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So I showed Brad my Comic-Con post and he only got as far as the pea man before he said "mid to late 80s science fiction adventure series V". It was about Visitors to our planet who were actually reptiles come down to breed food (yuck) and there was a big 'reveal' at the end of the show where 'we' learned that under their human disguise they were really green and scaly.
So apparently they weren't peas at all, but really scales. I will stick to my belief that they were green and round just like peas and nothing at all like scales. Brad said 'they looked like scales to me..... well I guess that's what I was expecting them to look like so I didn't look too hard." I'm thinking the poor guy couldn't find the scales he wanted in the make-up department and went with peas thinking no one would look too hard as most of it was under his helmet anyway.
We have survived yet another Baltimore Comic-con. For the uninitiated comic-con is slang for Comic Book Convention. I'm totally in the know by saying comic-con.
I finally got Brad for the most part to actually let me actually work at the thing. I've been spending this weekend with him running around doing things for 3 or 4 years now, but I think he's been so happy that I 'let' him indulge in his comic book passion this way that he's just happy I'm there and has always wanted to reward me by trying to make it like a mini-vacation for me. He'd say "Cam, you should sleep in, come over whenever you feel like it..." and for lots of the time I'd stand around waiting for that one moment where he'd have something to give me to do.... help an elderly guest out and hail a cab for them or something equally as challenging.
This year, I put my foot down as he was running around all stressed again because he didn't have the resources he needed to get everything done. 'Hey buddy, look right here in front of you. I'm a very smart person, more than capable of doing whatever you need done, including stupid mundane things like comparing names on a list....' Mostly this year it took (though not without a lot of reminders). I kept reminding him I was here to work. I told him I wouldn't come in future years if I was just going to be a decoration on his arm at the awards dinner. I've got better things to do than hang out with a bunch of crazy comic book fanatics for a weekend. But work we all did and the convention seemed to be another rousing success.
There were big storms coming through Baltimore for most of the weekend, but it didn't seem to dampen the mood at all. The hall opened at 7am on Saturday morning for artists and dealers to begin to set up their booths. At 6:45, still dark outside, a group of us trudged through the light rain over to the convention center to get it all going. The hall was set and ready and after some 'issues' dealing with security everything got going. By the time 10am (when the doors opened up) rolled around, the line for people with tickets was wrapped back and forth on itself all the way up to the third floor (the convention was on the first floor). I asked the woman who was first in line what time they got there that morning and she said "4:30am". Did I mention it was raining. "It's my birthday and yet here I was learning that I could survive as a homeless person who had to sleep on the concrete in the rain, all for the love of a man.... The things we do for love." I said "yeah, that's why I'm here too" We must both love those men of ours.
When the doors opened, the people started filing in in an relatively orderly fashion. I think it took 15 or 20 minutes for the whole line to make its way into the hall. I was positioned at the bottom of the escalator on the first floor and it was my job to make sure people on the first floor who were just arriving didn't try to cut into line ahead of the thousands who had been slowly winding their way down from the floors above. It was a bit tough to keep track of all those people and get it right until Brad sent me a bit of help. 
This lovely gentleman made chaotic crowd control a thing of the past. He had no problem keeping in character (whatever that was) and the fans who had just purchased their tickets didn't bat an eye when he told them exactly where they needed to go; up, up, up, to get to the end of the line. You can only barely see it but he has peas, yes I said peas attached to the side of his face on his right (it's the left side of the picture). It was this thing attached to his face; I'm sure it was really amazing makeup, but for me I couldn't see past the peas. It was supposed to look like a bit of his face had been peeled back to reveal what was underneath it. It would have made sense to me if what I saw 'revealed' was computer chip-y looking things; as if his character was really a machine. But peas. Really the were green and looked good enough to... ok, I'm not going there, but you get the idea. There is probably a sci-fi reference that made sense to the rest of the people who saw it, but to me it was just part of dinner and someone needed to clean him up. 
And then there was the box office line. OMG. I had to leave to run an errand at about 12:30; two and a half hours after we'd opened, and the line to buy tickets was still winding back and forth inside and up the stairs and through the lobby and out the door and back and forth and back and forth and back and forth. I'm sure there were still at least 1,500 people in line at that time. I was told that the line contined without break until 3:30; and the hall closed at 6pm. - WOW.
Though I was running around, in fact out of the building much of the day, people watching was still the best part. I've attached pictures of just a few of the interesting people I saw on Day 1.
I have no idea who she's supposed to be, but I thought she was cute as a button, and as soon as I lifted my camera to get the shot, she straitened up and gave me a big smile. Do you think she likes the attention?
Well I'm sure you can all recognize your friendly neighborhood spiderman. I'm not sure what he was getting ready to pounce on, but apparantly just his presence stopped whatever danger his spidy-senses sensed.
And these two, spent a great deal of time in the lobby on the first day, waiting for the opportunity to brighten someone's day with a photo op. Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures of the Storm Trooper Garrison (apparantly that's what a group of Storm Troopers is called) that was out on the streets of Baltimore directing people to the correct Convention Center entrance. I've seen them in past years and it's quite a sight to come around a corner to be met with a life sized Storm Trooper, complete with weaponry telling you where you need to go. I assure you the only proper response is 'yes sir'. WOW.
Overall, things ran very smoothly. Lots of people having lots of fun. All the crew was running around, working hard to make it look easy and I think we were almost completely successful.
I am SO not sure this whole GT math was a good idea. Brad and I discussed and debated it FOREVER. Sure, Teddy is super good in math - his parents are a CPA and an Electrical Engineer, this is not a surprise. But he is also high strung and emotional. He gets frustrated easily, he thinks he's the worst at everything he doesn't immediately get.
When he was, I don't know, 4ish and he wanted to dribble a basketball like the older kids could. He picked up a ball for the first time and dropped it and... oddly.. wasn't able to immediately dribble it. Well this was the end of the world for him. He was the worst kid ever. He was NEEEVVVEEERRR going to be able to dribble a ball or God forbid actually play basketball, he might as well just sit in his room for the rest of his life. It took a lot of persuading to get him to even touch a friggin ball again. The same thing happened when he first sat on a swing and couldn't propel himself instantly. Just about every new thing he wasn't immediately expert in, was a traumatic ordeal in his life until he did master it.
That said, in school he's yet to be challenged in any subject. Not once. We live in one of the top school districts in the country. His elementary school is one of the top 2 or 3 in the district. Even in this current housing market, houses don't stay on the market at all because people so want to be in this school district. I point that out to say that this is a school where they don't teach to the middle. In kindergarten they have 4 or 5 different reading groups per class of 20; completely based on ability and kids are moved around to different teachers if their level isn't in their class. I call it the La La school because it's so not like real life, so not like any school I've seen before, but still he's not been challenged and at some point one would think he would be. I'm not sure I was until one class in high school, but we live in a totally different school district than where I went to school.
But I don't think Howard County does the GT math program well at all. Instead of teaching gifted students differently which is apparently the original point of it. That some students learn differently so they will teach them differently. In our county GT just means 2 grade levels up and lots and lots of work. (I will say they do the non math GT programs very well.)
So our dilemma with GT math was this. On the one hand we have Teddy who struggles with new things and struggles with things that he doesn't get on the first try; struggles in a very emotional way. But on the other hand, he's yet to be challenged in school and this is his last year of elementary school. His middle school isn't nearly as good and caring as his elementary school is or as his high school will be. It's still a Howard County school, but really not in the same league as the other 2 schools he'll attend. Do we risk how hard it might be for him, since the expectations are much higher. He won't be allowed to do it all in his head anymore, there will be A LOT more homework, it's a new system, etc.. OR Do we push him now because I'd rather him be pushed and even fail now in 5th grade when it doesn't really matter, then get slammed at some other point when it does. We decided to push him now and see what happens. We can always pull him out.
OK, so now we get to the POWs (Problems Of the Week). Each week there is a problem that requires some extra thought and effort to solve. And the answer is to be given in 2 parts. One part is the work, how it was actually solved and the other part is the worksheet where the student describes their thought process as to why they chose the method they did. For the worksheet part there is a very specific structure and very specific language that is expected. Mind you at this point, a month and 2 POWs in, I don't know what the language is, but that's a different issue, or maybe it's the same. So for the first POW Teddy had he immediately created a diagram that helped him solve the problem and he got the right answer in maybe 2 minutes.... Great... uh no. So me, stupid parent, who doesn't want to push my delicate son, thinks, great he has the answer (I checked to make sure it was correct), he can do the worksheet tomorrow. Ultimately he did the sheet. His handwriting was lousy, but he answered the questions in the fewest number of words which has always been his style.... He got a D.
This was crushing to him. The teacher told him and the others that got a D that they could do it over. She wrote comments. She has a reputation as an exceptional teacher, though she's still very new to us. I talked him down from the ledge... you're new to this... we'll learn from this... we'll try to do a bit better next time... let's see if we can address her comments... But he's still really hung up on the D.... Good God. What have I done.
OMG, these last 2 nights as Brad has been away and we've had soccer and piano respectively were when we had to put the finishing touches on not 1 but 2 POWs one each night. I will say the fact that we survived is proof possitive I should win a parenting award - NOT. I am very proud of the fact that all the windows and mirrors in the house remain in tact, as does (much more importantly) Teddy's mental health. Although when he gets his grades back on these, I'm not sure it still will be. OMG.
This has created a new house rule; POWs will be done on Sundays, no exceptions. And wow. I just don't know if I'll survive this.
To get a note home from Jackson. When they've gotten more than three reminders to behave in a certain manner, the teacher can give them a time out during which they have to write a letter home to us to describe how they were breaking the rules. He got it on Friday, but of course didn't tell us about it. And we've had such a crazy weekend with neighborhood picnics, cookie baking out the wazoo and comic book convention staff meetings that I didn't go through his back pack until Sunday evening...oops. Normally, I would have him write out a letter of appology to his teacher (teachers in this case since the behavior started in homeroom and continued into math), but it's too late to start that tonight. So we have a to-do for tomorrow evening.
Camela
