We needed a few things, so Carly headed to the store. We let him sleep, and he woke up at 8:50. I was working on sending sheet music to Carly to print later, so August spent some time on piano and practiced “Oh Susanna!” Carly got home as we were playing Minecraft. August randomly said, “Old favors don’t matter.” Then, “They’re soon forgotten.” Very confused where those came from. Kind of sounded like song lyrics. He finally said they were from a folk tale.
I made us oatmeal for breakfast, and Carly headed to school. We went outside and he walked around talking about Minecraft server and Myna relaxing every block on the server after investigating glitches. We sat in the comfy chairs for quite a while. He went back in and played some piano. Carly got home and showed him some video about the effects of laughter. He later asked me “What’s chronic pain?” A word of the day. Carly went out to the yard to work and we read Ben Braver. On the piano August decided he wanted to work on “Fairy Flight”. It was one that he had chosen and I had intended that one to be one he works on with Dalit, but he got right into it. We learned dim. e rit. As we played it he kept saying “It’s so beautiful!”
After working on that for a long time we then watched the latest Grian video. August really liked when he used “maths.” Carly came in and he showed her his song progress, then played more piano. She got him hummus and cucumber and I made a grilled tuna sandwich. While he went to the bathroom he asked why Catholic Church thought we were at the center of the universe. He seemed to understand the answer (about how that is how it actually looks, if you watch the sun) better than many of my 9th grade students. He then said, “I think I know why Jupiter takes longer to orbit the sun.” He explained about how the circumference of its orbit is a lot bigger.
He ate his sandwich, then worked on another line of the song. Carly then got him ready and they headed to the beach, the one in Netanya, one north of Poleg Beach. They had fun, then were back before 3:30. He played more piano, then we were listening to the latest episode of Space Programme but paused to have a story with Brother going in a g force simulator. Back on the piano he wanted me to fix the A. It is the first one I fixed, and hits a little soft. I took it out and sanded down some parts and made it rotate more smoothly, but when I put it back it still wasn’t perfect. I’m afraid there might be something else going on with it. Carly and I don’t actually notice the difference much, but August does.
At 4pm Carly and I had our first Zoom meeting with Gabi instead of going into his office. I liked the idea of teaching him more about the science of emotions, and have a book already that August might like. While we met in the office, August sat on the bed and watched Phineas Rage. We went back downstairs and we worked on more of the piece, particularly the first line of the second page. He asked me, “How are you better than me?” I had just been practicing the line several times.
He went and made Marble Maze structures. Carly was working outside. He spent some time searching and listening to songs on SuperSonics Piano. He turned it into a sort of Brother game. He wanted to see 64th notes, so we watched a couple videos on YouTube. I think I used the word integrate and he asked what that meant, so a word of the day.
He liked that you could search for YouTube videos using Google, and we talked about Google owning YouTube and how companies could buy other companies. For dinner I made roasted cauliflower and hot dogs. We ate, then he played Minecraft with Carly in a new world, after some negotiations. Think he actually only played about 20 minutes; he remembered adding time, so then Carly convinced him his time was about up.
They tried to call Cherie, but no answer, then called Vivian and Colin instead. He was a bit hyper, then Carly had him show them the Marble Maze. “Explain what it is. “Physics…it’s all physics.” He ran away when she showed a picture she had drawn a picture of coronavirus. He showed her his progress on “Fairy Flight”.
He talked with Colin for a long time. Colin told him to eat his pie on the floor, which we all did. Then to eat like a pig, then to go outside. August took him outside for a few minutes. As soon as he hung up he said, “I’m bored.” Carly said, “That was inevitable” and he asked “What’s inevitable mean?” Another new word. To Carly he had also said “IB” as an abbreviation for “I’m bored” at some point today.
He was then being really ticklish on the couch. He’d climb on to me, but then be ticklish even though I wasn’t tickling him. We got him upstairs and he told Carly, “I’ll trade not taking a bath for Mr. Addicty Pants.” Apparently that’s the name of the squishy alien toy. He did a lot of spinning on the bed, then claimed he was tired from all the spinning. Carly gave him a bath, then they were reading the cat math book in the big bed. When he came in to me he asked, “Did you know I spinned about a thousand times?” And he told me, “Here’s a golden shape: a rectangle that generates smaller rectangles inside it…” He had learned about ratios and golden shapes from the books, apparently. He asked why the graph for tan(x) makes the lines it does and I told him we could learn about it tomorrow.
We listened to “Drink the river, eat like royalty” on Stories Podcast, then listened to “Stegosaurus” on Bedtime Explorers. passion was a word of the day. He told me, “I don’t think I’m going to be a conductor; I’m going to be a musician. I’d rather play music than conduct it.” We listened to Shostakovich Piano Sonata No. 2 (a piece that we found out earlier in the day has sixty-fourth notes). He was asleep by 10:30.
Singing about how to kill cows:
Punching Some Trees song:
Fairy Flight, first two lines:
Adding the left hand to Fairy Flight:
Moving his hand on the piano!:
Showing his progress on Fairy Flight:
Talking to Colin:
Eating on the floor for Colin:
Taking Colin in the yard:
