Rocket Men

So the tall boy and a couple of his pals worked last Friday on the big end-of-year physics project. See, they took the AP exam at the beginning of the month -- hoping to earn those swell college credits. And they really did work their butts off studying for it; they met every Sunday afternoon and called themselves "the Brain Trust." Vain, much?

This studying and taking practice tests and so forth is all very well and good, except that now that the AP exams are over, these boys -- who are seniors in high school, three weeks away from graduation -- are so flipping done with school. "Flipping" is not the word they would use, by the way.

So their physics teacher, who is nobody's fool, doesn't give them a final exam -- he gives them a final project. And because he knows high school kids very well, the project is pretty fun. This year they're building rockets which can be launched with compressed air. If you need more technical information than this, you have so stumbled upon the wrong blog! They did try to explain it to me, and here's what I heard: "It's easy if you keep in mind that blah blah tedious fact . . . zzzzzzzzz . . . Bernoulli effect."

I also feel I must report that some people in the group -- who are not the tall boy -- are taking this project more seriously than others in the group -- by which I mean the tall boy.

This one was quite the contributor, as well.

Basically he and the tall boy stood around gossiping and drinking my sodas, while idly commenting from time to time on the progress being made by the rest of the group . . .

. . . where group = this obsessed kid. I mean, really. The epoxy! The debate as to whether Krazee-Glu or Super Glue is a better product! The requirement that I scrounge up scissors and duct tape -- STAT! He was pretty into it for a Friday afternoon. I'm just saying.

But of course he also got all the glory when it came time to test the . . . something. Fins, maybe?

They weren't really launching the rocket -- that will happen at school with the teacher's nifty compressed air thingie. So the obsessed boy just flung it into the air over and over again -- and then fiddled with it some more, and then flung it one more time, and then called for Scotch tape.

The tall's boy's sole contribution to this project was to say (and I quote), "Dude. I think Scotch tape is a mistake." Over-ruled!

Check it out! [iPhone, baby!] --

The hi-jinks and capers around here on a Friday afternoon are just trend-setting, people . . .

. . . as you can tell by the fact that after the trial run, the three hipsters came inside for a rip-roaring game of Risk.