We have spent the year telling both S21 and S24 they eat out too much at school. Remarkably we all eat out too much when they are home, I guess it is time to give in:joy:
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D24 is starting her internship Monday. Told her to claim exempt on her W-4 so she wont have to file taxes next year to get her withholding back.
She’s also going to put 80% of her salary into the Roth 401k option at work. They have a policy where you have to have at least $5k in contributions or it’s returned back to you. After her internship ends, we’ll roll that into a Roth IRA.
Any additonal amount that she makes from her TA job in the fall will go into the Roth IRA as well.
Whatever she earns from her jobs, we’ll put in the equivalent amount in her checking account so she can use it for personal expenses next year.
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I’m really happy that D24 is happy living her life this summer–waiting tables, reading, going to the gym, and reading. Until she had some actual experience with dating, she spent a lot of time feeling like she wasn’t good enough. Now she knows it’s all the boys’ fault! It’s also heartwarming that she’s come to enjoy her dad and me as conversational companions. Not always, but she’s now met a range of people who aren’t in or associated with the talking professions. She said the other day, laughing, “all your friends are weird, and I didn’t realize it. I mean, what kind of person spends their time trying to take the must out of a first edition [famous author] book with a special machine?” (author redacted to preserve our friend’s confidentiality, since he hopes to sell the book for a lot of money). I hope the summer continues to have this kind of tranquility and interest!
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D24 had an online counseling appointment yesterday. I’m glad about that. No idea how it went and we aren’t asking, are respecting her desire for some privacy in sorting some things out. She’s decided to start doing crochet, so glad that she’s picking up a new hobby. And she’s going to start going to the gym. 
All steps in a positive direction!
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Do you guys remember Mrs. Bennet in Pride and Prejudice? She was mocked for overtly and classlessly attempting to match up her (five) daughters to any young man who was respectable in her neighborhood. Well, I just came the closest I ever will to pulling a Mrs. Bennet, and I am properly embarrassed for it! I’m too paranoid to give the details, but luckily, I had a suitable pretext for “introducing myself” to a parent of a potential suitor, and then backed out rapidly when I saw the coast was not clear. Yikes! 
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Made our travel arrangements for driving D24 back to college in late August for sophomore year. D26 is going to join us since she wasn’t able to go visit D24 at all during D24’s freshman year. D26 will miss 2 days of school as a result, which she’s nervous about, but D24 told her that senior year HW is much lower, way more manageable than junior year.
I’m actually a little excited about this road trip because:
- we’re going to stay the 1st night in Tucumcari, NM at this 1950s-era Route 66 motel called the Roadrunner Lodge.
- we’re going to stay on the drive home in Lubbock, TX, and I think D26 and I will drive through Texas Tech University. Not gonna do a tour, just a drive through.
- on the drive home from Lubbock, there’s a route we can take which will take us through Roswell, NM, and drive through the campus of NM Tech in Socorro, NM.
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Lubbock and Roswell.
Be careful of UFOs.
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. . . and psychos.
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The obsession is real . . . s22 spent the weekend at practice with one club and then a round robin tournament. Meanwhile he still doesn’t have a summer job . . . .
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It looks like my S24 is only going to be able to arrange some relatively short shadowing opportunities. Then lots and lots of training.
I guess that is not the worst plan for a first summer.
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I’ve always wanted to spend the night in Tucumcari. Looking forward to it!
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Not the worst at all. S24 is working for the DCR (state recreation department) which appears to consist of cleaning ponds and trails and making sure no one gets up to any mischief at the local pond(s). S22 is going to end up at FedEx or something similar as those are the only folks really hiring around here. Hope your son enjoyed nationals - it was a fun time although Darkside fell short this year . . .
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He had a blast, and definitely came out motivated to work to be a significant contributor in coming years. I really enjoyed our match against Darkside, incidentally. By that point our boys knew they were likely not making the championship bracket, so they just played hard and played for fun. Definitely a tough pool, though, including the eventual champ.
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Some positive things to share:
- D26’s request for the weekend of 8/23-8/24 off was approved at Wally World (aka Walmart).
- this means that she’ll be able to join D24 & I on our road trip back to college like we’d hoped.
- during our road trip to TX, I want to stop at the Jackrabbit Trading Post east of Winslow, AZ. So I can take dorky pictures with the giant jackrabbit and embarrass my children. I totally dig unusual roadside attractions. This trading post’s billboard sign was the inspiration for 1 of the signs in Pixar’s Cars movie.
And I’m a huge Disney nerd, so there ya go. - D24 did her orientation yesterday afternoon for her 3-week CNA (certified nursing assistant) class, which starts next Mon.
- today, she’s doing step 1 of a TB test. Step 2 will be in 2 days.
- she also submitted an online request for a fingerprint card w/the state Dept of Public Safety. Tomorrow she actually gets finger printed. The TB test & finger print card are required for ‘clinicals’ during wk 3 of the CNA class.
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In an unexpected turn of events, the professor in charge of D24’s seismology / geodesy summer research project wants her to learn and leverage the algorithm underlying her dad’s (mrhilary1617) electrical engineering (digital signal processing) dissertation. Looks like they will bond over Fast Fourier Transform this weekend!
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OK, so after a long (great) talk, I have learned S24 is now “officially” premed. To him this means getting fully engaged with prehealth advising, making sure the family is starting to plan for next summer accordingly, and starting to plan financially (AUUUGGGGGHHH my eyes!!!).
It also apparently means he is no longer thinking he will do a Bio major, instead he will likely do his previous Humanities possible second major as his actual primary major.
All sounds good to me!
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D23 made a similar decision with her major (and her eventual path to getting a DPT). I think it’s the best of both worlds, you still take all the math/science courses needed but also get to explore another subject with true depth . 
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I always enjoy the updates and hope everyone is adjusting to life with kids back home for the summer. It is exciting to see their new growth and maturity.
Summer internships are in full swing and my S24 clearly had unrealistic expectations about how exciting intern level work would be. He is spending a lot of time entering data into spreadsheets, looking up cases online to determine case status, and drafting things like Motions to Withdraw (we had an attorney leave recently). I think this is excellent internship experience, but I think he somehow thought he would be doing . . . ??? I don’t know. But, he is getting paid, meeting people, and actually doing things, so I think it’s good. He’s also spending one day per week with the marketing department, and he actually loves that, and is currently in a training class on how real estate professionals can use AI. In a few weeks, he is going out with a surveying field crew. I means, come on! When I came home after freshman year, I worked the front desk at a motel.
D24 is getting settled in DC and enjoying her internships, and actually likes the work. She is in person three days per week, which is great for making connections, and remote 2 days per week, which is great for not having the 1 hour each way commute. Her first article was posted this week, so that was exciting! I’m really proud of her for going after these opportunities. It never occurred to me to spend the summer in DC when I was her age!
For better or for worse, home life is much easier now that only S24 is home. Sadly, he and D24 really struggle to get along, and family meals all too frequently turn into sparring matches. I miss D24, and truly enjoy her company, but she sets S24 on edge. Ugh. I hope they will outgrow this phase and learn to appreciate each other, but if they never see each other, I’m not totally sure how they will move past it.
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If this helps, I haven’t lived in the same city, and mostly not the same state aside from some early summers, as my siblings since I started college. In fact I was VERY ready to leave home at the end of high school, and even when I came back to the state for summers, I lived and worked in a different city. And that was in the pre-cellphone days, so contact with family was extremely sporadic. And then we all settled in pretty far away places, although eventually my sister moved to the same city as my brother–which is on the other side of the country from me.
But over the years we definitely grew into very positive adult relationships. We now make a point of seeing each other in person periodically, and stay in touch in other ways too (which is getting easier and easier). And I definitely value family much more now than I did when I was first rushing off to make a new life for myself.
So no guarantees, of course, but it is certainly possible.
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My D24 and D28 are like oil and water, so I know this dynamic well! I will say that the few weeks they’ve been back in the same space haven’t been terrible - in fact, yesterday D24 picked up D28 at school and ‘kidnapped’ her to go get ice cream (using my card - they know they can use my card in pursuit of sisterly harmony.) D24 is house/dogsitting this weekend for a babysitting family, and then starts her summer job the week after, as a counselor at her beloved summer camp - she lost her last summer she could be a camper to Covid (2020), so is looking forward to returning. The younger will be there midsummer for 3 weeks as a CIT, so I am also hoping some shared time at a place that has been so special to both of them helps them along, too.
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