Friday was the homecoming game. The tradition is for the cool kids to buy or make each other these "mums," which no longer have actual mums like they did when I was a teen. It's all plastic. Here is Beccano wearing one that his friend J. gave him to wear because he hadn't managed to give it to his intended recipient.
Here we see J's girlfriend, who although a freshman, seems to have gotten the spirit big time, huh? That is how you kept seeing kids--some had so many "mums" that they were weighed down, or had created special holders for them. Not my favorite tradition.
Another tradition is the homecoming football game. Tuba Boy and Debate Boy came to that and wandered around getting hugged. You had to find something to do, because the football game was just pitiful. Neither team had any defensive line (our team has three very large boys on crutches at the moment--so large they were in the newspaper!) which could explain our issue. So, there was lots of scoring and watching the quarterbacks run around looking for someone to throw to, since there was no one able to sack them. We enjoyed the other team's band show at halftime, and were thrilled when Homecoming King was the drumline captain.
And we were shocked when after the other team scored a touchdown at the last minute, their kicker missed the extra point, letting our team win their first homecoming game in 6 years. Not exactly a stirring victory, but it counts. Then, at the end, when it was our band's turn to play, their band LEFT (which NEVER happens--we watched the other team last week when it was their homecoming). And worse, their coach kept their football team on the field after the band was announced, and had them doing jumping jacks in front of the band. Then apparently they made threats and spit on the band. Yeah, like the band kids had anything at all to do with their defeat. I am still working on the letter to the principal of that school. What bad sports.
Saturday continued being good. I ditched the kids and spent some time at the yarn shop, which I hadn't done in a long time, and that was good. After that I had a "lunch/dinner" in the middle of the afternoon with two other band moms. We decided we did NOT want to eat any more stadium food, so we got Mexican and figured it would hold us all evening. It did. And I listened to a LOT of band mom gossip!
Then all us band parents loaded into buses and went to Kyle, Texas for another competition. Although it was not rained out, it sure was nippy out. We watched a LOT of bands, some of them with pretty spectacular shows. All sorts of props, sound effects and such. But, when they finally got around to announcing the results, we were sad. They announced all the people in our group through second place and still hadn't mentioned our school. We figured we didn't even merit a teeny little trophy. But, no! The announcer said our band was first in its class. What we hadn't realized is that the last three bands were in a larger category than us (didn't even know there WERE bigger high schools). Now, you may recall that in the last competition, our kids came in last. So, we were (and are) pretty shocked, but for once in a good way.
I must say they did look and sound better. Obviously practice helped, and I think the slackers were intimidated into trying (and some kids were taken out). I was really happy the color guard won, even though they had inadvertently left their sabers at the school. They looked very good with the "air sabers" and didn't drop a one of them!
Sunday I'd planned to spend with my friend Jody, but she didn't feel well. But, the yarn shop was open in the afternoon for the yarn crawl, so I headed over there for some laughs and that, along with working some extra, filled the day. I didn't go to church, because being out in the wind and cold for two nights had ruined my throat. I didn't have much voice!
The most fun I had, though, was getting to go to Waterloo Records with both my kids. I really treasure any time I can spend with Tuba Boy, now, so getting to do stuff with him on his fall break was nice. We all got CDs and listened to parts of them, then had a nice Chinese dinner. I was glad that Tuba Boy insisted I go, even when I hadn't felt like it. And I got more knitting in (I was making mitts for a band kid).
The other good part of the weekend was that I got to talk to Lee a bit more, since he wasn't working the night shift on the weekend. Three weeks is LONG. I hope he makes it!
So, that about catches you up from rainy and chilly Austin. Back to your other blog reading!
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