The last few nights were all about my school stuff, so tonight was the kids’ school stuff night. We went to Annika’s school and she has Ms. Ching for her teacher! Anders was in Ms. Ching’s class for E2, too, and we’re excited for Annika. She has a bunch of her friends in the class, so she’s really ready to go. Afterwards we went to Anders’s school to get his schedule and he was excited to see that he has guitar and orchestra as his electives this semester. He wants to join a jazz band that is going to be starting at the school, so that will be fun. He got to see a bunch of friends and he’s excited to go back now, too.

I had a lot to write about in my head earlier, especially about test scores and how pervasive they are to a sense of a student’s worth and how hard it is as a parent to deal with the sheets sent out by the state, as well as the implications of those tests on my career. I will probably write about that more in depth sometime.

But tonight Annika and I spent some quality time together watching YouTube videos of parrots, magpies, and other birds singing, talking, and imitating sounds. We watched birds sing “Let the Bodies Hit the Floor” and “Chandelier” by Sia and “Old MacDonald” and opera. We decided we want a bird and we’re going to teach it all kinds of things. We’ll see.