Friday, August 26, 2005

Heavy clouds, no rain.

I've never seen so many thunderstorms sweep over without hardly spilling a drop. We're wore out from the pressure, heat and humidity bouncing around like rubber balls; and we don't have any rain to show for it.

We're all sleepy and cranky. Sunshine isn't paying attention to lessons, but she is practicing her drawing. Brighteyes likes the Draw Right Now book but is getting tired of copying other people's pictures. Today's assignment involved drawing a cow. She balked at copying the picture's background, so I suggested she have the cow jumping over the moon. She loved that idea.

I've about run through my stash of Golden Age children's lit. Fortunately the girls have shown a willingness to have me read Victorian poetry that's over a page long at Story Break. (Story Break is that point in lessons when little hands need a rest.) Robert Browning has been a hit so far. I'm considering Rossetti's Goblin Market but I don't think I'm up to explaining about "allegory" and illegal narcotics trafficking right now. Some days I have a hard enough time getting through our bedtime chapter of Oz. All those jokes about well-connected citizens demanding to be made Army Generals when they know nothing about fighting can bring about lurid flashbacks to World War I when I'm tired. I'm completely at a loss when it comes to the Oz's alleged racism. I've never seen so many blatent pro-multicultural statements in a work written before 1960 before, let alone from the 1900s.

This was our last week of Botany. Brighteyes asked to crystallize flower petals. We couldn't find any roses in bloom but crystalized some mint leaves. The result looked nothing like those pretty crystallized leaves you see in the food photos, but the girls said it was the finest mint candy they ever tasted and wanted to know when we could make some more.

The weather was supposed to break this week. I hope it calms down next week. This heat wave isn't doing anyone any good. My husband says the students at his school are in no better shape. We could all stand for this heat wave to end.

3 comments:

jettybetty said...

I live in N Texas and it is oppressively hot here, too--the light at the end of our tunnel is that the heat usually breaks shortly after labor day.

Do you think you will be hit by Katrina?

JB

Lioness said...

No. By the time hurricanes get this far inland they usually begin following the rivers, and the Ten-Tom Waterway is ~30 miles away. They've also blown off most of their steam and haven't had a chance to refuel on moisture. The most we usually get is western edge rain as they go up Eastern Alabama.

I expect Kati's going to sit in the Gulf for a while soaking up the hot water before she makes her move, so she may build a good head of steam. And we do have unusually active stationary thunderheads right now that she could draw strength from. On the whole though, I don't see that much chance of her veering our way.

We lived for a year in Mobile. One year was enough.

jettybetty said...

YAYAY!!! Glad you don't live in an area that expects storm damage--a nice shower to cool things down to about 75 degrees sounds good, though!!

Happy Weekend!
JB