New Year Blues

I thought that things would quiet down with the end of Nutcracker and for about a week or two they did.
It's always calmest just before all hell breaks loose.

First thing I had to deal with was SP's school situation.
It seems that even though the Prince liked some aspects of school and had no trouble with the kids, he just didn't connect to the whole "school" scene. He wanted to go back to homeschooling.
Fortunately I'd just spoken to the parent of a fellow dancer about the homeschool curriculum she uses successfully with her children and it sounded quite good.

K12 Virtual School meets all the state requirements and even offers Latin, which is a particular interest of my little chappy.
Since the online curriculum is very straightforward we simply have a rule that SP work for three hours in the morning (schedule permitting) and then work another three hours in the afternoon.
This gives him the freedom to pursue his dance lessons and other interests without having to fit them in around school hours.

As for the socialization thing, well, um, he's not walled up in the bloody west wing just because he isn't in a classroom. He knows other young people exist and he isn't overwhelmingly fascinated by the fact unless they share a common bond of interest. Dance, MMORPGs, WWII games, skating, swimming, fencing, archery and that sort of thing.

As implied above, however, the school thing was only ONE of the situations we faced over the last month.

The second Big Thing involved our tomcat, Tom (brilliantly creative people, are we) whose urinary tract became blocked, seemingly overnight, and required much expensive medical care and a week long stay at the vet's.
It all turned out well in the end (quite literally that) but getting to good required a month of juggling money, ferrying Tom to and from doctors, dosing a stitched up tomkitty with antibiotics and putting something called Lick Guard around his sutures to make sure he didn't lick or chew them open again! Aaieee!

Number three isn't so much a bad or harrowing big thing as it is simply an exercise in my logistical abilities. The Prince has a supernumerary position in the Chicago Lyric Opera's upcoming productions of Cavalleria Rusticana & Pagliacci.
This requires several trips a week to Chicago (thank GOD!) and lots of sitting around waiting for and riding ON trains.
Working in the opera has been a wonderful experience so far. All of the people I've met are terribly nice, and the Prince has become friends with some fun kids, many of whom have already been in ten or more Lyric productions!!

So between these three things the last month has been full indeed.
Here's hoping that February will settle into more of a quiet routine without all of the big changes and expensive cat surgeries and school reshufflings that made January such a job o' work.