#tomato one

[strangetomato]

How to tell if you have a middle-schooler in your household? There will be signs. There will be six, maybe seven, signs.

[funny-doings-international]

rotates them in my mind

[leodraws9000]

I got my sticky note and sticker today :D

I’m really happy

[strangetomato]

You know how in the default TS2 game, the child Brandi Broke is carrying has Skip's genetics unlinked and thus gives birth to a clone of herself that's always a boy?

Well, that happened to me!

Tomato One (who will very soon be 13!!!) is so much like me that I can't enter the Middle School without at least one completely random kid asking me if I'm his Mom. I was there yesterday and the Principal said, "It's not hard to tell he's yours!" Everybody comments on it. Every single person.

[strangetomato]

I work at a job where I directly interact with people. I'm good at it. I generally like people and people seem to like me, and many tell me so and ask my name so they can remember, etc. I'm conscious of the fact that a certain amount of masking goes into it. It's a comfortable mask, for the most part, and one I enjoy performing. Small talk, I can do. Remembering someone's name? That poses more of a challenge. lol. But yeah, mostly it is something I enjoy, do well, and take pride in.

Summer is our busiest time and lately I am feeling so fatigued. People fatigued. My mask is cracked, taped together, and held up with one hand. At the end of a busy day, I need to be far away from any person at all. Or well, around my family of ND (or quite ND-ish) tomatoes who spend a lot of time in proximity while enjoying their own solitary pursuits.

I'll be heading out for a walk with Tomato One right after work. It's a thing we do a lot lately, and I really like it. I'm obviously very biased (he is my clone, after all), but I think he's a cool kid. I'm happy he still wants to hang out with Mom and chat. As long as he keeps wanting to, I'll be there.

[strangetomato]

Tomato One's class is doing The Hunger Games as a novel study in ELA at school (grade 8), and I had given him the book for Xmas because he knew about that earlier in the year. When they closed for spring break, he picked up the copy at home and read ahead of the class and finished it.

He hasn't been reading much these days outside of school, so I wanted to encourage this. I picked up the next book and he took it on a four day trip with my parents. And when he got back, he'd finished it! So I also grabbed the next book for him.

Books were the one thing my parents always made a point to buy for me if I wanted them, and I feel the same way. I'm more of a library person when I can be, but this called for speed and I do like the idea of him having these for himself, given his interest in them.

[strangetomato]

I went to a drag show with my Mom last night (her very first), and had a really great time. Fantastic show, and I also really enjoyed seeing Mom's reactions and how much she was loving it, especially the moment one of the queens first stepped out onto the stage and she gasped audibly and exclaimed quite loudly, "She's GORGEOUS!!!"

And also, as we were leaving, she said, "I think (Tomato One) would really have loved this." And yeah, I think he really would've. Maybe next time...

[strangetomato]

Tomato One brought home a holiday craft that was essentially a glitterbomb. As I type this, I see several sparkling up at me from this keyboard alone.

On a positive note, I no longer need to decorate for Christmas, lol!