Soph's School of the Mad: Week Three

Have you got kids in Key Stage Two? May I suggest you grow beans in a coke bottle? It took ours four weeks to become these ludicrous specimens. 

Anyway, school's back in session. What a fortnight I have had, doing absolutely fuck all in the garden, buying mail-order cheese, hoping nobody I love dies. You'll be thrilled to learn that Alex still believes homeschool is the devil. "Do you want to do school with Mummy?" I asked him on Sunday night. "No, I want to do school with MONSIEUR DADDY". Thankfully, Monsieur Daddy is still working from home. 

On Tuesday, we started the day with Jack kicking Jim in the bollocks during Andy's Wild Workouts. Andy never imagined his workouts would get quite THAT wild. Jack then made a poster about this. I'm not even joking. 

Jim's topic of the week is castles. Me and Tom jumped for joy. "LOOK" I shrieked. "LOOK AT NEUSCHWANSTEIN, THIS CASTLE IS RUBBISH FOR DEFENCE. THIS IS WHY BODIAM IS SUPERFICIALLY WELL DEFENDED BUT ACTUALLY JUST A RUSE TO HAVE A REALLY NICE MANOR HOUSE! SQUARE TOWERS ARE REALLY EASY TO UNDERMINE. LOOK AT CANAERFON! LOOK AT THIS MARTELLO TOWER! LOOK AT THIS TREBUCHET BEING FIRED!"

Jim, however, designed his own castle fortifications while  I went purple with over-enthusiasm. His castle has ten sides, ten towers, three-arrow-shooting auto-crossbows, and CROCODILES in the moat. "But what if the crocodiles escape and eat your villagers?" "They are TETHERED", he announced.

To which I could make no reply. 

On Wednesday, I went to the shops first thing. It turns out that going to the shops first thing, when possibly going slightly insane, is very bad for your bank balance. Very bad.

I discovered Alex can read French. Maybe he doesn't have a language disorder at all - maybe he's just French. Jack listened to this ABSOLUTE DIABOLICAL BASTARDISATION OF A CLASSIC:

And Jim drew his castle, complete with crocodiles:

There ain't no fort like a decagon fort defended with lions, spike pits, cannons and crocodiles.

Jack is not a creative child. Well, that's not true: he's an excellent musician and has a brilliant imagination. But like his mother, he's not an artist. This fine picture is a representation of how sound travels, between a screaming man and a man with one huge ear:

As the kids say, this a BIG MOOD:

Friday, finally, and with a wretched intercostal muscle strain, I sat down with the kids. "LOOK AT THIS MUMMY" yelled Jim. "FUCKING OWWW" I yelled back as I tried to turn to look. We had a video lesson with his teacher, where Jim mostly demanded to look at her cat. 

Jack's timetable demanded we make a 'healthy meal' together. I looked at the freezer, and the reams of pizza and mini kievs that form several lockdown teas a week, sighed, and got him to help make his birthday cake. TOMORROW, HE IS NINE. Feel free to whataspp him video messages: lockdown birthdays are weird.

Alex promptly insisted on joining us. So far, his school work has consisted of him writing his name in huge letters on a whiteboard, then dotting his legs with whiteboard pen. He looks diseased. Anyway, he wanted to help make the cake, so I guess in about ten minutes, we'll discover if too many cooks spoil the broth. This cake is going to have a jam AND white chocolate buttercream filling. It's gonna be SICKLY AS FUCK. 

Anyway, I hope you all have a good weekend despite, yanno, everything. Don't fucking drink bleach - remember An Inspector Calls? Don't do it. 

Soph's School of the Mad: Week Two

So corona is a shit because, even in mild cases, you think you're getting better and then! lo! You can't breathe again.

But I am now, finally, better, and we can soon leave quarantine. It's also my birthday.

Nobody could be arsed on Monday. Alex threw a meltdown enough to shake the world, because I did not make his breakfast fast enough. "I HATE YOU, I NOT WANT TO BE A GOOD BOY, I WANT TO BE A BAD BOY! I NOT WANT TO CALM DOWN, I WANT TO CALM UP" etc. etc. For half an hour. Urgh. At least he knows his opposites.

He calmed down. I managed to get hold of a mini whiteboard for him to practice writing on, instead of the FOOT HIGH letters he keeps putting in his workbook.

Jack wrote about the Battle of Hastings, cackling like a loon about arrows in eyes. And Jim?
Jim had to multiply fractions. And divide them. With whole numbers. Fractions are bloody stupid. You have to TURN THEM UPSIDE DOWN TO DIVIDE THEM, FOR NO GOOD REASON. Jim's immediate, visceral response on seeing maths is to scream. He cannot help it, it's like his brain is scrabbling to escape his head. This is also my response, although I scream silently.

Could anybody be arsed on Tuesday? No, although I did feel *whisper it* properly better. I even LEFT THE HOUSE to fetch a parcel. I felt more like I was going into battle than going two doors down the road. I washed my hands, left my phone at home in case I forgot and touched it, got Tom to open the door to let me out, held my breath, touched nothing but my parcel and then ran home again to wash my hands and dettol my parcel. And, for the first time in a week, I WORE JEANS AND I DID NOT LIKE IT.

That's gonna be the real challenge when lockdown ends: wearing proper clothes.

Wednesday was a bit better. Jack wrote a whole play about a goblin. Alex named some FRUIT. Jim's new jam is PowerPoints. Gawd, that boy could write PowerPoint displays for a living. On Tuesday, he wrote one about the food of America, and on Wednesday, he wrote a ROAD TRIP THROUGH THE STATES BASED ON WHAT HE WOULD EAT IF HE WENT TO THEM. We started in New England and went all the way to Florida. The kid has a calling: eating until he bursts.

Eggs benedick anyone?

Jim's teacher phoned me on Wednesday, and I bemoaned the sheer wealth of resources without any guidance as to what level I should be getting him to work at. I've been recommended FIVE different maths apps. Only one of them (Times Tables Rockstars) seems pitched at the right level. Prodigy Maths is FANTASTIC, by the way. 

Thursday started like this:

It vaguely improved after we learned a cafe down the road DELIVERS FULL ENGLISH BREAKFASTS, so the kids got sausage sandwiches for lunch and Jack did this thought provoking piece of art based on modern life:

Brought a tear to my eye.

And so to today, my birthday, and nobody can be arsed to do anything. However, Jim has been learning about the presidents this week and this is why we should Vote for Jimmy:

All hail the new leader.

Now go away and enjoy Easter, because it looks very much like this madness is going to run and run...