That gives me roughly two months to complete my coursework. Recently I've picked up my study of Latin again. I enjoy that a lot, especially since someone once said that learning Latin makes all subjects 50% easier. It certainly helps with a deeper understanding of vocabulary. Supposedly the sentence structure in Latin is helpful in mathematical thinking.

Speaking of...I've actually been enjoying Geometry - especially its emphasis on deductive reasoning! I am doing two lessons a day so that I will have it completed before June 14th (the day of the ACT). I could have moved through that more quickly, but I decided to tone down my academic focus in order to complete the research and literary work required to complete the screenplay (which I am also getting credits for).

Speaking of...Mom and I took the manuscript to the Minuteman Press (it turns out there is no Kinko's nearby) on Friday. It (along with 9 other copies they are making) will be bound and ready for registration by Monday/Tuesday.  Dad will probably pick it up on his way home from Rotary Club.

I also finished reading the Alabama Driver's Manual. It basically reinforced the common sense rules I was familiar with regarding automobile driving, along with providing some interesting statistics. Rachel will be 15 on May 30th, so we could conceivably take the permit test together. Speaking of tests...it dawned on me while studying fascinating history about the forming of the United States government that even though you have to take a test in order to drive and you have to take a test in order to get into college, you don't have to take a test in order to vote. You have to be 21 before you can legally obtain alcoholic beverages, but only have to be 18 in order to vote and 16 in order to drive on your own. It's interesting to discover the varying amounts of discernment and maturity the government expects you to have at different ages. Hmm...If everyone had to be so drilled in the structure of government that I've studied lately (and I haven't even finished it!), it would be amazing to see how much harder it would be for a candidate to sway people with nothing more than empty eloquence!

As James Madison transcribed Mr. Gerry's words while the delegates were debating voting at the Constitutional Convention:

"The evils we experience flow from the excess of democracy. The people do not want virtue, but are dupes of pretended patriots...they are daily misled into the most baneful measures and opinions by the false reports circulated by designing men, and which no one on the spot can refute."

I think I will be reposting that a lot during this Election Year. Imagine what our ancestors at the convention would think of the media in this day and age!

In the days of the Founding Fathers, educating oneself was a "moral duty". That's how it always has been to me - I think of myself as responsible for my education (under the submission of my parents) rather than a government institution. Why doesn't everyone want it to be that way? It seems like a far more interesting way to live. But if citizens actually learned to think for themselves - oh, horrors! The facade would fall away from the disgraced pretended patriots. Apparently, every era in history has its dupes. It's just like reading the Bible's history of the Israelites - turning away from the LORD over and over again even after HE had revealed so much to them!

The Read family Easter - or First Fruits - Celebration last week was lovely. Here are some pictures of all The Cousins having fun...and being squirmy.