AJ got his first ever report card yesterday and I had my first ever parent-teacher conference. It was quite something.

AJ was incredibly excited about the prospect of going to school and not being in class. He skipped up and down the hall while we waited our turn (they were running a full half hour late) without complaint. When it was our turn, he ran and did a puzzle and then settled into the corner with a book while I talked with his teachers.

I was completely unsurprised by all reports on AJ�s school performance, which was as it should be. He is off the charts in most areas and he is already discovering that he knows more than his teachers about some things (I�m guessing those things are the solar system and human anatomy). �AJ sure likes numbers,� the head teacher remarked. She was going over the result of AJ�s kindergarten readiness test, in which the children needed to demonstrate that they could count to at least ten. Apparently AJ counted to 2,000 before the teacher asked him to stop so they could move on. The only negative comments revolved around impatience and a refusal to accept rules at face value without an explanation. AJ sometimes rushes his work and lets quality suffer because he wants to move on to something else. And AJ does not like to wait for his turn to speak in class, although he is, apparently, getting better about it than he was at the beginning of the year.

He also regularly pushes his teachers about rules in the classroom. There is a rule that only three play areas can be open at a time. The rule is to make sure the room doesn�t get so chaotic that the children can�t clean it up before the end of class. But AJ doesn�t understand why they can�t have all play areas open at once (I know, because he told me in the car on the way to our conference). Consequently, he asks his teachers every day if he can play with one of the closed areas. I am sure that this is annoying to his teachers, but I have to say I�m quite happy to see it. For one thing, there is more than a little self-recognition in this trait (and the impatience too, for that matter). For another, it reassures me that AJ is going to make sure he gets what he needs at school. That�s probably the most valuable tool you need to get a decent education � the refusal to accept what you�re given if you think you can do better. AJ sometimes seems so eager to please that I�ve been a little worried about his ability to fight for himself when necessary. I don�t think I need to worry about that too much anymore.

I am certain that when I report on this meeting to my mother that she will laugh long and hard. I am equally certain that his report card is almost identical to any number of my early elementary school report cards.

This morning, inspired by our viewing of Wallace and Gromit and the Curse of the Were-Rabbit earlier this week, AJ has been inventing elaborate Rube Goldberg machines again. He has been sketching them on paper with his box of crayons and then trying to build models out of boxes and assorted objects he finds lying around his room. His first idea was a machine that had a tube that connected to a large storage container with another tube running out to which a dump truck could be hooked up. You would put the trash in tube one. When the container was full, you turn on a switch and the trash would be sucked out into the truck. I could actually have used this invention this morning. It would have saved me hauling the trash outside in my slippers when it was 8 degrees below zero.

The rest of �my machines,� as he calls them, usually involved a certain amount of animal cruelty and general mayhem. My favorite was a machine that both started a fire and put it out. The cat was supposed to do a lot of jumping and was in serious danger of having her whiskers singed. When AJ gets old enough to use actual tools, I�m guessing we�ll have to increase the insurance policy on our house.

He is currently in bed, where he is supposed to be sleeping, but is actually singing �Home on the Range,� at the top of his lungs: �Where seldom is heard, a discouraging word, and the skies are not cloudy all day.�

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