So Much For THAT!

I am an unfit pet owner. Yes, Winger is no longer with us. Me. Any way, he literally went belly up or more accurately, belly sideways. I'm not sure what I want to do as a memorial and I know flushing him is bad. I need to buy some baggies. The funny thing is that I'm more worried that the two kids who helped me get him will think I'm a bad person than I am that I don't have a fish any more. I think that makes me an unfit fish owner. My only consolation is that fish are fragile pets.

So, for now, I shall live alone. I'm okay with that.

Movie of the Day: Finding Nemo. "Fish are friends, not food." I love that line.

Tiny

I just cleaned my back hallway of snow residue (i.e. mud). It's not even 6 AM yet! Yes, this is a little weird for me, but not completely unimaginable. You see, I'm a details person and when I'm busy, I notice things that need doing and move on without doing them. When things calm down a bit, I run around like a loonie trying to put things "in order." That's what last night (and apparently this morning) are all about.

Movie of the Day: A Bug's Life. They lived small.

Colors Off the Top of My Head

Orange Green Red Blue Purple Black Gray White Pink Maroon Periwinkle Yellow Mauve Aqua Peach Salmon Navy Blue Teal Gold Silver Hot Pink Lime Green Tan Brown Beige Khaki Olive

Movie of the Day: Primary Colors (which I never saw).

Weird

So, when I go in to blog, it doesn't allow me to use different fonts/bold/links/ or pictures any more. Has this happened to anyone else? Am I being forced to switch to the new version? The format has added a "Allow New Comments" section and a "Change Time & Date" part. This is weird.

Movie of the Day: Back To the Future. (I want my old format back!)

I Think Too Much

Sometimes I make a list of Things I Worry About (TIWA). Usually I can fill up a whole page. What kinds of things make the list, you might ask? Well, I don't usually focus on world tragedy too much (that could fill up a whole book). Usually it has to do with family, church, school. How am I going to get such and such done or who is ill or whatever.

For the most part, making a list helps to keep those worries from bouncing around in my head over and over again. I keep the lists and look back at them sometimes. It always makes me think of the Christmas song about "Next year all our troubles will be miles away" (replaced with new ones, perhaps, but this year's crop might be gone).

Movie of the Day: Catch & Release. Saw it last night. Very, very good. Excellent acting. Laughing. Crying. People you would want to be friends with.

Foreign Language

So, I was teaching today and was headed towards a "Math is Like a Language" lesson when I asked my new students (15 of them) if they knew any foreign languages. They started telling me words that they knew. One said that she knew her native language but wasn't willing to teach us any words.

We filled up two big columns on the board and the aforementioned young lady offered a word in her native tongue. I was so proud of her! So, even though I didn't get much math language taught, I think I was able to get and keep their attention and form some connections.

Which languages were represented:

Dutch
Ojibwa
Spanish
French
Japanese
German
Indonesian

Cool, huh?

Movie of the Day: Cool Runnings. Jamaica, mon!

Groceries

Do you ever get so low on food that you're scrounging for something to pack in your lunch? Then, you force yourself to buy groceries and the next day you can't decide what to take because you have too many options? My lunch is HUGE today. I have a sandwich, baby carrots, grape tomatoes, an apple, and some crunchy wheat cracker thingies. I'm psyched!

Movie of the Day: Ice Age 2: The Meltdown. Food, Glorious, Food!!!

Bad Day

Okay, so today sucked. Big time. Anyone have some serious career ideas for me? I have a math degree and a Masters' in Education-Instruction.

Ugh.

Roses

Valentine's Day is coming up and roses are on people's minds. Aside from the fact that their prices are jacked up for the holiday, roses are also part of a fair trade concern. Many of them are coming from South and Central America and were processed by exploited workers. They receive low pay and are exposed to dangerous chemicals that are used to fumigate the flowers.

I love flowers, so I'm totally bummed about this. Now, I need to find locally-grown flowers to buy myself and recommend to friends. Anyone know of a place?

Movie of the Day: Maria Full of Grace. She quit her rose factory job to transport drugs and make some real money. Sad.

Big Rings

So, my friend Mary and I went to the mall Friday night to wander and we ended up looking at cheap jewelry at Penneys. They had a buy one get one half off deal so we each found a ring. Mary's was a tasteful layered ring with small cubic zirconium stones. Mine is a large square cz with little ones framing it. It's distracted friends all day. Tee hee.

Movie of the Day: Lord of the Rings. Ha.

Day of Freshmen

Oh, dear reader, if you are of any religious inclination whatsoever, please send a little thought up or out or in or whatever for me today. I have 9th graders taking (or not taking) finals. That's it. No calm classes. Just Squirmy Ones. Two bright spots: I have a first block prep hour and we're ordering out lunch. I guess the shear fact that it's Friday could make it three bright spots.

Oy. Wish me luck.

Movie of the Day: Mission to Mars. Their mission might have been easier than mine today. Ha ha. Just kidding. I don't need billion-dollar equipment.

Travel Advice

Do any of you have overseas travel advice? Or suggestions of where to go in Paris and London?

Movie of the Day: What a Girl Wants. She took off to London.

Babble

So, I'm sitting here thinking that I should blog tonight so I don't have to rush tomorrow morning after walking two miles on my treadmill. I try to think of a topic while walking, but I end up rushed when I sit down to write.

The trouble is I just can't think of anything thrilling to write about tonight. I'm writing a final. I'm drinking diet Coke with grenadine. I'm listening to KT Tunstall, the Walk the Line soundtrack, and Fat Boy Slim on my stereo. I had some yummy organic bread for dinner. I discovered a stupid mistake at work which will cost me about $130. I dried my hair flipped upside-down and everyone thought I got a haircut or highlights. I dropped a 12-pack of pop in my garage yesterday and two cans split open. The puddle started freezing before I could wipe it all up. I had a piece of mail today that belongs to the son of the woman I bought my house from 5 years ago.

Yep. That's my day.

Movie of the Day: The Remains of the Day.

Finals

It's finals week in Duluth (for the public school kiddies, at least). I'm not physically ready to give the finals, but I'm ready for some closure on this psycho semester! I'll be happy to start fresh next week.

Movie of the Day: Final Fantasy. Interesting animation.

Fur Soup

Last night, right before we were kicked out of Beaners (for having too much (sober) fun), Sarah told us a funny tale (tail?) about her dog. Well, parts of her dog. You see, she's a regular Martha Stewart in the kitchen (just kidding). Any way, she said that one night she was really craving rice for dinner, but only had a little left. So, after putting the rice in the pan, she accidentally dropped it on the floor, spilling the precious rice. Well, you know how cravings are, so she decided to scoop up the rice and cook it any way (maybe the 10 second rule was in play). As she was about to put it back in the pan, she realized the rice had mixed in with Bjorn (her yellow lab)'s fur off the floor. Sarah figured the boiling process would make everything okay. (Quit gagging, dear reader). Any way, it turns out that dog hair rises to the top of boiling water. By this time in the story, the rest of the table is wide-eyed and grossed out. She then tells us that you can just take a paper towel and wipe off the hair that is sticking to the sides of the pan and eat your rice.


Ew.

Movie of the Day: The Truth About Cats and Dogs. The truth: be careful eating at Sarah's.

Leaning Tree of Becca

Here's what you missed if you weren't driving around Duluth this past December!

Movie of the Day: Lean On Me.

Resorting to Candy

I need to bribe some of my kids to do their work. In my eyes, it would take a big bribe because some of them know they have to repeat my class next semester and what they do now will not make a difference. However, I think Jolly Ranchers will actually work for some of them. So, I'm gonna give it a try.

Movie of the Day: Brokeback Mountain. They were jolly ranchers (at least for a while).

Fix It

Well, the higher ups at school have decided to pay for the math department to have a half-day of substitutes so we can fix our 9th grade failure rate. Since this is such a simple task, we should be able to add world peace, homelessness, Iraq, abuse, and cancer to the list. Expect results by 1 PM.

I'm gonna need some caffeine.

Movie of the Day: Great Expectations.

Mittens

We're now at the point in winter where the temperatures are starting to dip down to normal. El Nino is taking a nap or something. So, I've been grabbing my mittens and scarves and when really weak, a hat. I'm not a big hat person. My sister makes me cute hats that I wear on occasion and while shovelling (one of these days, knock on wood).

Movie of the Day: The Scarlet Letter. Nothing to do with mittens, but scarlet sounds like scarf to me.

Survey

A wee little survey for ya:

1) Favorite junk food:

2) Most interesting scar:

3) Favorite vacation activity (keep it clean):

Movie of the Day: Billy Madison.

To My 4th Grade Teacher, Wherever You Are

Dear Mrs. Vitcenda,
I found out today that you passed away on Wednesday and it made me cry. The saddest part for me was that I've been thinking about you for the last couple months and wondered where you were. I even Googled you last week. See, I've been reconnecting with some 4th grade friends and had the idea that some of us should come and visit you and tell you what we were doing with our lives. Now, it's too late. So, I don't know if they have WiFi in Heaven, but at least I can share it with everyone else.

You were a great teacher. I love poetry because you loved poetry. I remember you taught me decimals, which I use every hour, every day (at least while I'm at work). I remember SRAs (reading practice) and saying the pledge. I remember Valentine's Day. I also remember how you sent me a note when my 9th grade math team won an award. You kept track of us.

I'm looking at our class picture right now and I see teachers, nurses, architects, and one we've already lost. We love you.

:)Becca aka Rebecca

Movie of the Day: Mr. Holland's Opus.

Blue

For all of you missin' The Lake, here's a photo. I miss this weather!

Movie of the Day: Talladega Nights. Odd little flick. Kids were hilarious!

I Hope You At Least Have A Good Weekend

Yes, this was said to me yesterday. What a doosie of a day! It started out fine. I walked 2 miles on the treadmill. Nice driving weather. Then, I found the graffiti in my room, personally attacking me. Yep. That was great. I think the problem was that I let my guard down. It's not like I haven't been called a B#$&* before, but this was in permanent marker on my radiator. There were a couple other slanderous things written attacking my looks and love life. Happily, they didn't call me stupid. That would have been the final straw!!!! Ha.

Why do a couple people have to ruin it for everyone else? Why can't a couple people "make" it for everyone else?

Movie of the Day: Amelie. She at least wrote nice graffiti.

P.S. I've had a request for a picture of the Leaning Tree of Becca. They will be forthcoming.

P.P.S. Goal # 2 (see yesterday's post) accomplished. Goal # 3 is next.

Tree

Last winter, I bought a pre-lit outdoor tree on clearance after Christmas. It sat in my garage, patiently waiting for it's moment to shine. In December, my dad helped me put it up. As we were reading the box, it said that we had to wash our hands after touching it because it was made of lead! Nice, huh? So, I refused to let my dad go near it because he has enough health problems (mostly back-related) that he doesn't need to add lead-poisoning to the list.

If you've been driving around Duluth and noticed a pre-lit tree leaning nearly horizontally, that would be my little tree. Yep, I couldn't get it to stay up straight for the life of me. Every time I saw it, I would giggle. I unplugged it the other day, though, because my neighbors are kind of particular (or so I imagine) and I didn't want to bug them any longer.

This weekend's goals:

1) Unplant pre-lit tree.
2) Clean Winger's tank.
3) Write college recommendations.

If I find time to goof off in the middle, awesome.

Movie of the Day: Snow Falling on Cedars.

Politics

I try to stay away from political discussions in my classroom. I attempt to keep my leanings to myself and not let the kids know who I voted for and what I think. Then, there's a topic that I'll feel really passionate about and I have to hold my tongue. Not literally, that's gross. Well, it's gross if you thought about how many germs I come into contact with each day. It's a miracle my immune system is in tact.

Movie of the Day: He Said, She Said. They spoke their minds.

Stuck In My Head

Do you ever get words stuck in your head? I mean, they're kind of like getting a song stuck in your head, only a single word or phrase. Right now, I have "Good Afternoon" in French stuck there. Why? Because I popped in my French CD-ROM yesterday and that's the word that stuck. I found that the colors came back to me pretty quickly (from this summer) and "water" and "milk" are going to be harder. One of the main words/phrases will need to be "vegetarian" and "Can you help me?" Yep, I can see it now. I'm sitting in a restaurant, trying to figure out what to eat and saying "I'm a vegetarian. Can you help me?" Ack. Sometimes I have to do this at Applebee's in Duluth. They like to sprinkle meat on everything.

My students from last year have started asking me if I'm going to Sundance this year. I tell them that I would love to, but I'm not. This year, I'm going to Paris. They stop for a second to try to think of which Film Festival that is and then realize I'm talking about the city. I'm glad I have something cool going on to report.

Movie of the Day: While You Were Sleeping. The dad and Saul are two great characters and these actors passed away this year: Peter Boyle and Jack Warden.

The Clock is Ticking

Winter Vacation is almost over. Duluth students and staff are coming back to town, turning in early, and bracing themselves for the alarm clock in the morning. Yes, it was a good break. Yes, we relaxed, celebrated, and slept in. Now, it's back to Reality and, for the high schools, thirteen days until the end of the semester.

The evening of the last day is always a rough one for me. I have things I meant to do over break and things that I would still like to do. The choice: work on more school work or cherish the fleeting hours of vacation and save the work for tomorrow. I tend toward the cherishing, which is wimpy, I know. Maybe it's actually self-preservation? Wishful thinking.

I hope you have a good night.

Pick Something Little

Happy New Year! Did you make any resolutions?

I'm not good at making resolutions and sticking with them. Mostly it takes me too long to decide just how to phrase it and if it will be do-able. So, the time passes me by and I either change or don't change.

This year, I'd like to find things that I've left behind and reintroduce them into my life. Maybe it's ice skating or poetry or taking voice lessons. Maybe it's a college friend who I'm lousy at writing. Maybe it's giving myself time to read or watch TV or just stare at the wall.

I think everyone has something that they liked but left behind. Can you find it again?

Movie of the Day: Defending Your Life. Weird little flick.