Snow day...but it's snot!

Today I woke up, and I looked out the window. And saw a blur of white. "Snow day" I silently begged, because when you wake up at 6:00 am you have to do everything silently lest you wake up the whole house, and padded downstairs in my jammies to check the news. (On mute of course.)

Snow day? S'no. A mere 2 hour delay. OK, I'll take it. Two extra hours without students, and shortened periods all day. So I dress (In my least fancy teaching outfit since I'll be trudging thru snow), get my coffee, and head out to brush of my car.

And fall on my ass. BOOM. Down. It doesn't hurt too bad, but DAMN is it cold!! Snow butt! And wet pants to boot! Pick myself up, shake myself out, try to get the snow out of my underwear, and get in the car.

HOLY HELL, what a drive! Sliding, spinning...it's like a ballet on 4 wheels! But a lot scarier, since, you know, there are other cars on the road. And they are spinning and sliding as well. Up the hill? Eh. Didn't happen so good. But down the hill? Now that's an adventure.

When I rule the world, and all are following the laws of elephant karma, there shall be a law:
There must. Must. MUST. be at least one snow day per school year. And we won't lose the Friday before Memorial Day to make up for it. In fact, we'll even have a Spring Day, where the weather is just to NICE to go to school to make up for the day we lost being trapped inside on a crummy weather day. Elephant karma demands it so.

Nails of nastiness

OK, so about a week and half ago I decided that it was time for the acrylics to come off. For one, I could see them starting to yellow, I guess because of lack of oxygen? But my real nails were also starting to seperate from them...in the front. Things were perpetually getting caught between the two layers of nail. Ew and ow.

First of all, removing them hurt!!! My hands were soaked in acetone for maybe 5 minutes on a generous timer, then Crazy Lady comes over and starts chipping away at the layer of acrylic. I was beyond grossed out when she started to use broken pieces of the acrylic AND HER OWN FINGERNAILS (!) to start prying the fakes off. I guess I complained a little too much, cuz she put my hands back in the bowl for a good 20 minutes and...left me there.

I sat in the nail salon, stinking like petroleum while she and her hubby worked on other people. They had time to do a full set while I soaked. Finally, her hubby came over, who I like much better because he smiles and is in general a much gentler nail technician. He wiped my hands with a clean soft cloth and started removing them, but this time he used the electric filer that was hanging there the whole time. Pain free, and no shards of acrylic flying off to pierce my eyeball.

But when he was done, I wanted to cry. My nails are so ugly! They are paper thin, and they have huge ridges where they had buffed down the nail to set the acrylic. Even still, they are bendy and weak, and breaking every which way. I've been taking great pains to coat them in nail strengthener and paint them so they look nice, but there is just no way to dress these suckers up. You can see the ridges through the paint, and as the nail breaks the polish chips.

What have I done to myself? Get me back to the salon, pronto!!

Ow.

So, if you were watching, at least from Pittsburgh, then you know that yesterday's game just HURT. We got spanked. Royally.

But really, that last touchdown was just RUDE. I mean, ok there, showoff. We know you won. Your 10 point lead wasn't enough? You had to make it 20 pts? Because we were, you know, such a terrible threat in the last 4 minutes of that game.

We were sobbing into our Terrible Towels chez moi. We had to run them through the dryer before putting them in moth balls.

I just want one Superbowl in my lifetime. Is that too much to ask? *sigh* I don't even have a hockey season to console me. I am so robbed.

Weekend!

Happy Friday, everybody!

Students may think they love Fridays. But no one appreciates Fridays like the Teacher. Same with snowdays. We're supposed to get truly dumped on this weekend by the Goddess of Winter Weather. Starting tonight, it's supposed to snow, snow, snow. I know my students are ALL praying for a snow day.
But no one will be praying harder than the Teachers. We will be praying to the Matron Saint of Snow that she may bury us deep in her snowy mantle, enveloping us in a cloud of white from which we will not emerge until at least...Tuesday. Likewise, we will be beseeching the Lord on High of Snowplows and Salt Trucks, that these dastardly tools of Satan will be cast out of the Snow Goddess's favor, and may they be unable to perform their job of clearing the streets until at least...Monday night.

(Of course, let it not snow hard enough that thy loyal servants may lose power, and thus be unable to view our beloved Steeler's game on Sunday.)

Let us pray.

First Day on the Job!

A lot of people think that the first day of a new job is the most intimidating. To me, this is not so true. What is very intimidating to me is the second job. I now know what I need to do. I know my students. I know what they know, and what they need to know by the end of the year.

Tomorrow I have to go in and make them work for it. That is the scary part. Knowing that tomorrow is when it begins. All the back work needs to be checked and graded, and put in the computer. All the new stuff needs to be taught. I teach differently than the last teacher, in that I'm a big believer in writing things down. She emphasized oral skills, which I also think are important and want to give them a lot of practice in. But I've always thought that if you don't know it, you can't say it, so I do lots of little dittos and exercises. Practice. Do homework. Do classwork. Definitely have fun, and incorporate music, and culture, and games, but LEARN.
Learning is where there is almost always a breakdown in communication between students and teachers. Namely because learning involves work, for all sides. And, hey, this is America! We don't want to work! We want the easiest way around it!

Ew

The air in this house is so dry. I put lotion on twice a day, and I still get white-girl ash. I drink so much water I could float away, and I'm still thirsty. And good Lord does my nose bleed. Not, like, gushing spontaneously or anything cool like that. But the capillaries inside the nostril will start to bleed, and make these huge crusty scabby buildups in my nose that start to itch and itch and itch. So when I get my hanky, it's just...ew. Big bloody bogies. Because bogies aren't gross enough when they're not bloody, I guess.

New job!

Starting tomorrow, I will be a French teacher at a local middle school.
This is a good thing. For one, I won't be waiting by the phone every night, hoping I'll get a call for a substitute job in a nice building. Everyday I will know where I'm going, and hopefully, what I'm doing.
For two, I actually know French, and how to teach it. Unlike special ed, which I have been teaching a lot of lately, without any real training past a 2 credit course on Inclusion. This will definitely help in the "know what I'm doing" department.

New Year's Resolution

I usually hate resolutions. I never bother making any, because when they fall through, I end up feeling bad, like I've let myself down.
But I'm going to make one. I WILL become a better blogger. I will post more regularly, and about more interesting things.

Bond. James Bond

James Bond is On Demand!

Hell yeah!

Love me some James Bond. I know, I know: the scripts are full of cheap lines, the stories are predictable, and the special effects are, well, not special.

But he's so damn cool.

While I've always been a Sean Connery fan, I have to admit that Roger Moore is growing on me. He's not so much a looker, but he's definitely witty. That other guy, though, whatshisface? Screw him. Un-hot, un-cool, un-Bond.

Pierce Brosnan, in my book, doesn't even rank as a Bond, simply because he came along so much later.

Who's your favorite 007?

Happy New Year?

I know, I know, I haven't posted since Christmas! Sorry!

(Though I'm not sure anyone is reading anyway...)

But anyway, Happy 2005.

Support relief efforts for the tsunami victims. If I can do it, you can too!

Bragging rights

So...

What was the best gift you got for Christmas this year? (Or for Hannukah, Solstice, Kwanzaa, etc?)

Ho Ho Ho!

Merry Christmas, if it's for you.

If it's not enjoy your day anyway!