Dan: talking about representation in various anime series they watch, enthusing over the responsiveness of the writers of The Dragon Prince to their fans in having more canonically gay characters and on-screen relationships as well as more representation of PoC and fat people and PWD, in contrast to those of Voltron. Helped me put away the washing up. Spent time hanging out with Hugh in the courtyard, weeding the raised bed and keeping count while he bounced on his pogo stick. They’ve done a rather excellent sketch of a character from Hamilton, are wading through the C18th biography, and are trying to find a video with more information about the battles of the Revolutionary War so they can fit the songs into context. They also want me to buy the sheet music for one of the songs so they can start learning it with Eleanor. And they are now so intrigued by the Marquise de Lafeyette that they are learning more about the French Revolution as well.
Hugh: spent a long time working on his pogo stick technique: PB went from 13 (yesterday) to 33 to 58. Helped unpack F&V shopping and wrote notes for me on my computer when I did the BotVC stockpile (need to show him how to write fractions as numbers instead of words, but the only words he misspelled were brocolli and coliflower). Told me about the Piccard family of explorers (YouTube channel That’s Amazing!). Helped me pick chickweed from the garden and make green smoothies with it; emptied the compost bin; put away the drying up; used the stick blender to puree the pumpkin soup for dinner. Watched a video with me (The School of Life’s “The Importance of an Unhappy Adolescence“: he was not impressed and thought the narrator was “a bit of a knobhead”). Told me about the inventor of “sea monkeys” and how they’re a bit of a rip-off, and that the inventor was a Jewish white supremacist.
The two of them have been spending quite a lot of time in the garden today. Yay for an inviting little courtyard! They also voyaged around looking for the two missing geese (Rosemary is back on the nest behind the fridge beds) and Hugh looked for eggs. Then later I took them down to Geeveston where they hung out at the bike track together and Hugh bounced (Dan did not want to change the wheels on their skates), then they played on the flying fox.
They have both been very helpful round the house and done stuff without arguing (much) when I’ve asked. They’ve both put away drying up and Dan has brought in laundry. Hugh has signed up to make lunch tomorrow.
I was just reminded that Hugh’s new Code Club on Wednesday mornings in Huonville starts this week, and if I have to take him with me when I pick Dan up from roller derby anyway, we might as well start going to Chess Club on Thursday as well. Still trying to arrange something for Thursday and Friday next week so I can try to make it to the show though.