Monday, Sept. 12

Up at 6:30 to get ready to go to water aerobics. Woke Daughter up at 7 a.m., because she wanted to go with me. We arrived at the pool around 8 a.m. Wow, was the water cold! There were only around six people there when we got there, and the leader said several members had e-mailed her to say they would not return to the pool until it was warmer. So she was waiting to see how many would show up before she decided whether or not to conduct a class today.

Daughter and I braved the water, though, and soon others began to arrive. Before long, about twenty had gathered. Since Daughter wasn't comfortable with going to the deep end of the pool, I stayed in shallower water today. Our leader put music on and helped us walk and jump around to warm up before aerobics began.

Every time another member arrived, one of the members already in the pool commented, "Well, there comes another lamb to the slaughter," and we'd all laugh as the newcomer yelped and made faces upon entering the cold water.

Despite the cold water (that we finally grew somewhat accustomed to) Daughter thoroughly enjoyed the session. She said it relaxed her.

After aerobics, we delivered the van to a body shop. Hubbie was already at the business with the truck so he could bring us home.

At home, Daughter showered and got ready to head back to her town. She stuck around long enough to join us in a soup and sandwich lunch, though. But she had plenty of time to travel to her town and then to her work at 4 p.m.

Later, around 2:30, I went to the college library to meet my Literacy Council student. I had to take the truck this time, since the van is in the shop. I'm not crazy about driving that loud, diesel engine vehicle to schools, but it was necessary this time. At least the parking spaces are easy to get into and out of, unlike the spaces at the other college, where the swimming pool is located.

Today, I noticed she had gotten a haircut. The style is similar to mine, though more wispy around her face. She has commented on my hair each time we've met, so I guess she finally decided to get her own cut shorter. She loves the color of my hair (blonde), but she herself has stunning black hair. We agreed that neither of us would look good with the color of the other's hair.

Today, she learned to use calendar ordinal numbers: first, second, third, etc., instead of one, two, three. When we got to the numbers 3 and 23, she pronounced them as "turd," and "twenty-turd." So I asked her to look up the word "turd" in her dictionary. She gasped when she saw the definition. I think she'll struggle now to pronounce the word "third" correctly.

We worked with changing "get" to "got," "tear" to "tore," "sell" to "sold," etc., and using the words "too," and "either."

On the word "tear," instead of pronouncing it in the sense of "rip," she pronounced it in the sense of weeping." At that point, she told me that because of the difficulty of the English language, in which the same word can have two or more meanings and pronunciations, and in which words can be spelled one way, but pronounced another, she had at one time hated English and didn't want to learn it. Now, since I've been her tutor, she has learned to love English. I think, though, it's less that I'm her tutor than that the Literacy Council material is designed to suit a non-English adult learner.

The student takes another English class at the college on Tuesday and Thursday evenings, and she believes that what she is learning with me is helping her in the other class. She thinks that the other students in the class should also have Literacy Council tutors. The problem, unfortunately, is that there are already about ten students awaiting tutors. There is always more demand than can be satisfied.

Back home, Mother had prepared pot roast with veggies in the slow cooker. Hubbie had peeled potatoes for boiling, and I mashed those when they were done. The meal was delicious slathered in a yummy dark gravy. We planned several days of meals around this large roast, so we won't have to cook fresh everyday this week.

Mother went home afterward, and Hubbie and I watched a movie on TV... the 2003 "Owning Mahowny," starring Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Minnie Driver, and John Hurt. Based on the true story of the largest one-man bank fraud in Canadian history, a man (a bank manager) with a gambling problem and "collectors" hounding him, has access to a multi-million dollar account that he uses to get himself into deeper and deeper problems.