Austin's Been Here ... Oh Man What a Gift!

Sunday, July 14, 2013 @ 11:50 am
Good morning.  This is me.  I'm sitting with my Grandson Austin.  We are having such a great time.  He probably thinks we're not such a good Grandma in that after yesterday we'r hanging back from the computer games.  We tried it yesterday, but he swamped me by our third turn.  And, then he took mercy on me and said he wouldn't conquer my country/capital, and he let me get it back ... but then later he said he had a surprise for me and I was like great!  But, the surprise was that he sieged me again!  Now like hey is that fair?  Today when he asked we asked him to consider how inadequate we were and then there is some discussion there.  So now he's giving me a little break on that and he's sitting next to me and we are here on the computer and he is on his laptop next to me and then there's some fun talking in-between  He's playing the game and sometimes we hear about things like Ethiopia and the Sudan.  I think he might feel a little empathy because of the weakness of those countries in the game.  That's a nice thing about him among MANY OTHER NICE things!
We do have to say that he is not an early riser.  We thought and thought about it and then asked Linda and Rich and we then woke Austin up at 10 am, so you could imagine it was kind of funny when he didn't know the time yet and asked to be woke up at 9 am ... He's also complaining about not needing so much metal .. Oh Annexed Ethiopia ... ok, we'll move on, but you sort of get the idea :)
I know we have to return him, but we're not exactly ecstatic about that ... we want to keep him :)  I know that Laura said bring him back anytime and that Mike said he was going to be home all day.  It'll get figured out ... most likely Rich will come in and say are you about ready?  And, then we'll have to leave.  He's out looking at the boat and his tackle.  He's going to be gone Wednesday through Sunday fishing with his friends and Bob in particular as his partner.  Rich holds the schedule because he knows what time he is going to want to be with his mother.  I'm not sure if he asked her or WILL ask her closer to dinner, but idealistically he wants to take her out for dinner.  We're willing to go along with that.  I AM in a pretty good mood.
Mostly, I'm just happy that Austin is here ...
He is just so gosh darn cool!
Ok, I know get a handle on it, right?
We did have a nice brunch a little bit ago when he FINALLY got up - Laura and I messaged back and forth and she said I forgot to tell you he likes to sleep in.   We were giggling ... yup yup that seems to be true. :)
Anyway Rich made us all waffles and that was good ... oh and then we cleaned things up.  Good deal waffles for cleaning any day!
We're having little conversations yet ... the last one had something to do with conquering and killing, not sure why war is so important - male?  He says its the best way to gain something.  Eh?  Arguable!
Did I say that I talked to Linda earlier?  I think pretty much we were just both talking about what was happening in our last 12 hours or so.  And of course our time is being rich in Austinism.  I love his questions and role playing and how he's always thinking - especially, about things like on country level rather then the girl next door or what he wants to buy next.  Linda is nice to talk to at times like this because she has grandchildren and is proud of them too so she understands when I say how excited I am.  Hmmm better say this too in case Austin decides to read my message - we're only 1/2 inch from him ... :) Hi Austin!  Love YOU! :)
He knows that we are writing in our blog and then that blogs sometimes become a book, or something close to that.  I don't know if he read our entire first book, but I know he'd started and gotten into it a bit.
I told him this morning that for our birthday (18th) that we ordered both him and us a book and that his book would be delivered to his mail box probably about Thursday - MAYBE on my birthday, "The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life." It's hard to explain, and I don't want to go into a lot of details because of Austin's privacy, but he talks a lot about intelligence and is trying to figure out things like what does it mean to be gifted AND he plays games where he's comparing things like, countries and social structures and he was able to understand when we talked yesterday about the bell curve.  He then was able to use it in the examples that he was talking about.  I also stressed that we wanted him to read the reviews on the book because the book is controversial and that people were taking it both good and bad.  We don't want him to accept one "given" idea - but use it to challenge his presumptions.  It might be too much for him, but it will be a good reference book if he can get past some of the boring ideas that aren't as important to him.  I didn't realize it until after we ordered it but its like 900 pages.  That's a lot for ANYbody to sit through.
So that was that ... I told him about the book this morning and I think he will take it in and then do with it as he must - whether he bury's the book or buries himself within it.  I think on the positive side he might like that others in an intellectual world think about the kinds of stuff he does ... Just not sure if he's ready to read something that dense.
We just talked ... it is about 12:45 pm and he said that we could go home about 2 pm.  That seems fair.  He went out to tell Rich about the time ... so that's all fair ... we were talking about sitting in the front seat or the back ... it had come up yesterday so we had decided that we wouldn't get caught up in that ... so today we asked him if he wanted to sit in the front seat on the way home, he said, "sure."  I thought that was nice.  :)
He just lost one game because of Czechoslovakia ... that's a shame ... he said it was ok.  I think he's doing something now that has music.  I'm going to miss him when he's gone.  I did ask him that when we took him home we were going to pick-up my birthday present ... a small tv and did he want us to do that before or after we dropped them off.  He said after so that was ok.  It's going to be a great birthday present.  I might have said it before, but Rich is getting me a tv so we can have one in the bedroom so I can give him massages the last hour of the day before going to sleep sleep.  I thought then that be a good present for both of us ... and it's been on my new house shopping list the longest.
Next would be a microwave, but that's not so much fun ... I know the microwave would quit squealing, but I only make microwave popcorn for 2 1/2 minutes.  :)
I'm not sure how the rest of the birthday is going ... I think Rich is going to take me out to dinner probably on Tuesday night if he's leaving early Wednesday morning, or at least to the degree Bob bargains with him to be up.  Bob likes to drive in the early morning when Rich is sleeping.
We are also going to be seeing Dr. Marvin on Tuesday and Thursday which is the birthday day - that doesn't happen every year.  Good times :)  I hope he doesn't do something to bring up bad feelings that day ... that would be terrible.
Ok, let's take it up a notch girls :)
Did I tell you about the part of the lawn mowing?  Rich said we have to take it one at a time, but yesterday (without me knowing) he asked Don if he would mow or lawn.  Of course, he'll pay him.  It had gotten long again and I was getting to it, but not fast enough and Rich felt back because his knee problems are preventing him from doing it without great pain.  I think Don could use the money, but I still feel kind for having a neighbor do it because it could lead to an uneven relationship and it makes us look like we're too good to do our own work.  I feel bad about that - much better when I was trying to get the lawn mowed myself ... I admit that it is at one of the harder things that I do, but I felt a little more sturdy and useful when doing it.  Rich said again we can decide time by time and see how the money holds out.  I don't know how much he offered or if the other decided by setting a price.  I think he doesn't like mowing on the weekend, and I don't know which lawn mower he will use.  I hope Rich lets him use ours.  I think ours is the better one ... i don't think Don's is self-propelled.  Shoot think we're woosiefied.  Grrr.
Ok, enough of that!  Shh!
Ok, why don't we talk about this ... we wrote a note to Nancy Preston - the writer/friend of Shirley Mason (Sybil).  AND AND AND ... she wrote us back.  Apparently we made her feel about as good as she had made us feel when we found the note she left.  I think it was good coincidence.  We will write to her next, but I'd rather do it after Austin leaves, because we need better attention.  We're writing now, but we accept being easily interrupted.  Speaking of ... Rich just came in ... he says he's dripping and is getting himself a cold pop WITH ice.
Oh ... now we're in time-out again.  We talked to Rich about stuff going on and the upcoming schedule and he ended it by saying that he needed a 15 minute nap and then asked if we would turn on the 50's music.  Austin and I had been listening to "The Blend."  Austin didn't complain so I didn't either :)
Austin was playing his game quietly all the time Rich and I were talking ... we're thinking he probably zone us out.  He looks pretty entrenched into the game.  Maybe he'll play it on the way home ... Rich has an adapter if he wants to use it.  BUT, we like the engagement of Austin's conversations, so maybe the computer isn't such a good idea.  We'll see.
Not sure where we left off.  Hmmm, let's go back to talking about Nancy ... I don't think we were through there.  Anyway, she sent us this really nice note and we were so proud to get it ... she seems very nice AND thoughtful.  She also asked more about me ... I'm not sure what else to say.  We could let her know that we have an "About me" section in our Ann's Multiple blog, but I don't think she's going to want that long of a story.  She's probably heard many ... I think we would like to keep conversation pretty much in the present ... Just we would like to know some of her experience with multiples - Shirley and others.  She' a part of a much larger community than we know of.  She did ask to exchange information about each other on our blog/web sites so we too care of that already ... Was proud to add her ... I hope she doesn't mind we don't have a really prominent place on our blogs because we've got so much clutter ... That's the sort of thing you get when "the system" decorates.  *sigh*
Yeeks ... got to go ... time for Rich to be up and we have ten minutes to get out of here.  I've got it the easiest ... BUT, I see Austin has started to move and he moves fast ... gotta go!
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