A long weekend roundup
Oct. 23rd, 2006 03:05 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
angela_oDue to the fact that Parent/Teacher conferences were held on Thursday and Friday, the kids were out of school for the last three days of the week which means 5 days at home. Or as M said, "Reverse the curse". When I asked him what the meant he pointed out that typical weeks had 5 days of school and 2 days of weekend, but that this one was the reverse. Ah, nine year olds. :)
Anyway, conferences were much less painful that I had imagined and after they were over on Friday (we had 4 of them back to back. I call it the Bataan Death March of conferences), we took the kids to the North Carolina State Fair. We only go every 5 years or so, but it was an experience as always. Who knew you could deep fry that many things? This year's addition to the deep fried line up was Deep Fried Coke. E had to try it. Turns out that it's funnel cake with Coke syrup poured over it. Like so many things at the fair, once you learn the trick, the magic diminishes. ;)
We walked for what felt like miles and got to see such things as the prize-winning watermelon (150 lbs) and the prize-winning pumpkin (664 lbs and about 4 feet wide) as well as all manner of livestock. There was also free hush puppies at the grist mill and handicrafts of all varieties. I bought a lovely little metal angel for my Christmas tree this year. On the midway M won at Whack-A-Mole prompting the carny to ask him how old he was and to proceed to tell everyone else that they were beaten by a nine year old. By the time all was said and done, all the kids had chintzy stuffed animals of various sizes (but none won by a demonstration of ring-tossing ability) and were happy with their haul. The kids rode the rollercoaster and three of them and me went up on the Ferris Wheel. Luckily no one in our family is a fan of the spinny rides! After nearly 4 hours, we headed home. Last night N had her collection of fair loot and announced "I still can't believe that we went to the fair". Ah, youth.
I also managed to get a few more books read.
#102 is Blue Smoke by Nora Roberts. Even more formulaic than her usual fare and somewhat of a disappointment.
#103 is Uglies by Scott Westerfield. I'd read his Midnighters series over the summer and J loved these so I thought I'd give them a try. Another interesting vision of dystopian society. One that uses the obsession with being attractive and how that can be used to manipulate. I seem to be on somewhat of a dystopian kick lately.
#104 is Pretties. The second in the Westerfield trilogy.
#105 is Specials. The final book in the trilogy. I liked the worldbuilding in these and found the protagonist an interesting character, but I'm not sure how much I like the resolution. I get that Westerfield likes to leave some things open-ended in case he wants to revisit the series, but still. The ending felt a little pat to me. Still an enjoyable series to read though.
It will be back to the usual routine tomorrow. I have to admit that I've enjoyed having a few sleep-in-late days.
In other news, is anyone else mildly weirded out by the fact that it's roughly 2 months until Christmas? I'm normally getting into the Christmas swing of things by now and I have no desire to get started this year. Scary.
Anyway, conferences were much less painful that I had imagined and after they were over on Friday (we had 4 of them back to back. I call it the Bataan Death March of conferences), we took the kids to the North Carolina State Fair. We only go every 5 years or so, but it was an experience as always. Who knew you could deep fry that many things? This year's addition to the deep fried line up was Deep Fried Coke. E had to try it. Turns out that it's funnel cake with Coke syrup poured over it. Like so many things at the fair, once you learn the trick, the magic diminishes. ;)
We walked for what felt like miles and got to see such things as the prize-winning watermelon (150 lbs) and the prize-winning pumpkin (664 lbs and about 4 feet wide) as well as all manner of livestock. There was also free hush puppies at the grist mill and handicrafts of all varieties. I bought a lovely little metal angel for my Christmas tree this year. On the midway M won at Whack-A-Mole prompting the carny to ask him how old he was and to proceed to tell everyone else that they were beaten by a nine year old. By the time all was said and done, all the kids had chintzy stuffed animals of various sizes (but none won by a demonstration of ring-tossing ability) and were happy with their haul. The kids rode the rollercoaster and three of them and me went up on the Ferris Wheel. Luckily no one in our family is a fan of the spinny rides! After nearly 4 hours, we headed home. Last night N had her collection of fair loot and announced "I still can't believe that we went to the fair". Ah, youth.
I also managed to get a few more books read.
#102 is Blue Smoke by Nora Roberts. Even more formulaic than her usual fare and somewhat of a disappointment.
#103 is Uglies by Scott Westerfield. I'd read his Midnighters series over the summer and J loved these so I thought I'd give them a try. Another interesting vision of dystopian society. One that uses the obsession with being attractive and how that can be used to manipulate. I seem to be on somewhat of a dystopian kick lately.
#104 is Pretties. The second in the Westerfield trilogy.
#105 is Specials. The final book in the trilogy. I liked the worldbuilding in these and found the protagonist an interesting character, but I'm not sure how much I like the resolution. I get that Westerfield likes to leave some things open-ended in case he wants to revisit the series, but still. The ending felt a little pat to me. Still an enjoyable series to read though.
It will be back to the usual routine tomorrow. I have to admit that I've enjoyed having a few sleep-in-late days.
In other news, is anyone else mildly weirded out by the fact that it's roughly 2 months until Christmas? I'm normally getting into the Christmas swing of things by now and I have no desire to get started this year. Scary.
