Zapata was referring to my knees specifically

I told everyone my old gimpy knee was not going to get in the way of my triumphant (and slow and painful) return to running. I swore I'd blow the whole joint out and force a surgical rebuild before I'd slack off because of this damned knee. I was going to assert my mighty mind over the frail matter of cartilage, ligament and bone.

You may insert your preferred clucking noise here. I skipped my run this evening and iced my knee after a half-hour walk. It started to hurt like hell on my Saturday run and, while it seems to be losing focus, hasn't quite quit.

My plan to run carefully so as not to reinjure the thing failed. I'm not sure how I did it exactly, but I'll have plenty of time to think it through while I rest. Turns out I'd rather be able to walk than to spend my time in PT or recovering from surgery. Stupid matter.

Answering the Question

Every homeschooler hears it eventually, if not daily: Why do you homeschool? Sometimes it's asked out of genuine curiosity (a la Carla, below); sometimes it's an attempt to prove that you are, in fact, out of your mind; sometimes it's just someone looking for a fight.

In any case, answering honestly can be dicey because talking about one's own parenting choices may make others feel judged for making different decisions. This is why we have Mommy wars, breast- versus bottle-feeding smackdowns, and mothers who scorn those who don't use organic cotton diapers washed only in yak milk. Each of us has a vested interest in raising our children the 'right' way, and it can be easy to lose sight of the fact that what's 'right' depends on the family.

So to preface my answer to the question, your mileage may vary. This is how we arrived at what works for us right now.

I never set out to homeschool my children. By the time I had Rocketboy I'd only met two homeschooled kids, and they seemed cripplingly shy, which I attributed to their education rather than their temperament. I assumed all homeschoolers were religious zealots seeking to disconnect their children from society. Not for me.

But I also never intended for my kids to go to public school. Hombre and I both went to public schools, his small-town and mediocre, mine big-city and "exemplary" (code for mediocre but with good test scores). Each of us was academically successful and we had a handful of memorably good teachers but we also had a laundry list of criticisms, mainly that we were unable to learn what we wanted to learn when we wanted to learn it. One-size education, as the saying goes, fits none.

That left private schools, which in Austin are crazy expensive and often have a religious component that we didn't want. Still, I was ready to eat lots of ramen so we could send the kids to Montessori grade school (I even trained to be a Montessori teacher so I could work on-site) and then Episcopal secondary -- assuming the kids were admitted.

Then two things happened: My friend Maria started talking about her wish to homeschool her kids and introduced me to the work of John Holt, a veteran teacher and educational reformer who advocated unschooling, or child-led learning. And we had a fateful meeting with our financial planner, Sam-Sam the Money Man, who, when I told him of our plan to send the kids to private school, pointed to a bar chart based on our finances, looked me in the eye and said, "You can't do it."

Smacked by reality and offered an alternate route to a fully customizable education, I took the path less traveled. Except that now it seems like everyone travels it. There are about 600 families in the secular homeschool "umbrella" group we belong to, and there is a larger Christian group that counts many more members, including our family doctor and his kids. Other relatives and friends are homeschooling their kids, and of the five moms in the original playgroup Rocketboy belonged to as a toddler, four are homeschooling.

So now we have this great community of people who may not all believe the same things or work the same way but who are all invested in the idea of giving their kids an education that is calibrated to their needs and interests. Rocketboy's cranky days aside, after doing this for a few years now I wouldn't trade it for private school at all.

Money left on the table, or Shop of Fools 2

I made about $100 yesterday just by going thrifting for fifteen minutes. Okay, that's sort of an exaggeration. Not the dollar amount or the time involved, but I don't actually have the cash in hand yet. Although I could, any darned time I want.

There's this history book, The Kingfisher Illustrated History of the World, that's the holy grail for homeschoolers using The Well-Trained Mind as a guide. WTM's author strenuously recommends it and uses it as the base of her history curriculum. One teeny problem: It's out of print. Another small problem: At our library at least, it's kept in the no-checkout adult reference section on the 'quiet floor,' which renders their copy useless to kids even though it's a children's title. Duh.

Giant problem: Used copies of this title regularly sell for between $100 and $200-plus on eBay and Half.

I have looked for a cheaper copy, say fifty or sixty bucks, for the past two years. Yesterday I found it. For $9.98 -- $8.50 with my teacher discount card.

Which brings me to my question about the used-book store where I bought it. Do they do any research when they buy and price their books? I've never noticed them using the internet at the buy table. Shouldn't a chain their size have that information handy so they're not losing potential money on a wide scale?

I don't think they knew what it was worth. A book that desirable and hard to find should've been on display by the register and priced higher. Instead, it was stowed on a messy shelf in the back of the kids' section, which fortunately was empty when I laid eyes on said tome and exclaimed an unrepeatable expression of surprise.

On the other hand, perhaps it's a canny strategy. Hombre pointed out that the promise of more unreasonably good bargains might draw me back more often. There's an out-of-print knitting reference that sells for hundreds of bucks online, too...

Dogtrot follies

Last night I went on my first run in a dozen or so years. I had my nifty super shoes, my extra-groovy orthotic inserts and my dog. It was supposed to be twenty minutes of alternating walking and running and it was, but let me tell you, it was not the light, liberating feeling I remembered.

As soon as I lengthened my stride into a run, my legs threatened to buckle and my quads began to cramp. I kept going, gradually recalling the stride I used when I was younger, although it was certainly easier when I was lighter and in better condition. My knee felt fine, and I wasn't overheating.

Not that I was making any great time. Dogzilla humored me and sped up to a trot. Even at that slow pace, she was so far out in front of me that she occasionally turned to make sure I was still at the other end of the leash.

As long as my knee doesn't cave and the dog doesn't shame me too badly I think I can get back into this.

"Every time you turn down the US Army, a clown dies."

So said my littlest brother at the tender-cynical age of 18 when the military recruiters just would not stop calling.

They called for me a lot when I was 18, too. Why? Habit, I guess.

I was short, didn't even weigh enough to donate blood and was a nervous wreck. I would've made a fantastic 'army of one' in any military action that involved smoking Yves Saint-Laurent menthols and mocking other people's idiosyncrasies. I told the army I was going to college, but they kept calling even after I'd gone. My mom said they sent me some socks as a lure, but I never saw them. She also thought I was left-handed and played golf so perhaps her recollections are not completely reliable.

I'm assuming the recruiters got my contact information from my high school. I guess the school voluntarily handed it over without my or my parents' consent back in the days before privacy was such a big issue. But now, as startle the echoes posts, public schools are required by No Child Left Behind to give the military student information, including information on minors. Want to opt out? Check her link.

Born to run (but carefully so as not to hurt the knees)

There's nothing like having a little time to yourself (or almost entirely to yourself in the company of a very agreeable baby) to let you get reacquainted with things you'd like to do. To wit, I've decided, after weeks of consideration, to take up running again after a brief 12-year hiatus brought on by a knee injury.

The planets are certainly aligned for this: I am older and fatter than when I last ran, it's hot (getting up into the mid to high 90s), and I have two children who require vast amounts of time and cannot accompany me on runs. So this is perfect.

I just want to run. There's no logic to it. I miss running. When I walk the dog, I find myself thinking, this is stupid; I should be running. When I finish a workout feeling like I have megawatts of energy left to burn, I wish I'd run instead.

Maybe I envy my kids their boundless energy. Maybe this is a mini-midlife crisis. Or maybe I just feel like running.

Time to myself

I'm about to have a whole bunch of it. I'm so giddy I can hardly type. Wishing you all a fabulous weekend. See you Monday.

Squirrely boy

Hurricanehead, now 16 fabulous months old, has a thing for squirrels. One raids the bird feeder out front regularly. It and the boy watch each other at the window for long stretches of time. Sometimes the squirrel hops onto the ledge and grabs the screen, the better to peer at my child as he flaps and hollers, "Gwerro!"

He went through a stretch of calling all nonhuman animals "gwerro," even fish. He began paging through books only after seeing Cyril the squirrel behind the shower curtain in a Maisy lift-the-flap book. No Janet Leigh, that Cyril, but at least he got the boy turning pages. The boy likes squirrels.

Maybe too much. Out back today a squirrel perched atop our "squirrel-proof" bird feeder, and Hurricanehead ran over to it. I expected the squirrel to motor, but it stayed put. Hurricanehead stood under the tree, waving like the squirrel was embarking on a cruise. The squirrel didn't move.

"Gwerro!" The cry went up. And again, nothing. Not a flick of the tail, not a sprint up the tree. Eager to elicit a response from this squirrel who was, after all, only about ten feet away, Hurricanehead picked up a smallish tree branch/dog toy and started flailing.

I intervened, and here's what unnerved me: Rocketboy and I approached the tree, and the squirrel not only didn't budge, it looked like it was drawing a bead on us. Like it was wound too tight and looking for an excuse to go off. Rboy and I had a bad chicken experience a couple of years ago, and I didn't want a repeat so I dragged the kids away.

We released Dogzilla, and the squirrel was out of the tree in seconds. It climbed halfway up the utility pole and stayed there, fuming, as Hurricanehead waved happily, giddy with adoration.

Fuel for positive change

Found this over at Common Dreams. Since my victory garden is never going to eliminate my need to drive, it's nice to know that not all gas stations are created equal.

V, V, Victory! V, V, Veggies!

I present the first root-vegetable harvest from our nascent victory garden. It may be small, but it didn't have to be trucked in from anywhere. We harvested carrots, onions and garlic Saturday. Perhaps I was a little early on the garlic but I got impatient. We dried it on the clothesline for a couple of afternoons, and now it's pleasantly stinking up my kitchen.

Rocketboy was astonished. "Look how much food was growing under our soil!" he said. Hombre was proud, too, as his job had paid for the soil. Hurricanehead carried around produce all morning like Linus's blanket. (I drew the line when I later found him lovingly rubbing a fresh onion on a stuffed chair in the living room.) And everyone helped hose the dirt off our haul.

My next victory garden work: stake the tomatoes, start harvesting blackberries any day now (birds beat us to the dewberries each day) and plant the corn, watermelon and bush beans I've been meaning to do. Oh, and thresh about a thousand or so coriander seeds from our crazy cilantro bed.

If we could grow coffee beans here we'd be really set -- and a whole lot more productive.

Google brain

I have it. I must have had it for a while but only realized it today while wondering if using shredded paper for mulch and compost puts dioxin into the soil. I caught myself mentally rephrasing this musing as 'shred paper mulch dioxin.'

Have mercy. My inner narrator now sounds like Homer Simpson after an industrial accident.

For the record, it looks like no one knows what the deal is with paper-related dioxin in mulch and compost. (You'll have to scroll way down to find this.)

Q. What is the effect of composting on dioxin content?
A. Good question! Not quite sure that many have studied this as a treatment mechanism! It's an expensive proposition! Dioxin is in many paper products at low levels, composting could help degrade them, or conversely, could concentrate them as mass is reduced.

Chuck Henry
Research Associate Professor
College of Forest Resources
University of Washington, Seattle

I happily shred newsprint for the compost barrels but I hesitate to shred things like bills and other items on bleached paper for the garden. Does anyone know more about this?

Remember, kids, it's a sin to think!

The author of my favorite children's book on evolution has been censored.

Lisa Westberg Peters planned to talk about the book in classroom appearances... at a Monticello, Minn., elementary school, [but] educators got cold feet.

"Our Family Tree" focuses on evolution, the scientific explanation for human origins that some believe contradicts biblical teachings. Peters' appearances, which were to focus on helping kids learn how to write, were canceled.

"It's a cute book. There's nothing wrong with it. We just don't need that kind of debate," said Brad Sanderson, principal at Pinewood Elementary.

Monticello's assistant superintendent, Jim Johnson, said school officials made a reasonable request of Peters to talk about writing but leave the discussion about evolution to teachers [emphasis mine]. When she refused, the visit was scuttled.

And people ask me why I homeschool. Freedom from religious meddling is a big reason. I don't know which is more contemptible, adults who teach children that it's a sin to think or the cowards who cringe in fear of these people. Perhaps it's a tie.

What, indeed?

Robin posted a link to a very useful blog for those of us wondering what we can do to improve the world around us. Think of So What Can I Do? as a directory of potential good works.

And happy Friday the 13th to you all!

"I gave up my wardrobe to show off my breasts"

Trend alert! Women who've spent a fortune having their breasts inflated to unnaturally large sizes relative to the rest of their bodies are now spending a fortune to alter designer togs that were designed for unnaturally skinny body types.

Ladies, please. I can think of at least two less costly ways to give up your wardrobe to show off your breasts. The first, simple nudity, is generally frowned upon in the workplace.

The second way, nursing a baby, is a little trickier to learn but just as effective; you will wear geeky layered blouses so you can pump at work without stripping down, or you will amass a collection of stretchy, stained t-shirts if you're the stay-at-home type.

Either way, your breasts will get noticed, your current wardrobe will be toast, and you and your clothing will avoid costly surgery.

No Child Shakes Behind, Part Two

So now Texas is a laughingstock because of our skeevy new sexy-cheerleader-patrol legislation:

"If we outlawed everything some people find offensive, there wouldn't even be a Texas in the first place."

Does the lege have some kind of ridiculous-law contest I don't know about?

Somebody beat him to it

Rocketboy didn't offer any recommendations this week because he's doing his own writing every morning and doesn't want me strip-mining his brain for ideas. Sigh. I'll have to go about it sidewise.

We're almost through the first of the four-volume Story of the World set of history books. Yesterday we read about the life and death of Jesus in the context of the Roman empire. The text mentioned Christmas as an observation of Jesus' birth, and Rocketboy lit up.

"Everyone celebrates Christmas," he said.

"Well," I said, "not everyone."

"Who doesn't?"

"Lots of people," I said.

His eyebrows started creeping downward as his face reddened.

"When I grow up and am president, I will find all the people who don't believe in Jesus and threaten them!" he said.

[Insert your own political snark here, dear reader.]

I rattled off a list of family members and friends who would be harmed by this policy, and he backed off. I think he was surprised to learn that not everyone believes what he believes. Which is funny because until a few months ago he vehemently denied the existence of God, nutmeg, mosquitoes and one of Hombre's good friends. Convert zeal, I guess.

Now we're working on tolerance, which is supposed to be some crazy cornerstone of our religion. You know, once you get past all the threatening.

Old Timer

I inherited a kitchen timer from my great-aunt. Maybe inherited is too strong a word; my mother passed it along in a box of quilts from my great-aunt's storage room.

It's a very old timer and it feels completely different from the one I recently bought. For one thing, it weighs about two pounds. For another, it doesn't emit a beeping noise or a shrill shriek. It dings like one of those push bells at hotel counters.

At first, because of the ding, I thought it was a useless relic. I laughed about what it must have been like to live in an era when a ding could get someone's attention. Among the phones, kids and dog plus an array of noisy toys, what good is a lone ding?

But I tried it last week and now I love it. It reminds me of how I felt when Rocketboy started to outgrow his first whining phase. I don't have to do anything to make it be quiet, and it doesn't nag me by continuing to make noise. Mutual respect between human and gadget.

The house that Mom built

This is the doghouse I built, with Rocketboy's help, over the course of a week, with scavenged lumber, aluminum roofing and store-bought weatherproofing. The gaps on the sides were to be screened in to allow a cooling breeze on those blistering August days, but...

This is the snake

that lives under the doghouse that I built. I found it under a board there after a recent rain. You would think that a dog would scare it away, but...

This is the dog

who stepped on the snake that lives under the doghouse that I built. She didn't even notice the damned snake writhing under her paw. She did notice the house, but will neither enter it nor chew on it, which is more care than she takes with my domicile.

Just after the doghouse was completed, Dogzilla tore her own dog door in the south wall of our screened-in porch.

Someone told me Friday that labs have an adolescence that lasts until they are three years old. Two to go!

Okay, Anita

I hadn't forgotten. The boys got me a fancy camera for Mother's Day, so here you go.

Table or shelf, you make the call.

No Child Shakes Behind

The Texas legislature has had more than a decade to figure out our shameful school-finance situation. Instead, they are tackling the problem of "suggestive" school cheerleading. Send the "American Beauty" DVD back to Netflix, fellas, and deal with some real issues.

Butt seriously

I worry that as a nation, we are making war on one brand of fundamentalism overseas and replacing it with another here at home. While some Americans may truly believe (and "believe" is the operative word) that Christian fundamentalism is better than the Islamic variety, a lot of us value personal liberty over any religious doctrine even if we characterize ourselves as believers.

We'd do well to keep an eye on creeping personal infringements and persistent attempts to hamstring women that are the hallmarks of any fundamentalism, including but not limited to:

• lawmakers (see below) who want to police cheerleaders at school football games (oddly reminiscent of the Egyptian belly-dancing authorities described in Floating off the Page)
• state legislators who try to force women to report miscarriages to the police
• states that allow women to be thrown out of restaurants for breastfeeding their babies
• attorneys general who request women's health records from abortion clinics
• pharmacists who deny women emergency contraception
• states that try to force thirteen-year-olds to bear unwanted children

I could list more examples, but I have a family that needs my attention right now. And that's just it. Policymakers and pundits get to spend their time debating and sometimes pontificating on what women should or should not do while women are busy making the trains (or kids, or websites, or whatever) run on time. For our own sake, it's important to try to make time to stay on top of this stuff. Sunlight, as the old saw goes, is a wonderful disinfectant.

"Who do you have to snow around here to get some kind of face?"

We have a winner! Congrats, Robin!

[I hereby invite you to caption this pic. (It's from two winters ago, when we actually had snow.) A winner will be announced soonish. I have no idea what the prize might be, apart from bragging rights -- and what rights they are! But I'll think of something.

And yes, I plan to photograph that table/bookcase soon.]

Knit Rider

My exercise bike almost went to Goodwill this week because I haven't used it in so long. But last night I realized that I could work out and knit at the same time. If you try this at home (and for all I know, I'm the last person figure it out) set your yarn on the floor in front of the bike and pull the yarn over the handlebars to keep it from getting caught in the pedals.

Second-best part of knit riding: I still feel like a dork biking to nowhere but now I don't care. Best part: Makes the workout go faster. (Disclaimer: Knitting does not actually have the power to alter the flow of time, but it will distract you from the timer on your bike.)

It's not just me

and it's not just Texas. Evil Mommy expounds on the war on science education. It's gonna cost us, folks.

Rocketboy speaks

I'm working hard to position Rocketboy as the Martha of small kids. Just imagine a lifestyle doyenne (doyen? doyito?) who likes to blow fart noises on people's arms and whiles away afternoons hiding in a brushpile.

This week's fine-living recommendations for the six-year-old set:

First, launch a model rocket. You have to wait for a windless, clear day when the grass isn't crispy dry (not easy to come by around here). Get your whole family out in the field with you and blast that baby off. Marvel at the fact that the parachute actually works to return the rocket safely to the ground. Then you and your fam can spend the rest of the day saying, "Can you believe we launched a rocket?!"

Watch "A Boy Named Charlie Brown." The video you may remember from your childhood (although back then it would've been a 'special') about Charlie's trip to the national spelling bee. Rocketboy says it's funny, and hey, it got him interested in spelling and grammar.

Read Son of the Black Stallion. As they say in "Urinetown" (one of Rocketboy's favorite soundtracks from his toddler days), "Nothing kills a show like too much exposition." But once you get past the first review chapter, it moves along like Farley's other horse books (for better or worse). Plus the horse in this one is named Satan, which makes for some pretty funny dialog: "Ya mean, Satan?"