It’s Daniel’s 16th birthday tomorrow – I can’t believe how big he is now. He is turning into a wonderful young man. Yesterday he asked if he could vacuum his room. Although he’s the first 16-year-old I’ve had I can’t imagine this is a common request. He’s kind, polite, considerate, has a wonderful sense of humour, and is very clever.
At Daniel’s school the grade 10 students do career matching using the Morrisby profiling tool. Daniel sat the test last week which lasts two hours and at the end it spits out scores for verbal, numerical, abstract, spatial, and mechanical skills. It then makes career suggestions based on the student’s strengths.
Daniel scored very high for numerical and abstract skills. He got a 100% match for a career as a computer programmer. He’s probably going to go in this direction anyway so it was nice to see it confirmed. I don’t think you can go wrong with a degree in computer science these days. It’s what I did at university and I’ve never regretted it perhaps that’s why I was so pleased to see his results.
For his birthday he wanted to go skiing again so we drove to the Lecht. Ben is back from New Zealand which meant I had a better photographer in the car for photos.
Ben managed to get a photo of Corgarff Castle without obscuring it behind a tree or a sign as Daniel did on our last drive past. Most of the snow has melted.
This next photo is from the top of the hill looking down into the valley at Corgarff Castle.
Although most of the snow has melted the beginner slopes at the Lecht are always open as they use snow machines for those. I managed to get our annual photo of Ben looking miserable in the snow.
Here he is coming down the slope.
I’ve been keen to try snow boarding for purely practical reasons: it requires less equipment and the boots are almost like regular snow boots. I watched a beginner video on YouTube last night and thought, “How hard can it be?” It was hard. I kept spinning around and couldn’t control my direction at all then invariably ended up on my butt. In the end I got fed up and switched back to skis. They were very good at the ski centre and let me swap without charging for hire again. I would like to try snow boarding a second time but maybe I’ll get a lesson first.
Daniel and Elizabeth have improved a lot and Elizabeth may have even enjoyed herself this time although she’d be faster on foot than on skis. This is Daniel.
rachel.blog 
I think of snowboarding like skateboarding – apparently skateboarding is difficult and dangerous if you are over 30, you have to be young and flexible to learn it. I hope you can learn it though. I think a lesson would be good.
Where I work, the maximum pay grade for programmers is lower than what I am on as a solutions architect which is crazy, as programming is much harder. Unsurprisingly they can’t attract any recruits, it is a dire situation. I would think of switching otherwise, they really need some coders. I was describing your family’s online school, as a friend of a friend has autistic children and has decided to home educate, due to no local secondaries being suitable. I told her that everyone in your family is very intelligent. It is great that Daniel is going to swell the ranks of programmers but also that he is a lovely young man with manners – my boyfriend manages programmers and their interpersonal skills can make them difficult to manage.
Both our kids are back at a regular bricks and mortar school now but they did the online school for 18 months and it was very good. In fact, I think it was ahead of normal schools academically. Both kids were advanced for their grades when they started back at school. Elizabeth was missing the social contact though so we made the decision to move them back.
The job market is exactly that – a market so if programmers are hard to attract then they’ll need to increase the salary to meet the market. But I can understand a solutions architect would be paid more because it’s more of a management role with more responsibility.
It’s tempting to do that test just to see what they come up with – lol! Two hours is a bit daunting, though, so maybe not 🙂
I noticed that none of you had ski poles – why’s that?
It’s better not to use poles when you’re just starting. They’re not really necessary and just get in the way. Most kids don’t have them.
I have not had a moment of regret over learning to snowboard. It’s so much better on your joints after you learn. Lessons are really smart. I also have gloves with wrist guards built in. It’s controversial since that makes shoulder injuries more common, but I’d rather damage a shoulder than a wrist with my job. Message me if you want tips 🙂 I’m in my 12th year of it. Started when I was 39, I think. I’m in some women’s snowboarding groups online and have learned a lot.
Yes I can see snowboarding is probably much better on the knees and there’s no chance of you twisting your legs and landing in an unnatural position. I’ll give it another try at some point. Do you have any tips for how to get started? Did it take you long to stop falling over all the time?
I am one of the most un-athletic and uncoordinated people you might ever meet. It took me about a month to go down a bunny hill without falling. From what I know of you, it will be a lot faster 🙂 This looks like a great tutorial – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5vA49rOIMc
Best advice I had was from my husband. Just relax, bend your knees and stay over the board. I overthought the science of it all too much at first. Had to learn to just go and just stay over the board. Always wear a helmet. Some of the worst wipeouts are on flats when you catch an edge.