OMF, Book 4, Chp. 12 - 17

[Tristram]

Now he has a girlfriend, has voted in the European elections, and takes mischievous delight in lifting me or beating me at arm-wrestling. Luckily, I still show him the ropes in chess.

[Peter]

Ah, children and grandchildren. Our two grandsons had a sleepover last night. My wife Ana and I spent an almost sleepless night worrying about everything that could go wrong.

Fortunately, ‘the boys’ slept through every moment of our worry and are now busy playing trucks.

[Mary Lou]

Peter - my granddaughters will occasionally come for a sleepover. I just assume I won't be sleeping much. Sometimes I'm pleasantly surprised. Either way, the crash is significant once they've been turned back over to their parents' care. I need a full recovery day.

Tristram - sounds like you'll be telling us about your grandchildren before too much longer. The wink of an eye.

[Kim]

Tristram, you're making me feel old. I remember your daughter being born. And when your son first started taking guitar lessons and you both taking fencing lessons, although I can't remember what came of that.

[Kim]

It's hard to get out grandchildren here anymore much less sleep here. Now that they are in high school there is always something going on. Every minute of the day. Softball, football, volleyball, wrestling, any sports they aren't playing our grandson is an announcer for. He gets paid $53 a game to announce them. I don't know how they came up with that odd sum. So if we don't go to their games we don't see them and we don't see them then anyway because they are on the field with their team. I actually spend more time texting with them than actually talking to them. Our granddaughter texts me during the school day when she's bored. Something just doesn't seem right about allowing students to text people because they're bored even if it is me that is getting the text but I guess the teachers don't mind.

[Tristram]

In our school students are not allowed to use their mobile phones during the school day at all. If I find a student using their phone, I collect the phone and the parents can retrieve it the following day. This is common practice at most German schools. That's why grandparents find time enough to pursue their hobbies in the morning ;-)

[Kim]

She will text me and we will start a conversation and usually I don't give a thought to what the day or time is until she finally says something like "this class is so boring". Then I realize we've been talking about the double she hit in her game the night before while she's been in class. A boring one apparently.

[Mary Lou]

I think many school systems are wising up and cracking down on cell phone use. Long overdue. If your granddaughter's school follows suit, Kim, I hope she'll still text you on her own time.

My granddaughter was homeschooled for kindergarten last year, and starts 1st grade in the local elementary school tomorrow. Big day! Do you suppose there will be 1st graders with their own phones? Gosh, I hope not.

I think I figured out my posting problem, by the way. I'd changed the email address on my account, and apparently I needed to verify it before being allowed to post from the app on my phone. Seems to be working okay now.