Good news . . .and bad news

Happy Thursday, all!

The Evening

It's down around 8:30 pm and the mountain of grading has become more like a mole-hill. We're definitely going to have to go over adding a bit of extended definition again tomorrow in class. Besides that, everything is fine. Came home. Worked out.

It snowed and snowed a lovely blanket of white today in Boise! Walking to the gym trudging through the powder was kind of fun! On the way, I saw Rudy, the homeless guy I gave a coat to a while back in front of the apartment house. I ran into him yesterday, and he didn't seem to recognize me. He asked if I could spare some change, and I had none, so I told him so. He yelled something behind me about going home to my warm house. I saw him today too. To be honest, he kind of scares me. Most of the time I see him, he seems to be talking slowly, like he's drunk or on some kind of downer. So, today when I saw him, I tucked my head into my hood a little lower hoping he wouldn't recognize me. That's not particularly Christian, but how am I to respond? He knows where I live.

I need to go home and shovel the snow from teh sidewalk before I get ready to go to bed. Top of the evening to you all!

The Afternoon

This was one of those "I'm so tired and so frustrated and so insert growl here I want to cry" days

Indeed, it's been one of those weeks.

Moan #1: WhAT ON EARTH am I supposed to do with a 90-MINUTE STUDY SKILLS CLASS? They're antsy. They're disrespectful, and they seldom, if ever, have that much homework. People have told me, "IT's easy! You can do what you want! Teach them something fun!" But no one has ever mentioned any ways of teaching "fun" things, or targeting the skills these kids need, without offering me ideas that would take valuable time away from the other two brand new classes I'm planning and the "Oh, Elisabeth! This seems like your job: you do it!" mentality of the consulting work I've been doing lately! AAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!

That's mostly it. I'm just tired and I have a mountain of papers to correct, tomorrow to plan, and two meetings tomorrow that will keep me from being able to use my planning period to do that.

And that damn pushing nature is acting up again.

FUN STUFF

However, yesterday was fun!

Once again, I got to meet a famous person at the Egyptian Theatre (bringing to mind my Eric Idle evening three years ago.) Aron Ralston, the man who cut his own arm off in Utah three years ago to survive, came to the Egyptian Theatre last night to give a talk about his experiences, the proceeds going to the Idaho Youth Ranch. I have taught Aron's story twice to my classes, and so it was really fun to go meet the man I taught about to my kids. (I don't usually get to meet 'em cuz they're usually dead.)



But I got to meet him. How fun!

And he even gave me his e-mail address! That was cool!

But I lost it before I got home.

Oh Well!

Christmas Shopping Official!

Hooray! My grandmother has finally chosen the pattern she wants me to embroider for her so now my Christmas shopping scheme is official.

Here are the two I will be making. The first is for my mom, the second is for my grandma.






Kudos to Grandma on her excellent taste!

Unfortunately, the web site says that it could be THREE WEEKS before they come, which means there is no way I could have them done by Christmas. Even so, I'll do my best!

Elisabeth

Boys are so very dumb!

Hence my new slogan!

Elisabeth

Christmas Shopping Update

Halooo! So, Thanksgiving was really fun and so was hanging out with my uncle, my aunt, and my grandparents all day on Friday. I've been really focusing on getting Christmas completely planned out/as finished as possible this weekend. I spent a bunch of time xeroxing, cutting, writing cards, and applying stamps to envelopes. Now, I am proud to say, just about everyone on my list has a card on the way!

It has been important to me this year to make a Christmas present plan so that I don't buy as I go and end up spending waaaayyy more than I can afford, as is always a concern at Christmastime.

So, here's the holiday plan (since none of the following read this blog, I can publish this plan here)

Gifts:

Mom: A pretty wreath with pictures of her precious family members (found it at Kinkos) Kit is bought but I am waiting for her to choose pictures and get them to me.

Dad: Two new Sonicare electric toothbrush heads (bought today) and a bunch of high-quality socks that my sister and I will go in on together (Really! This is what he wants!)

Emily: A collage of pictures of the family. I hope to start going through the pics tonight after planning. I will have her choose a frame the day we go to find socks for Dad.

Wesley: A new retractable leash (because my mom and dad said they would take him on their hikes if he had a retractable leash), a new electric toothbrush, and some ear cleaner. (All bought today)

My grandmother: A napkin/placemat set that I will embroider as soon as she chooses it off the website and gets back to me.

Misty: a surfer talking "Squirt" doll. (She already has it)

My cousins: a coupon for one free evening of childcare. And for those with no children, gift certificates for gas or individualized inexpensive gifts.

Everyone else: Cards with pretty pictures of YOURS TRULY on them!

Embroidery: My mom looked on selmasyarns.com today and decided that she wants me to embroider her the following placemat/napkin set. I'm glad she chose it. I never would have picked that one for her, because I think it's hideous. Take a gander if you dare:

http://selmasyarns.com/page/SELMA/PROD/tdinner/t204537

I would also like to make her -- ultimately -- this quilt, sham, and pillowcase set. But that would be a VERY long term goal:

http://www.herrschners.com/products/product.aspx?sku=075065

Well, that's it! Gotta get to planning!

Elisabeth

Monday

"Sounds like someone has a case of the Mondays!"

Not so much. Today was an okay day,actually. Neither of my lesson plans worked, but I revamped them after school so hopefully they will work better next time.

I'm just kind of sitting around work alone waiting for something exciting to happen. Somehow, I doubt it will. It's almost 5.

So, I think I'll go home. I have grading to do, but that can be done at home. A+!

Elisabeth

Sunday Night

Well!

Had I written earlier, you would have gotten my traditional earful of "Oh, I'm so panicked!" message. But, tonight is not so bad. It was pretty bad today, because there was so much that I couldn't figure out. So, I walked around downtown, worked out, got a little panicky, went to the library, worked on my Christmas cards . . .Now, I think everything is coming together. I printed some stuff and I have a little more clarity on how I'm going to teach the tenth grade unit, but not much. I guess that's good for one night. My colored load of clothes is in the dryer, my permanent press are in the washer, and things are pretty good.

Now I'm trying to find an envelope template that will fit the funky little Christmas cards I made because I think I would have to search to find pre-made ones that would fit.

Hmmm. Everything is fine! Thanksgiving is this week! Yahoo!

Wow. Not much to say. I guess I'll have to try again in a few days!

Elisabeth

Keep on Pushing, Liz

When I was a little kid, my parents tell me that they would come upon me crying my eyes out from time to time while holding something really heavy.

"What's wrong?" They would ask.
"It's too heavy!" I would ball.
"Then put it down, Silly."
"No!"

And I would cry and cry that whatever I was carrying was too heavy and never put it down. Nobody could help me because I refused to help myself.

I think those stories are akin to my lifelong tendency to take on problems in the same way over and over. The first time, it doesn't work out, so I set out to do it again, this time better, this time stronger. I resolve to push harder this time. Then my plans fail miserably once again, and on and on it goes. It hasn't escaped me that doing something the same way over and over expecting a different result is the definition of insanity.

When I first started teaching, Wilhelm used to refer to my "losing battles." I would start a unit that was destined for failure for one reason or another and then keep trying and keep pushing long after it was dead and needed to be discarded.

So, today I figured out that I need to discard the unit we've been donig in tenth grade. The text is simply too hard.

The same goes for other areas of my life, especially with my MFZ. I thought I was done ever treating men like anything other than friends. I thought I had them out of my system that way. I was sick of the roller coaster; sick of the crap. Then I turn around and find myself pushing just as hard as I was before and getting absolutely nowhere. Over time, I guess pushing and pushing has become a hard-to-break habit. More specifically, I tend to pursue men -- I mean, even if I just want to be friends -- far past the point where pursuance is wise or prudent or anything besides just downright annoying. My Aunt Becky once told me, "Honey. You obviously don't understand how men work. They like to be in control. They don't like to feel pursued." Fair enough, but I have to still be me. Still, there is no reason to continually put pressure on relationships that don't exist in the first place and I'm finding I still do that and I don't want to. So, God and I kind of made a deal . . . .or, should I say, I kind of made a deal with God. (I think he's copacetic): if I quit pushing and quit trying and quit fighting losing battles, then I will give to him what I'm fighting about and I want him to take care of it. We shouldn't tell God what to do, but it's more like I want to say, "Here, God. I'll let this go if you'll take care of it because it's really important to me. Please don't just file it under unimportant and never get around to taking care of it. Please take care of it for me because I'm really sick of it remaining unresolved in my life."

But that's the hamster wheel I'm running in. I don't like things unresolved but I don't often have a choice, so I just stay uncomfortable. I should just learn to live comfortably with ambiguity. Still working on that one.

Well, time to go. I've got a new 10th grade unit plan to get started.

Elisabeth

Sunday night

Hello, my friends,

How's it going? Everything here is going pretty well. It's been a pretty good weekend. Yesterday I spent getting treated by the wholistic lady, collecting leaves from the apartment house lawn and bagging them, walking Wesley, cleaning my bedroom, and making dinner. Alayna and I went out last night to the cafe' where I had some coffee and she had some dessert.

Today was the same old Sunday routine. Church this morning, then I cleaned out my car, went out to Meridian to get my stuff to prepare for tomorrow, dropped some books off at the library, then came home. I walked with Wesley to get a copy of the movie "The Odyssey" to preview it and see if I can show it to my kids. (There's more sex in that movie than plot. But some of that is true to the original. You can tell that a man wrote "The Odyssey." Would a woman ever put a married man in multiple situations where he has no choice but to sleep with beautiful goddesses and not be guilty of infidelity because he has no choice? I didn't think so.) I watched the whole, looooong movie and now I'm preparing an anticipation guide for the book tomorrow. As usual, I'm no farther ahead than I have been all year, but I worked pretty hard this weekend. I have to do stuff besides school, like clean up my apartment and take care of other things in my life. That's just reality, so getting ahead may not happen any time soon. Baby steps.

It was a good weekend. I realized last week that the jazz and poetry night on Friday wasn't on Friday. It's December 9th. :) Luckily, I asked my friend, Anne-Marie if she wanted to accompany me and she has accepted: at least until she cancels, which she does on occasion.

I'm supposed to eat raw until noon everyday this week. It's going well so far.

Besides that, spending time with Wesley was nice this weekend! What a cutie! I came out of the Co-op when I was buying organic food, and Wesley saw me and wagged and wagged, and put his paws up on my legs and looked at me intently like, "Mommy! You came back for me!" The lady who was trying to pet him at the time said, "Yes. We know who your mommy is." It was cute. Now he's curled up behind me on the floor, and Pepper is snoring in a nearby chair. It's pretty cute.

That's it. I gotta get my stuff together and get home so I can start preparing for the week! I've got the dishes to wash, lunch to make, the kitchen to clean up . . .
I'm swamped. :)

Good night!
Elisabeth

Things are looking up

Hello, all!

This was the day I have my ninth graders, so the day was pretty good. After school, I went to work out, then spent the rest of the evening standing in line waiting to vote, getting to the registration table, being told that my checkbook was not adequate proof of my new address, going home to get a utility bill, finding out that my checkbook is indeed adequate proof of my new address, and then standing in line again so I could show my checkbook to the same, confused lady who sent me home before. Finally, I got to stand in line waiting for a voting booth, and lo and behold, I finally got to vote. I thought of Sara when I stuck on the little "I voted" sticker since I remember what a kick she got out of getting to wear it. I must say, I don't experience the same rush of adrenaline. Even so, it made me smile to think of the personal party she had last time we three voted together.

I tried hard not to be mad at the poor volunteer who made an honest mistake and sent me home and then, as a result, caused me to have to stand in line again. We Americans have made inconvenience a cardinal sin. Inconvenience me, and I have a right to be rude to you: It's conventional wisdom. I notice a lot of that in me. I could see it in the face of the guy I rear ended yesterday. He was horrified that I wasn't more concerned about having damaged his car than I was about getting back to work. I'm sure I seemed like the incarnation of what's wrong with today's youth to him. But, honestly, I didn't really care about the scratch in his bumper nor about the plastic cover to my headlight that was lying in pieces on the ground. I just wanted to get back to school so I could get ready for tenth grade English. I'm trying to realize that inconvenience can often be a blessing, and that it's certainly no excuse to treat others poorly. That's one of my major oversights, though. I'm not very nice to people who inconvenience me when I'm in the middle of something or wanting to be somewhere. I'm trying to change it. So, I tried my best to be nice that lady tonight and, hopefully, I contained my consternation so it did minimal damage.

I'm just pooped. No more working tonight. I'll have to do it tomorrow during prep. I hate waiting that long but I'm feeling sleepy and content and I think sometimes you just have to go with it.

I had an interesting interaction with my student who is always misbehaving today.
For a while, my student had a habit of showing up in my classroom during his other classes. So, finally I e-mailed his teachers and asked them to please not let him leave their classrooms during class because there is no reason he should be in my classroom in the middle of his other classes. (He was leaving class A LOT) Well, Today I was previewing part of a video for tomorrow's 10th grade English, and in he comes with his classic:

"Hey, Ms. Skoro!"

"Hi. What are you doing?"

"I just came to get something out of my binder. Can I have a pop, Ms. Skoro?" (He keeps his binder in my room. I don't mind because it gives him a sense that somewhere he has a homebase)

"I don't have any."

"Come on. You are always bringing pop to school."

"I don't have any here right now."

"Oh. Okay" He sits down in a desk behind me.

"What are you doing?" I ask

"I'm going to watch the movie with you."

I pause the video.

"No. You need to get back to class."

"Oh. It's just art. We have a sub today and I said that I needed to get something from my binder."

"Okay. So you need to get it and go back to class."

"Oh."

He doesn't budge.

"You need to get it and go back to class."

"Okay." He gets up, opens his binder, gets it out.

"Bye, Ms. Skoro! See you tomorrow!"

"Bye"

He's sweet, and, yes charming. But he can wear on your nerves after a while.

The Boise State Writing Project is having a jazz and poetry night this Friday. I got a flyer for it in my box from one of the English teachers, and immediately I e-mailed Wilhelm since a) he's founder of the Boise State Writing Project, b) two of his favorite things are jazz and poetry, and c) his name was on the flyer. He said I was invited to the night. (I did get a flyer for it,after all.) and that I was equally invited to the party afterwards at one of the rooms in the sub. I'll check it out. Hopefully, I'll get to meet some people in the Boise State Writing project. Apparently, the application is process is pretty competitive and apparently, being Wilhelm's student really doesn't give me any kind of advantage, since he doesn't choose the participants any more. This might be a good way to not only find out more about it, but to meet some of the folks from it.

Do you know that Parrot Bay commercial? (Have you noticed that researching commercials is a weird, yet satisfying pastime of mine?) I'm talking about the one where the guy is standing in line somewhere, and ahead of him he sees a parrot on the back of someone's collar. He is suddenly transported to a Carribean night club where people are dancing and drinking Parrot Bay rum or whatever kind of alcohol it is. Well, I really like the song on that commercial. I did a little research and discovered that it's a song called "Bonnie and Clyde" by Destra Garcia. It's from some music genre called "Soca." (Never heard of Soca music.) It's a fun song. Here's a link if you're interested in checking it out:

http://www.trinijunglejuice.com/music_soca/2004/bonnie_clyde.ram

I also found the song from the Sheraton commercial. It's called "We Belong" by Pat Benatar.

I'm going now. I'm going to finish listening to "Bonnie and Clyde" once more time and then spend a little time with the fam before I go home and go to bed. :)

Elisabeth

What a day!

Hello, all!

Wow. What a day! I don't know what's been up lately, but it seems like my systems are breaking down. Why? I don't know. I'll explain how today went:


I got up this morning, went to work, and then headed over to the library to take some books back, check one out that I needed for today's "Learning Strategies" lesson plan, and pay $35 worth of library fines that I have accrued since the the beginning of the school year when I went on a "Aaack! How am I going to teach the Odyssey!" checking-out rampage and then didn't take very good care to keep track of the books I checked out.

So, on my way out of the parking lot, I accidentally ran into this guy's bumper. He was pulling out of his parking spot and I came around the corner too fast and ran into him. The plastic cover on the side of my headlight needs replacing now, and there's a hairline scratch on his bumper. He was very careful to take all my insurance information (in case his huge pickup has any internal damages from being tapped by my small sedan) and to mention that the paint on my car shows evidence of the time I accidentally scraped the side of a garage door when I was trying to enter the garage from a funny angle. Irritated as all get out, I just wanted to go back to work . . .a hairline scratch on his bumper is not something we need to discuss over coffee. Worse damage happens when someone parks too close to me and dings my door while getting out, but I don't make a federal case out of it. He pointed out that he could "buffer" out the scratch in his bumper. (Please! Why do they call it a "bumper" do you think?)

Anyway, as soon as the fellow in the pickup gave me leave -- and as soon as he had written down my name, my license plate number, my insurance provider, pointed out the error in my driving, inspected the hairline scratch in his bumper, and sweetly refreshed my memory about the paint on my car, I went back to work, my pride wounded and my already over-loaded and scattered brain ready to collapse. I got back to work, got to my classroom, and just started bawling, and it was really hard to stop. Even so, I pulled myself together and went to make copies, only to find that Monday is "Copy mom" day -- the day when all the organized people who can plan a week in advance get their copies made. So, I separated all the copies I had, being sure to give her individual instructions for each one. An hour later, I went back to find that none of the copies had been made, so we had to proceed with tenth grade English class without them. During tenth grade English, I realized I'm going to have to practically start over with the "personal narrative" because the kids are thoroughly confused. The rest of the day wasn't so bad, except for a certain student's behavior that I wont go into because that would turn this entry into a dissertation. The rest of the day wasnt' so bad. I just have to say, I'm wiped out. Completely wiped out. Exhausted. Emotionally and mentally drained. All I want to do is sleep, and cry, and curl up in a ball with the covers over my head.

A good thing that happened though. I e-mailed my liason from teh district, and she wrote back to say that she is really surprised that I didn't break down before this. (I have an especially tough job that is especially underhelped and underfunded) She said that she retaught things lots when she first started teaching, and that if I wanted to get together for coffee tomorrow night she would help me plan for tenth grade English. that was awesome. My mom was great too. I'm just so tired, and so freaked out right now. It's one of those times teachers remember always -- the doom days.

Right before I started teaching, I heard a story of a teacher who went through a divorce and got her first high school teaching job at the same time. Five different preps. Five! He said that she came home every night and cried for half-an-hour before she picked it up and started working again. This can't be nearly that bad, but that's akin to what I feel right now.

It also reminds me of the teacher I knewwho went through chemo and taught at the same time. HOW???? How can you have cancer and teach? That's amazing. I have no idea.

But Im going to go. I have to get ready for ninth grade English, and my ninth graders are my sweethearts.

:) Elisabeth

Sunday Afternoon

Hello!

Thanks for the feedback, Sara. I don't know what was wrong with me yesterday. I was really down . . .hormones? PMS? Fatigue? I think it could be a mix of all of it. I'm still fighting depression some today, but I'm working on it.

I'm actually pretty much squared away for tomorrow at school. Some of the stuff I need is actually at school. Some is at my apartment, some is at the public library. I'm at my parents' house right now doing three loads of laundry and baby-sitting the turkey, which is baking. When my parents get home (or when the turkey finishes cooking, whichever comes first), I'll be able to go to my apartment and to the library.

Wilhelm told our class once that the hardest times of the year for teachers are the end of October/beginning of November and the end of March/beginning of April. I've notcied that lately: I've just been down. I must just be tired.

The wholistic lady told me to start taking a supplement called Chlorella to replenish some of the nutrients from veggies that get depleted in the stress of my day and in my aversion to eating the veggies in my frig before they go bad. Today after mass I went to the Co-op and bought the kind she recommended. Awf! A 20 day supply for 25 bucks. I'm starting with a low dose. The stuff I bought is supposed to be for my parents and I, but if we do that, it'll be gone in a week. We'll have to figure something out because I'm definitely going to take it.

It was so weird yesterday when the lady was working on me. I could barely feel her fingertips on the back of my neck, but I could feel weird things in my body. Like, I felt something like a wave coming up my spine on the left side, swelling at the base of my brain, and then going back down, just like a wave on the ocean crashes on the seashore and then subsides. She said that that was the fluids going up my spinal cord, but that my right side was so locked there was no way I was going to feel it on that side. Weird. But I don't think what she is doing can possibly hurt, so we'll see how it goes.

What else to say? There isn't much really. Just waiting for my laundry to finish, for the turkey timer to go off, and stuff.


I saw the movie "Troy" last week. Someone pointed out -- rightly -- that that movie serves no function other than to allow the viewer to see a) fighting, and b) Brad Pitt's body. I guess he's right. The point of that movie, I think, is to admire what Brad Pitt's arms, chest, and legs can look like after -- get this -- 6 months to a year (I couldn't find a straight answer on which amount of time was accurate) of spending 3 hours every day in the gym and eating a strict high-protein, low-carb diet, cutting out beer, cigarretes, and everything else he liked to snack on.

Who on earth is going to follow that kind of regimen? You would either have to be a) preparing to play an epic hero in a movie and getting paid dearly for it, b) incredibly arrogant, c) truly in need of some other hobby, some friends, or -- maybe -- a job to take up more of your time ,or d)all of the above. It's false advertising. Distorted beauty, just like that video on Shawn and Sara's blog showed.

Speaking of which . . .my pants are looser. Nice, huh?

I'm gonna go and type up my agenda for classes tomorrow. Laters!

The Beginning of a Better Evening

Hello all!

Well, it's Saturday. It's supposed to be a day of rest. And, I hate to say it, but it's been a weird day.

I woke up this morning and headed off to the Y, where I joined a bunch of older ladies (including my ninth grade History teacher) in a Corepowerclass. It was mostly stretching and weight lifting. I then came home, took a shower, and my mom and I went out to see this wholistic specialist who's helping my uncle with his cancer problems. It was nice, and the whole evaluation took about two hours. I left feeling pretty good about the whole thing.

Mom and I came home and I ate lunch. Then got Wesley ready and walked to my apartment. I got out the rake, raked up a bunch of wet leaves and, as I was standing there, a homeless, drunk guy named Rudy stopped and ask if I needed help. That was really nice, but I was a bit creeped out. He asked if I had an extra sweatshirt because he was cold, and I gave him my old coat. It fit him well, so I was glad about that, but he didn't really want to leave. That kind of scared me, so I got into my car and came here. Now I'm sitting browsing stuff on the internet. Why am I not having valuable personal time, you ask? Well, mostly because I know I should be working, I should have finished picking up all the leaves, I should have walked Wesley farther, I should have gotten my apartment clean. I should have, I should have, I should have . . .

But this is just a self-destructive state of mind, and I'm not sure why I'm posting about it. :)

Last night was fun. I invited Ryan to come to dinner with me at "Trailer Park Cuisine," and we got together and just kind of had a good conversation. After dinner, I went home, watched a movie, washed dishes and then . . .Misty called! It was so cool. We talked for a bit and then I went off to bed.

More later! There's not really much worth blogging at this particular moment. :)