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This last week has been a little bit of a blur.

It was "crazy week" at Andrew's preschool: on Monday, they wore crazy socks; on Tuesday, they wore pajamas to school; on Wednesday, crazy hair; on Thursday, hats. We tried to get Andrew's hair to spike up. Apparently, I'm no product expert, because approximately 10 minutes after this picture was taken, his hair was starting to revert to its normal position. We put more gel in it, which got him at least until he arrived at school. (I'm not sure whether to feel proud or ashamed that I know so little about methods to make hair stick out.)



This week also marked the onset of Spring Soccer for us. I'm Andrew's soccer coach (which I think I've mentioned before). How this came about is somewhat of a mystery . . . I kept getting emails looking for a team coach and I finally responded, "I'd volunteer if I wasn't going to be out of town for the last few games . . ." Apparently that was close enough to a "yes."

I'm discovering that coaching is harder than it looks. Trying to get a bunch of 5 (and younger) kids to go the same direction and work together is a little like herding cats. You get one into position only to find that another one has wandered off . . . I'd much rather sit back and enjoy watching Andrew; instead I get to watch all the kids. We had games Tuesday night and Saturday morning; luckily, the weather was decent for both games. The Saturday game, oddly enough, was even harder than the first one--I had one little boy who was game, but sort of clueless (I think he's only 3, which explains some of that); another little boy who was willing to play but kept wandering back to his mom at random intervals; and another little boy who wanted to play (I think), but every time we actually got him on the field, he cried and ran back to his mom. Some highlights (lowlights?) from Saturday's game: one boy was so excited to actually get the ball in front of him, that he kicked it all the way down the field toward the other team's goal, where one of the other members of our team (trying, I think, to get the ball turned around) knocked it into the goal. (The other coach was nice and said, "A point's a point, right? No matter where it gets scored.") All the parents giggled when the boy who'd been responsible for this yelled proudly, "Mommy, I scored a goal!" Another low was my own son: after failing to score a goal at close range, he lay down on the grass and cried.

This week, we didn't get our international meal in (it was supposed to be "M"), but there was a reason for that. I mentioned last week that I'd had a phone interview for a position here; on Monday, I found out that they wanted me to come for a campus interview, which I did on Friday. I also got to give a 40 minute presentation on my research to my department, which was, oddly enough, a little intimidating. But I think it went well enough (although I have to admit to feeling a bit conflicted about the whole thing. We'll see what happens).

On a more positive note, last night I went to a book club meeting, where Ally Condie came and talked about her new novel, Matched. (Ally's sister is in our book club; Ally herself went to high school here). I was really impressed by her--she was open, down-to-earth, friendly. I particularly liked the fact that she seemed uncomfortable with all the adulation she's been getting--she said that everyone has some talent; why should hers be any more remarkable than any one else's? It was also pretty clear that she felt like her success was due to hard work and some luck--not necessarily to an overwhelming talent. All in all, for someone contemplating trying to pick up creative writing again, it was a very encouraging discussion.

I tried something new in Evelyn's hair and thought I should document it here--otherwise people might not believe that I do occasionally do her hair.