He woke up at 6:40 and went right back to sleep. He kept until 7:40. Downstairs he cuddled on the couch, then asked for his iPad. He did his one move for his watch game. He then asked, “Here’s a challenge for you: Yesterday I goed to another place and you have to guess where.” It turned out it was Turkey. We played our 5 minutes of Green Planet, then chess, first on the board, then using the iPad app to play a full game. I made him oatmeal for breakfast. He then wanted me to make music. We made another song, and he told me the reason he wants me to make music is that he wants me to be a performer, in front of people, “when you are like 60.”
He watched some Curious George, then were going to do challenges with the modeling clay, but did more chess instead. We went upstairs to do the brother and sister robot game. We created a longer story where they fix one, but it is left behind by the other robots when they return to their planet. The bot they have has plans for a spaceship, and other alien technologies along the way. the Robot Doctor starts building the spaceship, and when he dies they continue the work (it takes years). When they finish, they take it home, back to it’s hollow egg planet and then live there.
Yet more chess, then we had schnitzel and broccoli and some of the leftovers for lunch. Shmuel surprised us with a visit. I hurriedly moved the beds so that he and another technician could take a look at the AC. The technician took a photo of the barcode. Something I’d already sent Shmuel. Shmuel had brought an old modem for August, and an old electrical engineering book. As August and I took apart more of the vacuum, getting to the motor, Shmuel brought those, then a small bag of English book. Later, he would leave a keyboard on the doorstep.
August read Who? and Cat and Mouse to me. The first went in the read-it-himself area, while Cat and Mouse was nearly there, but he decided to practice again. He surprised me with how fluently he read the last few full sentences in it though.
We now did our play dough challenges. Well, mainly he gave me things to do. That was sort of his MO today, and it got tiring. We had planned to walk to school and have a snack in the cafeteria and then go to the library. However, August decided we should drive, and got upset when I said that wasn’t the plan, or an option. So a bit of a breakdown after that. Enough that I said that going to school was no longer a possibility. He handled that pretty well, though, and eventually agreed to walk up to Snakes and Ladders Park.
While that was happening, someone came to the door looking for a רם קארי. I told him we didn’t know who that was, and eventually had to show him my ID numbers to prove they didn’t match.
We got ready to go, and that’s when August found the keyboard that Shmuel had left. We got walking at 3:05. We walked up to the park. We noticed a fence had been put in o you couldn’t cut across the grass into the park. He went to the spinning thing first. Played on that for a few minutes, then had the bar I brought as a snack. We played the escaping luggage game, but I was piloting a spaceship this time. We then played with the snakes and ladders board, turning it into a math game, adding our ways to 100. He asked what an “Infinite time loop” was (from Timepocalypse) and then sang a song about it.
He decided it was time to head home. Carly had sent a message telling us she was heading home a few minutes before that. So we would see who got home first. On the way home August talked about putting different things in infinite time loops. He had practical applications too: he could put the wheel in an infinite time loop and it was turn over and over on its own. He put other cars in infinite time loops too, which would make them crash.
We took the back path to check on the flower corn (one didn’t grow this year) and ran into Mikaela coming the other direction. She said that Shmuel had been showing her place today. We were home at 4:40, after Carly.
They took apart the keyboard, then he had me use its parts and others to build a “thingamajingjongjoo.” It was a machine that makes monkeys. Don’t know where it was from, but he asked “What’s stun mean?” A word of the day. He kept wanting me to make things, and I got him to agree to taking turns. He made a ramp.
Carly made fried rice for dinner and we ate. He then went outside with her. He then read two Bob Books to me: Cat and Mouse and Milk. He put both in his stack. I then read three Skybrary books: Oliver Otter’s Own Office, Left, Right Freda, and Lucky Beans. He then helped me do all the dishes. He and I both had an ice cream sandwich, then we were looking for his water bottle when Carly got home, after 8:30.
I took him up for his bath. He didn’t play in the sink, and just kept asking me questions. So eventually we did a quick wash. there was then a lot of talking about the planets and which had atmospheres and what sorts. August found his baht coin from Thailand and took it downstairs to give to Carly. He told her, “Mama, you’re the best.”
In bed we read a few chapters of Ben Braver. He decided he had a power: “Here’s my power: I can chew through steel walls.” It turned out he could eat anything. Carly came in and I left them at 9:40.
Spinning:
Snakes and ladders:
Infinite time loop song:
Singing for points:
