Won a meal for four at the Turnpike in a raffle at church a while back and because it was only valid until the end of October we decided tonight was the night. No matter what its reputation is the landlady has dragged it up from the old style to somewhere you might want go for something other than getting smashed in…?

OK its not fine dining but they did a good burger and a pint of Stella so I was ok but also so were my family too. 3 cheeseburgers and Reagan had the Steak’n’ale pie

A good night was had with food drink and Uno

Away at Top House has been a happy hunting ground for us in recent seasons at tonight was no different we went 5 nil up so we just needed one more frame but we stalled when a poor break followed by a poor frame and they had clawed two frames back with just the last singles  game and two doubles to go.

I knew we could win either or both doubles but I really wanted to win the final singles but he was a new player and the other new player had already been beaten. There was no need to worry he may not have played the perfect but all we ever want is a win and he delivered

We lost both doubles which was annoying and maybe because we had already won the match but still concerning that we could have drawn if that last singles game had gone differently.

Lincoln recieved his first black flag this evening for being far too aggressive trying to overtake through a a gap that clearly did not exist. If it was a race car his race would have been over because the crash would have destroyed his car.

Testosterone in a car is a dangerous thing and a 15 year old in a kart who plays F1 video games where crashes can be just rebooted has to learn

He was ordered into the pits and missed two laps while the marshal explained the error of his ways and how to avoid a repeat. We took him to one side and told him we saw what happened and that it was him being too aggressive he needs to be calm drive smooth and overtake in the right place and you will be quicker.

The next session it seemed to work because all his un impeded lap times were under a minute which they were not earlier, and he attained a personal best lap time of 56.433 on lap 9 and was a lot smother throughout overtaking many karts in to process proving Calmer over Karma is quicker

We thought about what we had done as punishment and gave Lincoln a chance to work his racing back, by weeding the yard.  We know how hard that would be but we also know how much he loves karting and this would still be a tough punishment but if he did it he wins back what he wants to do.

He agreed but Saturday morning came and he informed me he was going to do a few races on computer first and weed the yard later….

This infuriated me but I can’t have a go at him for failing until he fails I was even told by Jamie to move me car so he could weed under it. I thought it was a waste of my time but I did it.

When we got back from Costco we found most of the weeds still growing out of the yard and Lincoln finished for the day. The patio and the bit of the yard he had done he had made a really good job of and I was impressed with that but he prioritised fun before work and I thought that was a good enough reason to take Karting off him still. Mom on the other hand thought the effort he had already put in plus if he carried on with her help and completed the job he could still go Karting

He did carry on and Mom did convince me it was enough so he got his Karting back.

In life we try to be the best version of ourselves every day and for the most part if you are good person people will see good in you. Personally I have not always been the best version of myself over my 56 years but I don’t believe any of my shortcomings and failures overshadow the successes which, in my opinion, far far out way them.

If the person I portrayed at 15 carried on throughout my life I would have taken a very different path, but that wasn’t who I was, I was young trying to find that out the answer to that question!

Lincoln’s teacher called us this afternoon to inform us that he had receive a behavioural detention for an incident at school today.

He called us shortly afterwards to warn us and to explain what had happened but we told him to come home and tell us. His version was he had a bad morning the drama studio was loud and he was goaded to the point where he called a girl “Fat Bitch” which he had instantly regretted but she went to a teacher and span a far bigger tail than what actually happened then admitted she lied but not about the name calling. In light of this Lincoln received a detention and so di the girl. They subsequently made up and all is now OK!

This did not sit well with me because firstly as much as I want to believe it is ‘completely’ out of character this type of emotional reaction is becoming a regular occurrence and his character can quicky become perceived as this.

I was disappointed and told him that saying sorry is OK but what if that girl takes that one single comment with her forever which may sound dramatic but in life we can be told 100 times we are great but remember the one time someone said you’re not! I am glad that you took responsibility for your actions but you can not go through life not experiencing consequences for your actions. After discussing what we thought should do we decided to take away Mondays Karting because he really needs to understand how severe we consider this is.