Monday? Really? You Can Go Jump in a Lake.

This photo has nothing to do with the post...I was just inordinately pleased with it, and wanted to make sure you saw it, in case you aren't following my 365 project at tumblr...

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The weather is actually not terrible today. When the boys and I went out at about 11, it was already 41 degrees, and I think we may have broken a sweat on our one mile run. They are participating in a marathon of sorts, in conjunction with Dr. SmartyPants' and my half-marathon in April. They ran the first mile of it on Saturday, at the Knoxville Zoo, and then they will run 24 more over the next 10 weeks before finishing the last mile on the marathon course. They get to cross the 50 yard line at Neyland Stadium on the Saturday of marathon weekend, just where we'll finish on the Sunday.

Today's run was the hardest mile I've ever run in my life. And actually...I only ran 1/2 of it. I walked the rest of the way back. The Smarty and I ran 9 miles yesterday and everything on my body below my ribcage is in pain. Good pain - not injury pain - but holy smokes. Ouch.

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The thing about Mondays is that it's always a battle. We have to reset the internal clocks for the boys after the weekend. They don't sleep all that late on the weekends, but it somehow feels to them like we're getting them up at the crack of dawn.

Which we don't. I get up before the crack of dawn, and I don't wake them up for another hour and a half because IT'S SO FREAKING QUIET during that time.

They have no idea.

We started school well this morning, but there were some dramas that had to play out over the course of the next few hours. I have this one child...who shall remain nameless...that is SO DADGUM STUBBORN I can't even believe it. He is convinced that if he avoids doing his work, I'll eventually get tired of looking at him sitting at the table and tell him he doesn't have to do it.

Not once, in all the years of schooling that he has, have I ever told him to just stop working. Ever.

And yet.

Last week, I started the new policy of a timed math lesson - he has a certain amount of time to get his work done, and if he isn't done, he gets twice as much math work to complete. Last Thursday, the day after the implementation, he got his work done in 5 minutes UNDER the scheduled amount of time. And it was all correct. Because he's a freaking math genius.

Lazy...but genius.

Today, at the end of the scheduled time, he had completed 3 (THREE) PROBLEMS. Not three sections, mind you...three. individual. division. problems.

So, I counted up the remaining problems, multiplied by two, and made him a new set of worksheets, thinking that would certainly spur him on.

Fast forward four hours later...I've taken him on a run, given him a lunch break and gone to the grocery (while he stayed home and "worked.")

He had completed 8 (EIGHT) PROBLEMS. Please understand that I'm not even talking about eight ADDITIONAL problems. EIGHT PROBLEMS TOTAL.

So we had another talk where I asked him if he understood how to do the problems (yes,) if he had a brain disfunction that prevented him from doing his work (no,) or if maybe he just thought I wouldn't make him actually finish (yes.) YES. He admitted it.

I gave him 30 minutes to finish (the original work) or risk another doubling of extra work, while I went to finally take my shower. After 20 minutes?

He was completely done.

Now he just has to do his reading, write a paper, go to piano lessons and take care of the additional math work and we'll be all done with school.

9 billion hours after we started.

Oh, Monday. You really are a bitch.