You've Got Mail!

Today, I opened up my e-mail and had 5 new messages. I wasn't really surprised by this because I seem to have ended up about 100 lists... the ones that just seem to make it through the spam filter. Hoping at least one, or two if I was lucky, was legit, I clicked on my "inbox" link. And guess what... they were all REAL e-mails from people I care oh-so-deeply about! It was really exciting and I took my time and read each one carefully. I decided that I'm going to try and send more e-mails to people because now I truly appreciate the feeling.
For those of you who might not know... I have this little thing about mail... or more specifically, about GETTING mail. I love it! Apparently my psycosis has now spread to electronic mail as well, but oh well. It also made me really happy because I had a weird day at school. Kids are so weird.
Alright, that's all I have for you at the moment. Hope you're enjoying your very last day of January, 2005. Tomorrow starts a brand new month!!
So, would today be a "happy first week of february" or a "happy last week of january?" Now I'm genuinely confused. And concerned. I'm confuscerned.

Ripley's Believe It Or Not

So I saw another dog running down the side of the road today, but nearer to my house this time. I quickly pulled over to see if maybe this dog knew the dog from my previous encounter.
"Hey, hey!" I called. And, yes I did [whistle, whistle].
"What?! Can't you see that I'm going somewhere?"
"Yes, I did notice that you looked like you were on a mission, much like most lost dogs that I've seen wandering around..."
"Hold on a second, there, missy. If I was LOST and didn't know where I was going do you really think I would have just climbed through that barbed wire fence?"
I noticed that he had in fact just climbed through a barbed wire fence. "Well, I was just trying to do the right thing! I mean, the other day I saw this dog I thought was lost and I stopped and talked to him, and then I told my friends what happened and the couldn't believe that I didn't call someone to come get him so I wanted to see if I could, I don't know... redeem myself or something by helping you..." I was beginning to ramble so I stopped.
"Oh yeah!" He said, now turning towards me. "Ernie told me all about you, how you whistled at him and tried to get his people's number so they could pick him up. He said you were real nice..."
"You know each other?"
"Of course we do. We hang out almost every day."
"Oh." I was stunned. What an amazing coincidence!!
"Well, gotta go. The street lights are starting to come on, and you know how they like to have me home before it gets dark..."

The saga continues.
But then I think to myself,
WWLD??

The Chicken or The Egg?

Here's two words for you to chew on: WASTE RECEPTACLE.

I was at school the other day and in the lounge was a sign that said, "please utilize the waste receptacle." After getting past 'utilize,' not it's meaning, but the word itself, I got hooked on 'waste receptacle.' "Who in the world," I thought to myself, "came up with THOSE words to substitue for simply TRASH CAN, and why?" And then I thought, "who came up with TRASH CAN, for that matter? Were they not satisfied with GARBAGE?"
And then I began to think, what if my logic is backward: what if 'waste receptacle' came first, and all the rest followed? By this point I am thoroughly confused. I start walking back to my classroom saying robotically: "waste receptacle, waste recptacle..." to the beat of my feet walking.
But seriously... waste receptacle? Doesn't it remind you of something the characters of Dawson's Creek would say?
"Ah-hem. Pacey, would you put this over-utilized geometric math problem in the waste receptacle?" (or something like that, anyway!) but you get the picture.
Thus, my theory for the day:
One day someone got bored and wanted to sound smart so they put two words together that seemed to make a good combination.
AND THEN
one day someone got even more bored and wanted to sound even smarter so they made a sign to hang up where they were hoping educated people would see it so they would think, "wow, someone really knows how to utilize neat words, like 'recptacle.' I want to be like them when I grow up!"
Well, that's what I was thinking, at least...
(-;

we're off to see the wizard

Dogs always seem to know where they're going, even lost dogs. I've been toying with this idea for a while now, and I decided the other day to make my theory official:
I was driving home from the post office, where I had to stop on my way home from school. As I turn onto Signal Butte Rd. there's this dog and looks like he's totally on a mission. Worried that the oncoming traffic might pose a mortal threat to this poor little guy, I pull over to see if any tags are present. This was our conversation:
"Hey little guy... come here. [whistle, whistle]" I ask. To which he responds:
"Oh, me? I'm okay, really."
"Come one. Are you lost?"
"Well, I wouldn't call it 'lost.' Just looking for the best way to get me home. Hey, if I come over there will you pet me?"
I hold out my hand to show that I will infact pet him if he comes over. "Hmmm, you're pretty clean to have been a stray for a long time..."
"Who are you calling a stray?"
"Let me see your tags and we'll get you home."
"That's right. I have a home. I'm not a stray."
"Oh my! You're pretty far from home, aren't you?"
"Well, it's only like 5 miles. It's not so bad. Gets me out of the house, you know?" he tells me as he starts to back away.
"Do you want me to call your owners and tell them to come get you?" I ask, sensing he's wanting to take off.
"Nah. I know where I'm going."
"Don't all dogs?" I ask, half joking.
"Yes, in fact we do" he says matter-of-factly. Then he turns and trots off.
"Watch for cars!" I yell after him. Although he didn't respond, I knew he heard me.

no tango nada

I seem to enjoy days that I'm happy more than days then I'm sad. (quite a concept, huh?!) Even though TWO of my sixth graders got sent to the principals office during recess today, I managed just fine. (Probably helped that one of them stayed there FOR THE REST OF THE DAY!) But, moving on, great songs were on the radio (but unfortunately I heard NO sophie b. hawkins... sorry rob!) but I did try drinking some coffee this morning and tried to utilize all of my coffee knowledge from the summer. I never got through the cup, and I don't know that I'll try again... my frosting eating contest the other night provided much stronger results (-:
Speaking of food, because I was... if you happen to be a "regular" yogurt eater, don't attempt the switch to the "light" stuff. It's bad.
Sorry to my faithful bloggowers... it seems I've run out of interesting things to say. Oh, except: I ate birthday cake and ice cream tonight, and it's not even anyone's birthday here! So that was just a little bonus for the day!! Oh, man. Life is good sometimes, isn't it?!
I'll try harder for y'all tomorrow.

shake your booty

I love interesting days, most of the time anyway. And, lucky for me, being a teacher brings many to my attention! My big story for the day is as follows:
I'm reading a book with the 6th graders and today the following line was in the story: "The man collected his goods and walked out into the street showing off his booty." Obviously we're talking about SHOES here, right? Or maybe it meant his PRIZE? OR, if you're a 6th grader it obviously means BUTT--(surprisingly enough to me)!! This totally sweet girl comes up to me while they're working on an assignment and looks genuinely concerned. "Why would he walk out in the street and show his... butt... to people? Like why would the author have put that in there?"
I can in no way explain what my face must have looked like, but I went on to explain that, "oh, no! That's not what they mean by 'booty.' Think of it like a pirate, you know, when they would steal stuff, they would get booty... Wait, wait. hmmm, I don't think I quite mean it like that either...!" I think I finally got the point across to her and then I said I would have to tell the class that explanation. So, I do. It really was kinda funny, and they all started blushing cuz, you know, they're in 6th grade. And of course some wise-ass kiddo is like, "oh, yeah! booty! hahaha."
Kids.
They say the darndest things, huh?!?!

Hippie with a Banjo

I am very excited. I have a friend who has a banjo. Not only does this friend own a banjo, he just happens to be a hippie. It's official... he's a Hippie with a Banjo.
(If you don't know the song, you might not know how cool this actually is!) (-:
Most of the time my blogs are not awe-inspiring or deeply personal, so I guess I'll give it a go on this one: I am about to share with you one of my life long dreams. Prepare yourself.
Imagine yourself sitting around a campfire with great friends and company. There is the calming lull of talking with the occasional burst of laughter. But then, what's this? Someone is pulling out their musical instrument? Probably a guitar, you think to yourself. Because that is totally normal, for someone to whip out their guitar around the campfire to sing, among other things, Kumbaya. --Huh, what's this?? Your mind is spinning as you hear not the strum of a six string, but the twang of... a banjo?!?! Can it be? Yes! Someone has brought their banjo and is about to finger-pik their way into the morning. How often do you get an opportunity like this?
This is one of the reasons that I thought I needed to take up the banjo... so I could be this wanna-be Bela Fleck and jam around the campfire. It would be very memorable, in my mind. After all, who WOULDN'T want to be involved in these 2 great American past-times simultanioulsy... the traditional campfire in the woods and the banjo?
I'll let you know if it's everything I expected... or more! (-:
(hey, we all have dreams, right?!)

crooked piece of time

My belt broke in school the other day. Okay, so there's more to the whole belt dilemma than just "it breaking," so I suppose I should start at the beginning:
Lately I've been SO good about getting my stuff ready for the next day before I go to bed. I am so proud of myself (-: This usually includes getting some lunch stuff together and laying my clothes out. So I set out my super cool navy blue dickies to wear with a very nice teacher shirt (-: good stuff. When I'm getting ready to leave, (five minutes early just incase there's ice on my car), I decide I need a belt because I don't want my super cool navy blue dickies to fall down half way through the day. I have this totally neat belt that is navy blue with little green turtles around it and figure that would be Perfect-o. I proceed to spend the next 10 minutes of my already tightly scheduled morning looking for that perfect navy blue belt with green turtles around it. It is no where to be found. I even took a little teeth-brushing break to look for it thinking that I might recall where I had put it. no luck. Instead I decide to wear this other leather belt (that I haven't worn in years so i was hoping it would still fit--which it did, luckily), and I decided that I looked okay with that belt on.
While picking the kids up after morning recess, I am fidgeting with my belt and it breaks. Like in half (well, but not in half-- more like into two pieces). The leather had worn down and broken where it "clips". So I try really hard to non-chalantly take off my belt and put it in my bag, but then I felt really uncomfortable all day because I felt like my pants were gonna fall off. It was just weird.
Imagine the complex I could get because my BELT BROKE ONE DAY!
Perhaps I should lay off on the cereal (-;
(yeah, you know I'm kidding... I could never live without my cereal!)

save a life. donate blood

I am convinced that someone is seriously against my plight to get to school on time in the mornings. Last week there was a small ice incident involving my car, windshield, and a pancake flipper. Since then I decided that I would just need to plan on leaving 5 minutes earlier in case I needed to scrape my windshield... (in the middle of the desert, mind you!)
This morning I got up a little later than usual and was like "oh well. there hasn't been ice on my windshield all week so I'll be fine." (yes, that was my first thought when I woke up... sadly not kidding!) --but to redeem myself, my second thought was a fun one (-:
So I get up and go through the motions of getting ready to be a sixth grade role model. 7:20: Time to go. I go out to my car and... there's ice. Frustration sets in. BUT, thanks to my FAITHFUL BLOGGOWERS, I remember some great advice and run into the house in search of a bucket to fill with water. Let me just say, worked like a charm! Filled up that blue bucket with some water and dumped it on my car. (and i didn't even spill any on me and my grown up clothes!!) Then I was off to school and I felt like I had really defeated something. Whoever is messing with me sure has another thing coming! (-:

National Thank You Week

I'll be honest... today was not nearly as interesting as yesterday at school when I had a student ask me "...if girls could be gay in Afghanistan." BUT, that is a tough one to top, I admit! (-:

It has been decided amongst the other sixth grade teachers that I am a passive teacher. I say things to the kids like: "please take out your books and begin reading silently." Apparently this gives them a choice of whether or not they want to take out their books and begin reading silently. Like they could say, "No thank you" if they felt like it. Or, another example might be, "Johnny, would you like to stop talking to your neighbor and join our class discussion?" because in all likelihood he could retort with a "no thanks. It's more interesting over here." So, I'm working on being an assertive teacher. This teacher sounds more like: "it's time for reading. Take out your books and turn to page 57." etc... no pleases or thank yous. (bummer man, because it's National Thank You Week this week!) Anyway, I decided to try this new found attitude on some friends last night:
"We are going to get ice cream, now." (so now if the person decided to disobey this DIRECT COMMAND, there will be consequences.) "Okay, you've chosen to not follow directions, so these are your options. You can either take me to get some ice cream or you can stay here while I whine about it all night." See how effective that is? You can really use this knowledge in MOST situations, and so far it has proven to be pretty powerful stuff.
Because of it's success rate in my own life I decided to pass it on to you. Now I'm off to bed to rest up for another fun day of being an ASSERTIVE 6th grade teacher.

Wisdom Beyond my Ages

There are so many things that I could write about today... "Where to start?" is what I've been saying to myself all day! So, instead of humoring y'all with my nonsensical witt, I've decided to take on a more serious tone and give some life-long advice instead. I know, but I gotta say it: I do it all for the fans!
Advice from Amanda--be sure to take note:
Never iron your clothes while you are wearing whatever it is you are trying to iron.
Okay, okay. I imagine some of you might not be taking this as seriously as you need to be (-; but let me remind you that this is something serious. You see, this morning I was ironing my shirt (no, not while I was wearing it) and I thought how much it would hurt if I got burned by the iron. "If I was in a rush," I thought to myself, "would I still stand here patiently and iron the shirt? Surely it seems faster to put it on first." As I restrained myself from trying this experiment out (I'm always looking for ways to get things done faster... especially in the mornings) I thought "I should write about this in my blog. This is just the sort of thing that people need to hear about." After going back and forth between, "that's a stupid idea" and "that's the best idea EVER!" I decided to go with my second feeling. You see, if someone WERE to put up on their blog one day that they had been burned by ironing an article of clothing while they were wearing it, I would feel responsible. Like I didn't do my part to prevent this tragedy.
So please remember this, if it's all you EVER remember...

(-:

The Glory Days

Last night I ran into three people I went to highschool with FOUR years ago! It was kind of a strange moment. I walked into this restaurant/bar place in Tempe last night and right away I said, "I think I went to high school with that guy." After deciding that I didn't want to approach them we went outside to enjoy the desert air. (or something like that... it's freezing here!) Then I notice this group of people leaving and I think, "what the heck..." so I say, "umm, are you Cody?" When he stops to give me his attention I guess that I'm right so I add, "because i'm thinking we went to high school together." and to my surprise he says, "yeah, Red Mountain. Hey Amanda!" Okay, now this is a big moment because most of the people I've run into since those wonderful days of RMHS don't recognize me. (for those of you who have been troopers and known me before my college days... i look a little different!) (-: Behind Cody steps up Kellie and... Mr. Lunk Pocket himself, Austin.
Okay, now the interesting part (well, that other stuff was interesting too!): We all get into the "hey, how are ya, how's school, how's life, what's new...?" conversation where you try to play catch up from the past 4 years in 30 seconds. The conversations inevitably ends with, "it was so good running into you!" like it's been something you've been wishing would happen for oh-so-long now. I'm surprised no one dropped the, "we should totally get together" bomb. That's a classic!
Anyway, that was my nite.
I also saw Ocean's 12 and I'm still pretty undecided about it.
But that doesn't say much because half the time i can't decided on whether to have lucky charms or cap'n crunch in the mornings. These are the trials and tribulations I go through every day...

A Great Way to Start the Day

Oh, goodness. The joys of pretending to be a grown up!
Yesterday morning was oh-so-eventful. Already by 7:45am I felt like I had put in more than a day’s worth! Here was my day:
6:00 am- Wake up and start getting ready for school. (Now that I’m a wanna-be teacher!)
6:50 am- Ahh. The best part of my day… BREAKFAST!!
7:00 am- Pack a lunch and make sure I look like a grown up before I walk out the door.
7:20 am- Head out the door, awesome water bottle and lunch box in hand. Oh yeah. I’m ready for anything.
7:20:30 am- Unlock my door and notice that my entire car is COVERED IN ICE!!
7:21 am- Frantically search through my purse for my driver’s license. I’ve heard that these things will scrape off a windshield!
7:23 am- This isn’t working. Go to plan B.
7:23:05 am- Realize there is no plan B. Heck, there’s not even really a plan A.
7:23:15 am- Continue scraping at my windshield with my driver’s license.
7:26 am- Realize I’m going to be late. Run in the house for my cell phone and call Kathy. “I’m gonna be late. My car is covered in ice and I’m chipping away at it with my driver’s license!” Laughter on both ends of the phone. “I’ll be there as soon as I can!”
7:27 am- Yell down the hall asking my mom if we had a windshield scraper ANYWHERE in our house.
7:27:10 am- Negative on the windshield scraper.
7:27:40 am- Begin rifling through kitchen drawers for something… ANYTHING!
7:28 am- Stumble upon a pancake flipper/spatula/(apparently) windshield scraper.
7:28:30 am- Run back outside, (in my grown up shoes, mind you!) and begin to furiously scrape away at my windshield.
7:30 am- Still messing with the stupid spatula and windshield dilemma.
7:35 am- Yep. You got it. Only this time add “while freezing my fingers off!” to the end of the sentence.
7:37 am- Good enough. Even though my defrost doesn’t seem to be working, this will get me there.
7:46 am- Pull into the school. Kids are lining up for class and I am panicking. I go to stand in line with the 6th graders. They all ask why I am carrying a spatula. Oh, wouldn’t they like to know?!?!

So that was pretty much how my day started off yesterday.
Fun stuff.
But at least I got cereal (-:

Just another reason to Hate the Yankees, (as if I needed one!)

So I was having a pretty good day, up until about 8:15 this morning when I heard the news... The Commissioner of Baseball approved a trade that will send Randy Johnson to the Yankees. I know it's hard, so just take a second and collect yourselves here...
....
....
There. Maybe that's a LITTLE better now. Anyway, I'll take this moment to say that, no, I never really have been a fan of the New York Yankee baseball team. Maybe it's the pin-stripes, or the fact that they think they're ALL THAT plus a BAG OF CHEETOS. Maybe it's the fact that when I was just a small girl, they STOLE Chuck Knoblock right out from under our noses and then hardly ever played him, Yes, actually I'm pretty sure that's where it all started. And then they come out and get these cocky-poo-poo players who act like we should be privileged to watch them play in those God-forsaken pin-stripes, and are like, "yeah, the WORLD owes it to me to let me play here." (Can we all say JETER?) Bull. AND THEN, they go around flaunting the fact that they have one of the highest payrolls in MLB, oh, but wait... where's the WORLD SERIES RING TO PROVE IT?!?!?! Oh, would that be the one that ARIZONA swiped from you in the 2002 World Series? (ok, so I'm happy about that one, but you see what I'm saying.)
Okay, I suppose I should quit venting. Sorry you had to go through this with me, but it's just too painful for me to have to go thru on my own!
grrrr.
I need to go eat some cereal.

Back to School Sale

Today was my first day of student teaching, and I came home with scars to prove it! Seriously... I have a scratch mark on my left cheek right below my eye and it stings, and I have no idea how it arrived there. I'm pretty sure it's NOT from when I was stealing that kids lunch money... (-: totally kidding, totally kidding. Anyways, it was an interesting day. It's been raining here for the past few days, which continued on to today. So it was a rainy day schedule. Now for anyone who has been an elementary school student (ah-hem...) you can maybe imagine this. Now remember back to your 6th grade days, and a day right after break. ALL these kids wanted to do was chit chat. It was fun, but just weird, being a "role model" and all.
And then there's this scratch on my cheek.... tomorrow should be interesting!

back in MY day

Today I saw something that I (obviously) thought was worthwhile: (once you get through my preface you'll see!)
Today my mom and I went up to the mall so she could get a calendar (they're on sale since we're SO far into the new year, ya know!) and so I could look for some teacher clothes on sale. The stop light on University and Brown was red, like ALWAYS, (I'm not kidding. I think I've hit it green like ONCE in my entire life), and we both noticed this little kid in his side yard with a shovel digging at something. He put his trusty shovel down and hopped on his bike. This is when I noticed the bigger picture: he was working on a dirt track for his bike. Okay, so the kid's like probably nine years old and he's on a little Huffy, probably the same one that he's had since training wheels (it looked beat up) and he was having a great time. And his track looked really fun, too! At the same time, my mom and I both looked at each other and were like, "that's so cute." But not in the "oh, look at the little puppy!" kind of way. I guess we could have said "that's a beautiful picture" like you say "that is beautiful" when a father his little son are walking hand-in-hand down the street.
One day I'll have to expand on why this blog happens to be called "back in MY day." Now THAT'S a fun story. Not beautiful like the one I saw today, but definitely fun!

Happy New Year!

So my big question about BLOGGING today was, can a BLOGGER BLOG more than once a day? Hmmm, how does the peanut gallery feel about this?

New Year's Eve was crazy, as usual, but it didn't let it bother me (-: Now is it "Beer Before Liquor" or "Liquor Before Beer??" That was the question that was racing through my mind as I held a rum and coke in my left hand, after polishing off a Bud Lite.

I suppose this would be a good time to share my silly New Year’s story with all my faithful BLOGGOWERS (that’s a new word I invented… it’s a combination of Followers and the word Blog. See, because everyone is SOO interested in my life that I decided a word needed to be invented. Thus we have BLOGGOWERS. Oh, and I decided to have 2 G’s just to make it interesting, and because I can!) So, back to my story: I’m standing at this bar-type thing at the block party and this nice guy says he’ll buy me a drink. “What do you want?” he asks. I tell him that I’ll have whatever he’s having. He orders two rum and cokes. The bartender proceeds to pour some rum into a plastic cup followed by….. PEPSI! (yeah, I was REALLY confused, too!) So I feel like it is my civic duty to inform her that we ordered 2 rum and COKES. Yeah. Talk about a stressful moment! Well, maybe you had to be there.

Hope everyone had a supercalifragilisticexpealidotious new year, and welcome to 2005!