Novel Excerpt: Teakettles, Microphones, and Bird Seed Shirts...

I too, was out of class for most of the period so I missed the analysis of the beginning of the novel. When I did arrive back to class, both Alex and Allison were giving me a lot of insight on what they had noted in the beginning of the novel.
The passage which came from the beginning of the novel, introduced us to the narrator, a young boy. While he didn’t outright give a physical description of himself, his level of language implied his age. He also uses comical language to convey his messages whether it is about farting or kicking his jujitsu master in the privates. Most sentences consisted of simplistic sentences and thoughts—and the thoughts were often scattered and unrelated to his previous comment. He constantly discusses different topics but after he says “Anyway.” he is able to discuss his jujitsu class for quite a while. When he says that his first and last jujitsu class was three-and-a-half months ago, it reaffirmed his young boy tendencies of not being able to stay committed to the task at hand.
After reading the excerpt we still were unsure of the significance of the chapter title, “What the?” and wonder how and why he speaks French? Not only does he speak French, but when he talks about farting in front of the Hall of Mirrors in Versailles, it shows that he either has a good understanding of France or he has visited there before. The narrator also talks about the teakettle, the microphone, and the birdseed shirt which all seems like things that he believes can keep people safe, but in reality it isn’t practical. Our group was unsure of why he was avoiding the topic of his father’s death. We knew about his death on 9/11 because we researched the book before reading it, but until now it hasn’t appeared yet in the text—the only mention of his father is when he says that he can read a teakettle in his father’s voice—perhaps as a way to remember him? When he says that “self-defense was something that I was extremely curious about, for obvious reasons…” does this have something to do with his father’s death?
Most of my analysis was done at home, but the group came up with similar concepts as a whole. I’m interested in learning more about the unanswered questions throughout the upcoming chapters.