it's been a while...

sorry about that. this past week was pretty tiring (stupid key club) and i just wasn't feeling particularly funny, and a non-funny blog just seems kind of pointless.

first of all, i would like to thank abc, nbc, cbs, fox, upn, the wb, tbs, wgn, f/x, mtv, mtv2, vh1, tnt, spike tv, abc family, and (for the hell of it) the home shopping network for giving me the saddest weekend ever. i'm feeling a little lonely this weekend, but it wasn't unbearable. i didn't consider throwing myself out of the window (i live on the first floor, so it wouldn't doo much good anyway) or anything, i just was missing home. so, of course, i turn to my favorite form of escapism, mediocre movies on basic cable. luckily for me, every channel except for freaking hgtv and animal planet decided to play every sad film they could think of. examples: a walk to remember, armageddon, stepmom, a britney/kevin: chaotic marathon on mtv (sad only because its so incredibly bad yet i can't ever seem to turn it off when it's on), and a dancing with the stars marathon on abc family (sad because no one needs to see that much joey macintyre in one day after 1993). by saturday afternoon, i decided that i didn't need tv when i had a fairly substantial collection of movies, many of which i'd never watched. so what did i choose? not something happy like 10 things i hate about you, or pride and prejudice; not a mindless action movie (i even have a rented copy of james bond: goldeneye on my tv); not even an episode of jem (yes, i do own seasons one and two) or alias. no. what did i watch. finding neverland. and what happened? i cried. a lot. i'm sad, and the only thing on tv are sad movies, so what do i watch? one of my sad movies. stupid negative emotions.

so now, in the spirit of surrounding myself with humor while i write my blog, i'm watching 8 mile. hilarity. i'm screwed up.

this evening i decided to get chinese take out for dinner. i went to a place down the street and got some sesame chicken, about which i was VERY excited, but, unfortunately, it wasn't very good. i was expecting wok 'n' roll (my favorite chinese takeout place in chicago) quality, and it just wasn't there. disappointment.

a few weeks ago, i went shopping at the outlet mall and a got a new sweater at ann taylor. i was very excited about said sweater because a) it was really cute, b) it matched a skirt that i bought this summer and hadn't found anything to match, and c) it was from ann taylor and only $25.00 (plus 10% off because i opened up a charge account). i wore it to school on thursday with said skirt and was very excited, because it looked really cute together. halfway through the second period of the day, one of my students said to me, "miss nolan, did you know that there is a rip in you sweater?" the shoulder seam had ripped out of the back of my left shoulder. and i don't mean a little hole, i mean SIX INCHES of the back of my shoulder was hanging out. one of my other students yells out, "i saw the tear, but i thought it was supposed to be like that." this scared me for a couple of reasons: 1) it means that ripped clothing is becoming so common that my students see nothing wrong with it (i'm having flashbacks of the breakfast club and sixteen candles as i type this), and 2) they really thought i would try to be that trendy while teaching.

here are some things i'm not okay with:

1) teva sandles. i'm pretty sure they are only acceptable while doing the following activities: white water rafting, kyaking, canoeing, some type of river/creek hiking, and under special circumstances, mowing the lawn. they are not acceptable while doing the following activities: anything else. i saw someone wearing them shopping today. and here's the best part: it was a woman wearing them, and she was wearing all designer clothes.
2. a woman wearing a white tanktop, a black baseball cap (backwards and sideways), and brown warm up pants that had a patch of a moose or elk or something right in the middle of her ass crack. scraggly hair. i wanted to smack her and say, "okay, first of all, you're not a celebrity, so stop trying to be famous-chic. second, brown and black do not, under any circumstances, match, and three, WASH YOUR HAIR!!! this girl was white. her hair could handle being washed every day.
3. i saw a woman today wearing a tank top which was stretched very tightly across her (obviously fake) breasts upon which was written the word, "suger." yes, suger. IF THE WORD IS SPELLED INCORRECTLY, DO NOT BUY THE GARMENT. this is just a rule of thumb.
4. the fact that my right eye has been twitching all day. for the past five hours or so. unacceptable.

anyway. this is going to be lengthy, because i'm very tired and i know that if i sit down to watch tv, i'll fall asleep, wake up at 8:30, and won't be able to go to bed a a decent time.

i have open house on thursday, which means that i have to fill 10 minutes in front of the parents six times. and i have to find my most adult, professional, "i'm a teacher" outfit i have. it doesn't help that i'm only about 5 years older than most of my students. eep!

i might have talked about this before, but i'm going to again. there is a wal-mart grocery store a block from my house. it's great. it's cheap, has lots of variety, and a store brand for just about everything in the store. but there are picketers on the sidewalk in front of the store every day with signs about how wal-mart doesn't pay fair wages and whatnot...they don't bother anyone going into the store, but they're always there. so now i have a huge guilt issue with shopping at wal-mart and feel like i need to apologize to the picketers everytime i go in there to buy things. but it's so cheap! and it's wal-mart, so it's comforting to go in there. and it's really cheap.

today, i was loading my groceries into my car in the wal-mart market parking lot and this guy comes up to me asking if i can help him, he lost his credit card, and he tried calling his mom, and he's locked out of his car, and he lives on jones and tropicana (not really anywhere near the store--close to the south end of the strip, at least 30 blocks away), etc. i told him i was sorry i couldn't help him, even though i wasn't really sure what he wanted. i think he wanted a ride to his house, and i wasn't about to let a stranger in my car, especially when he didn't know the secret word my parents and i had come up with when i was five (i think it was dorkbreath? mom, dad, let me know). he just said thanks anyway and walked away, and then i felt bad, because i'm a little too midwestern for my own good, and today at church they talked about helping people, and doing good deeds and going the extra mile, and a life of service. i realized i could have let him use my phone, but i was too scared that he would kidnap me and rape me and bury me in the desert and then steal my car (which is far from being paid off) and then i'd never get to make cookies on my new cookie sheet, and i'd rather meet nick stokes while i'm still breathing thanks. and he said he'd been waiting for an hour, but he had a fairly fresh cigarette in his hand. i hope he's okay. so i did the smart thing, and i'm still alive. on the downside, i haven't met nick stokes. oh well.

so, this week i accidentally drew a penis on the board. i was talking about columbus and trade routes and how the europeans used to go around africa to get to asia, so i was drawing a nonmap on the board, and i just drew a little half circle for europe and asia, and a longer, narrow, rounded area for africa. i noticed that my students were giggling and when i looked back at the board, i realized it looked like a penis and two testicles. it's amazing how i can keep a straight face at anything when i'm teaching. i'm giggling as i write this, but that day, i was just like, "guys, let's not be 12, okay?" and i erased it nonchalontly as i talked, but the damage was done, i think. it was embarrasing. a few days later, they giggled at the word seamen in one of our stories. i probably would have too if i wasn't pretending to be the adult in the room.

my key club kids crack me up. they're all from summerlin (a pretty wealthy area), mostly honor students, and mostly asian, yet they all think they're gangster, and then they laugh when i tell them they're not gangsta, because i say gangsta, like one should. one girl told me she's a baller. i said no. they crack me up. they're all wearing hollister and tommy hilfiger and chuck taylor's, while acting like they're rap stars. they're so cute. they think it's cool that i have my nose pierced.

today while i was picking out bananas at wal-mart, i passed three old ladies, one of whom was wearing the perfume youth dew by estee lauder. now, if you smelled youth dew at the estee lauder counter at macy's, you'd probably make a face and make a comment that it smells like old woman, which it does, but it's the perfume my grandmother, who died in may, wore everyday of my life. that smell will always remind me of her. it was her smell. i teared up and got all frowny in the produce section of wal-mart, much like i'm doing right now.

i don't know if i've written about this before, but there's a casino called the rio on the strip here in vegas. there was a cartoon in the 80's called jem and the holograms, about this rock group whose lead singer was a hologram. there was big hair, lots of neon, and some reallybad make-up. the songs were even worse. jem had a boyfriend. he had a purple mullet. his name was rio. therefore, when i see the rio, i don't think of carnivale, or brazil, or sexiness, or anything of the like. i think of the cartoon character with the purple mullett. i just can't take that place seriously. the fact that the outside of it is pink, purple, and aqua doesn't help the 80's association.

here's a brief list of the things sitting on my desk:

1. speakers
2. a super big gulp from seven eleven.
3. a swiss army knife.
4. my old cheks.
5. the pink cover for my ipod, which is locked in a file cabinet at work.
6. a pen holder (holding a magic marker, a pair of scissors, a sharpie, a mechanical pencil, and an unsharpened pencil from AAA.
7. two cd's with very bad bootlegs of Mr. and Mrs. Smith and Bewitched.
8. a receipt from taco bell.
9. two big, sparkly clothespins that i need to take to work, but haven't yet because i'm a lazy piece of flesh.
10. a blue ink pen.
11. my graphing calculator whose graphing funcions i've never used because i don't know how.
12. my pencil case from france, full of colored pens that i bought in france to write letters to people, none of which i ever wrote.
13. the form from my tuberculosis test that was over a month ago.
14. three packets of ketchup from mcdonald's
15. headphones.
16. a candle holder which has in it another pair of headphones and a hairpin with a puple sparkly flower that i've worn exactly twice.
17. the phone number for a police officer here in town.
18. the phone number for a woman that works at the hotel where we stayed when i moved out here.
19. the change of address packet from the post office that i forgot to fill out, so my parents filled one out for me and i haven't walked the 10 steps to the trash can to throw this one away.
20. mousepad, for a fiber optic mouse that doesn't need a mousepad.
21. mouse.
22. keyboard.
23. a beck's glass i stole from a bar in indy somewhere that now houses my change.

as you can tell, it's a very productive workspace.

well, i feel that this is sufficiently long and pointless, so i'm going to stop writing. i think i had some more funny stories, but i can't remember them. i'm too distracted by my eye constantly twitching. stupid eye.