finally fall

and back on days. As in, Ray's no longer a vampire. The temperature has cooled significantly and its starting to feel like fall - in a good way. A few weeks back Ray commented that he was, for the first time in years, looking forward to the change of the season, now that its not all about "back to school" for him. That was nice to hear.

Unfortunately, he ended up not going with me to the Live and Learn Conference in NC. That was kind of a bummer, but my grandfather died and we (Mo and I) ended up going to his funeral Labor Day weekend - which was in MA - and going to the conference from there. Kind of a long drive and dull several days of waiting from Ray's perspective, so he opted out. The conference was fun, but the room and food situation would have been pretty stressful for Ray, it turned out, so I'm glad he missed that part, even though I'm bummed he didn't get to meet the really cool teens there.

Anyway, we're back to plotting trips to the skatepark and some other outings. While we were on the road, Mo discovered "claw" machines - you know, put a quarter in and cuss at the thing when if fails to grab a toy - and I suggested that we collect quarters at home for a trip to Walmart or some such just to play the claw. As soon as we got home Ray happened to comment that he hadn't ever eaten at IHOP, so now I'm scheming - there's an IHOP next to Walmart in Murfreesboro, maybe we can make a day of it.

Yup, that's what "field trips" look like in my world LOL! Hey kids! lets go out to eat and play some arcade games! Woo Hooo! And naturally, I'll find a way to tag this for the "learning plan" thingy... hmmm, lets see, we're still broke, so we'll need to set aside some cash to eat out, plus the Quest for Quarters (although that's more a Mo thing) - hey this isn't even hard. Real life actually does provide real learning opportunities. I just have to drive!

Okay, I'm in a whimsical mood, today, but this is the sort of thing I run into over and over in our family's journey deeper into the wilds of autodidacticism - once there's no need to play the school game there are countless learning opportunities everywhere! I actually found myself worrying about that a few weeks ago, especially with the vampire thing going on, but even then Ray was spending hours reading (!) on the computer, playing God of War (Greek mythology, problem solving, blood and guts), going to live musical events and waterskiing regularly. I could have wished for "summer school" that fabulous as a kid.

And to top it all off, summer vacation isn't ending for Ray, its just the shift from "waterskiing season" to "skateboarding season". He's been hunting for his boards and checking out his equipment all week.