Why I am the best auntie, like, ever

Today was Kieren's first day of driver's ed classes, which commence at eight o'clock in the morning. Heavens to Betsy. Here I was thinking that eight o'clock ayem was just about daybreak, but it turns out some people go to work then. Or to class as the case may be.

You know, come September, I am really really going to regret this business of staying up until two or three o'clock in the morning and then sleeping until ten....

I didn't sleep until 10:00 this morning, because that's when I had to be at the driving school to pick Kieren up. He was already out of class, leaning against the building in a cool manner that I'm sure enhanced his hearthrobby essence with the girls in his class. Does he know how good looking he is?

Anyway, Kieren's had a lot of driving practice out at his grandpa and grandma's house, where they have this super-fun dirt track around their pond and a couple of go-karts. The problem is that he doesn't have a whole lot of experience with stoplights and stop signs and the like. Or, you know, turning corners on residential streets. Or for that matter, driving on streets that have parked cars on your right and oncoming traffic on your left.

So we spent an entire hour after his class today gaining that experience so that he wouldn't feel like a total piker on his first solo drive, which will be this coming Wednesday. We drove downtown, we drove out in the country, we drove in neighborhoods. And coming home, we drove on a state highway! He did a fantastic job, only terrifying me once (oncoming farm truck pulling trailer, narrow-ish bridge, way too close to the right-hand drop off into a fairly steepish sort of ditch) and scared me once (Anne's side mirror wasthisclose to the side mirrors of some parked cars along the side of the road.)

Tomorrow, we'll find a church parking lot and practice pulling into and backing out of parking places.

I have nerves of steel, man.