NABLOPOMO fail

28/30 in a very hectic month. Not so bad.

Ow.

After a cold, nasty, October, our November has been mostly dry and beautiful. Yesterday the temperatures crawled up into the low 50s, and the sun shone all day. We spent most of the afternoon out in the yard playing the yard games ma picked up on the Black Friday sales. The fresh air was welcome and a little disconcerting for those of us preparing to hibernate. After supper the bulk of us trundled off to the indoor ice rink, where I perched myself atop a couple of metal blades for the first time in over 20 years, and teetered around the ice for about an hour. I discovered a couple of new muscles in the process.
I'll check in again tomorrow, if I can roll myself out of bed.

Success!

Fat. Sassy. Sleepy. Thankful.

Thanksmas

Well, I got all the activities for this week completed, and managed to teach a little in between, too. Oy. Looking forward to four days with family for Thanksmas. I will get to curl up in a comfy corner and do a little grading. Our Thanksmas gatherings have plenty of activities to join as well as quiet time to visit and just chill. It will be nice not to have the housework and other distractions calling to me. It will be good to reconnect. Now it's time to pack and prep and bake a bit before we leave.

It's a wrap

Kids pulled off their show with aplomb. Not without a glitch here and there, but they had energy and carried it off despite lapses. I am very proud of them. And really, really glad its over for a while.

Show time!!

Matinee and 7pm tonight, then it's time to pack this baby up. I've had a lot of fun with these kids, and maybe they'll ask me back next year. I'll try to curb my response rather than run screaming or laugh in the poor woman's face.

Sweet irony

...that even as I struggle to get these kids on the stage and finish this play so I can have a little sanity, I think ahead to the next show and can't wait to start. Or maybe that's insanity and not irony. They both start with "i."

Philippians 4:13

...and it's a good thing, too, because I need all the help I can get.

The old gray mare...

Friday night. All I want to do is crawl into bed. When did I get boring?

home stretch

Four days until this play hits the stage. Enough coffe and aspirin and I may survive.

The story of my life...

see more dog and puppy pictures

Today's lineup...

Let's see...
Evaluation during 3rd hour class, tech work all afternoon, rehearsal after school,
and my daughter's band concert tonight. More coffee, please.

Fall Frenzy

I am a little busier than I want to be these days, but it's all good. Since I only have a part-time teaching contract, I take on extracurriculars to help pad the paycheck. The middle school play may kill me. I try to remind myself that this cycle repeats itself with every production I have ever participated in, regardless what my role has been, onstage or off. Next week it will be over and the panic will fade. Until then, gaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!

Long days have their benefits.

I had to collect a batch of exchange kids from a lock-in this morning, which necessitated a drive out in the frosty morning, watching the sun rise. This afternoon, I went off in search of some costuming items and drove home in a glorious sunset. Long days aren't all bad.

Running in circles...

...but I haven't caught my tail yet.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

All is well, but I've plum hit the wall. Nitey nite.

Addendum...

As I was getting Thing 4 ready for school this morning, he was pretty owly, so I called him a crabby pants, 'cuz I'm mature like that.
He replied, "Don't you know one of the Ten Commandments is "Don't Call People Names'?"
I smiled and told him that wasn't a commandment, but a pretty good idea, nonetheless. He considered a moment and said, "Actually,(pronouced ak-a-chully) He meant eleven commandments."

Remember a Vet Today!

Thank you to all who have served, and those who serve still.

But its a good tired

Long days lately. Working on a play with the middle schoolers after school. Plum beat. Having a blast!

A sad realization

Over the weekend, I heard a radio story introduced by the announcer,"When we hear of mass shootings, we often..." and I tuned out the rest of the story. My brain was too busy trying to wrap itself around the concept of a world in which "when," "mass shootings" and "often" all fit logically in the same sentence. God Bless Fort Hood, and God save us all.

Hrumph

I watched with interest the shenanigans as the US House of Representatives debated and eventually passed the HCR bill last night. Between all the grandstanding and gladhanding, its surprising either party had any time for legislating. Of the three Reps from my own state I was able to track, one blithered incoherently, one snarked about the Stupek ammendment though the majority of the state is pro-life, and the one from my own district voted AGAINST his constituency.
The one moment of levity I got was from a brief exchange. I don't remember who the (R) rep was, but he was stickling on the rules.
Rep. Whatshisname: "Does the chairman know where the actual document is so we can (I forget what he said) it according to the rules?"

Chair: "The clerk has possession of that document.".
RW: "So I'll take that as a no."

The baffled look on the face of the chairman was the only thing to smile about all night.
We need health care reform in this nation, and desperately. We don't need one party refusing to play while the other tries to railroad a bloated bill just because it can.

November!!

Wow!! What a great day outside! It gave us a chance to get out and tackle the yard a bit. You may remember this brush pile from a post in May:















Well, today, we hacked the new chainsaw out of the box and borrowed a lopper from the neighbor, so now it looks like this.

















The catch here, is that with that saw and loppers, we also cleared a bunch of scrub trees from the alley, so the pile above was replaced with this one...











and this one...













aaaaaaand this one.






Said neighbor is Uncle Dan, who also uses his big John Deere Lawn tractor as a source of light exercise. Since his kidney transplant, he feels a bit more up to getting out and about. He still can't handle lots of walking, but he does quite a good job of mowing our lawn! He gave it one last pass today, then when he saw us out puttering in the yard, wandered over with some of his accessories to power rake and help run the saw and lopper. The kids raked and burned leaves had a fire for recreational purposes in the outhouse pit, while we roasted weenies and marshmallows in the firepit and enjoyed the sunshine. Tomorrow is supposed to be nearly as warm, although cloudy. Hopefully we can get a bunch done then, too.

Polite terms?

Indian summer? Saint Martin's Summer? Gypsy Summer? Brittsommar? Altweibersommer? Ruska? Saint Luke's summer? WHatever you deem politically correct enough to call it, it's here!!! We spent every possible moment in the sunshine and fresh air today, and now I'm tuckered out and ready to do it over tomorrow!

Nice try...

It is an absolutely GORGEOUS fall day. Those in the know threw a fire drill on a temperate day to go outside in shirtsleeves. The caveat? Telling the kids to go back inside...

I think he was on to something...

see more Political Pictures

Another little moment of win!

My six-year-old was reading his Beginner's Bible tonight. I heard him reading aloud and poked my head in to inquire. He said he was reading to the cats. He invited me to sit down and read it together, so I had him read to me. It was the story of Moses parting the Red Sea. The only word I had to help him with was Pharaoh. Then he wanted to show me a particular picture, and started flipping pages. He passed a picture of the nativity and exclaimed on the way by, "Hey, it's the New Testament." For all the nagging and fidgeting this poor kid endures, it's good to know he's picking it up on his own. I concentrate so hard on the behavior sometimes I miss the message. Good thing he doesn't.

Why I do what I do

Just finished English 11, and one of my "average" students stayed behind to discuss something she'd found online while looking for some supplementary material(!) about Of Mice and Men on her own(!). She made some good connections and asked some good questions, and as she left she said, "This book is really sad, but it's good. It's like real life." This is why I teach.

NABLOPOMO

In order to kick my butt into posting a little more often, I joined NABLOPOMO again this year. No guarantees of quality, but you should see me around here more often, at least for a little while!