When It's Raining on Saturday

All I want to do is curl up with a book today, and spend Saturday listening to the rain come down and drench Houston from the comfort of my own bed. It's such a refreshing sound, and I love how rain makes everything fresh!  But this is the Saturday that will be spent grading and planning and cleaning. Then tonight, I have been invited to an end of the year party at a coworkers house. He's from Louisiana, and is making REAL southern food. I'm excited. And he lives in the Heights which is an adorable neighborhood filled with craftsmen houses.

Allow me to swoon for a minute while I dream of cratfstmen houses with big porches and built-ins.

OK.  Now I'm done. Since I'm up, and since I promised, I'm making scones this morning, as soon as i clean the kitchen.

With blueberries!!!

Work Hard. Be Nice.

Sex, Drugs, And Rock n' Roll (but mostly just Drugs).

I did something pretty ballsy on Tuesday, and I am so lucky it didn't blow up in my face. I was trying to get 8th period started on the topic of the history of Australia, Antarctica and Oceania. Getting 8th period started is always difficult, and usually takes 15 minutes longer than any other period. This is the class with ... 4 students with modifications, one of which is a big, Texas-sized pain in my rear end. As I was reminding JP to move back to his original seat, I told him he needed to hand over the tennis ball that he was playing with, as it would only serve as a distraction to him and the rest of the class, and would most likely spend the next 80 minutes rolling back and forth on the floor. JP flat-out refused to give the ball over, and after about a minute and a half of me stating "I am not arguing with you about this. This is not a discussion. This is not a question, but rather an order", I told him to leave.

Get out of my class.

Just go.

When he asked if I wanted him to take his work, I told him to leave. Again.

When he asked where I wanted him to go, I repeated the oder to leave my classroom. He was no longer welcome.

He packed his things quite quickly (for JP), and left.  The rest of the class worked almost silently for the rest of the class. A couple students asked if I wanted them to go look for JP, but I said no. I did step into the hall once or twice to see if he was simply sitting outside of my door, but he wasn't. He was no where to be seen. Inside, I was panicking. What had I just done?? I sent a kid to wander the halls. I could get into trouble for this. He could get into more trouble.

Shit.

Class ended, JP came back, and he had his work complete. We talked after class about how he was in serious danger of failing my class, and failing freshman year, and having to repeat. I told him that for my own sanity and well-being, I could only care if he did. He said he didn't want to repeat and so I told him he really needed to start acting like it. I was not going to tolerate blatant disrespect, and if he wanted to pass my class, he needed to act in a way that would allow me to teach, and his classmates to learn as well as him.

We will see if it happens. I really don't want to teach him again next year.

As for the drugs, a freshman is suspended and could be expelled for going off campus before school on Monday with a couple other students and getting stoned in an apartment across the street. The school called the cops and drugs were found on the other students. We're sure all of the drug tests are going to come back positive. The faculty seems split on whether or not the students should be expelled. Some say there needs to be a no tolerance policy, others say that if we expel them, some of them may never finish high school.

Wrestle with that dilemma for a while. I know I am.

I'm almost done with year numero uno. I'll do cartwheels down the hall, a la Brian Reichelt, my advising teacher during my student teaching. I'm also going to buy a car at the end of summer. I'll have saved $4,500 bucks, and can put that towards a car OR pay off one of my student loans. Hmmmm....

Remember: Work Hard. Be Nice.

Break in Concentration

I'm in my third-to-last week of my first year. There are officially TWO Mondays left. And I can't keep showing movies, right? I need to keep teaching, and it's hard and I don't know what to do and all I want to do is start their research projects but we can't do that just yet. So here I am, stuck trying to figure out how to make learning about Australia and Antarctica and Oceania neat. I don't want to rely on the book, because that is boring as heck. But I don't want to put in the time to create awesome power points and find neat resources. What kind of resources could there be? And I've already shown an awesome video about Australia that was narrated by Russel Crowe. 

Man, I need to step up to the plate and stop bitching. I'm ALMOST DONE...

So here are some things I've been thinking about INSTEAD of work...

London

Rome

Good Coffee

Yummy food...

Home...

Oh you know, just the normal stuff...

Like a good Portland rain...

And a good rain jacket

Because, really, what could be better than a good rain jacket, with a good cup of coffee, while walking in the rain in Portland? I urge you to find something more soothing than that!

Oh, and it's sunny and beautiful in Houston, in case anyone was wondering.

:)

Grades

Here's some big news: There are officially TWENTY class days left. Uh-oh.. I have a lot to do!

And as I'm entering grades, I'm listening to Josh Ritter

He makes great grading music, and is SO very romantic. Josh: if you need someone to sing to, I'm free.  

:)

Thanks to Andy, I've discovered the Avett Brothers. The Avett Brothers station on Pandora is full of all sorts of great music, and was PERFECT for grading. 

Perfect lesson planning music? Why, that would be Matt Nathanson, of course!

OK, back to grades...

Goodbye, WaMu

It's taken me two years to say goodbye to Washington Mutual. I held on for as long as I could, and longer than most. Today I finally activated my new, blue, rewards-earning Chase debit card. Now I'm sitting here with the shiny new card next to my old and trusty WaMu gold card. Why is this so hard for me? First the T-Mobile account, then the Oregon phone number, and now this. I'm not sure how I held on this long to the card, but when Chase first bought Washington Mutual way back when, I was told by the teller at the local branch that I would not be issued a new card until mine expired (which would have been next year). Every now and then I'd get an interesting comment from a waitress or bank teller, but no one ever forced me to switch. But then I heard about this new card, which would reward me for the money I was already spending. Easy decision.

And now I'm thinking about my history with Washington Mutual. It hadn't always been easy and care-free. In fact, we separated ways for a while. My first contact with WaMu was in first grade when my school had a school savings program. Once a week a very nice man would come in and help us deposit money into our account, and then record it in this GIGANTIC register. I would normally put in fifty cents, or some other small number, but would get a neat pair of neon shoe laces or sunglasses in return. Those were the good days... But then came a day when I wanted to open a checking account. I was in middle school I think, and was denied by WaMu due to my lack of an income (duh). So I withdrew, closed down, and high-tailed it over to the credit union, where they didn't discriminate against adolescents.

After a few years, I went back to WaMu for a second account (I can't remember why off hand), but I had been with them ever since. When I heard that Chase had bailed them out, I was a bit sad that I would now be a Chase customer. WaMu was a Seattle-based bank, and thus my Northwest ties were tight. But I've learned that Chase is pretty awesome, and there are branches EVERYWHERE down here.

I guess all of this crazy attachment could be analyzed by some psych somewhere, and they would probably tell me I have attachment issues. Psshhh. Whatev. I'm just loyal. A true-blue (gasp!), loyal person.

I think the count is down to seven...

It's been a while since I've updated everyone (and by everyone, I mean my mom) via this outlet. That's not to say that I haven't attempted, because I have. In fact, there is a WHOLE little ditty that I wrote about home in an open and untitled Word document that has been minimized in my doc for about a week now. I began it when my students were finishing Slumdog Millionaire. It began as a look at how my definition of family has changed. Because for me, home used to mean this:

and this...

and this...

But over time, it has melted, and changed. Home is now this...

and these people...

and...

and...

and...

I could go on, and on, and on. Also, I REALLY need copies of some group photos I know are floating around somewhere...

But my point is, home changes. It's not a physical location (even though I still KNOW Portland/Scappoose is my home), but it's a state-of-mind.

But enough of all of that. Since I've gotten back from Spring Break 2010: Tour de Tejas, I've been busy, busy busy. But I've also let the procrastination monster catch up to me. Here are some highlights:

New bedroom furniture:

Pretty, no?

Totally worth losing my 503 phone number, and becoming a 713. 

Anything else interesting? I'm counting down the days till summer, which promises to be epic, and incredibly too short. I'll miss my kiddos fo' sho', but I need a break, as do they. Oh, and I'm finally getting a new debit card. I've been holding on to my Washington Mutual card for much longer than any other person. I often get strange looks and interesting comments when I pay for things using that antique card, but I swear I was told by Chase that they wouldn't give me a new one until that one had expired. But today I was in Chase and was talking to a teller about wanting a new credit card that earned me airline miles but that I don't have a long enough credit history (not that it's a bad thing) to get the one I wanted. She informed me I could actually get a new debit card that earned points, which is better than having a card that doesn't earn points. I get to keep my card number, but as long as I run the thing as a credit card, I earn POINTS that I can use for TICKETS (and other cool stuff).

Ok, so that all sounds really geeky, but whatev. I'm pretty excited. 

Now I need to tackle this procrastination monster head-on. Wish me luck.

One More Left

I'm entering grades for the third quarter tonight. That means there is one more quarter left.

Let the countdown commence!

Also, I want to move to Austin. Maybe.