School has started

School started last week, and it seems just like last semester. Not much is new except that one of my math classes only has 4 people in it, and including the professor, are all women. The class, because of its size, and that this is the first time its being taught, is really flexible. My other classes seem alright so far, except for one class were the midterm and final are take home essays.
I can't sleep because it is cat mating season outside my window. Its cat mating season a lot. There are a lot of strays in the neighborhood, but they usually don't come into the backyard. The strays like to sit in the driveway though. They are not useful to me because they make noise and don't keep away the blue jays or the crows, which make even more noise.
Back to school, I am reading this book "The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America" by Jonathon Kozol, for my Social Science (SOCS) class. It has some interesting points in it, but I am only 4 chapters in, and it has covered mostly schools in NY and some in Southern States. It describes how minority children in urban neighborhoods or "inner city children" are getting the short end of the stick in many ways: poor facilities, revolving door teachers, no funding, and work programs that would never be tolerated in middle-class neighborhoods.

Babysitting

So today I went to work with my dad, but instead of helping him I watched and played games with a little boy named Sean. I played the game Sorry! for the first time today. His mom and I didn't know the rules so it took a while to actually get started, and we didn't get to finish the game. But while my dad and the agent were talking I took Sean to the corner store and we bought ice cream. I offered him help with opening his, but he didn't want any so he tried pounding it against the glass case it was in, I had to open it for him before he broke the glass. We then hung out in the backyard of the house for a while. We came inside when it got cold and were able to find batteries to play Operation. He was getting tired and upset at losing the game. We all went out to dinner at the Burrito Factory, which is on Blossom Hill and the 85. I am tired because I was not expecting to spend 4 hours with a child today, but it was fun. He was telling stories about how his friend and him got fire off the roof of the house and created cement in this patch of dirt in the back yard.
So that was my day today.

Happy New Year

Hi everyone, sorry for not posting for so long but the holidays kept me busy. I don't have any child development related news to bring to you right now, but in a few days I will have something to report. My holidays were great. I made almost all of my Christmas presents this year, there were 18 scarves altogether. Everyone claimed to love them. I hope they do like them, it took me a while to make each one, not that long since it was fun.