Stress = Death

I must be stressed out. I always have death dreams when I'm stressed out and last night's was quite interesting. I was in a group of people, maybe 20 of us, at some sort of summer school or training or something. We would return from a session or dinner or whatever and there would be a dead body and a sign. I don't think I ever saw what the sign said, but I think it was elaborate (like typed, of all things!). The last victim was the guy who plays Mini-Me. One of my friends had already died. For some reason, I wasn't scared that I would get killed.

Movie of the Day: Bourne Identity. Matt Damon is an awesome action hero! He wakes up in the ocean with a bullet hole in his back. His memory is sketchy, at best. And people are trying to kill him. Run, Jason, Run!

Only the beginning

I think my classroom is jinxed. You read about the MacGyver-style monitors this morning. Today, I had a calculator do the weirdest things I've ever seen. Multiple cursers, numbers jumping around, shutting off at random, nutsy stuff. Then, mid-lesson (no periscope yet), I notice that the lock on the middle drawer of my desk is loose and it then falls out! It hasn't worked in the 6 years that I've been using it, but at least it stayed in! Yikes.

I shudder to think of what's next. (Knock on wood).

MacGyver, help!!!

I need MacGyver to make a little visit to my classroom. Soon! I have one of those gizmos that will focus a camera on my desktop and then show a picture on two tv screens. It's very helpful for notes, demonstrations, etc. It also has a tiny little monitor so I can see what I'm doing.

Somewhere between my first and second classes yesterday, the monitor went black. Nothing. Now, I have to either lean way over to see what the tv is doing above my head (have I run off the page? Is it too small?). OOOOORRRRRR...... I can rig up some mirror system to tell me what it looks like.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I have about 100 aol discs in my room. I did take one and tape it to the top of the camera and that worked so-so. Everything was backwards and I needed to half stand up to see it. I tried moving it down, but it got in the way of the paper. Ideally, I would have two big mirrors, but I haven't figured out how that would work.

Maybe I need a periscope.....

Movie of the Day: Strictly Ballroom. It doesn't have anything to do with MacGyver, but it's a great movie about risking being yourself. The first couple minutes are a little frantic, but it calms down after that, so have no fear.

Save the Children

Right before I fell asleep last night, I had an image in my head. I was a huge bird and I was trying to gather all of my students under my wings to protect them from the world.

If only...

Movie of the Day: Lady Hawk. Michelle had the church movie group watch it. Very interesting. A little cheesy-80's-esque, but good.

Bead Happiness

I like beads. I like looking at them, making jewelry with them, or just plain shopping for them. A coworker had an awesome necklace on the other day: a strand of grape-sized agates. She said she bought the beads at Spirit Bay in Canal Park!

After work today, I took a little detour to Spirit Bay and found some lovely grape-sized agates for myself. Can I repeat her necklace? Sure. Will I? No. I would never be able to wear it to school without feeling like a cheat. But, I was looking around and found an awesome agate slice (with bead hole) from Botswana, where my friend Nate doctored for 6 weeks. I figure it'll do nicely as a center to the ten other agates. When I finish it, I'll post a picture.

Three more days of Trudge, everyone! Hang in there!

Un-snowing

We have the phrase "to unearth" but is there a phrase for the act of revealing things that were buried in the snow? I'm not talking about the permanent things in our yard, but everything (specifically garbage) that blew in for the Winter.

Everywhere I turn, there's some sort of fast food wrapper, wind-blown "recycled" item, or just plain salt and silt from the snowplows.

Wouldn't it be cool if someone hired people to clean up the junk? Sort of an FDR-esque movement.

The saddest thing I've heard of after a Winter melt is my parents' neighbor finding a dog who had tried to stay warm by curling up next to their house. It didn't make it. That poor dog.

Movie of the Day: O Brother, Where Art Thou? It starts with men in a chaingang. They escape and go on any journey. Great music. Great lines for George Clooney.

Bottled Up

I'm one of those people who likes to look calm until I've finally been pushed to my limit. Once I hit that limit, I start speaking quickly and poignantly, trying to make my case. I can't give details, but some parents riled me up tonight. Luckily, I had some nice conferences afterwards to settle me down.

Conferences are always kind of an interesting night. Sometimes, it's a little weird. A little creepy. Sometimes, it's just long or boring.

The important thing about tonight, though, is that my 27 hours of conferences for the year are OVER!!!!!! I actually did a little happy dance in the hall afterwards. Well, it was more like a gallop with clapping, but whatever....

T - 9 days and counting `til break!!!

Gregy Brown

I saw Greg Brown last night with my friend Michelle. His voice was as deep as usual, but his biceps were covered in a suit coat. Drat. For some reason, I had a hard time understanding his words, so I would close my eyes to try to concentrate. I only caught about 25% of the words, but he music was good.

The man next to me reeked of alcohol; it was permeating from his skin into my air space. Drat. Maybe it added to the bar feel of the evening?

I tried to keep my mind from wandering, but it didn't work very well. Some random thoughts:

What should I wear for parent/teacher conferences tomorrow (today)?
How can I get the kids in my club to DO something?
What "teen slang" should I teach Michelle?
Do I really say "Yeah" a lot (as Michelle claims)?
How do I befriend new people my age at church?
Could I pull off wearing cowboy boots like them? (No.)
How many drinks DID the guy next to me have?
Who is the weird guy in the front row with the camouflage rain gear?

Yep, it was an interesting evening, folks.

Your Movie of the Day: Junebug. I watched this on Saturday with my folks. Amy Adams was up for an Oscar for her role as Ashley, a cheerful pregnant woman. It's a good movie once you get over the fact that two of the actors who play a married couple also played siblings in Mansfield Park (Alessandro and Embeth).

Who are you?

So, it's come to my attention that some of my readers (hi!) are a bit leery to make comments for fear of being traced or whatnot by government entities. This is a valid case, but sad for me because I don't know who all is reading this little chunk of cyberspace called my blog.

If you would like me to know that you read it, but don't like comments, feel free to drop me an e-mail at silentvelcro333@yahoo.com

Aside from that random thought, the only thing going through my head this morning is that the sun is shining, I'm going to lunch with my favorite 6-year-old (and his cool family) and I hope my band does well at church today.

(Okay, there are a ton more thoughts going on, but who really wants to hear them all?)

Movie of the Day: House of D. Watched it last night with my folks. My dad and I counted how many Kleenexes (Kleenices?) we used and then picked on my mom for not crying at all. Ha ha. It's a movie about a guy who finally tells his wife and son about his early childhood and everything that happened to him when he turned 13. Very sweet and moving. Hence, the Kleenex.

Glitter

I mentioned yesterday that I wanted to make things a little goofy. So..... I brought glitter to school. It's a roll-on glitter thing that I bought at Bath & Body a while ago. I put some on my cheeks and then offered it to the kids who came in before school for help. Most of them were boys, but they tried it any way. Then, a girl started trying to put some on a reluctant boy. She won. Everyone laughed which is a great way to start a Friday. Now my kids sparkle!

Movie of the Day: 13 Going on 30. Jennifer Garner. Mark Ruffalo. She gets magic dust on her that grants her wish to be 30. Very cute movie.

Yikes

So, it's Friday evening and the weekend is a blank slate until Sunday night (minus church, of course). What to do?

Clean? Watch the old Alias episodes that I taped (even though this season sucks)? Read Kite Runner (good, but a downer)? Who knows? Weird. Weird.

I'm even done with all of my homework for the weekend. Everything is corrected, recorded, and entered into the computer. Sometimes, I boggle my own mind. Ha.

Maybe I'll dust off my treadmill and even turn it on!

Goofy

I could go for some goofy right about now. I had some scheduled in on Wednesday when I had tickets for Steven Wright. However, his show was cancelled and I'm left without my two hours of laughing. Drat.

Sunday night, I'm going to hear Greg Brown with Michelle, which will be awesome. I probably won't giggle a whole lot, though. He tends to bring out the sighs and drool.

So, my mission this weekend is to laugh, relax my tense muscles, and see if I can share some goofiness.

Movie of the Day: Benny and Joon. Johnny Depp. Mary Stuart Masterson. Aidan Quinn. Julieanne Moore. Silliness at it's best.

My Classroom

It's officially Spring and yesterday I started taking things down in my classroom. I like to start slowly. (Anyone remember me doing this in college too?). Any way, in the Fall and Winter, I tend to put up random things that I find funny: a pencil sharpened to within an inch of it's life, an empty box of chocolate fish from Japan, Homies (collectible gangster figurines), a teddy bear, a fake plant, calendars, a tiny ceramic piggy bank that has "bribes" printed into it, a Snoopy piggy bank, foam flowers (from a craft store), etc.

My two favorite things are my wall of aol discs that come in the mail and a freaky holographic picture. The aol discs started when I felt weird throwing them out from the mail. So, I kept a stack of them. This Fall, I put pushpins in a bulletin board and hung them up. They're quite pretty, actually. Kids started donating their discs and I now have an entire board full. It's pretty when my fan hits them and they wave in the breeze.

The picture was something I picked up at a church rummage sale in the Cities. It's a house in the country, but apparently it looks like the Bates house. Ha! It has a plastic coating that's ribbed so it sounds funny when you run your nails across it. Best $1 I've spent in a long while.

My room didn't seem cluttered to me, but now that things are starting to get packed away, the room is opening up. Now I just need to figure out how to wash the floors more than twice a year (yep, twice) and I'll be good to go.

Does anyone else have quirky work spaces?

Movie of the Day: Office Space. Work angst. Funny.

The Screw

When I was in college at St. Olaf, my JC's (Junior Counselors similar to RA's) decided our corridor should go on a "screw." It sounds dirty, I know. The name is short for Screw Your Roommate. The idea is to find your roommate the weirdest date and then everyone goes out as one big group. By the time I got there, though, it had morphed into "Who do you want me to ask out for you?"

I went on three screws during my college career:

Screw # 1 (Freshman Year): Bowling and pizza. Went with my physics TA who was super nice. Found out he was back with his girlfriend (now wife) the day of the screw. Bummer.

Screw # 2 (Freshman Year): Picnic and the Minnesota Zoo. Fun. Hung out with my date and my friend's gay date. Oops. Fun, though.

Screw # 3 (Senior Year): Made spaghetti in our dorm and had guys over. Played boardgames. Many guys left around 9 PM and most everyone else went into their rooms to play drinking games. Good food. Not so fun entertainment (since I don't drink).

Imagine going on a screw now! Of the 9 other girls I lived with my senior year, only two of us are single. Four have kids (some three!).

Movie of the Day: Blind Date. Bruce Willis. I saw it a LONG time ago, but remember liking it.

Torn

My school had two incidents of threatening notes last week. The police caught the kids who did the first note and are closing in on the second. The names of the two boys were going around school yesterday. Most kids who know them were defending them and saying that they didn't mean it and didn't want anyone to see it.

Well, that's not going to cut it these days. The teacher that the first note targeted, spent a terrified week worrying about her safety and her child's safety. Add in 1100 freaked out students and 100 staff, 20 plus police officers added to the building and their little note caused a lot of damage.

Schools need to be safe. Calm. A place to learn and grow.

Movie of the Day: Stand and Deliver. A great movie about a school in East L.A. where students go from taking basic math to the Advanced Placement Calculus test. Inspiring!

Okay....

In an effort to come up with something interesting to write about this morning, I decided to wander around my house. I looked out my front window to see if the paper carrier's minivan was there (can't imagine accidentally opening the door when she's right there).

I didn't see a minivan, but I did see a deer. It was crossing the street and then went through my yard. I ran from the livingroom to my office and watched it disappear.

My friend Catharine thinks that deer might be my animal totem or something because I see them a lot and have spiritual promptings to be on the lookout for them. Beats me. It could just be that there are a ton of deer running around Duluth.

Movie of the Day: Walk the Line. I saw it last night, as probably one of the last people in the country to see it. Very good! Joaquin and Reese both deserved their Oscars.

P.S. Happy Birthday, Michelle!

Movie Prescriptions

"I need a ______________ movie." Romantic Comedy? Tear-Jerker? Action? Artsy? Political?

Some people will stop and think about what they feel like eating or listening to; I stop to think about what I feel like watching. Yesterday was such a good day, that I wanted to keep it upbeat.

My grandma passed away almost 5 years ago and what did we do? Bought food and rented a movie to help us zone out. What movie would we select on a day such as that? Dude, Where's My Car? Yep. The brainless wonder of Aston Kutcher and three other people I can't remember. I watched it with my siblings, aunt, and uncle (the cool ones I'm visiting in CA). The rest of the week, through planning, funeral, and "lunch", we quoted the movie: "DUDE!" "SWEET" "SHIBBY!" "And, then?" We're weird.

Haven't seen the movie since. I wonder if it would conjure up emotions that have passed (for the most part)?

If you haven't seen it, check it out, if for no other reason but to understand what teenagers are talking about.

Good Day

After 11.5 hours of sleep last night and a shining sun this morning, I'm ready to face the world with a smile on my face. It's been a while, actually. I might even get past trudging! Woo hoo!!!

My Spring Break plans are working out: San Francisco. Not the warmest, but it's somewhere I've never been and I have cool relatives there! Adventure awaits!

I'm also going to see Steven Wright next Wednesday with my mom and my sister. Should be worth a couple hours of laughter.

Now, where to start the day?

Movie: The Wedding Planner. Matthew McCutie, J.Lo, San Francisco. Great dancing scene, sculpture encounter, and integrity. Lots of laughs.

Skittish

I'm a little jumpy tonight. It's been a long week in Lake woebegone, dear readers. Long. To unwind, a group of us went to Failure to Launch tonight. It won't win any Oscars, but it was good for some laughs. Much needed laughs. Then, we went to Green Mill for dinner and Thrillz for some Skee Ball. Yep. Six women, 29 - 39, hanging out at the arcade. Good times.

Now, I'm hopped up on diet Coke and grenadine (no green beer for me, I'm afraid). What to do? What to do?

The Community Ed class listings came out today and I'm thinking of trying Tai Chi. I was at a conference with the instructor a couple weeks ago and he seems cool. Might be worth rearranging my schedule for it....

Well, I should quit babbling before I start sharing weird secrets or telling REALLY boring work stories.

I hope you all had a lucky St. Patty's Day. Next stop, Easter!

Early

I've always been prone to waking up early and zoning out for a bit before I had to be somewhere. In elementary school, I would wake up at 6:45, catch the end of "I Dream of Jeannie" on The Super Station WTBS and then watch "Bewitched". THEN, I would get ready for school. Weird? Yep. I've actually had debates about who is cooler: Jeannie or Samantha. I always go for the women's lib favorite of Samantha (who still isn't THAT liberal). Jeannie had to say "Master" and dress all scantily. Not to mention, she wasn't that bright. Samantha at least had the upper hand with Durwood. I was bummed that the recent movie "Bewitched" didn't live up to the show. Oh well. Who can replace Elizabeth Montgomery?

Road Trip!

My siblings and mom were reminiscing about our family road trips and I guess a few stories about me cropped up.

About 10 years ago, my family drove to Big Sky, MT in the summer to meet up with my twin uncles, an aunt, and one cousin. We stayed in a fancy hotel and then drove to Yellowstone on day trips.

Every day, we'd drive past a gas station that had "Fir Woob" on it's sign. It meant "Fire Wood" but I decided that "Fir Woob" was the name of my future husband. You have to pronounce it with a Southern accent. Then, I made up kids: Squinty, Squatty, and Scruffy. Boys.

So far, I've yet to meet a Fir Woob, but if you know of one, give him my e-mail.

Movie of the Day: Big Fish. Ewan McGregor, Albert Finney, Danny DeVito, Jessica Lange, and the really tall guy who just passed away, star. A man is dying and telling his son the story of his life.

Rubber Duckie

Rubber Duckie, you're the one... My sister tried to convince me to visualize floating on a big rubber duckie when I go to my department meeting today. I think she means I shouldn't internalize the stress of it, for surely there will be stress. From there, I go to a meeting with a parent, and then sit in my room and pray that my dad's surgery is a success.

Rubber Duckie.....take me away!

Movie of the Day: The Shipping News. Kevin Spacey always kind of creeps me out (think Seven), but this is an interesting, dark movie.

Spring Break

March is in full force and I'm ready for Spring Break. Sadly, Spring Break isn't ready for me. We have four more weeks until the happy event. I'm trying to calm my antsy-ness by planning a trip to somewhere warm. Interesting and warm would be best. I'm not much for sitting at the beach all day. I like to see the sights and learn too.

I've been going to www.weatherunderground.com to try to predict April weather in different areas. It's kind of fun and odd when a place is cooler than I thought it should be. We'll see what I come up with.

Movie of the Day: How to Deal. Mandy Moore is a high schooler whose parents are divorcing. Teen angst. Excellent soundtrack!

It's here!!!

The Best Loved Poems of the American People book has arrived!!! The book that shaped the inner philosopher Becca into who she is today. I shall share a few of my favorites over the next few days:

Don't Quit
~Author Unknown

When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,
When the road your trudging seems all uphill,
When the funds are low and the debts are high,
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit
Rest if you must, but don't you quit.

Life is queer with its twists and its turns,
As everyone of us sometimes learns,
And many a failure turns about
When they might have won, had they stuck it out.
Don't give up though the pace seems slow,
You may succeed with another blow.

Often the struggler has given up
When he might have captured the victors cup;
And he learned too late when the night came down,
How close he was to the golden crown.

Success is failure turned inside out
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt
And you never can tell how close you are,
It may be near when it seems so far;
So stick to the fight when your hardest hit,
It's when things seem worst that you mustn't quit!

Surreal Connections

Have you ever "Googled" yourself? Do you ever wonder who is reading this blog or your blog or you dog's blog? My sitemeter tells me what city and country the visitors come from and I'm always fascinated by places outside of Duluth. What do these visitors think? Can they read English? Has anyone famous from Sundance googled themselves and found my blog?

Whenever I am cruising "Next Blog" land, I keep going when I can't read the language. Next time I should at least look at the pictures and try to figure it out.

Is that the same case here? Do some people see "English" and hit "Next Blog"? I'll probably never know, since they can't read this either. Yikes! I bet some see US and keep going...

Movie of the Day: Scooby Doo 2. I watched it this weekend with friends. I prefer the cartoons, but this was funny too.

A Question

I have a book called "If?" It has a ton of questions, so I pose one to you, dear reader.

If you could occupy the world described in a novel, which would you choose?

Rocks

One of the best places to think in Duluth is Brighton Beach. It consists of a variety of rocks in a variety of sizes. The beach is less than a mile long and has picnic areas and a playground, but I don't recommend the playground if you go there to think (unless it's deserted and you like swings).

I like to do one of two things while thinking "at the shore": wander up and down the shoreline looking for cool rocks (agates, sea glass, pretty stuff) or sit on a big rock and stare at Lake Superior. You can't see the other side, so staring is more meditative.

Movie du Jour: School of Rock. Different kind of rock. Jack Black is well, Jack Black. The kids are funny. Joan Cusack is awesome.

Weird Dream

I was hoping to wake up naturally with the sun this morning, but it turns out the sun took a raincheck. So, I slept a nice, long time.

My last dream had me married to a guy that I knew in college. We lived in different towns and barely acted like we were married. He lived in Madison in a HUGE house, with a girlfriend and I lived in Duluth. Alone. Hmmmm.... how fair. I went to see him and ran into old friends who tried to help me sort out what to do. They kept telling me how great he is now and that I should talk to him. I was pissed that he had a girlfriend, though I was trying to find a boyfriend. I woke up mid-trying to decide what to do.

What the heck does this mean? Who knows. Should I look up the guy from college (who was married as of 8 years ago)? Who knows. Maybe I'll Google him. Weird.

Movie of the Day: An Ideal Husband. All about love and marriage. Minnie Driver, Rupert Everett, Cate Blanchett, Jeramy Northam, and more star.

HBO

I don't get HBO, so it takes me a while to catch on to the HBO trends. I've resorted to renting the shows I want to see. While at Sundance, I met Justin Kirk who was in "Angels In America," an HBO miniseries. It's 6-hours long and I carved out time to finish it last night.

I think if I'd seen it before Sundance, I would have been more chicken to talk to Mr. Kirk. He was so humble when I got his autograph. He introduced himself "Hi, I'm Justin." So cool.

I get into movies (duh) and the movie at Sundance was so intense/realistic/sad that I felt like he was his character and I was therefore less thrilled at meeting him than I would have been if I'd seen AIA beforehand. He's an excellent actor.

Movie of the Day: Angels in America. It stars Justin Kirk, Al Pacino, Meryl Streep, Emma Thompson, Jeffrey Wright, Ben Schenkman, Mary-Louise Parker, and Patrick Wilson. It's about AIDS in the 80's.

No More Teenagers!!!

Yesterday, I had one more hour of school and I had reached my max on speaking to teenagers for the day. I mentioned this to a colleague and two kids heard and said "You're supposed to wait until we're gone." I said that it wasn't them specifically, just all teenagers in general for today.

I think I'm starting today with a low threshold. Oh well. I thought about making a sign to hold up every time they ask me if I know their grade (gradebook closed yesterday and I have a couple inches of papers left to grade). Some of the sign options that I won't use but will giggle about later:

"Keep off the teacher"
"Beware of Teacher"
"Don't bother asking"
"Ask at your own risk"
"No, they aren't done."
"Just leave me alone."

Now, the polite thing is to explain, blah, blah, blah, but they don't really want to hear WHY the grades aren't ready. They just want to know when and will they make honor roll or merit roll or $50 from their folks.

I can understand where they're coming from. When I took calc in 12th grade, I was teetering between an A and a B for my final grade and it hinged on my final exam. I bugged that teacher, I'm sure. Maybe it's Karma for me now.

Can you pay off Karma?

Movie of the Day: Election. Reese Witherspoon as an annoying high school girl. Matthew Broderick as the teacher trying to survive a student council election.

Well...

I cant' think of a theme today, so my theme will be "Randomness". I sometimes cause people to go "huh?" when I'm rambling because I only say a fraction of my thought process and they get lost. I've always thought I was "Abstract Random" vs. "Concrete Sequential" but I haven't really taken any tests to prove it. I could be Sequential with Random sharing? That would be the perfect Becca category.

Years ago, I went to hear a jazz band with one of my best friends, Kim. She's a musician who plays multiple instruments. Afterwards, we were discussing what we were thinking during the set and I had a h-u-g-e list that I rattled off. She said "I was thinking about the music." Ha. Story of my life. I'm overthinking and she's enjoying the music.

Movie of the Day: Immortal Beloved. It's about Beethoven's life. Interesting and sad. It has a wonderful soundtrack.

Mystery Stairs

There are mystery stairs at the school where I teach. They look like ordinary stairs. They feel like ordinary stairs when you step on them. The mystery is that no matter how physically fit you are, you end up winded and "feelin' the burn" after climbing just two flights. Honest.

Yesterday, I was chatting with some fellow teachers and they were going to take the elevator. I figured I'd go with them even though I usually take the stairs. When I walked to my room, I realized I didn't have that shortness of breath and strain in my chest. Hmmmmm..... Elevator? STAIRS!!! Or, lack there of. Interesting....

Is it the distance between each stair? The material of the staircase? The air quality in that stairwell (one friend commented that she can do one set of stairs but not another)? Weird, huh?

Maybe the school should station a monitor/trained CPR specialist in that stairwell. If you're ever at my school, avoid the middle staircase!!!

Movie of the Day: Wayne's World. "No playing Stairway to Heaven" but you can sing along in the car!

:)Becca

The Oscars!

Any interesting question, Anon. I have conflicted feelings about the Oscars. I love seeing magazines with dresses and cute guys on the red carpet. However, I was at a Movie Club last night! I know, the irony. I'm happy that Rachel Weisz won. I haven't seen any of the other winning movies yet! I actually bought Crash at Block Buster and haven't watched it yet. I do want to see Walk the Line and Syriana. Capote? Maybe. I liked Brokeback Mountain.

Here's the conflict: Part of me thinks it's just superficial "Let's get gussied up and pat ourselves on the back". After going to Sundance, part of me wants to take movies even MORE seriously. So, it's weird. I taped it, in case there was something that I just HAD to see for myself.

Did anyone out there watch? Did I miss anything really amazing?

:)Becca

Open for Suggestions

So, I tried to blog this morning and I couldn't get the webpage to call up. Hence, I'm blogging tonight. Sorry for any concerns you might have had about me. I'm all right! Ha ha. Well, I guess I'm a bit sore from shoveling. New muscles discovered and all. Overall, I'm fine.

Any way, I've been spending random parts of the day trying to come up with something witty to blog about and nothing is coming at all!!! Oy.

I've decided to take requests. Anything you'd like me to rant about? Any random stories that you've heard before that you think I should share with The Net?

Speaking of The Net. Excellent movie!!! Jeremy Notham is creepy! I like him much better in Emma (Two for One Monday!).

Oh, another question: Has anyone rented/gone to a movie because I recommended it? If so, what did you think?

:)Becca

Wage Peace

I heard this poem at a Spirituality conference this weekend and thought I'd share.

Wage Peace
By Judyth Hill*

Wage peace with your breath.
Breathe in firemen and rubble,
breathe out whole buildingsand flocks of redwing blackbirds.
Breathe in terrorists and breathe out sleeping childrenand freshly mown fields.
Breathe in confusion and breathe out maple trees.
Breathe in the fallenand breathe out lifelong friendships intact.

Wage peace with your listening:hearing sirens, pray loud.
Remember your tools:flower seeds, clothes pins, clean rivers.
Make soup.
Play music, learn the word for thank you in three languages.
Learn to knit, and make a hat.
Think of chaos as dancing raspberries,
imagine grief as the outbreath of beauty or the gesture of fish.
Swim for the other side.
Wage peace.
Never has the world seemed so fresh and precious.
Have a cup of tea and rejoice.
Act as if armistice has already arrived.
Celebrate today.


* Sometimes mistakenly attributed to Mary Oliver

Yes!

I just heard a bird outside and I think it might be the first sign on Spring!!! Woo Hoo!!!

Friday, I decided to count how many Christmas wreaths are still hanging on houses between my house and the freeway. 9. Then, I've been counting them ever since. I'm at 15. Come on, people. It's time. Are you planning to lodge Easter eggs in them? Think Spring!!!!

I have a flag hanging off of my garage that says "Winter Welcome." Yep, I need to take that down and find something like "Winter Scat," "Winter, Go Away Already!," "Winter's So Been Done."

What would a Winter Scat sound like "Doot Dwee Bop Wow. Get Out Winter"?

Movie: Reality Bites. An early film of 20-something start-ups. Angst. Tons of stars: Ethan Hawke, Ben Stiller, Winona Rider, Steve Zahn, and Janeane Garofalo.

:)Becca

Craving Comments

What is your middle name?

Feel free to comment as an anon.

:)Becca
P.S. No comments for days. Getting sad. May start crying any minute now.... (snif).

Spirits

Spirits are up today. It's Friday!!! What a relief!

I've been living vicariously through one of my friends, as of late. She has a first date tonight with a man who has been courting her for a month! I'm so excited for her! She's going to have an awesome time and I CANNOT wait to hear about it (remember to call me!!!)!!!

I will be at a Compassion Conference tonight and tomorrow morning. I think it will help my restless soul. Or at least, I hope it will.

Oh, Steven Wright is coming to Duluth and I'm hoping to get a group together to go. If you would like to read some of his one-liners, click here. If you're interested, drop me a comment. It's March 22nd at the DECC and tickets are about $30.

Movie of the Day: My Best Friend's Wedding. Cameron Diaz is annoyingly perky, Julia Roberts is kind of scary, Ruppert Everett is hilarious, and Dermot Mulroney is hot. An interesting take in "always the brides-maid..."

:)Becca

Oy

I'm a believer in signs. I think it's a bad sign when the first words out of my mouth for the day are "Oh, crap!". I overslept an hour. I get up way, way early so I can chill, read my favorite blogs and just ease into being human. Not today. I wasn't late for work, but today, I was pissy for most of the day. People mostly could tell something was up, but couldn't pinpoint exactly what it was bugging me. You would think that extra hour of sleep would have helped my mood, but no. Oh well. I think it was a bunch of little things that I can normally handle.

So, now I am home, facing a little bit of shoveling before book club. We read "Peace Like a River", which I recommended. Did I reread it? No. Luckily, the next book is new to me.

Is it bad to need a day off only four days after returning from vacation?

:)Becca

Ugh

Overslept an hour. Ugh.

Movie: Rush Hour.

More tonight....

I'm Not Crazy, Just Weird

For some odd reason, I was so cheerful yesterday, that I tried to convince my first hour "earlies" to call March "Trudge". ("Earlies" are kids who hang out about 20-30 minutes before school starts because it's a relatively quiet place to sit) . The only people who have opposed Trudge are those with March birthdays. This, of course, is bound to happen. I wouldn't like November messed with either. But, overall, people agreed with me. They also kind of shook their heads in a "I think she might have finally gone off the deep end." I just laughed (which probably didn't help my sanity rating, huh?).

My fourth hour on Monday would NOT stop talking while I gave notes. Sometimes I tell my classes that I'm going to send them the bill from Miller-Dwan (the local padded room institution). They don't understand until I explain and then they might be quiet. Or, they might keep talking... This is a class of 34, with a leaning toward girls with lots of make-up and football players who would rather be charging into something than multiplying letters. They are masters of "distract the teacher" but oddly, it feels like a family. If only I could get the family to do some math....

Movie du jour: Pride and Prejudice. The new one. I'm sure I've recommended this before, but it came out yesterday and I already have it. Watch it. Fall for Darcy or Lizzy or the dad (Donald Sutherland). If you are hooked on the BBC miniseries, there will be room enough in your heart for both versions. Honest.

:)Becca