Miser Family Update: back to school, playing hooky edition

   School began this week for many, many members of the Miser Family, adding to the richness and fullness our our lives.  

• A-child started preschool.     First day of school ever for this kiddo!  And a bit of extra free time for her mom, K-daughter, who tells me she simultaneously welcomes having time to herself and misses the time away from her offspring.
• J-son began physical therapy school, and he loves his teacher.   She's "cool", and seemed to be exceptionally clear about how she expects students to divide their time between in-class and out-of-class activities, which J-son appreciates.  He told my husband, "My teacher is really organized, not like me, but like (gesturing my way) her."   Aww, I'm flattered. 
• I-daughter started teaching a new crocheting class this week.  She's also really enjoying get to know the movers-and-shakers in the fiber arts community; we had a good talk about a fiber arts expo that happened in town recently, and I-daughter provided detailed critiques of (both positive and negative) of how that event came off.   
• My husband started Hebrew class, which he's auditing at my college.  On the first day, the students played "one truth and two lies".   He says that all the college students correctly figured out that his statement "I dye my hair gray to look more mature" was a lie.  (But they mixed up the other two, not believing he'd been a tank commander, and falling for his claim that'd he'd met Putin in person.)
• N-son didn't start school, but he's still on track for attending his orientation/evaluation in October, and he sent in a few more job applications to tide him over during this gap (semester?  year?  We won't know for a little while longer).
• And me, I started teaching my three classes (pre-calculus, and two sections of calculus), with my 76 students, plus two independent study students.

for my family, who are fans: 
a sparkly portrait of Dale Earnhart Sr. in the Atlanta Airport

And then I stopped teaching those students.  I'm writing this from the International terminal of the Atlanta airport, where I'm waiting to board a plane bound for Panama.   It's a bit heady, walking past gates marked "Zurich", "Quito", and then getting to a gate marked "Panama" and thinking, "that's me!". I'm playing hooky from my students for the majority of next week, and like K-daughter, I'm both welcoming this opportunity and feeling a tiny bit guilty about that.  

In the middle of the week, to add to the general hullabaloo, we celebrated Michael Jackson's birthday by inviting some friends over, setting up the projector, and dancing along to some of his music videos.  The most enthusiastic dancer was a 2-year-old guest.   J-son seemed to appreciate the menu (fried chicken, mac-n-cheese!) more than the music, although the end of the "Black and White" video rocked us all.  

And that's the latest news from our family, who continue to be wealthy in our adventures.  May you and yours be similarly prosperous.