Tales from the Steppes

2005-04-08

2:22 p.m.
Never knowing who or what you are until you're, Living with the unfamiliar

The phrase for today is "no rollerblades in the house." Or more accurately "Take of your rollerblades before you come in the house. I said NO ROLLERBLADES IN THE HOUSE. NOW!" The elder mongols have the day off from school, which I completely don't get. This is the first week after Spring Break. What teacher workday business could not have been accomplished during the 6 schooldays they had off? I do not purport to have any understanding of our public educational system at all. All I know is that parent's work schedules do not seem to be of any importance in the school's schedule.

Fortunately, the YM went off to preschool today, even though his siblings stayed home. Usually this is a major point of contention with him but he is completely easy to manipulate. All it takes is the promise of a couple of Jolly Ranchers to get him moving in the morning. Generally his diet is excellent. He prefers to eat apples and peanut butter rather than pizza and chicken nuggets. But he has a terrible weakness for candy. And gum. Earlier this week I caught him chewing a piece of gum he had fished out of my purse. Normally this is not a huge problem but this gum was energy gum. It contains as much caffeine as a cup of coffee and I keep it for emergency puposes only. Sometimes I will be out writing and get really tired but still need to drive home. Thankfully I smelled the gum in his mouth, cinnamon, and got it from him before the caffeine had much time to work into his system. He is not a child that needs anymore energy.

I have made a counteroffer on the position I was offered. It may be next Thursday before they get back to me with an acceptance or counter. This works perfectly in my favor, as I want to drag this process out as much as possible. It looks like May 8 will be my start date, if we can come to an agreement. This gives me 4 weeks to write in and I think I can get drafts written for my first three chapters. And then I can just concentrate on the actual research and then writing it up. Not too horrible.