This is a short post.
There was an earthquake in Norman yesterday.
I missed it.
It was a 5.1 earthquake, centered just east of Norman, and it happened at 9:06 a.m. Apparently it was strong enough to be felt as far north as Stillwater, and all across Oklahoma City. Folks here at the office said it really shook the museum (which is a big building). And Grayson said he felt it shaking his chair in the gymnasium at school.
I was driving to work, and so I completely failed to register any movement of the earth. I'm so BUMMED. A real earthquake in Oklahoma - of all places - and I missed it. I was in my car for less than ten minutes. And THAT ten minutes was when we get an earthquake. I was gyped.
Authorities tell us that the temblor was caused, not by movement of tectonic plates, but possibly by deep hidden fault lines OR - most probably, as a by-product of oil or gas drilling.
Heck. Maybe I'll feel the next one... in another 40 years or so.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Friday, October 8, 2010
School Stuff
Lately we've been struggling with difficulties at school. Grayson has a teacher who is, I'll go ahead and say it, a bit of a hard-ass. This is a woman who has rules for her rules, and doles out punishments on a formula. Enter X you always get Y. And Grayson's not integrating all that smoothly into the New World Order. There's just no wiggle room.
Unfortunately, Grayson is all about wiggle room.
So, he is feeling the pinch. The whole household is. Primarily all the drama is caused by his consistent failure to put the number 6 on the upper right hand corner of his papers before he turns them in. Not only does he lose five points from every paper on which he fails to do this, he also as to sit out recess. He has had, consequently, only one recess this week.
I'll go ahead and say this, too, while I'm at it...I totally don't agree with this system of punishment. It's completely counter-productive. I think if you make a kid sit out recess, what you get is a restless, resentful and distracted kid, not a kid who has learned any kind of lesson. Not my kid, anyway. But I don't make the rules, and me thinking they're stupid doesn't change a thing for Grayson. So I'm doing what I can to try to nudge him into compliance. I remind him every morning to put his number on his page. I ask him every afternoon if he got recess. I've taken his TV privileges away. But I don't think piling on more punishments is going to produce any better results. So I will have to come up with something else. I just don't know what. What can I do to make him remember? I can't be there, whispering in his ear. I just have to hope it gets better on its own. He has no recess today because he put his number on the wrong page on work he turned in yesterday. Sheesh. Today, I hope, is the last day of no recess. We've had two difficult weeks. I hope next week will begin a new era.
Today is Book Report Day. Grayson was up late last night, finishing his first-ever "book report:" actually a shoebox diorama accompanied by a five-sentence synopsis of Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone. I was worried that it would be torture getting him to work on this, and it has been a challenge to get him to do some of the preliminary work. He was convinced, of course, that he could complete the whole project in a single night, and resisted when I made him starting drawing the figures for the diorama on Tuesday night. But last night went well. Fortified by milk and cookies, he plowed right into the project and kept at it, not even fighting me on the writing bit at the end.
Grayson hates writing. He'll be the first to tell you so. But turns out he just hates the mechanics of writing. He's actually a bit of a dab hand with a sentence. A chip of the old Mom Block, perhaps. I was worried that the synopsis would be an ordeal, but here's what he came up with:
"Harry has had a mysterious life, but the day he turns eleven, everything changes. He realizes he is a wizard and goes to a school called Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. He meets two friends named Ron and Hermione but once they find the sorceror's stone it leads them on a great adventure. Together they accomplish any obstacle that comes their way, including He Who Must Not Be Named. But then Harry has to say goodbye to his new found friends, but he will see them next year."
Myself, I think the kid may have a career in writing book jacket blurbs.
Unfortunately, Grayson is all about wiggle room.
So, he is feeling the pinch. The whole household is. Primarily all the drama is caused by his consistent failure to put the number 6 on the upper right hand corner of his papers before he turns them in. Not only does he lose five points from every paper on which he fails to do this, he also as to sit out recess. He has had, consequently, only one recess this week.
I'll go ahead and say this, too, while I'm at it...I totally don't agree with this system of punishment. It's completely counter-productive. I think if you make a kid sit out recess, what you get is a restless, resentful and distracted kid, not a kid who has learned any kind of lesson. Not my kid, anyway. But I don't make the rules, and me thinking they're stupid doesn't change a thing for Grayson. So I'm doing what I can to try to nudge him into compliance. I remind him every morning to put his number on his page. I ask him every afternoon if he got recess. I've taken his TV privileges away. But I don't think piling on more punishments is going to produce any better results. So I will have to come up with something else. I just don't know what. What can I do to make him remember? I can't be there, whispering in his ear. I just have to hope it gets better on its own. He has no recess today because he put his number on the wrong page on work he turned in yesterday. Sheesh. Today, I hope, is the last day of no recess. We've had two difficult weeks. I hope next week will begin a new era.
Today is Book Report Day. Grayson was up late last night, finishing his first-ever "book report:" actually a shoebox diorama accompanied by a five-sentence synopsis of Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone. I was worried that it would be torture getting him to work on this, and it has been a challenge to get him to do some of the preliminary work. He was convinced, of course, that he could complete the whole project in a single night, and resisted when I made him starting drawing the figures for the diorama on Tuesday night. But last night went well. Fortified by milk and cookies, he plowed right into the project and kept at it, not even fighting me on the writing bit at the end.Grayson hates writing. He'll be the first to tell you so. But turns out he just hates the mechanics of writing. He's actually a bit of a dab hand with a sentence. A chip of the old Mom Block, perhaps. I was worried that the synopsis would be an ordeal, but here's what he came up with:
"Harry has had a mysterious life, but the day he turns eleven, everything changes. He realizes he is a wizard and goes to a school called Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. He meets two friends named Ron and Hermione but once they find the sorceror's stone it leads them on a great adventure. Together they accomplish any obstacle that comes their way, including He Who Must Not Be Named. But then Harry has to say goodbye to his new found friends, but he will see them next year."Myself, I think the kid may have a career in writing book jacket blurbs.
Monday, October 4, 2010
On Lying Down with Dogs
The weather is cooling off, and that means that I lie down with dogs. Three dogs, in fact. Usually they are arrayed thus:
Flower takes up residence at the foot of the bed near the window, and barely moves. She knows where she can sleep and incur the least disruption from moving feet, moving dogs or incoming kid.
Kobi roots her way under the covers and descends all the way down, often curling up around knee level off to one side. This works fine unless G crawls into bed with me, in which case she sometimes gets squashed a bit.
Roxy find the absolutely most inconvenient and uncomfortable place for her to possibly lie down and then spends most of the night alternately scratching herself bald or chewing on her bone. Usually she lies down right where I want to put my legs. Sometimes, however, if I get up in the middle of the night, she moves to my pillow, where she sticks like a limpet until I either smack her butt or harry her off the bed, whereupon she immediately bounces right back up and reinstalls herself wherever I most want to put my feet.
Roxy really would like to sleep with Grayson, but she just can't bring herself to stay there after lights out. She can't stand it that I'm still up and moving around, so she always comes in to see what I'm up to. Getting Grayson to bed, however, is an exercise is outfoxing the Rox. We go into Grayson's room and Roxy leaps onto the bed and curls up on the covers. I snap my fingers and she jumps down. Then she jumps back up as G is getting under the covers and she lays on them so he can't pull them up. I snap and down she goes. Grayson pulls the covers up. Roxy leaps onto the bed, steps over him, leans down to investigate his face, and then plops down at his side.
I say good night and turn out the light.
If Roxy doesn't jump down right away to follow me out of the room, within minutes the scratching begins. Or the chewing. Or both. Soon I hear Grayson struggling to get Roxy off the bed. Finally, I will call her and she will assume her post at my feet. I choose this martyrdom rather than sacrifice Grayson's sleep.
Sometimes she lies very still and quiet and black on the floor of my bedroom in the dark, waiting for me to trip over her on my way to the bathroom in the wee hours of the morning. That's always fun. And sometimes she comes and prickles my face with her whiskers at 2 a.m. wanting to go outside herself.
Ah dogs.
Flower takes up residence at the foot of the bed near the window, and barely moves. She knows where she can sleep and incur the least disruption from moving feet, moving dogs or incoming kid.
Kobi roots her way under the covers and descends all the way down, often curling up around knee level off to one side. This works fine unless G crawls into bed with me, in which case she sometimes gets squashed a bit.
Roxy find the absolutely most inconvenient and uncomfortable place for her to possibly lie down and then spends most of the night alternately scratching herself bald or chewing on her bone. Usually she lies down right where I want to put my legs. Sometimes, however, if I get up in the middle of the night, she moves to my pillow, where she sticks like a limpet until I either smack her butt or harry her off the bed, whereupon she immediately bounces right back up and reinstalls herself wherever I most want to put my feet.
Roxy really would like to sleep with Grayson, but she just can't bring herself to stay there after lights out. She can't stand it that I'm still up and moving around, so she always comes in to see what I'm up to. Getting Grayson to bed, however, is an exercise is outfoxing the Rox. We go into Grayson's room and Roxy leaps onto the bed and curls up on the covers. I snap my fingers and she jumps down. Then she jumps back up as G is getting under the covers and she lays on them so he can't pull them up. I snap and down she goes. Grayson pulls the covers up. Roxy leaps onto the bed, steps over him, leans down to investigate his face, and then plops down at his side.
I say good night and turn out the light.
If Roxy doesn't jump down right away to follow me out of the room, within minutes the scratching begins. Or the chewing. Or both. Soon I hear Grayson struggling to get Roxy off the bed. Finally, I will call her and she will assume her post at my feet. I choose this martyrdom rather than sacrifice Grayson's sleep.
Sometimes she lies very still and quiet and black on the floor of my bedroom in the dark, waiting for me to trip over her on my way to the bathroom in the wee hours of the morning. That's always fun. And sometimes she comes and prickles my face with her whiskers at 2 a.m. wanting to go outside herself.
Ah dogs.
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