Thursday, September 27: sick day

He was up around 5, I think. He was at least doing a decent job of just resting in bed. We all got up around 5:45. He watched Llama Llama as we got ready. Carly took his temperature and it was 37.6. That combined with a lack of sleep convinced me to keep him home for now.

Carly headed to work and he switched to The Magic School Bus Rides Again. When he went to the bathroom he was talking about a special machine he had to see tiny things and it was made out of special iron. He said it could show a model of a water droplet (from the episode he’d been watching), but then he told me it wasn’t a model, but the real thing, as he’d added tiny tentacles that got real water droplets. He said he wanted to show mama, so we did a video to send to her, but then he said it was too complicated of a machine to explain to her.

We Skyped with my parents and wished my dad happy birthday. We were doing a good job skyping but August was clearly looking tired. Thought he might take a nap today. We said goodbye and pulled out the bed part of the couch, as he didn’t want to go upstairs. We rested for awhile – maybe 15 minutes or so. We then played his science lab game. He kept expanding it, with having the kids coming back day after day to do different things in his science labs. Later I was talking to him about how he calls it a game, but it is also a form of writing stories, as it is more than just the chasing games, etc. that the kids usually play at school. We played it for a long time. I got us to eventually take a break and we read Magic Tree house. He then watched Pink Panther and ate apples and I rested. After while we were back to the science lab game. In the game he claimed that he was always at his science labs, doing science. I was asking if he did other things, like go to the beach. He said, “I do that! Just with science!” As the game extended with multiple days he had the kids going for trips through the heart, nerves, brain and others. Then it was other things, like a car battery factory (apparently he had seen how car batteries are made on YouTube). Then it was one long extended trip through a Gumball machine, the plastic wrapper, getting chewed, digestion, the toilet, and the sewer system: “That means we’ll go on multiple adventures!”

He asked, “I have a question for you: do people know what makes up DNA? What about inside the stuff that makes up DNA?” For lunch he had rice with mushrooms, then he wanted to start the science lab game over from the beginning. Then he started a new game with a new scenario: “You’re just going to be walking through the park and you find a door not attached to anything…and you’re going to be someone’s sister and you don’t even know me and you’re very nice.” I asked him, “Are you a mad scientist?” He replied, “I’m not mad! I’m trying to help people learn! I’m not trying to take over the world!…I try to reach the world better ways to live…Like not pollute as much.”

He played on the iPad and we did some Hebrew. We had done some Hebrew and Arabic together earlier. He played Math Tango, etc. Jumped around. Then back to “You’re someon walking through a park and…”

He went to the bathroom, then had a cookie but didn’t eat it all. He then told another story where a door appears in a classroom as they finish math and start art. It goes to a guy who gives them a magic school bus. He takes the class into the teacher’s brain and they change his DNA into a lizard. He talked about taking away someone’s nervous system so they can’t feel “sad or nervous or angry…”

So he had declared himself not sick, and his temperature had been back down below 37 for several hours. We had planned to play with Taya and Grace and a couple other kids after school and he said he was up to it. We got in the car and headed to school. But on the way he had some bar. He didn’t eat it all, and when I didn’t take it from him right away he got upset. Then, he wanted his water and got upset when I couldn’t hand it to him, even though we were just a block away from school. He was clearly tired. He agreed to head home. We went to the school and had Carly bring out the iHerb box so we could take it home. Carly noticed bumps on his legs and took him in, against his will, to see the nurse. He was afraid he was going to get a shot. The nurse said they were just because his fever had broken.

Carly went to finish up some work and pack up, so we went to the library for a few minutes. We saw Amelia and she told us that one of August’s bracelets was in the library. It was one he had given one of his teachers. We went and picked it up so August could track down its owner later. (It turned out to be Marion’s.) Liz said that Amanda had been playing with it, like worry beads. August watched one Sarah and Duck while lying on a bean bag, then Carly was ready to go.

He got home and he promptly fell sleep from 4 until 5:20 when Carly woke him up. He watched an episode of Magic School Bus about how trees and plants communicate with each other through their roots. That was totally new to him and Carly and I only barely knew about it. He then watched Max and Ruby and I cooked a chana masala (https://cookieandkate.com/2014/quick-vegan-chana-masala/) and Carly made a mango smoothie. We ate dinner (he said it was yummy but then didn’t eat much) and Carly went up to take a shower. We read Zachary Zebra’s Zippity Zooming on Skybrary, then August ate a little more and Carly gave him a bath and I made the popcorn he’d been requesting. I did dishes and they read some Beezue and Ramona and Red Wagon, then did their preschool game. He also took photos of popcorn. He told Carly his preschool ‘problem’ from the other day – that his name was on the cubby twice.

She took him up and I said good night at 8:35. They were reading Will I Have a Friend? I got a text message from Carly asking to add ‘inference’ to the words of the day list. I then went on a run.

When I got back he was still up. She read him the small Plants Versus Zombie book, then I took him in on the Zinnie bed and read one of the bigger Plants Versus Zombie books, Lawnmageddon. Read about half of it. He was ready to go back in to Carly at 10 but he didn’t fall asleep. I heard crying, then it got quiet around 10:15 and I thought he was asleep. But he was still up at 10:30. Finally asleep about 10:45.

His new machine made of iron: