(no subject)

[the_rck]

We didn't do much yesterday until it was time to leave the house to go meet Scott's family for dinner. The restaurant served 'pan-Asian' food. There were Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Thai and (I think) Vietnamese options on the menu. Scott's mother and sister both got bibimbop, so I assume that was safely gluten free. I had chicken with vegetables. Scott had chicken teriyaki. Cordelia had chicken fried rice. She said it wasn't as good as what she's used to from the place we usually go.

We got there first by at least ten minutes. Apparently, nobody'd made reservations because the restaurant was not expecting a group of nine at 5:00. Fortunately, they had space to seat us pretty much immediately. Of course, Scott and I were guessing when we said nine-- If our brother-in-law's sister and parents had come, too, it would have been twelve. We had no idea if they were coming. It often happens for things like this. We thought it especially likely since our BIL and nephew had been at a Boy Scout camping trip up until an hour or two before the dinner and so wouldn't have seen the other side of the family earlier in the day.

Service was only so-so. They divided our table in half, and neither waitress thought they were responsible for Scott's parents, so we had to yell for a waitress to come back to take their orders. I think the waitress for the other half of the table was a trainee, but I'm not sure.

When we got back to Ann Arbor, we went to Orange Leaf for frozen yogurt. Cordelia's best friend and her family were there already, and they let us sit with them. I had cheesecake and pink lemonade frozen yogurt. Scott had three or four fruit flavors. I'm not sure what Cordelia had.

I need to email the Girl Scout leader to find out whether or not there's a meeting on Sunday. If there is, we need to schedule Cordelia's party after that. If there isn't, I'd like to have Cordelia's party start at 1:00. I have confirmed that Cordelia's best friend isn't available at all on Saturday (well, she might be available in the morning, but I don't really want to have a party before noon). Cordelia wants a fairly small party, only five or six girls. (Which isn't, I suppose, all that small. It's just that it doesn't include some of her new friends from school. All the girls she's talking about are people she invited last year.) I think I have email addresses for all of the families involved which is a big relief. The school hasn't done any sort of directory this year, so getting that information for new kids is really difficult.

I'm not sure Cordelia has gotten any taller in the last six months. In November, she was about an inch and a half shorter than I am, and she's still visibly shorter than I am. I really, really hope she grows some more. She'll be really disappointed if she doesn't end up taller than me. She does keep remarking that I'm not so very tall and how strange it is that she used to think I was quite tall.

I really, really don't want to do my metanews work this week. I may end up putting some of it off until next week just because I run out of time. I don't know. It's just so much easier to do other things instead. I think I'm burning out. We have got to get those other volunteers on board quickly. The senior moderator has promised to email them today, before she goes to bed, but I'm not sure she's going to (I think she might already be in bed. I don't have a good feel for the time difference between here and where she is).

I'm frustrated with my current library book, not because of the content-- that's interesting-- but because of the size of the book. It's relatively thick and also tall and wide, so holding it is awkward. I think the size is because it's heavily annotated and each page has to accommodate a double column of text. The font is not particularly large for the the notes, either. Each page of text has at least a page and a half of notes. I'm finding the notes more interesting than the main text. The book is Pioneer Girl, Laura Ingalls Wilder's autobiography.

Comments

[evalerie.livejournal.com]

I have the impression that girls usually have a big fast final growth spurt right before they hit puberty, so she may be in line for that if she hasn't already reached that point.

Kendra was supposed to end up taller than me, but at this point I'm kind of thinking she'll end up being a little person like me.

I'm curious about Pioneer Girl -- it's on my mental list of books to read someday.

[the_rck]

I'd be surprised if Cordelia gets a puberty related growth spurt. Her periods started a couple of months ago. I'm not sure she's as developed as she's going to get yet, but we're smack in the middle of puberty. I'm hoping for a mid-puberty growth spurt for her. That, we still have a chance for.

The actual text of the autobiography isn't very well written. It doesn't flow very well, and it's clear that Wilder's memories aren't complete in places. In the fictionalization, she smoothed things out and filled things in and focused them down so that events happen in a different order and at different times than in her autobiography. The notes, though, are fascinating. The editors have tried, where possible, to track down who the people Wilder mentions might have been. They also give family details that Wilder glosses over.

One interesting thing-- All of the stories that Pa tells in the Little House books were considered too distracting and juvenile to be left in the polished manuscript of Pioneer Girl which was intended for an adult audience. Wilder included them in her first draft, and her daughter removed them when preparing the manuscript for submission. (The text presented in this book is, as far as can be reconstructed and transcribed, Wilder's first draft which she wrote in #2 pencil.)

[evalerie.livejournal.com]

That makes sense, that Cordelia is already close to her final height.

I'm still intrigued by Pioneer Girl.