I should mention that the cool thing about this competition is that it is purely voluntary and he is the only student at his school that was interested in the competition. He loves Math, I avoided Math like the plague.
Early Wednesday afternoon we hopped in my reliable old CRV and headed west down 290. If it had been March or April, the highway would have been rich with Bluebonnets and Indian Paintbrush. As it was, it was dead and brown. In hindsight, that's good; I am easily distracted by all the pretty colors when driving. We chatted some, mostly with me telling stories about my mother's family when they lived up that way. I don't know if it was my babbling, the higher speed limit or me reveling in having Mikey to myself, but before we knew it, the turnoff to Blinn appeared and there we were.
I dropped Mikey off at the Student Center and he told me that he would text me when he was through. I brought a book with me, figuring that I would find a spot to hang out and read. I immediately decided that it sounded like more fun to drive down Main street to see downtown Brenham.
The more I travel, the more I notice that small towns are mostly the same. There is usually a massive court house in the middle of town square, with smaller buildings on the edge, some of which have been around for over a hundred years. You can count on there being benches to sit on in front of the court house and an attorney's office or two located close by. Best of all? Plenty of stores to wander through -- mostly antiques and such, a used bookstore and restaurants. Given that I love books, antiques and eating, I found my bliss. I wandered through a few places before I decided to head back to the college.
Again, more bliss: an old cemetery on the edge of campus. No, I don't have a morbid fascination with graveyards; it's more that I love Texas History and Genealogy. Having researched my family history I know that some of the richest, most reliable information comes from cemeteries. Darn it, I was wishing that the cemetery office was open. If it had been, I could have given them surnames and found out if any of my ancestors were planted there! Alas, left to my own devices, I was content to wander around.
I walked through the cemetery, taking pictures and such when Mikey texted me that he was ready. I drove back over to the Student Center where I found him walking down the steps. He said the competition was as he expected, meaning that he was familiar with all but four or five of the problems (Math that he hasn't taken yet) so he felt that he did well. Geez, I'm beyond impressed. There are not many young people that would spend their free time on a "voluntary" competition let alone one that is required.
Knowing that Mikey would prefer to lean back and be a passenger, I stayed in the driver's seat and steered my little car in the direction of home. We didn't drive too far down 290 going east before I realized that I was hungry. If I was hungry from doing nothing, Mikey was starving. Lucky for us, we were in Texas so we didn't have to drive too far before we found a Sonic, our favorite road trip food. The weather was nice so rather than eating in the car, we sat outside. Once finished, we ordered drinks for the road and took off.
As we left the Sonic, I asked Mikey, "Hey Mikey, may I take a picture of the practice test with answers that they gave you at the competition? "Mikey: "You're going to blog about this, aren't you?" Me: "Yes." I expect him to say no just for sport because he knows that he is one of only two people on this earth that can get away with that. Mikey smiles and says, "Yes."
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