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I. Sharing a Room

The boys are moved in together. The mattress for the top bunk arrived earlier this week, and they were both hopping up and down excitedly as we pulled a fitted sheet over it (only peed on once since then) and set up the newly shared room. The first night they went down at about 7:30 and we heard them talking until 8:30. The second night they went down at 7:30 and we finally broke up the party at 10. The third night they both took really good naps and fell asleep promptly at 7:30. I still think they're staying up later than they were, but it's been a success on the whole.

Neither them were particularly good at keeping their room clean under the old arrangement, but the new situation seems to have an exponential effect on the mess. James spent on afternoon clipping every piece of paper he could find into the tiniest possible shards with a pair of kindergarten scissors. I don't know if that was a deliberate effort to make confetti, but that's exactly what it looks like. Just this morning we heard the unmistakable sound of Owen turning over an entire plastic bin of legos. What once was neatly put away is not scattered from one end of the room to another.

Also this morning, James came down and reported that Owen had spilled sand all over their floor and was playing in it. I figured that this must be a pretend game that they were playing. After all, Owen keeps talking about how much he wants to go back to the beach. It was not pretend. They had two balloons (neither inflated any longer, but how dare anyone suggest we throw them out) which were tethered by a smaller balloon filled with sand. Owen emptied all the sand out of one of the tethers. And, yes, he was upstairs playing in the sand. I went up with them with a broom and dustbin and swept up all the sand.

They had also--and I have no guesses as to why--stolen the wastebin from the bathroom. There wasn't anything new in it, just kleenex and toilet paper tubes from the bathroom. But it was in there. And then it was tipped over, so that was all over the floor too.

Whenever their room does eventually get cleaned, I might need a hazmat suit to do it.

II. Lawn Mower Troubles

There was no postponing mowing the yard any longer. Our neighbors to the right had mowed, our neighbors to the left had mowed. Our yard was an unsightly field of overgrown grass spotted with patches of even longer growths of grass. I carefully set up the stepladder and pulled the mower down from overhead storage. I wheeled it around back, primed it, and got ready to attempt the first pull-start of the season. Then the boys came out and needed their push-mowers out too. So I went back into the garage, and pulled theirs out. And then they watched me start it.

I yanked the cord, and the engine roared to life. And then died.

"I don't think it's working." remarked James.
"It no work." said Owen
"No," I said "it isn't working yet."

So I primed it again and yanked on the cord. The same thing happened. I checked to see if the air filter was clogged, and made sure there was some oil in the pan. I tried starting it again, and it still didn't work. The boys sat down in the grass to watch me work. I went down to the basement, came back with some tools, and disassembled some parts that looked vaguely important. Then, seeing nothing obviously wrong. I put them back. Still nothing. The boys decided to play baseball. I googled "Why does my mower stall after starting."

It quickly became apparent that I would need to check/clean the carburetor. Unfortunately, I didn't have the necessary tools or expertise to do this. Notably, I did not have carburetor cleaner, or knowledge of what a carburetor was, or what a carburetor does, or a firm grasp on how to spell the word "carburetor."

But, gradually, with the help of Amazon and the internet, I acquired all of these things, albeit imperfectly, and so it came to pass that yesterday, after spilling gasoline all over the driveway, I successfully cleaned my lawn mower's carburetor and changed the oil.

The boys were happy to mow too.

III. Recently Reading
All Quiet on the Western Front
The Twenty-One Balloons
Germinal
Ancient Education and Today