odds and ends

A is cramming in Algebra 1; we have decided it would be a great idea if A took a Math class over the summer. A would also like to row, so rowing summer camp is in the works.

I have been busy with the B-M.

I have been reading a lot on the subway, as well. Three weeks ago it was The Secret Life of Bees. I thought it was good. Like the Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood. Or Fried Green Tomatoes. Nothing like a story set in the South, where you understand how sad or promising riding a Trailways bus can be.

The following week, it was The Kite Runner. WHAT a novel. It was heartbreaking to read the first 100 pages, but I could not put the book down. Should I continue reading it? No, I can't. Yes I can. It's a novel, LaMai. Novel. As in, fiction. But no, it's too much. I finished it two days later just reading it on the subway. When suddenly, a man glanced over my shoulder while I read the last 10 pages on the 6 train:

Man on Subway: How is that book? Everyone seems to be reading it.
Me: It's a gorgeous story. Gorgeous, tragic, and...
MOS: What's it about? Iraq? Iran?
Me: It takes place in Afghanistan, mostly.
MOS: Yeah, it's all the same, right?
Me: Well, that's just where we get into trouble. Assuming that it is all the same.

I am glad that I did read it to the very last page. It is a powerful tale of the human ego at its worst, of self-effacing loyalty, and of self-redemption.

Then I read Blink. It was okay. Okay, I thought it was sort of stupid. Mostly because the author attempts to correlate everything with everything. Meh.

A has actually talked about boarding school. I am not against it; I myself am a product of a boarding school education. But it does require a certain rigor to literally live in school. Oh wait: we do that already. Heh, heh.