"A Brilliant Idea!"

"Yes?"

"That's what we need, a brilliant idea." ***

This morning the Missus and I were chatting about her curricular plans at St. Marie of the Blessed Educational Method. Specifically, we were discussing her upcoming science topics. (She is incorporating science into her general classroom package this year. Next year she is going to be the o-fficial floating science teacher for the elementary kids.) Among those topics are a lot of what they call "Earth Sciences" matters - geology, biology, meteorology and so on. And among the projects she mentioned for her students was one involving composting.

This started a train of thought clanking out of its siding in the cluttered and confused depot of my head.

Why couldn't the Earth Sciences curriculum include a project or projects in the gardens and grounds of Orgle Manor itself? I mean, surely such tasks as laying sod in the side yard, clearing out deadwood from the azalia hedges, pruning back rosebushes and weeding the garden (all of which will need to be done), would be educational?

Furthermore, most parents in our rayther snooty corner of Northern Virginia would pay thousands of dollars for such a hands-on experience for little Liam and Ashtyn, so long as it was packaged with a name like "Potomac Reserve Eco-Immersion Experience for Gifted Young Adults". Heck, if the little blighters were to show up ready to work, I'd pay them.

I brooded on this idea all the way in on my commute and frankly, I still can't find anything wrong with it.

(***Spot the quote. The post title is included as part of the exchange in the original.)

UPDATE: We have a winner! The quoted exchange is between Pseudolus and Hysterium in the movie A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum. Incidentally, the name Pseudolus, which means the "lying slave" was lifted from a play of that name by the Roman comic playwrite Plautus, as was much of the plot of AFTHOTWTTF. The character Miles Gloriosus, a braggart soldier, was also lifted from a play by Plautus called Miles Gloriosus, which means, well, "the braggart soldier" and is, well, about a braggart soldier.