Post-test Weekend: More Moping over Books and a Mother's Day Feast

Hello, Tim!

Our midterm was over, and the results… weren’t pretty. I think it was so foolish of me to think that I could still get decent scores without enough revising; after the performance at the end of this month, I will have to catch up with the studies once again.

Contents of the Week

- The Painfully Hot Weather
- Reading the Finale of The Iron Druid Chronicles and Moping until my Mother was Worried
- A Belated Mother’s Day Celebration
- Questions Answering
- End

The Painfully Hot Weather

These days were painfully hot here, and since my sweat glands (or let’s call it respiratory system, I prefer calling it that way) were performing a bit too well, I never leave house these days without an extra T-shirt, or I will have to walk around with clothes that look like I had just taken a dip in a pool or something. Literally, I had been offered the question once. We just had our P.E. class, and some classmates went to the water fountain, and we came across another P.E. teacher, who exclaimed upon seeing me and my soaking wet shirt. ‘What, did you went for a swim or what?’ which set Candy, Cathy and me into a series of laughter a while ago.

People say it is better if you sweat more, but sometimes I would disagree, for it feels far from comfortable when you can literally squeeze sweat from your shirt. It doesn’t sound like a pretty description, but it was how it really is.

Reading the Finale of The Iron Druid Chronicles and Moping until my Mother was Worried

Last week, I picked out the ninth and the last installment of the Iron Druid Saga, Scourged, and it was an enticing book. The most special feature about this book is that one of the protagonists who was sent on a quest, went to Taiwan! This is like an experience totally out of the blue; normally when a foreign author wants to write about Chinese culture, one would normally use China as the setting, and what’s more, the settings are the places that I pass on my way commuting to school! There were mentions about the red line of our metro system, beef noodles, Yangming Mountain, and bubble milk tea (which was made by the Monkey King Sun-Wu-Kong from the story Journey to the West; this is still an urban fantasy).

Because of the Taiwanese culture, I was beaming when reading the first half of the book.

Only the first half.

When the final battle was off, the book took an emotionally unpleasant turn.

There are moments when I felt like shouting into the void, “I HATE PLOT TWISTS!”

But none of those chagrin can compare with how the gods treated the protagonist in the end. ‘To atone for the wrongdoings of his past,’ was what they said. True, in retrospect, our main character Atticus did make some terrible, poor choices in the previous books, but the sentence he got, in my opinion, was worse than death. They took his pride in who he is from him, and at that point, I had had enough. My hands were numb by holding the book, but I couldn’t stop reading, desperate that there will be some sort of consolation for him, some reassurement. He did, and he did calm down in the wake of his final judgment, but I couldn’t help but feel sad for Atticus the druid. He pulled all the strings he could to keep himself and the world safe. He strived to protect the ones he cared about. What did he get? A punishment that also served as a humiliation.

I was upset the whole afternoon because of this book, so upset that my mother was actually worried if somethings wrong. I didn’t bother to offer more than a curt explanation because I knew she wouldn’t understand the feeling of being hurt by the plots of books.

At last, Atticus found hope, and the journey ends there; it has been a solid four years that I had picked up the first in the series in the convenience store (Yes, we also have books in convenience stores) and since then, I had been a big fan of this series and the author, who is still writing new books. I think he has a charm different from Rick Riordan, and I will keep following him and his books.

‘’I have amends to make. Regrets I must own, and many seasons of peace I must sow and harvest. One day, we will feel the sadness peel away from our past and stand justified, knowing we could not, as imperfect beings, have made any other choices than the ones that haunt us at this moment.”

Ouch.

A Belated Mother’s Day Celebration

As you know, last week was the week of our midterm, and it was also the week of Mother’s Day. I planned to bring Mom out for lunch at a restaurant she told me of, but she said she would rather let me stay at home and study and put the lunch off for a week.

It was a Japanese restaurant that sells tempura donburi as their signature dish. That was what we had, and it was both a mesmerizing dish as well as one that made me very full. The whole bowl had the appearance of a box of jewels when it was served. Lustrous, even.

We had an amazing meal in the amazing atmosphere, and then as an after-walk, we took a small walk in the corridor of the small department store when we came upon a bookstore.

And as usual, I made some impulsive purchase.

Mother, Happy Mother’s Day, and I am thankful for all the things, no matter big or small, that you have ever done for me.

Questions Answering

1. Patrick decided that he wants to go to Drill Sergeant School because he gets to train the newly-arrived soldiers about the basics, which is supposedly a better use of time, and he gets the chance to practice the comparably “uncivilized” language. :D

2. If I were to have a teacher who once was/is an Army Drill Sergeant I would try however I could to behave well and not step on his nerves, and I hope that the others would behave as well.

3. Mr. Maher’s plan to take watch on the children includes: fetching the kids from their summer courses at one in the afternoon, an hour of swimming, and Netflix Disney movies every day! Sounds like an awesome plan for summer vacation! A kind of sport that you won’t need to worry about sweating and awesome movies!!! Why not?

4. Kids just won’t learn to close the doors until they are eighteen. The consequences weren’t mentioned in the passage, but if the circumstances are alike with that of in Taiwan, I believe it would be very hot outside, and insects like mosquitos and flies will go around in the house.

5. There are tons of things you can instantly think of as a nine-year-old kid with orange trees, including using them as projectiles, orange smashing, or trying to suffocate yourself in a handful and a face full of orange juice.

6. You can get fresh salmon where you have docks or harbors that offers salmons, and in the USA’s case, you can get the freshest salmon at Portland or some states along the coastlines around the border between Canada and America.

7. Seagulls follow the fishboats because they sometimes can find the guts and some other organs of the fish when the fishermen are trying to preserve the freshness of the fish.

8. Mr. Maher and the others are not telling his grandkids about the salmon probably because they want to keep it as a surprise until the fresh salmon dishes are served.

9. The Maher family are replacing the gravel with grass because Kathleen wants it that way. In my opinion, a piece of healthy-looking grass looks way much better than bare gravel.

10. The first problem encountered when Mr. Maher was trying to ‘ summon the grass’ is that he had to first deal with the sprinkler system, which was buried under the gravel.

End

It is nine o’clock in the evening, Sunday now, and I need to hurry and do the dishes, and I have to go and pack Allison’s present. (smaller voice) Tomorrow’s her birthday.

Sincerely,

Hugo