He was up at 7:50. He got his shoes on (he’s now refusing his Crocs, as he’s used to his Minnie Mouse shoes and socks) and went out side with Carly for a couple minutes. They came back in and I showed them photos of Notre Dame. They cuddled on the couch and I took a shower.
He watched Joseph’s Machine videos and had crackers and cheese for breakfast. We got going right at 9. He watched the Berenstain Bears where sister plants an apple tree, and as he went to the bathroom he told Carly about how he planted an orange tree where the junk pile is across from our house so no one can put garbage there. He had talked about that plan weeks ago.
On the walk to the busy street to the South he saw inside a car garage, then talked about how he took apart a whole car and used the parts for his inventions.
We caught a cab. After a couple minutes I saw a place called Kinky Opera. August heard me and thought the name was funny. The taxi dropped us off by the Blue Star office we’d seen on a map. They directed us to another place if we had a reservation. We looked around inside E8 and couldn’t find it, then Carly led us to another office she saw on the map. Success there. We stopped at a D’espresso and I got a sausage pastry and a cheese one (that turned out to also have ham). We walked to E9. No boat, so we sat outside the smoky sitting area and sat and ate some of the pastries. Then we were looking at the tickets and realized the vessel name was FDXVII. On our walk over I had seen the Flying Dolphin XVII and pointed it out. That turned out to be our ship.
So we walked back over to it. August asked how you get on. I said that workers might help. “By lying down and you walk on them?” He spotted a little olive tree and looked on it, then had fun climbing on the planter boxes for a few minutes.
We got on the boat and found seats at the front right. It took about 40 minutes to get over. August looked out for several minutes, then in open water played on his iPad. On the island we walked left from the dock. Carly suggested getting food first, but August said he just wanted a treat and I wasn’t yet hungry. We should have eaten first though and August was grumpy the whole way and didn’t want to spent time at the beach at all when we got there. He found some treasures though and insects along the way. In particular an earwig thing near the beach, then a beetle as we walked back through town.
We spent about ten minutes at the beach. We sat and he ate a Balance Bar, but still wanted to head straight back. Also, the Temple of Apollo archeological site was closed on Tuesdays. But we could see it through the fence. As we walked back he told me about his “Infrared defaus tracker”, which sprayed infrared ink on someone and then you could track them. We paused so August could climb in a tree, and I looked at n odd old Ford that seemed to claim to be a Taurus, but was older than that.
We made it to a restaurant called Rembe. Not very Greek, but we had a table on the edge outside looking out at the water. We got the Thai appetizers, and Carly got a chicken club. August ate some of both, but mainly liked the prawn and shrimp from the appetizer. I had a cappuccino viennois (with whipped cream) and let August help with the whipped cream. He got a taste of coffee and hated it. It was a beautiful clear day but he was still negative about rain, arguing, “Water is evaporating to make clouds.”
We got walking, south this time, at 2. We played at a little beach area. He found a bone, maybe 5 inches long. He asked, “You like how I’m really interested in wildlife now?” He carried it around for a few minutes before agreeing to take a photo of it and leave it behind. We started looking for a treat for him and walked back north, taking the narrow streets into town, window shopping along the way. He picked a flower head that sort of looked like fuzzy garlic and told us he makes cotton from them. He was then making articles of clothing at our request and charging us for them in Euros.
He caught a butterfly and had me do a slo-mo video of it. As we kept walking he talked about having a butterfly live in his hair and lay eggs there, then they would go and come back to his hair. Finally, he found a daddy long legs sort of spider and made it run.
We looked at the Tower of Markellos for a couple minutes, then headed back towards the water. We found an ice cream place called Dodoni back by the water and August got a small vanilla caramel brownie. We ate that out at a table. He reminded us of seeing cotton candy in Akko – we had told him the popcorn was better and got that, but he remembered the cotton candy machine and now compared it to the one at the International Day.
And I don’t know if I’ve mentioned that he’s been refusing to sit on any cushioned seat in restaurants. Here, that has meant removing or flipping up the cushions to sit on the metal chair. We used the bathroom, then headed across and out to the end of the docks.
Threw a few rocks. He looked at the big chain and anchor with Carly. We then went and found where the boat would be. He played with a couple of big ropes, then we started reading Nick and Tesla. One page in the boat showed up. While we waited to board, a big group of German or Scandinavian tourists walked right up in front of everyone. Led to some pushing and solving while boarding. We had our exact same seats in the exact boat, but August was convinced this boat was bigger.
We saw the church and lighthouse we would have walked to if August was back in the backpack days and easy to haul around.
He fell asleep after humming to himself for five minutes or so. He woke up as we got off the boat at 4:45. I carried him as Carly led us to the subway station. We got seats, and he watched our progress on Google Maps on Carly’s phone and we looked out at the graffiti on other trains. As we transferred he told me about a locking invention that could lock anything. We took the train four more stops, then as we walked to our place he was trying to spot Smart Cars and sang, “Come over here cute, cute car.”
We found an orange I could reach and picked it. We got back at 5:50 and Carly cut it up. Smelled better than it tasted, but he was happy about it and ate several bites. He made a circuit thing all on his own, then played Toca Plants with Carly. Had some leftover pizza. Another new phrase for August is “Ahem!” and he said it several times today. He also talked about how he and Carly had taken apart his soil and pH sensor thing at home the other day, since it didn’t work well anymore.
We left at 7:20 and walked down to the grocery store. As we walked down the street and he noticed the sun was low he said/joked that he had woken up a couple minutes ago and we hadn’t gone to the island yet. He claimed it was the morning.
He did a ton of running around the grocery store and outside in the open area. Carly had him give a woman sitting outside some money; I had had him give some money with me to a woman on our way back from the National Garden yesterday. Afterwards, he was asking if men/boys could be poor, as we have only seen women. And he wondered why they all use cups.
We got back at 8. He told us he was making a strawberry out of chemicals in his lab. “I’m gonna do what a plant does.” We taught him about ‘synthetic’ and that was the word of the day. “It’s for a competition. I’ll win a golden trophy.” Carly brushed a crumb or something off of him and he asked, “Was there a crane fly on me?” He played with the tape and put some tape on my forehead. We read some Nick and Tesla, then he had a meltdown when he wanted to keep doing circuits and it was time for a bath. Carly took him in to bed right before 9.It was a big, long meltdown. I went in at one point to try to help, but it wasn’t. He was finally asleep after 9:30.
Climbing on the dock:
Fast ferry:
Playing with a beetle:
Caught a butterfly:
Butterfly slo-mo:
Over to the chain:
Big ropes:
