I're read this before! The earlier version, I remember thinking James was a sweetheart then and my opinion of him hasn't changed. I bet he's fun to dance with, too. Or watch dance. 😏
Your "among other activities" at the end was great. I got a giant grin from that sentence.
There are a few sentences that would benefit from a shift into past perfect tense (that's the one that uses "had" like your lovely "his brain had gotten him far" sentence in paragraph two). I tripped up a bit at "his only knowledge about it was" (shift was to had been maybe) and "he discovered" (I suggest he had discovered) in paragraph one, but that's just grammar tweaks to differentiate "now" from "before now" - the sacrifices we make to write in past tense. (You can never pry my past tense away from me.)
I do love how he put on a show for Tim to get Tim to join him. I bet Tim wasn't the only one enjoying watching. 😏
