In which I continue to be a terrible LJ friend
Week Five of my not being able to read LJ. Seriously, I have never been this poor a correspondent before! I feel terrible that I'm not keeping up with your lives.
First, the good news: my BIL was able to rescue most of my pictures off my SD card. The bad news: he didn't realize my pics were ON an SD card (whereas I hadn't realized this was such an unusual situation and that it needed explaining), so before this was straightened out, I had taken a couple of pics and a short video. I did know I risked overwriting old information, if it was still on there, but I thought it would be "first in, first out" sort of thing. No, what it meant was about 50 old photos - including maybe a half dozen wedding photos - were splinched: half the pic was there, and half was missing. Wrenching to lose them, but at least I got the rest back, which is way more than having none of them. (Incidentally, when Rob first looked at the SD card, he couldn't find any evidence of my photos at all, so with a heavy heart, I put the SD card back in my phone - except none of the apps I had saved to the SD card (rather than the device itself) came back. And when I looked at my photos, the only ones I saw were from ... 2009. It was then we realized that when my SIL had found the SD reader/adapter, there had already been an SD card in it - a REALLY old one of mine (probably from back when I had the Blackjack), and nobody realized that she wasn't handing the reader to Rob with my current SD card in it. Thankfully, we found the proper card in short order, my current photos were rescued, and my apps magically reappeared when I had the correct card back in. So, other than some minor loss, all is well. THANK GOODNESS.)
Thank you to everyone who made conciliatory and soothing gestures when I was tearing my hair out last week. ♥ I'm so thankful to have you for friends.
In other news: MiniPlu got her Chromebook last Monday. It was our first time walking in by the auditorium (where the introductory presentation was given), rather than through the main front door, which didn't do wonders for our minimal sense of building layout. :-P Also, we had to walk past the marching band, diligently practicing in small groups outside (as was the color guard), which put MiniPlu in an even more sour mood, as she was wistfully wishing - again - that she was part of her would-be school's marching band as a majorette. We picked a spot and sat down, but in a few minutes another mom and her son looked at us as if we were in their seats, asking if we'd been assigned those spots by the list outside. What list? We scurried outside and, sure enough, on a display case were taped assignments ... for Freshman Orientation, which was the next morning. I was pretty sure that had nothing to do with Chromebook night, but we dutifully sat elsewhere when we went back in.
The principal - who didn't even bother to introduce herself, which I was kind of annoyed by (it's one thing to talk to a group of kids and parents when 95% of them know you already, and another one when EVERY family in there is with a freshman, and therefore, unless they have older sibs, they DON'T know you) - gave a similar sort of useless presentation that they'd done over at the middle school, and then kids were sent out to assigned rooms (8th graders who'd had Chromebooks at the district middle school the previous year went to the library; all new students and freshmen from the non-district middle school were divided up by alphabet to various classrooms). Went to MiniPlu's assigned room and ... the teacher in charge was the British Commonwealth (I still can't decide if he's proper British, South African, or what) dad who had helped me get Two's account set up properly at *his* Chromebook distribution the previous week. Small world! The high school students zipped through the process faster than the 6th- and 7th-graders had, although I did have a few minutes to exchange small talk with another mom, whose fraternal twin girls were sitting in front of MiniPlu in her row, and who were also new to the system - they had gone to the parochial school.
MiniPlu couldn't get out of there fast enough and didn't breathe a sigh of relief at being out of the building until we were back in the car. Seriously, this girl has major anxieties about starting school here, way more than I ever had, even when I was at a new school. Nothing I say or do has made the slightest difference, sigh.
The next morning, MiniPlu was back at the high school bright and early for Freshman Orientation. Unlike the middle school's 5th grade/new student orientation, which ran 9-11am the previous week, MiniPlu's started exactly the time school will start: 7:20am. I had planned to drive my kids to school in the morning because the bus comes 40 mins early when they're less than 10 mins from school (and we're on the cusp of bus-ability for the high school, so as the closest in, you'd think they'd be picked up last, but noooo. However, a neighbor warned us that traffic - with the upperclassmen who drive - can be a bitch in the morning, and that the bus was safer to ensure you wouldn't arrive late. So, grudgingly, we'll have MiniPlu bus to school both directions, at least until I can verify what traffic is really like for cars at the proper hour.
So, anyway, Tues a.m, MiniPlu was up at 5:30a and I was up at 5:45a (that was 5 hours of sleep for me, argh) to get her out the door by 6:30a for the 6:38a bus. Thankfully, our stop is only half a block away. These are gargantuan blocks in our neighborhood, because each house sits on ~1 acre, but still - it takes 4 mins to walk, tops. I promised to be within line-of-sight to MiniPlu, without being WITH her, until the bus came. I brought the dog and planned to go for a run. I stood across the street and hung back, until I saw another mom and her daughter come up. Well, hey, if she can be seen with HER mom, then MiniPlu can be seen with hers. :-P I didn't come completely to the corner, but I did walk closer, to chat a little with the mom. Turned out they'd just moved to the neighborhood, too, although they came in early June. MiniPlu shooed me away with her eyes so I took off, just as the bus became visible down the street. Just then, another car pulled up, for a third student to join the other two girls; as it turned out, this girl was a sophomore but, she, too, was new to the neighborhood, so, as Two had done, she was attending the Orientation as a new student, just not as a freshmen. I'll get back to these two girls in a min.
So, anyway, Orientation was scheduled to last 7:20-11:30a, with an ice cream social starting at 11am. Around 10:40a, MiniPlu texted me that I had ruined her life, so I knew that the event wasn't going so well. When she got home, she said that the sub-group of girls she'd been put in pretty much ignored her, even when she spoke up, abandoned her completely at the ice cream part, and another party of boys took over her table, leaving her completely isolated. (Hence the text.) It was pretty much every conviction and nightmare she'd had about this new school, that it was going to be jammed full of bitchy snobs. Oh, and her locker wouldn't open, not even when other teachers tried. They think the combination is wrong - I don't know if this means they gave her the wrong combo, or if the locker was set wrong, but either way - it wouldn't open, which means now MiniPlu has the bonus anxiety of not knowing if they've fixed it when she goes on Wed.
So, yeah, she was in a pretty horrible mood when she got home. The one bright spot - the other two girls from the bus stop had chatted with her once they got off the bus after the event, and the three of them planned to spend part of the afternoon together. They got a ride into town where they walked around and explored the kitchy little shops, got some ice cream, and even got matching beaded bracelets, completely charming the shop owner and a trio of older women shoppers - who had met when THEY were in high school - in the process. She was in a much better mood when she came home, although still dreading - possibly even more - actually starting school.
(As I write this, MiniPlu is actually having her first get-together with these same two girls. They had planned to get together much earlier today but it just didn't work out until after dinner, and at that point, one of the girls invited the other two to sleep over. It's MiniPlu's last night of freedom and a chance to cement some friendships - at least enough to get her started - which might make starting on Wed marginally less traumatic. She's got biology with the sophomore girl, I know, but I don't think she shares anything with the fellow freshmen. I'm really hoping she'll continue to get along with these girls - it would make a big difference, I know.)
Back to the Chromebook thing, btw - you may recall that the kids all get a small canvas bag to haul the machine around in. They are allowed to personalize the bag, just not the Chromebook itself. At the middle school, they brought in a local embroidery company (which apparently makes the spirit wear for both kids' schools) to put names or monograms on kids' bags for a modest additional cost. I was perfectly happy to do Two's, and offered to let MiniPlu have hers done, too, except, when I picked up Two's finished bag Mon morning, they said they hadn't been contracted to serve the high school. Why not? No idea. But they did say they'd be happy to do MiniPlu's; I could just drop off her bag Tues night when they'd be at the middle school one last time.
Except that on Tues night, nobody was there. I emailed them to go "Wha...?" and they apologized, saying they'd gotten their schedule confused, but the employee I was interacting with - when she found out where I lived, cheerfully told me, "I have to pick up my daughter's friend in that same neighborhood on Wed afternoon. Put the bag on your front step with your order form and I'll pick it up for you." Talk about service! Not only that, but - the last batch of middle school bags - and MiniPlu's bag - would normally be ready for pickup this Wed morning. Except MiniPlu will be at school Wed morning and I'd rather - if possible - that she have her bag by then. So, I emailed the company again, and the same savior woman will have MiniPlu's bag with her when she takes her kid to karate class tomorrow night, just down the street from our new church (and the middle school). I can swing by and pick it up from her then. I feel like I should bring her flowers for going so far above and beyond the call of duty.
In non-school news: I finished reading Hyperbole and a Half (the book version), which I'd picked up Goodwill the day Two got his braces off. I only knew it from "Clean ALL the things!" and was surprised at how thoughtful and serious it sometimes was, in between the hilarious stories about cake and unmanageable dogs. I also finished reading The Glass Gauntlet, the sequel to The Blood Guard, both of which I read aloud to Two, and both of which were entertaining and action packed, along the lines of Percy Jackson, but with a totally different form of magic and no mythology. (hamsterwoman, did O like Blood Guard?
I'm currently 3/4 of the way through Lady Midnight by Cassie Claire, while coincidentally simultaneously reading aloud The Bronze Key by Cassie C and Holly Black to Two. Which has resulted in an amusing set of (non-spoilery) passages, that only someone reading both books would notice. And how many people are in BOTH target populations, really? So, I was reading one of the early chapters of Bronze Key, and two of the main (male) characters are amusing themselves in a thrift shop by finding the weirdest thing possible. One of them finds a Batman alarm clock that says, "WAKE UP, BOY WONDER!" when the alarm goes off. That SAME NIGHT, I curled up on the sofa to read Lady Midnight. I was almost halfway through at that point; two of the (female) leads are headed out to a vintage shop one of them loves, and they ask one of the other main characters if he needs anything. He jokingly says, "Well, I've always wanted a Batman alarm clock that says" - (wait for it) - "WAKE UP, BOY WONDER!" I actually stopped dead for a second, wondering what the odds were of such a weird item appearing in two different books - that I would happen to read on the same day, no less. And then it hit me: same author involved in both books. *g* I'm wondering how many people will actually read both series, much less close enough together that they'll happen to notice the connection.
The irony of MiniPlu's first day of school is that EVERYONE will be home ... except her. It's R&K's 25th (!!) wedding anniversary on Wed (would have been my grandparents' 82nd anniv), so they've both got the day off (R works from home anyway), Will will be working from home as usual, and it's Two's last day of freedom. And meanwhile, the poor kid has to be out the door at 6:30a to head to a stressful first day of hopefully-fixed lockers and not getting lost and worrying about who she'll eat lunch with. Send her positive vibes, if you think of it?
First, the good news: my BIL was able to rescue most of my pictures off my SD card. The bad news: he didn't realize my pics were ON an SD card (whereas I hadn't realized this was such an unusual situation and that it needed explaining), so before this was straightened out, I had taken a couple of pics and a short video. I did know I risked overwriting old information, if it was still on there, but I thought it would be "first in, first out" sort of thing. No, what it meant was about 50 old photos - including maybe a half dozen wedding photos - were splinched: half the pic was there, and half was missing. Wrenching to lose them, but at least I got the rest back, which is way more than having none of them. (Incidentally, when Rob first looked at the SD card, he couldn't find any evidence of my photos at all, so with a heavy heart, I put the SD card back in my phone - except none of the apps I had saved to the SD card (rather than the device itself) came back. And when I looked at my photos, the only ones I saw were from ... 2009. It was then we realized that when my SIL had found the SD reader/adapter, there had already been an SD card in it - a REALLY old one of mine (probably from back when I had the Blackjack), and nobody realized that she wasn't handing the reader to Rob with my current SD card in it. Thankfully, we found the proper card in short order, my current photos were rescued, and my apps magically reappeared when I had the correct card back in. So, other than some minor loss, all is well. THANK GOODNESS.)
Thank you to everyone who made conciliatory and soothing gestures when I was tearing my hair out last week. ♥ I'm so thankful to have you for friends.
In other news: MiniPlu got her Chromebook last Monday. It was our first time walking in by the auditorium (where the introductory presentation was given), rather than through the main front door, which didn't do wonders for our minimal sense of building layout. :-P Also, we had to walk past the marching band, diligently practicing in small groups outside (as was the color guard), which put MiniPlu in an even more sour mood, as she was wistfully wishing - again - that she was part of her would-be school's marching band as a majorette. We picked a spot and sat down, but in a few minutes another mom and her son looked at us as if we were in their seats, asking if we'd been assigned those spots by the list outside. What list? We scurried outside and, sure enough, on a display case were taped assignments ... for Freshman Orientation, which was the next morning. I was pretty sure that had nothing to do with Chromebook night, but we dutifully sat elsewhere when we went back in.
The principal - who didn't even bother to introduce herself, which I was kind of annoyed by (it's one thing to talk to a group of kids and parents when 95% of them know you already, and another one when EVERY family in there is with a freshman, and therefore, unless they have older sibs, they DON'T know you) - gave a similar sort of useless presentation that they'd done over at the middle school, and then kids were sent out to assigned rooms (8th graders who'd had Chromebooks at the district middle school the previous year went to the library; all new students and freshmen from the non-district middle school were divided up by alphabet to various classrooms). Went to MiniPlu's assigned room and ... the teacher in charge was the British Commonwealth (I still can't decide if he's proper British, South African, or what) dad who had helped me get Two's account set up properly at *his* Chromebook distribution the previous week. Small world! The high school students zipped through the process faster than the 6th- and 7th-graders had, although I did have a few minutes to exchange small talk with another mom, whose fraternal twin girls were sitting in front of MiniPlu in her row, and who were also new to the system - they had gone to the parochial school.
MiniPlu couldn't get out of there fast enough and didn't breathe a sigh of relief at being out of the building until we were back in the car. Seriously, this girl has major anxieties about starting school here, way more than I ever had, even when I was at a new school. Nothing I say or do has made the slightest difference, sigh.
The next morning, MiniPlu was back at the high school bright and early for Freshman Orientation. Unlike the middle school's 5th grade/new student orientation, which ran 9-11am the previous week, MiniPlu's started exactly the time school will start: 7:20am. I had planned to drive my kids to school in the morning because the bus comes 40 mins early when they're less than 10 mins from school (and we're on the cusp of bus-ability for the high school, so as the closest in, you'd think they'd be picked up last, but noooo. However, a neighbor warned us that traffic - with the upperclassmen who drive - can be a bitch in the morning, and that the bus was safer to ensure you wouldn't arrive late. So, grudgingly, we'll have MiniPlu bus to school both directions, at least until I can verify what traffic is really like for cars at the proper hour.
So, anyway, Tues a.m, MiniPlu was up at 5:30a and I was up at 5:45a (that was 5 hours of sleep for me, argh) to get her out the door by 6:30a for the 6:38a bus. Thankfully, our stop is only half a block away. These are gargantuan blocks in our neighborhood, because each house sits on ~1 acre, but still - it takes 4 mins to walk, tops. I promised to be within line-of-sight to MiniPlu, without being WITH her, until the bus came. I brought the dog and planned to go for a run. I stood across the street and hung back, until I saw another mom and her daughter come up. Well, hey, if she can be seen with HER mom, then MiniPlu can be seen with hers. :-P I didn't come completely to the corner, but I did walk closer, to chat a little with the mom. Turned out they'd just moved to the neighborhood, too, although they came in early June. MiniPlu shooed me away with her eyes so I took off, just as the bus became visible down the street. Just then, another car pulled up, for a third student to join the other two girls; as it turned out, this girl was a sophomore but, she, too, was new to the neighborhood, so, as Two had done, she was attending the Orientation as a new student, just not as a freshmen. I'll get back to these two girls in a min.
So, anyway, Orientation was scheduled to last 7:20-11:30a, with an ice cream social starting at 11am. Around 10:40a, MiniPlu texted me that I had ruined her life, so I knew that the event wasn't going so well. When she got home, she said that the sub-group of girls she'd been put in pretty much ignored her, even when she spoke up, abandoned her completely at the ice cream part, and another party of boys took over her table, leaving her completely isolated. (Hence the text.) It was pretty much every conviction and nightmare she'd had about this new school, that it was going to be jammed full of bitchy snobs. Oh, and her locker wouldn't open, not even when other teachers tried. They think the combination is wrong - I don't know if this means they gave her the wrong combo, or if the locker was set wrong, but either way - it wouldn't open, which means now MiniPlu has the bonus anxiety of not knowing if they've fixed it when she goes on Wed.
So, yeah, she was in a pretty horrible mood when she got home. The one bright spot - the other two girls from the bus stop had chatted with her once they got off the bus after the event, and the three of them planned to spend part of the afternoon together. They got a ride into town where they walked around and explored the kitchy little shops, got some ice cream, and even got matching beaded bracelets, completely charming the shop owner and a trio of older women shoppers - who had met when THEY were in high school - in the process. She was in a much better mood when she came home, although still dreading - possibly even more - actually starting school.
(As I write this, MiniPlu is actually having her first get-together with these same two girls. They had planned to get together much earlier today but it just didn't work out until after dinner, and at that point, one of the girls invited the other two to sleep over. It's MiniPlu's last night of freedom and a chance to cement some friendships - at least enough to get her started - which might make starting on Wed marginally less traumatic. She's got biology with the sophomore girl, I know, but I don't think she shares anything with the fellow freshmen. I'm really hoping she'll continue to get along with these girls - it would make a big difference, I know.)
Back to the Chromebook thing, btw - you may recall that the kids all get a small canvas bag to haul the machine around in. They are allowed to personalize the bag, just not the Chromebook itself. At the middle school, they brought in a local embroidery company (which apparently makes the spirit wear for both kids' schools) to put names or monograms on kids' bags for a modest additional cost. I was perfectly happy to do Two's, and offered to let MiniPlu have hers done, too, except, when I picked up Two's finished bag Mon morning, they said they hadn't been contracted to serve the high school. Why not? No idea. But they did say they'd be happy to do MiniPlu's; I could just drop off her bag Tues night when they'd be at the middle school one last time.
Except that on Tues night, nobody was there. I emailed them to go "Wha...?" and they apologized, saying they'd gotten their schedule confused, but the employee I was interacting with - when she found out where I lived, cheerfully told me, "I have to pick up my daughter's friend in that same neighborhood on Wed afternoon. Put the bag on your front step with your order form and I'll pick it up for you." Talk about service! Not only that, but - the last batch of middle school bags - and MiniPlu's bag - would normally be ready for pickup this Wed morning. Except MiniPlu will be at school Wed morning and I'd rather - if possible - that she have her bag by then. So, I emailed the company again, and the same savior woman will have MiniPlu's bag with her when she takes her kid to karate class tomorrow night, just down the street from our new church (and the middle school). I can swing by and pick it up from her then. I feel like I should bring her flowers for going so far above and beyond the call of duty.
In non-school news: I finished reading Hyperbole and a Half (the book version), which I'd picked up Goodwill the day Two got his braces off. I only knew it from "Clean ALL the things!" and was surprised at how thoughtful and serious it sometimes was, in between the hilarious stories about cake and unmanageable dogs. I also finished reading The Glass Gauntlet, the sequel to The Blood Guard, both of which I read aloud to Two, and both of which were entertaining and action packed, along the lines of Percy Jackson, but with a totally different form of magic and no mythology. (hamsterwoman, did O like Blood Guard?
I'm currently 3/4 of the way through Lady Midnight by Cassie Claire, while coincidentally simultaneously reading aloud The Bronze Key by Cassie C and Holly Black to Two. Which has resulted in an amusing set of (non-spoilery) passages, that only someone reading both books would notice. And how many people are in BOTH target populations, really? So, I was reading one of the early chapters of Bronze Key, and two of the main (male) characters are amusing themselves in a thrift shop by finding the weirdest thing possible. One of them finds a Batman alarm clock that says, "WAKE UP, BOY WONDER!" when the alarm goes off. That SAME NIGHT, I curled up on the sofa to read Lady Midnight. I was almost halfway through at that point; two of the (female) leads are headed out to a vintage shop one of them loves, and they ask one of the other main characters if he needs anything. He jokingly says, "Well, I've always wanted a Batman alarm clock that says" - (wait for it) - "WAKE UP, BOY WONDER!" I actually stopped dead for a second, wondering what the odds were of such a weird item appearing in two different books - that I would happen to read on the same day, no less. And then it hit me: same author involved in both books. *g* I'm wondering how many people will actually read both series, much less close enough together that they'll happen to notice the connection.
The irony of MiniPlu's first day of school is that EVERYONE will be home ... except her. It's R&K's 25th (!!) wedding anniversary on Wed (would have been my grandparents' 82nd anniv), so they've both got the day off (R works from home anyway), Will will be working from home as usual, and it's Two's last day of freedom. And meanwhile, the poor kid has to be out the door at 6:30a to head to a stressful first day of hopefully-fixed lockers and not getting lost and worrying about who she'll eat lunch with. Send her positive vibes, if you think of it?