bloggity blog blog blog

my friend gwen told me that my blogs are too long and she doesn't like to read them, and all this time i'd been feeling inferior because my blogs were so short, which is part of why i don't update very often--i feel like i have to make it 3 pages long for it to be worth anything (it's the english major in me). since i have to make it so long, i get a little bit of blog anxiety (a new disorder I just invented) and true to my "fight or flight" tendency (flight), I don't do it.

did that make any sense? if not, read it again.

i don't want to teach...i just want to lay in my bed all day...
i don't want to grade...i just want to watch my tv all day.

welcome to 4th quarter, ladies and gentlemen. couple general 4th quarter apathy with the impressively low academic abilities of my students, and it's pretty clear why I don't want to look at the crap they turn in to me.

we're reading In Cold Blood by truman capote in my modern lit class, which i was really excited about--i really thought it was something they'd enjoy and would get into, but most of them aren't reading it. it's pretty depressing. the funny part is that they're all going on sparknotes, which i've looked at, and they're really terrible for this book. which means they're all failing my quizzes. which makes the sadistic part of me really happy. vengeful? never.

today was staff development, and at the end of they day, the committee had kind of a "showcase" of student work. we saw roller coasters built by the physics classes, drawings by art students, a song and a dance from spanish, a dramatic speech from the speech and debate team, and an impromptu debate, from the same team. their debate was about whether or not teachers should be randomly drug tested, and one of the students quoted the rap lyric "smoke all night / drink all day / that to me is the american way." it was a pretty big hit. the kid who was arguing for drug testing prefaced his speech with a request that his teachers not lower his grades because of it. it was really cool.

then, we went into the cafeteria for performances from the choir and polynesian club. the other four groups that went took about 30 minutes total. the last two groups took 40. the choir sang five (count 'em!) songs, and the polynesian club did three dances. now, i'm okay with these groups performing, but it was not a choir concert--one song would have done nicely to show us what they were capable of.

however, the boys in the choir wore sparkly silver vests. i'm fairly certain a male person DID NOT pick out those costumes.


On a different note, alison and I have been eating amazingly well lately. friday, i made indian food with fake chicken and broccoli and lime-coconut rice. and then last night, alison made fake ribs and corn on the cob and i made some mashed potatoes. then tonight, i made baked potatoes... mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. we're also addicted to strawberries, which I guess are in season out here. we invented something amazing on friday night: strawberry boats. take a giant strawberry, cut it in half, and then put about four inches of whipped cream on it. if you get whipped cream on your nose, you have enough whipped cream. today, we had strawberries, but with just splenda on them, because strawberry boats are something than can only be enjoyed on special occasions.

friday night was a special occasion, because we watched several episode of alias, to which i've gotten alison completely addicted. we try to watch at least two episodes a night. tonight we got three in. we were talking about how much we love alias and we decided that the night we only get through two episodes would be a truly sad night. hopefully that day will never come.

this is long, rambling, and ultimately pretty pointless. and not very funny, all of which i apologize for. i just couldn't think of anything funny.

oooohh! here's something funny: this morning, we were in a staff meeting and alison was sitting next to me, which is never a good idea. someone's address came on the projector screen and it was meteorite circle. i turned to alison and said "i totally want to live on meteorite circle!" alison's response: "It's out of this world."

we literally were laughing so hard (for no reason, because it wasn't that funny) the principal noticed and started giving us mock-dirty looks. he knew how boring it was, so he wasn't really mad, but i think he was mostly confused because NOTHING funny had happened in the last several minutes.

my principal thinks i'm a huge loser most of the time. at least he knows who i am.

almost bedtime (the happiest part of my day!)