
[Breakfast conversation]
Dad: … that’s why I think that there’s a good senior thesis in analyzing authentication systems for making online game data portable without being copyable.
Alice: Yes, yes, I was just thinking about that Daddy!
Dad: Very good, Alice.
Well, the trade show was a near total bust. As a result we managed to get home much earlier than originally planned, early enough that we could have watched the boys vs. girls soccer game except that it was rained out.
I teased Alice when I got back by pretending I didn’t recognize her, although I thought she looked kind of familiar. This drove her crazy, until she reasons that make sense only to Alice pulled off her dress so that I would know who she was. She proudly pointer at her stripped down self and said “see? It’s Alice”. I agreed to recognize her if she put her dress back on.
Mom and I left this morning for two days for a trade show after a frantic couple of days getting ready for it. Ethan is back to keep an eye on the boys and Grandma will be taking Alice away for a few days of wild adventure. We had to get up at 4:30 AM, leaving poor Grandma to see that the boys made it to the bus on time.
That’s it. Busy busy busy
Oh, well, if you insist —
Here’s a picture of the ceiling in my office. The little spots are the dozen or so ladybugs that have fled the harsh outside conditions for the warm comfort of my office. I think they’re getting in around the air conditioner which is not as well sealed as one might like. I had hoped they would frighten Alice and Charles off from gaming in my office but no such luck.
Last week we tried to get Alice ready for an outing and couldn’t find her shoes. We searched the entire house thoroughly and failed to locate them. I thought they might be outside because the kids had been playing outside with a few of the neighbor kids. I did a couple of passes but failed to locate any shoes.
The next day was a school day so Mom sent Alice in wearing her Barbi boots. Alice thought that was fine but the boots were a bit much. The next day we tried Alice’s wedding shoes. Alice also wore the headband from that day and remembered on her own that they were wedding clothes. She checked to make sure that I remembered Erica’s wedding as well.
Unfortunately, Alice managed to break the strap holder off the shoe so that pair became unwearable. Her original shoes were still missing so Mom took Alice off for emergency shoe shopping. As they left, I predicted the previous pair would turn up within the week, Mom predicted 24 hours. Turns out Mom was a better guesser as just under 48 hours after buying new shoes, Corwin (Corwin!) found the previous pair out on the basketball hoop in the dead end. For once, I hope this was not a learning experience for Alice.
Charles has become quite a bit more difficult over the last month or so, losing his stoic and serious demeanor for a bit of rebellion and levity. I asked him about that at dinner one evening and he explained that we, Mom and I, mean and evil parents that we are, were the ones who had changed to making him do stuff. By this he meant chores, such as tidying up the basement. It seems his cooperation was dependent on not having to cooperate much. At least he is not complaining that Alice doesn’t help much, although I am sure that is coming soon (although Charles might realize that Alice is not, in fact, help even when she’s trying to be).
Alice had a bit of a regression this weekend. She had a containment failure on Saturday, which fortunately was (1) outside and (2) in a dress so it wasn’t so bad. However, she had two today, both inside. She didn’t seem much bothered by it, perkily noting that she had to have a bath because of the accident. The second time we punished her by making her put on night clothes instead of new outfit, because it was after supper. Alice did not like that, so we’ll see if she modifies her behavior.
Today was Corwin’s and Charles’ last officially scheduled games. Naturally they were at different locations and the same time. Because Corwin’s game was farther away (and departure time was therefore earlier) Mom sent me there. The only report I got from Mom was that
Corwin’s game was another blowout. The offense was ramped back by half time and by the last quarter it was “headers only” for goal shots. There were actually a couple of half decent attempts at that but sadly no actual scores.
The opponents were one of the better teams Corwin has played, with one very fast player, but I really noticed the better coordination of Corwin’s team. The other coach nearly went hoarse shouting “spread out!”. I did notice that Corwin’s team would execute the same plays against them multiple times. One that stuck in my mind was a kick off technique. PatrickM would just kick the ball hard, which I thought dumb since it would land among the opponents and get kicked back. But apparently Patrick was counting on the other team thinking that while another kid, Brian, raced down field the instant the ball was kicked so that while the opponent was setting up the return kick, boom! Brian was there, blocking. Then the rest of the offense would catch up and the attack was on.
Corwin had some good returns but the other team didn’t get over much and most of the time were fast breaks that tended to go right by Corwin. He did run to keep on the attackers. At least a couple of times he did such a good job that one of the other defenders was able to sneak up and knock the ball away.
Still, Corwin’s team did get lucky a couple of times when the other team should have scored but didn’t quite make it. I don’t think it would have made any difference but I felt kind of bad for the other team.
POset enjoys her new cat bed. Even better, it’s directly under one of my halogen lights so she’s basically being warmed like old hamburgers in a fast food restaurant. And what’s better than that?
Dad: I don’t know about this shirt, Alice, it has a big spot on the front.
Alice: That’s a heart!
Dad: Isn’t that supposed to be inside you?
Alice: It’s not a real heart, it’s just a picture.
Dad: You have a picture of a heart inside you?
Alice: No! I have a real heart inside me and a picture on my shirt. See, it has pink.
Dad: Ah.
Alice: Real hearts have red. So pink hearts are fake.
Dad: What about pink Alices?
Alice: I’m not pink!
Dad: [holds out Alice’s arm] What color is that, then?
Alice: That’s peach. Peach Alices are not fake.
Dad: Ah.
Mom decided we needed a picture of Charles like this for some reason, and naturally Alice had to be part of it.
The boys had yesterday off from school, although we sent Alice in so we would have a chance at doing some useful work. We had a business phone meeting in the morning, during which we locked the boys in the basement. This was so traumatic that afterwards, when I called them out to announce that they were released from durance vile, Corwin said “you got me out of the computer room for that?”.
In the afternoon the neighbor girl Olivia arrived, whether on invitation, randomly, or conspiratorially I have no idea. We invited her in to play with Charles, who she took off to get Zina. Two other kids from down the street arrived along with Matt and Claire so we once again had quite the crew. It turns out that Amalia was being paid to babysit a subset of them but had not noticed them all slipping away to Charles’ house. I discovered this when Amalia’s mom called to find out where her daughter Zina was. Amalia meanwhile was in transit to stand watch over her charges once again.
I would like to think this sudden convergence is due to Charles’ maturing social skills, but I suspect Olivia is probably the magic ingredient. Plus that Mom feed them fresh baked chocolate cookies the first time.
Corwin’s soccer team had an out of league game this evening, against the school team for a local Christian school. A couple of players from last season shifted to that school when they went to middle school so the coaches thought it would be fun to have a game this season.
When Corwin and I arrived at the field, the other team was already there, dressed in really snazzy purple uniforms. Right then I knew they were trouble with a capital P (for “purple”). Corwin had originally claimed he wasn’t going play because of his bike injury yesterday, but I told him to get out on the field anyway, even though the entire roster had shown up for the game.Even a 7th grade boy who practices with Corwin’s team was there1 and was allowed to play.
Rumours had been going around that the purple was hot stuff, but the proof of the play is in the kicking. As it turns out, the purple team was quite good.
The game started out with a bang, with a lot of big kicks and fast breaks right off. Corwin’s team was playing a rather offensive set up and in the first quarter purple staged a break away with 3 players which blew through the defense and fired the ball in the goal after a cross field pass. About a minute later Purple scored again on another break away pass. It was a really excellent shot from outside the goalie box with a near perfect trajectory leaving our goalie with nothing to do but jump futiley as it sailed over his head.
Things were looking grim but the team roared back and roughly a minute later scored with a nice shot from the outer goalie box through the thick of the purple defense. There was much rejoicing. After another ten minutes of brisk action Corwin’s team scored after a collision just in front of the goal involving a the purple goalie and a couple of Corwin’s teammates. Another teammate in the attack group was the first to recover and popped the ball in for a score. Not a particularly pretty goal but hey - it went in. The rest of the half had a of excellent play on both sides. I think purple had better field dominance but not obviously. The goalies and defense on both sides got a serious work out with lots of last second saves (like one of the players kicking it almost out of the hands of the goalie for a corner kick because of purple pressure on the goal).
Things were so desperate that Corwin was running. He had a lot of good kicks to clear and actually worked at dogging incoming purple players instead of just letting them by. This enabled another defender to break up the play while the attacker was watching Corwin. Corwin even managed at least a couple of good headers, bouncing the ball back to the offense.
The second half was a bit slower, as the kids were starting to tire. Both teams were playing well and full out in a very mobile game. There was a lot of good passing, although Corwin’s defense should have watched for offsides a bit better — purple was playing aggressively and could have been caught offsides more often. On the other hand, purple had gotten both scores on direct kicks from break aways which clearly was a worry to the defense.
There was no more scoring until about half way through the forth quarter when Corwin’s team put a very nice outside kick. It went out through a hole in the net so it wasn’t initialy clear it was a score, but keen, totally unbiased observers confirmed it had gone in. There was much rejoicing.
But it energized purple who came roaring back with an all out attack. It was touch and go for a bit until purple made a long kick and one of Corwin’s team tried to header it back. Instead, he bounced it back past the goalie (who wasn’t expecting it) and in to the goal. There was much sadness. The kids tried to push but you could tell that both teams were wearing out. A few minutes later it was all over, final score of 3-3. A bit heart breaking because of the own goal and because one shot went across the goal, bounced off the upright and back across the goal again without going in. But that’s just the way things go … in Alllllllllllbequerque!
Woops, wrong song. A few other notables were
1 There’s no 7/8 team this year because not enough players signed up.
Mom took the crew on a bike ride to the library today. I went with them but cut out early because I am way behind on work. On the way home, Corwin had an accident which gave him a big scrape on his arm just below the elbow. He managed to finish the ride home but was in desperate straights. He almost panicked when he realized that he couldn’t use a bunch of the regular sized bandages.
Luckily, when we bought the van, I had the foresight to have a first aid kit included (and Mom said I was just getting gadgets because they were available!). I retrieved it and it had a nice big adhesive bandage large enough (about 2” by 2”) to cover the Corwin wound. Corwin was by this time almost in tears, barely holding back. I put the bandage on his scrape and literally, in about one second, he was OK and smiling. I have got to find out what chemicals were soaked in to that bandage.
Not a very exciting game. Corwin’s team crushed their opponents 8-0 or so. By half time the coaches had throttled back the offense and by the last quarter the players were only allowed to make goal shots via headers. One of the kids made a good attempt at it.
Corwin was extra sluggy during the game but got a few good kicks in. I noted his sluggishness to the coach who switched him over to sweeper to get him running more. It helped a little bit, but Corwin still needs to be mroe proactive about moving.
Our Wii broke today. Charles was playing Mario Kart. Last night we had to send him to bed because he had become so distraught over not placing in the 100cc Special Cup after numerous attempts. He needed that to unlock the Mii which lets him race as “himself” rather than a standard Nintendo character. Charles was trying again, after promising to not cry no matter what happened. He had just finished placing first (on his first attempt of the day, even) when the Wii crashed. After a bunch of fiddling around, we determined that it was the Wii and not any of the game disks. Mom put in some time on tech support with the bottom line that we’re going to ship it off on Monday and someday (2-3 weeks later) we’ll get a working one. At least we were able to determine that Charles really had unlocked the Mii, which helped him take the bad news better.
The bigger problem is that naturally Nintendo won’t guarantee any of the data because
As a result, I was sent out to get a memory card to put in the Wii to save the state of the various games (such as Mario Kart). I bought a 2G card because that was the smallest of the brand I like, but is way more storage than the entire school could use up. The bigger problem will be storing the Miis, of which the kids are inexplicably fond. Mom’s researching that.
Last Saturday Mom sent us all on a field trip to the Illinois Natural History Survey’s 150th anniversary exhibition which consisted of a large number of booths set out in the parking lot demonstrating various projects.
Of course, Mom decided that we should all bike there. Hence, the screaming Alice on the bike buddy scene. Mom believed that there was also a book festival of some sort somewhere on campus, but that turned out to not be the case. Instead we ended up with hot, sweaty, whiny kids on campus. So Mom did what any desperate Mom would do and bought them some ice cream because good snacks are a magic cure all for any childhood depression.
Eventually we made it to the exhibit that was not a figment of Mom’s imagination. I thought we, the parental units concerned about properly educating our spawn and exposing them to knowledge about the world we live in, would be hard pressed to press gang the kids in to walking the booths. But the kids actually had a great time and we ended up closing out the exhibit.
Alice and Charles liked most of the exhibits, but especially the bug collections. What Corwin liked best was the live snakes. He kept sneaking back to spend more time playing with them. Personally, I found the stuffed snapping turtle the most impressive. The thing was bigger than Alice’s Barbi car. I had thought snapping turtles were just kind of large turtles but they are in fact huge.
I packed light and only took my small camera, but I managed a few pictures for the day.
Charles had a mid week game this week, and none Saturday, so I will get to pester Corwin at his game then.
The game started out reasonably well, even though the parents had to get the team organized for the game (the coaches were late). We put Charles in goal and the other good player on offense. The first half went well. It ended 0-2 (with an early score on Charles) but the team was doing a decent job on defense and threatening the other goal.
After the half, though, Charles and the other good player were taken out at the same time and the other team scored 3 goals in just a few minutes and about 6 that quarter. Afterwards with Charles back in the other team’s scoring slowed down, even though Charles’ team didn’t manage to score at all. One of the big problems with the team is that even when someone gets a good kick away from the other team, no one chases after it, so the other team just runs up and kicks it back. Oh, and it’s a bit of a bummer when the goalie stands inside the goal. Ah well.
Charles did well as a goalie, paying attention and reacting to incoming attacks before the shot at the goal. He played strong defense for a quarter and also had some good drives, coming close to scoring a couple of times. Despite the team’s record, Charles is having a good year.
Polynomial brought home her first big delivery of fleas today. Well, actually, probably a few days ago but today was the day we noticed that she was sharing. Mom immediately stripped on the beds and ordered baths for all dependents, dogs and kids.
The one bit of silver lining was explaining to Corwin that people didn’t suffer from fleas because of regular bathing. I could see the wheels turning, considering which was worse - fleas or regular bathing. It is probably fortunate that Mom is unlikely to be interested in what Corwin finally decides.
We found out last week that one of the kids in Charles’ class at school, Olivia, lives in the neighborhood. Charles had managed to not notice until then, despite riding the bus with her every day. Somehow Mom got her to come over for a visit yesterday, along with Zina and Claire. Mom fed them milk and fresh backed chocolate chip cookies. This encouraged them to come back today. Claire’s brother Matt showed up as well, along with Olivia’s little brother John and two boys who are grandchildren of the neighbors across the street. It was quite the child crew with a good age range. They all played mostly together without any major breakdowns. That was the most kids we’ve ever had spontaneously.
Charles and Corwin both had games today at the same time. At least the games were at the same set of fields, so I was able to catch part of both of them. This will be a bit briefer than normal because I am very overloaded at work these days.
I watched the first half of Charles’ game. It did not go so well. The first quarter wasn’t bad, the other team kept the ball on Charles’ side most of the time but his team managed to generate a few strong attacks. The second quarter was much worse. The other team scored 6 or so goals, I think all of them by the same kid who could drive the ball down and, if he got past Charles, take it in for the score. Charles was the only one who stood a chance because he, at least, tried to get in front. Every one else charged along behind which, all of them being slower, wasn’t much help. The goalie holding leaning on one of the goal posts behind the goal line didn’t provide as strong a goal defense as one might hope. After that, I decided I would go and watch Corwin’s game. At least Mom would be there for Charles with snack, which is the important part. I found out later than Charles’ team didn’t score at all. Still, I think Charles did well in a difficult situation but sometimes one person can’t make enough of a difference.
Corwin’s game went a bit better, with a final score of 3-2. I saw Corwin actually run a bit during the game, which was a very intense game with lots of good playing. Corwin’s team clearly had the better field dominance, but the other team frequently threw strong attacks at the goal which evened out to 2-2 score with two minutes left to play. The coach really wanted the win, so he went for broke, sending everyone except the goalie over to attack in one last blitz to get the winning goal with one minute left. The team was switched to strong defense mode after that and held out till the buzzer.
The goalie for Corwin’s team played very aggressively, which helped break up a lot of plays but also cost a goal when he got knocked down in a fight for the ball. This left the goal open with the ball nearby and one of the opponents took advantage and popped the ball in for a score. On the other side, there was one kick that the goalie blocked, but then dropped literally on the goal line (see here). He managed to scramble over and fall on the ball before it could be tapped in. It doesn’t get any closer than that, but no score.
Most notable event — double header by Levi. He bounced the ball off his head twice in a row before someone else kicked it.
Alice has been playing with Andrew at school quite a lot lately. This is fine except that the two of them don’t want to stop playing when it’s time for Alice to go home. Andrew frequently tries to hold on to Alice or take her home with him. I mentioned this to Alice one time after putting her in the van.
Dad: Alice, why did you want to go home with Andrew?
Alice: I didn’t.
Dad: But you were following him out of the building.
Alice: He told me to!
Dad: You were going to do what he wanted just because he told you to?
Alice: Yes.
Dad: Does that work for me?
Alice: No.
This would make an excellent early Christmas present. Otherwise I may never use my laptop again.
Alice did kept this up for most of the first leg of the trip. I think even Mom got a bit annoyed by it.
The kids still look in on the super worms. We’ve discovered that the worms shed their skins. When we watched them today, we even got to catch one in the act of molting.
Charles insisted on getting a bigger box so the worms would be more comfortable. As long as I had two contaminated plastic boxes, I decided to try the isolation experiment in the smaller box to see if we could grow adult beetles. Charles’ class had isolated their meal worms and had a few cocoons. We kept two in the old box and the other twenty-some in the new spacious box.
Charles’ worm interest got me motivated to pick up some red wigglers and reactivate my worm box (which I’ve been lugging around unused since grad school). The worm box is on the back deck, and since it has been so cold, they aren’t very active. I need to pull them onto the sun room or garage. Once they get going, there shouldn’t be much smell. Unfortunately, I don’t think we are to that stage yet.
Until the red wigglers get more active, the kids definitely prefer watching the super worms.
