That was the question.

I decided to grow a beard for the first time in a long time. It came in grayer than I was expecting. Though it made me a bit more distinguished, it also aged me a couple of years. I know, I know, I should not be so vane but I am. I need all the help I can get. I put up with looking a bit older because the beard also helped hide some of my weight. This trade off of weight for age took a turn for the worst. A couple weeks back I was skiing with Alex and he convinced me to go off a jump. After completing my little jump and landing on my feet Alex skied down to me and informed me that the guys up top said, “Hey look the old guy can do tricks.” Flattering as that might sound, I decided to shave off the beard and look younger even if that means looking heavier. Now of course, the young guys on the mountain will still see me as the old guy but I do think I look a bit younger.

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The time has come for the great frog dissecting.

Yes - Alex has been finding this very exciting, though I am not convinced that he has been doing much learning. I think he and his lab partner have used this as an excuse to act more goofy than normal. If that is even possible!! Melinda has found this to be completely disgusting. At least it is something he is doing at school that he wants to come home and talk about. His class also went on a field trip for the purpose of dissecting a sheep’s heart. I do not remember getting that opportunity when I was in school.

On the subject of of field trips

– I went on a field trip the to the art museum (with Melinda’s 4^th grade class) . Some of the things were rather interesting, including the building itself. And I enjoyed a day of being with Melinda. I do not know what particular exhibit had the most impact on Melinda - however, there was one in particular that grabbed my attention. This room had all of the walls painted – a mural of sorts - an almost abstract mural – not enough of an abstract. It did not take but five minutes before a couple of the boys in the class noticed a man in the image with a penis shaped like foot and another man that was – shall we say over sized. I was not sure how I was going to explain this to Melinda if she asked, not to mention the women that had body parts well out of normal proportion. The person from the museum that was showing us the exhibit was trying (in vain) to redirect their attention. She talked about some of the other images in the mural and how there was symbolism in all the images in the painting.. I was not getting all of the symbolism!!! And the images I did get, I did not want to talk about. I realize I am a bit behind the times but………

So the real question – do I bring it up with Melinda or do I not say anything unless she brings it up. I know it was suppose to elicit some emotional reaction, and it did, the reaction was - is this appropriate for fourth graders??? I must be out of touch.

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Do I yell?

 Do I let it slide and just chalk it up to another lesson learned? It had already been a relatively long day of teaching skiing. Alex was given some freedom today to ski with a friend and for safety reasons and so he was able to call his friend I gave him my phone to use. With the phone he got a good lecture about keeping it safe and not loosing it. He lost it!!! On the Mountain!!! In the snow!!!

He had a great day to that point. Though I did not get too mad at him but he will be finding work around the neighborhood to pay for the phone. The new lecture was about taking responsibility for the mistakes we make. He was good with that.

Pattie got on line and deactivated it so we hopefully won’t find any long distance charges on it. Now the chore of finding a new (cheap) one.

At least he had a good day to that point skiing with a new friend. And Melinda got to spend a day at home with mom and now big brother bugging her.

On a side note Melinda skied a double black diamond with me on Sunday.

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Day off of school.

Melinda took one more day off of school today with some cold type symptoms. Alex brought school work home, and though this is a great idea to help keep Melinda caught up we could not ascertain what exactly was to be done with the school work. So, She will have to make up her work next week when she can get some direction.

Flu

When calling the school attendance line, the voice mail system still wants to know about any kind of flu type symptoms. Do they use this as some kind of statistical numbers about kids missing school because of the flu? Seems some what un-scientific but what ever works for them.  NO she does not have the Flu.

She does not hate school but has been enjoying staying home and playing computer games. I insist that she does some studying on the computer as long as she’s there anyway.  It is amazing how much time the kids spend on the computer. We even have started watching some shows on the computer.

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She did not even notice my hair cut

School had a fund raiser – of sorts – last week. One of the restaurants nearby gives the school a percentage of the proceeds during a particular night. So all the parents took the kids out for a night (including us), while their we ran into the family that we car pool with. As parents we find a certain amount of pleasure in teasing Melinda and one of the boys about how they argue like an old married couple. They of course adamantly deny it.  But about this time Alex commented about the other boys new hair cut.  He thanked Alex for noticing and added that Melinda did not notice. NO!! that’s not acting like an old married couple at all.

Earrings?

So this past weekend Melinda wanted to try having her ears pierced again. Last year it just did not work, as they became infected and she had to let the holes close up. Now it is one year later and she is trying it again. Having never had my ears pierced I am not sure why it is so important, but it is! If you look close you can see how pretty her little earrings are.

She went to school with her new earrings in, and at the end of the day she asked her friend (the boy that is not her boy friend) if he noticed her new earrings. His comment: yes I noticed but I was pretending not to notice because you (Melinda) did not notice my hair cut!

I thought the girls were suppose to be sensitive about this sort of thing. And are you sure your not an old married couple? At any rate Melinda is very happy to have earrings again and said she is sorry she didn’t notice his very important hair cut.

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