My son has recently acquired a passion for basketball. He is practicing four or five hours a day – on his own at the park. He is a serial obsessionist. His goal today is to be an NBA star. What I can be thankful for is that he has the concept very clear – you want to be great at something you have to put in the time. For now, he is putting in the time.

The first time he went out he didn’t take anything to drink. He found a couple of bucks in his pocket (lucky coincidence) and bought a Gatorade at the corner store. That afternoon he came home and announced that he needed drink mix and a bigger thermos. “Mom, it’s too expensive and I don’t want to be throwing out all that plastic everyday”. (Hoooray!!! says I, thrifty and environmentally minded, even if he doesn’t end up as a professional basketball player :). Because he is a serial obsessionist and not all enthusiasms “stick” we have a deal about not spending a lot of money on a new hobby till we know if it is sticking around for a while. He made do with a couple of containers of Gatorade mix quickly purchased at the local Loblaws and an old coffee thermos that I had around.

Two months (and two new basketballs) later and it’s time to get a new thermos. He’s away at camp this week and I had time to do some shopping so this is waiting for his return. You don’t get a feeling for the size in this picture but the thermos holds 1.9 liters and the cans can make 8L each (if you mix it full strength which we don’t, the other advantage of making it at home). That should keep him going for a while. When the cans are empty we soak them in water to break them down to their component parts – of which only the outside paper is not recyclable.