Frenzied Daddy

Miss B’s first high school quarter is coming to a close, and I can say – EdBox is great, but it’d be greater if the teachers would update it more regularly. It’s a whole lot better than just guessing as to whether her work is done or not, though. Overall, I’m pleased with her grades. She has a couple of weak spots that EdBox is helping us track down, and one of those is the reason I’m sitting in Starbucks far from my normal haunts while she spends her Saturday morning at the school doing biology labs.

I’m trying hard to be the “awesome uncle” but my sister in law upped the ante. I’m sending my nephews and niece holiday cards, and sent out Halloween cards. Imagine my surprise when the girls got cards from their new nephew Dylan. Imagine my further surprise when each girl found a five dollar bill inside their card. I was shocked! And soon, I’ll be broke. Thanksgiving is coming. I bet I could fit a whole turkey into the card this time.

Miss K had a good time at her school’s literacy fair. She went to the book fair, ate Round Table pizza, made some comic strips, met a librarian from Multnomah County Library, and won a (scary) book. She spent her “Halloween money” on a Pokemon black/white catalog book. She was unhappy that I wouldn’t let her pack a lunch on the way out the door to school on Friday. Apparently it’s hard to carry both her book and the lunch tray. But I didn’t want to be late to school; we’ll work that out next week. Miss K also won a “respectful” award at her school’s award ceremony. Sometimes the “word of the week” at her school smells slightly of brainwashing, in an Orwellian sense, but some of those kids could use some washing. Last week’s word was “Volunteer” and this week’s was “Character.” She and I trick-r-treated in our neighborhood. She dressed up as a vampire woman, but because she mislaid her teeth, it was just a pretty red and black dress. She got the traditional bucketful of candy.

Miss K has been remarkably clingy this week. I waver between enjoying it and wanting my own space. Usually when I come home, I need my own space. Miss B, not so clingy.

Ms B had a day of Jury Duty this week and was released about lunchtime. I met her for lunch before she went home. It was very nice to sit and eat with her, even if we ate in the mall’s food court. She is angling for me to clean the house today and move the Xbox and PS3 upstairs so they get played with more. The basement is so dark and cold. This is tempting, but the obvious spot for them (at least until after Christmas) is our bedroom, where everyone congregates. I made the tactical error of offering to move our bedroom stuff to the (smaller) living room and then we could use the bedroom as the living room and just come in / go out through the back door. And hey, why don’t we have the Christmas tree back there too. Unsurprisingly, she thought the first idea was silly. Surprisingly, she could get behind the second idea. Whoops.

I’ve run twice this week and plan to either run tonight or tomorrow morning. I’m running 4 ten minute intervals, and my route takes me around a loop on the sidewalk. I’m not running on the (dark) bike paths or down the middle of the street. But it’s cold and wet. Hopefully I’ll keep my motion going through the winter.

And the best news of the week was that Grampa R is out of the hospital and healing at home. So glad he’s ok. I like him a lot.

It’s no secret that the economy here in the US is pretty damn pathetic. Being out of work for 2 years is “the new normal.” That’s not right. So Howard Schultz, CEO of Starbucks, is working on something intriguing. They call it “community investing in America” – but it’s not investing, really. What the Starbucks Foundation is helping organize is people donating five bucks or so to a general fund that’s used by community lenders to help businesses. It’s not investing, because we (the investors) aren’t paid dividends. However, it’s an intriguing plan, and I expect to donate $5 myself.

Here’s what BlogHer co-founder Lisa Stone says:

In a nutshell, Starbucks is donating five million dollars to seed a fund at the Opportunity Finance Network for capital grants to local lenders who fund small businesses that make a difference. Businesses like Zonia Torres’s overnight day care in San Francisco and like Nicholas Kujawa’s housing units and fresh local market in Butte, Montana — these are my favorite examples as a former single mom who had to figure out how to work nights occasionally, and as a Montanan who watched the towns of Butte and Anaconda suffer when local mines declined.
source

To learn more, you can visit the CreateJobsForUSA website, and particularily today, you can listen to a conversation with Mr Schultz – 11AM Pacific or 2PM Eastern, you can call 877-698-0629 and use conference code 23564006. It’ll be a short conversation, and you’ll only be able to listen, but it should be interesting.