New pictures

We went to Walmart yesterday to get pictures done of us as a couple. Last time we did that was when we were engaged and then when we were married. Eventually I'd like to get more professionally done photos of us but Walmart had to do for the time being. There are some more poses that we did but we'll get those distributed out later on. Here's just a taste of what's to come. :)

ps. This time, both of us had our hair cuts and we also had on nice, new clothes. That's always a plus!

Turkish food...a party in the bowels

We ate Turkish food tonight. Let me tell ya...it's rough on the colon and the gas. Whew! hahaha!!


Anyway, we're enjoying being home so far. We've had the wonderful family gatherings and lots of time to relax. Although for some reason, I always feel like I can't get enough sleep! It's so hard to get used to the eastern time zone after staying so long in mountain time. I've been eating such wonderful foods too and way too much food at that! I'm feeling very remorseful for all that I've eaten but I intend on taking it down several notches beginning tomorrow and getting myself way back on track since my train has totally derailed this past week! Oh well--it's the holidays and you can't fully enjoy yourself if you can't let go a little and eat what you don't normally eat. I know I'll be okay this week.


This morning, I went to the gym with my dad and I participated in a step aerobics class. It was fun. It made me feel good that I got it done. Hopefully it'll get my metabolism back to where it was before all the foodfests! I plan on going several times again this coming week so I can get back into the groove and hopefully take off whatever I've gained. I probably oughta weigh in this next Saturday so I can assess the damage. Although, if I'm REALLY good this week, I should probably do okay--even if it means staying the same on the scale. Better to stay the same than to go up and be really discouraged. I've been getting mad at myself lately whenever I have a gain. I know I shouldn't be mad but I can't help it. It seems whenever I have an awesome week, my subconscious tells me that I can go ahead and go for the second helping or the not-so-healthy choices because it's a reward for doing so well. I HAVE to retrain myself!! I fear I've trained myself really bad way back when I was hardcore half marathon training and I was losing close to 2 lbs/week and then I'd treat myself to some donuts that Saturday morning after weigh-in. Ugh...it's a nasty trap to fall into and I'm slowly trying to climb out of it.


I got to see an old classmate of mine from high school today, Brian Nelson-Palmer. He was like a brother to me all through high school band camp because we'd always carpool in the beginning when we couldn't drive ourselves. I also would stay at his parents' house sometimes when my parents went out of town and so they were like my 2nd family. I also used to babysit his sister, Brigitte. I was SO happy to see him walk through the door at the holiday open house at the Cornelius's!! We haven't seen each other in years and then when he walked through the door, we all grabbed each other in a group hug--me, him and his sister and were laughing! It was an awesome feeling! It seems we always missed seeing each other at the holidays because if Kyle and I were coming into town, he'd just be leaving or vice versa. Needless to say, it was awesome getting to see those two. I might get to see my friend, Danny Herres, this week too. We might be going out to lunch or something on Tuesday. We'll see if I can get in touch with him. He was also a close friend of mine. I can't wait!! :)


Well, that's it for now. I'll probably write more later.

Merry Christmas!!

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!! :) Hope Santa's good to you!

Winter Wonderland

It started snowing last night and hasn't stopped yet today. We've got a nice blanket of snow and it just keeps coming down. That's alright though. We like it. For now. We'll probably be sick of it in a month or so. ;) Or at least, I will.


We leave early Friday morning for the ATL. We're so excited!! We've been longing for the comforts of home--the smells, the food, the hugs...Anyway, we're totally ready to come home for the holidays. This weekend is probably the time I need to spend really cleaning and getting clothes ready to pack, although, I don't think I'll pack that many clothes because I might want to go shopping for some new outfits. I'm down a few pounds and I'm wanting to celebrate it. I want to lose another probably 10 pounds altogether to make myself feel comfortable. I hate being so close to my Weightwatchers goal weight because if I get too close, there's a chance of going over and I'll have to pay. Plus, I've got more motivation now that I've started my new class. I'm feeling good about going to the gym again and I don't want to ruin that.


Kyle got some news earlier this week about promotions: Micron will start promotions again in March! I figure that's a good sign if they were able to pinpoint a month now. In the past, they've just had a "wait and see" policy. This is really good. One of the newspaper headlines read, "Micron's big success for 2009? Surviving it". That's the truth! It was very scary for a long time! Now it seems they've jumped the hurdle and are aiming at doing well this next year. Once they do well, maybe the house prices in the Boise area will begin to recover because they'll be wanting to hire out again, which means they may be pulling people in who want to buy houses!


Progress was made last night: I finished hat #4 of my senior hat project. I've got to make 9 more. I'm planning on making hat #5 today and tonight. I need to prove to my kids that I haven't given up on it. They keep asking about it and I keep pushing them off. I have to get one of the hats done relatively quickly because one girl is pregnant, who's a senior, and she'll be leaving probably in mid-late January since her baby girl's due in February. I'm debating whether to make her a baby hat or not. My department head said that we shouldn't give her gifts for the baby because it'll seem like we're promoting it. Maybe I'll make it near the end of the year and give it to her in private. The Knitwitz club is still kicking but lately I've had really low attendance. I think it's because a lot of the students are being held in their 6th period classes due to having low grades in their subjects. That tends to affect the attendance sometimes. That's okay though. I want to start making hats with them soon. I'm hoping a lot of them will go ahead and buy the knitting looms at the store so I can show them how to do the hats before Christmas break is here--that way they can be whippin' out hats over the break when they're bored or they can make Christmas gifts. I think they'll really appreciate having those looms because they'll be able to produce stuff so quickly and feel accomplished.


Well, I better get going. Kyle and I slept the day away just about it. We had to get up kinda early this morning to meet the garage door people so they could fix the sticking of the door. After I went to weigh in at Weightwatchers and attend a meeting, I went back home to pick him up and we went out to a late breakfast--SO YUMMY! When we got home, we decided we'd go back to sleep for a little bit. He stayed up almost 40+ hours Thursday because of a stupid class project that he neglected to work on during the week. He stayed up all night Thursday night, didn't go to bed at all and then got a shower Friday morning and left for work, worked all day and then came home that night and we watched a movie until about 10:30pm! CRAZY! I would've died! Now our cars need oil changes and the line shouldn't be too long *fingers crossed* because of the snowing. I've gotta go to Walmart and buy some more yarn for my hats and I have to pick up another yarn needle for it because I left mine at school in all the knitting stuff. I might just buy a new kit because mine is getting really scratched up and the pegs are looking a little worse for wear. I might donate my set to the knitting club for the year.



Okay. I'm done for now. Gotta go. :)

Front and Center

http://caldwellschools.org/News/Newsletter/2009-12-04-CSDNewsletter.pdf

I'm in the district newsletter! There will probably be some additions and deletions later because I had to add that I was currently earning my Master's degree in ELL and the fact that I actually don't want the CDL advertised, as I may be getting phone calls about driving buses--I wouldn't want to do that. This is exciting though!

Here's our turkey! It wasn't so bad to fix. It was a little daunting to do this but we were extremely careful and it turned out DELICIOUS!! :) The sides that I made were candied sweet potatoes and green beans with slivered almonds (both WW recipes and they did NOT taste like they were from WW at all--that was what Kyle said). They were very tasty and his favorite was the candied sweet potatoes. I'll have to make them for ya'll when I come down to GA in a few weeks! The green beans were also extremely delicious too! I will make both for everyone at some point in my visit. Maybe I'll make them for Christmas Eve (if I have time) or Christmas Day or anytime ya'll want them. :) We had a lot of turkey leftovers so tonight I'm going to make turkey noodle soup. Should be good!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

We went to Walmart last night plenty of times and each time, Kyle saw this deal on a 40" tv for just under $600. He said that it was a screaming deal and he felt like he couldn't stand to pass it up! We remember when we kept looking at the televisions and they were all under $1,000 and we thought those were great deals but we just kept waiting and waiting and finally, this Christmas the deals came to us! This was intimidating to make the purchase but this was the first time in a long time that we felt like we could do something special like this! It's quite an amazing feeling! :)


I will post pictures of our Christmas decorations soon. I have to clean up the house though. It's a tad bit messy right now but I must say that I'm quite proud of my window decorations in the living room! Oh yeah and we did take pictures of our fried turkey too! I'll post those right now.

Still Zumba-ing

I've gone through my first week of Zumba class and I'm still not tired of it. Tonight was irritating though because I wanted to go to the 4:30pm class and the instructor was 30 minutes late!! She didn't get there til about 5pm or so and I was ANGRY! I got so angry that I ran over to one of the elliptical machines and started going full force on it! hahaha! Kyle was right next to me and he couldn't believe how fast I was going. I just needed to get some calories burned because we had driven all the way over to Boise to do this class and then she was not there! Finally as I had completed about 15 minutes of elliptical, I looked over my shoulder to the classroom and the teacher had arrived. I ran over there and joined class for the next 30 minutes. I think I got enough exercise but not as much as I had anticipated. Oh well. Here's to another week of ZUMBA!!!!!! :) :)

It's about time!!

ZUMBA dance class is finally here!!! My gym finally started having Zumba class here in Meridian!!! I was ecstatic when I looked on the new schedule. I'm going to start going to those whenever I can get a chance! Unfortunately, I can only go 2 times this week instead of the 3 or 4 times I had actually planned. I have something blocking up my Wednesday evening class (unless I can get away early) but I probably won't be able to get away.


In case you're wondering what Zumba is, it's a latin fusion dance class. It has a little of salsa, merengue, bachata and hip hop all in one. It's so much fun and it doesn't even feel like a workout and before you know it, you're drenched with sweat by the end of the hour. It's about time that I feel excited about going to the gym again. I haven't been in the last few months to a class because I'd been bored out of my mind. I hated going there because it was the same stuff ALL THE TIME. I know Zumba might get that way after awhile but it didn't seem like it was the same at all when I first tried it. I think it'll be different though because it's not a Les Mills program where they have certain routines and whatnot. This is more independent. I think it'll be refreshing and new most of the time.

Knitwitz. A club.

I'm starting a club at school this week. We're going to knit for fun and for charity. I've set up an account with the Donorschoose website to see if donors want to put money towards our projects. Any yarn we get will go towards making projects for Goodwill or other donation places. We'll also have fun making different things for people as gifts and whatnot. I'm excited about this and I think a bunch of kids will be excited to start too! Only thing I'm worried about is having the knitting needles or looms for the kids. I'm going to ask them to get their own tools so that they can take the stuff home and work and plus it'll allow them to take pride in their work if it's all their own stuff. If they can't afford to buy needles or the looms, then I can lend some out and just expect that they bring them back when they're done.


You can take a look at my donor proposal, if you'd like:

<http://www.donorschoose.org/donors/proposal.html?id=338743&sharebar=true>

Silly video. Tiger talks to us.

Tiger doesn't like the dishwasher. He shows me exactly what he thinks of this at the end of the video. Just watch (and make sure the volume is up). :)

The letter is sealed

I just finished a letter to Chris. It goes in the mail tomorrow. :)

I can't wait til Thanksgiving! We're going to fry a turkey. I know, I know. Not healthy at all but hey, it's the holidays and I'll be sure NOT to weigh in that weekend. ;) I probably won't do that bad though. I'll peel off the skin, how 'bout that?


Four day week this week with the kids. Friday is teacher workday. YAY! I definitely need some organizational time.

I had a really long week this week. 2 observations in one week wears a girl out. Thursday was bad because I had a falling out with my kids in 3rd period. I'm going to have to mend some relationships I guess but at the same time, the kids aren't exactly innocent either even though they'd have you believe otherwise. They apparently went to the counselor and talked about me and said that they felt I was singling them out. Well, if they're going to sit together, and talk loudly and not do any work like I asked repeatedly, OF COURSE they're going to be "singled out". Anyway, gonna see if I can divide and conquer by moving a couple of kids from 3rd period to my 5th period to kind of separate the strong personalities. Hopefully that helps. Fingers crossed.

Just another lazy weekend (at least that's what I want it to be)

Just sitting here typing a little update because I know ya'll are getting bored looking at the same entry for the past couple of weeks.

*Chris goes off to boot camp on Tuesday. I know he says he's not nervous but I know deep down he's a little worried. It probably won't really hit home until he gets there.

*One of my main troublemakers in my class has withdrawn from school due to moving out of state--CELEBRATION!! I'm happy.

*I only have one more real master's class to finish up this semester before I take my spring capstone course before graduation.

*We're enjoying having the extra income from my job. It really lets us relax more and not worry so much about having a little extra to use or to not worry so much about having to pay big bills from the mortgage and whatnot.

*I'm teaching English classes to adults at a local community college every Tuesday and Thursday night for some extra pocket money (about $400 extra every month). The adults are SO much fun to teach! It makes it even better that they want to be there. We had such a good time this past Thursday doing tongue twisters for treats. They gave me 2 Spanish tongue twisters to work on and one guy said that if I could do those close to perfect, he'd bring me chocolate. HA! So cute! These adults are so nice and polite. They've told me they love how patient I am and how kind I am with them in learning this new language. One person did tell me that they wanted me to be harder on them about correcting mispronounced words but I did tell them I did NOT want to be rude and interrupt them. If I correct them too much, it's going to make some people discouraged and not want to talk.

*Kyle's working a lot harder in this first shift position than in his original 4/3 work days, 12hrs a day shift. He's now working M-F, 7-5pm-ish. He says it's a lot harder to get his school work done on this shift because he doesn't have whole days off to get caught up. It's posing a bit of a challenge for him.


Okay, there's an update on what all is happening as of now.

Nice weekend

I had Thursday and Friday off from school. It was great to sleep in. Unfortunately, I haven't done anything work-related.

Celebrating women

I did the St. Luke's Women Celebration 5k yesterday morning. Ran most of it and probably would've run all of it had it not been for my running buddies, Anita and her daughter stopping a few times. That's okay though because we had a lot of fun. I think next year if we do it again, we'll do the timed race. This was just a non-timed section we were in and so it didn't matter how long we took to run it. Today Kyle and I signed up for the Barber to Boise 10k together. He wanted to do a run with me finally. He was saying how I do all these little runs and he thought maybe he'd like to do one too. So we are doing that one on October 17th. My City of Trees half marathon is this coming Sunday. I'm nervous but I'll be okay. I'll probably just have to stop a lot to walk since I didn't train nearly as much as I did last year. Maybe that's what will happen but then again, maybe the adrenaline push will get me to go further. Who knows?

Tragedy strikes

A senior at our school was killed this morning on the way to school. He had a head-on collision with a school bus. He crossed over the yellow line and smacked into the driver side bumper of the bus and thus, killing the boy at the scene. Shawn Heckathorn was wearing his seat belt and his airbag deployed but it made no difference. We haven't yet learned the cause of him driving over the yellow line (i.e. texting or whatever else might cause the minor distraction). I'm sure we'll learn soon once the investigation is complete. There were kids crying all over the school. What's a weird connection is there were was a boy that drowned this summer in a canal and the boy happened to be Shawn's best friend. The drowned boy's sister was planning on going to the Homecoming dance with Shawn this coming month. Another sad thing that I heard today at our emergency staff meeting was that Shawn's sister came in today to collect his stuff out of his PE locker and school locker. How devastating. The family is also hurting for money. The dad has a heart condition and hasn't been working lately and they've been collecting bills like there's no tomorrow. I didn't know this boy personally but I can't even imagine the hurt that his family and friends are feeling right now. His life was way too short.

Worst weekend of my life...but I'm getting over it.

I had a bad weekend at class. Here's the rundown of it and then I'm gonna show you what a person responded back to me after I told her what had happened (she's also in the program but I thought she would've been on my side). Apparently, if your skin is brown, you're able to talk about the issue of racism without being called a "racist".


My initial message telling her what happened after she had asked why I was upset (online):
I was explaining to Arturo about what I've been doing within my class to address the issue of my kids calling out racist to their teachers and at random inanimate objects (like a composition book being sewn upside down--seriously) and the fact that they called me racist already just because I might reprimand them for something like disrupting class or something that a teacher is supposed to do in order to have good instructional time, as well as some other stuff that's been going down and he said that since I was white, blonde and tall, it's not fair that I tell them that stuff. In so many words. It really hurt me. I took it as him saying that I don't have the right to talk about race since I'm white. IN MY OWN CLASSROOM.

I'm trying to do some of the same stuff they encourage us to do all the time in our master's classes and yet he tells me I can't do this particular thing because I'm white. Fine. I'll just let my kids yell out stuff at each other (wetback, beaner, etc) because since I'm white, I don't have a right to stop them from saying hurtful things to each other. That's not what I'm going to do but that's sure how I felt after having things like that said to me from a person with a Ph.D. Anyway, that's what happened. :(

I'm extremely hurt right now and I'm going to file a complaint. I just think that's what I need to do.


Classmate response:
The kids who you reprimanded were brown or black? because that may be the reason why they call you (and the other teachers) racist. i remember a mexican girl i interviewed for a class told me that she has grown very susceptible to any sign of intentional or unintentional racism so i see why your children say that. And i suppose the fact you're white and blond makes it more difficult for your students to understand that you're not racist (Peter McLaren told us during the summer institute about the many times in his classes of critical pedagogy students of different races just stood up and shouted at him he had no right to talk about race and discrimination because he's white). i don't think arturo meant you couldn't teach because you're white but that students from different races believe you can't teach about racism because you're white (especially if they are marginalized and are rebellious about that). of course you have the right to address name calling but i suppose your students think you can't address racism because you haven't been discriminated like they have so you don't have authority to address that topic.


My response back at her:
All of my students are brown. They're high school kids who occasionally act up in class (like any kids--white, black, asian, etc). Am I not allowed to reprimand them if they're being disrespectful/misbehaving in class because I'm afraid they'll call me a racist? Doesn't seem fair. :(

What I don't understand though is that I'm trying to have an open dialogue with my students (which is what this program promotes ALL the TIME) about some issues they're facing, and then I get shot down and told that I don't have a right to do this because I'm white. I guess that means that I just need to tell my kids that I can't discuss these things with them because I'm white and don't understand hurt. I also wanted to tell him that I've made great gains (or at least I think so) in the fact that I have decreased the amount of times my kids call each other "beaner" and "wetback" because I told them that it's language of impossibility and I want language of possibility. However, I didn't get the chance. They say stuff like, "we do this because we're 'beaners' and 'wetbacks' and 'mexicans'".

Anyway, I'm not getting angry and I'm probably not going to send a letter just yet. I just didn't appreciate having my race thrown in my face (by a professor who supposedly people are to look up to) because I was trying to have a dialogue with my students. I refuse to let a "teachable moment" go by and just say, "Oh, I have nothing to say on that because I'm white."


Be mindful that the more I talk about this, the better I feel--it's therapy. This is making me feel much better and it'll probably be pretty much the last time I talk about it. Oh and by the way, I have another friend who's white but she's from Bosnia and she constantly was harassed and discriminated against in classrooms because of her accent and whatnot...Tell me she doesn't feel hurt and pain (even though she's got white skin).

:) :)

Hey! Just thought I'd say hello. I've got a busy week ahead of me still--school, master's class on Friday and Saturday and planning for next week (although I think some of this week's lessons will be overflowing to next week. I gave my first test and graded them and the kids didn't do so hot. They were a little shocked to get their tests back today which was a good thing to be shocked. I told my kids in 4th period (I'll have to tell my 1st and 2nd period) that I will see how they do on the other tests and if they do better on those, I'll drop the lowest grade at the end of the semester. :) We'll see if that gives them the incentive needed to improve their performance in the classroom.


Sudden change of subject: Books I want to read soon:
Her Fearful Symmetry - Audrey Niffenegger
Stones from the River - Ursula Hegi
The Lost Symbol - Dan Brown

That's all for now.

Racism vs. Discrimination

Do you know the difference between racism and discrimination? Apparently, my kids don't and they're the ones who will probably see it on a daily basis for the rest of their lives (unfortunately). Anyway, lately my kids have been calling anything and everything racist. They've been throwing it around like a beach ball to the point of the word losing it's strength and meaning. Racist is a very strong word to play around with and you aren't supposed to just throw it around like they do! I'm going to come up with a lesson on the two terms/concepts and discuss with them the importance of the words. They've already called me racist and I'm just not going to put up with that. I don't doubt that they've seen these things in action toward them at all. I believe they've experienced it more than they care to say but I'm here to tell them that if I were a racist, I wouldn't be in that room everyday, staying til 7pm sometimes trying to come up with lessons to teach their butts! If this school were really racist, they wouldn't even be admitted into classes or even allowed into the school. If this school were really racist, they wouldn't be allowed to eat in the same cafeteria as the other white students. If this school were really racist, they wouldn't be riding the same buses. I'm going to try and make the point that calling "racist" (like calling "wolf") is not something to be messing with and it will definitely put people off. I know these kids have definitely made me a little irritated at them by them calling themselves "wetbacks" and "beaners" and I'm not going to have that at all. It's a way to pull each other down and there's no excuse for that AT ALL!!! I asked them the other day why it was okay to call each other that and if somebody else said it to them what would happen? They said they'd beat the people up if they called them those names, so why is it okay for other Mexicans to call their own people that? It's such a frustrating thing to me. Why do we feel like we can own words? It's not right. One adult told me that it's because it's a way of showing the whites all of the oppression that was directed towards them and so it's a way of saying, "Look what you did to us!" Okay, that is a sad way of putting it but can't we also move on and get past that and start fresh? If you keep calling your own people those derogatory terms, are you ever going to overcome the oppression? I keep thinking about the signs in pictures during the time of MLK, Jr. that said "We Shall Overcome!" Is that going to happen if groups keep calling their own people these names? I think not.

I will update later, promise

I haven't updated lately but I will later. I promise. We've just made it through the first full week of school and warmly welcomed the Labor Day weekend. Now that it's gone, we have a four day week to get through and try to make it productive. I have a test I have to give the kids later in the week. I also have open house tomorrow night as well as a faculty meeting in the afternoon so it looks like I won't be getting home tomorrow til about 9pm or so. Then it's straight to bed for me! I'll be exhausted. I've been telling Kyle though that it's a different kind of exhaustion than when I was working with Rowland. It's a satisfied exhaustion. I feel as if I'm truly doing what I want to do. I know it's still early in the year but I think I was having negative feelings at the beginning of the school year for Rowland and so far, I haven't had any of those here. Good sign? I think so. I did have an incident this Friday that really pissed me off concerning a couple of girls getting out of class and taking advantage of an aide but I really don't want to get into it right now. Too long of a story but I think I've figured out what I'm gonna do about it tomorrow and it starts with a stern talking to. They basically broke my trust in them and it'll take awhile to get it back. Anyway, I need to get a lot of sleep tonight since tomorrow's gonna be a long one. I'll update later, promise.



By the way, I'm reading a new book (as if I have time to read but I think it's part of me telling myself to let loose for a bit) and it's called "The Doctor's Wife" by Elizabeth Brundage. It's good. I recommend it if you like psychological thrillers.

No time to eat and not that hungry.

Surprisingly even though I've been under a whole bunch of stress, I haven't been eating nearly as much as I usually do when I'm under stress. I think it's because I don't have time to eat as much. There's a vending machine in the teacher lounge but I avoid that thing like the plague. I know once I go down that road, there's no hope for me. :) Anyway, I do get hungry about 4th period right before lunch and when it's lunch, even the smallest amount of food that I bring is just enough. That's surprising to me because I used to wolf down food and then still be hungry. There's so many things I have to think about now and so I just don't even think about food and naturally, I've been going for the healthier foods such as going for celery/peanut butter for a snack or a piece of fruit instead of going straight for a junk food item. I'm happy about that. Planning's been going okay but I've gotta be on my toes when it comes to sending off for copies to be made. It takes the lady about 4 days or so to get them done and delivered back to the school. I have to plan a week ahead just in case. GEEZ. That's a lot of brain power! Anyway, so far pretty good with most everything. My study skills class is a little chaotic so I have to add a little more structure to it. The kids like to get a little rowdy in that class. Not good but most of the kids are good kids and pretty nice to me.


I've never been this tired in a very long, long time.

Exhausted

I'm so tired. So tired, I feel drunk. I'm ready to see how Monday goes with my first lessons. We have one full week this week and then the following one is Labor Day weekend so no school on Monday the 7th and then the Monday after that is teacher collaboration and there won't be any school for the students. I used to like having these days off but now that I actually have to worry about getting through material, these days off might prove to be a problem, but I'm not going to complain just yet.

The classroom and the happy teacher (after the kids were gone for the day)

*GASP*

I don't have time to breathe. Sorry.








I'll update ya'll this weekend about how the first 2 days of school went and maybe if you're lucky, I'll update again next weekend to let you know how the first full week went too. :)

Interesting...

In Caldwell, we can no longer call what I teach, ESL. Well, teacher to teacher it's okay but when and if a student writes ESL on their paper, it's a gang acronym. It means "East Side Locos". HAHAHA!!! That's so clever of them to make their group that name because they probably thought that by writing "ESL" on their paper, the teachers wouldn't catch on that it was gang-related. Well, now we're on to them. So, the title is now ELL, which I've been saying all along but just so ya'll know. I bet within the next year or so, the title will change because another gang will come up with a name that goes along with that one.

Idaho Fair!

Texas Longhorn

He had an itch so he decided to rub his head against the cage bars. If somebody wasn't watching where they were going, they'd get poked or goosed by his horns!

IT'S A WATUSI!!! These animals are native to Africa. Some tribes in Africa use a mixture of milk and blood from this animal for some of their rituals. I saw this on "Bizarre Foods with Andrew Zimmern" (on the Travel channel) and Andrew did drink some of this junk--it seriously made me want to throw up.

We went to the Idaho Fair tonight because we wanted an elephant ear. We got one ear and split it because they're too big for one person to eat alone (although, I probably could but know I shouldn't). Then Kyle said he wanted one more junk food, deep fried Fair food item. He got a Pronto Pup corndog and he enjoyed it thoroughly. My next thing was a unique item that probably is only found here in Idaho. I got an ice cream potato! Now, you're probably thinking, "what is an ice cream potato? why would you want to eat ice cream on a potato???" Well, it's not an actual potato. It's ice cream shaped into a potato and it's even colored like one with cinnamon on the outside to give the ice cream the potato skin color and it's sliced in half just like you would do a potato and it's even got a dollop of "sour cream", which is whipped cream. It's awesome but I mean, it's just ice cream and tastes like ice cream so it doesn't taste like a potato. It just looks EXACTLY like one! It plays with your mind, seriously. The next people that come out to visit us here, we'll take you to the West-side Drive-in because they serve those and I think it's a cultural experience! :)

Monday will be a teacher workday for me so Kyle has said that he'll go in with me and help me with my room setup. I've already started some of it but it still needs help. I want to get a welcome rug for the entry way and I want to maybe eventually get some plants (probably fake since I have no windows in my room) to bring in some life to the room. I've got to get my stuff organized too and I have to come up with plans for the first full week or maybe more! I'm SO EXCITED!!! I also want to have a cozy reading corner but in order to have a reading corner, I need more books. I only have about 3 books that I found there at the school. I don't know how I'm gonna do this. Maybe I'll stop by a thrift store and see about cheap books that way I don't spend a fortune on stuff with my own money. Each teacher gets about $300 for their room for the whole year so I need to use that wisely! I already know that I need pencils probably but paper isn't an issue because my dept. head said she had tons of paper. I also need journals for my students but again, those will probably be provided for me. I will take pictures once my room is pretty much done. :)

It's late. Gotta go to bed because I really need to start a regular schedule for myself or else I'm not gonna survive in the early mornings!

CELEBRATIONS!!!!

I got the ELL job at Caldwell High School that I applied to months ago!!!!! I know most of you already know that but I just thought I'd make it "official" by writing it here on the blog. When I got the acceptance phone call, I saw Kyle's eyes well up with tears and when I saw that, it was all I could do to keep myself from bawling on the phone with the principal. After we were finished talking and discussing logistics for tomorrow's first day for new teachers, the principal asked me to take a deep breath and then he asked me if I remember everything he told me. I did remember because I wrote it down just to be sure. The principal also said that he enjoyed our "conversation" very much this morning--he said he didn't think of it as an interview at all. He thought of it as a friendly conversation with interesting discussion points. After I hung up the phone, Kyle and I hugged each other and cried. HAHA!! We were so happy to finally have gotten this job. I had tried so hard at all the other things that paid much lower and/or other jobs that people just didn't seem to appreciate what I had to offer and then turned me down. Well now I can show them that I AM worth something!! *Sigh* Now I'm so tired from all the excitement that it probably won't take much for me to go to sleep tonight especially since I have to get up EARLY tomorrow to start the day with other new teachers. I'm excited! I can't wait! :)

YIPPEEEEEE!!!!

I PASSED THE PRAXIS!!!!!! My score was a 630 and the state of Idaho only needs a 580 so I passed with flying colors! I'm so happy to not have to take the nightmare of a test ever again! I passed it with my own studying and absolutely no help from my master's classes. I believe I did good. :)

Interview!!!!

Awhile back I had applied for an ELL position at Caldwell High School (about 20-30 minutes west of Meridian) and it took them forever to get back to me. In fact, so long that I just thought that they weren't interested. Well, this morning I had a voicemail from the principal there and he was interested in talking to me about my application! I finally got in touch with him later on today and he asked me a couple of questions to get some introductions going and then he asked me to come in for an interview on Wednesday! I'm so excited and nervous too! I hope I have what it takes to be considered for this job because it would be really really nice to have 2 incomes finally in this house and then I don't have to feel so bad about spending it--haha! My praxis scores don't become available until about this Saturday so now I really need to pass! So nervous! So nervous! If I get this job it's gonna be so awesome for us and we can breathe a sigh of relief finally and start saving up for savings and possibly a family later on down the road. :)


Speaking of which, I might get the opportunity to babysit for a 4 month old. She's sooooo cute! She's one of those well-behaved babies that make people actually want to think about having babies. As James (Kyle's coworker and father of the baby) said, "She's a baby that makes you want to push your luck and try for another..." HAHA! We got to see her last night and when we got to the house, James was bathing her in the sink--the little butterball turkey baby. She's so fair and white-skinned and round in all the right places that makes you just want to nibble all over her! I was pouring some warm water on her belly and she just kept giggling and giggling. Nothing better than a nice, clean, lotioned up baby belly! I might not get to babysit though if Liz's mother comes into town, in which case she'll just let her mother take care of Lilly. If I get to watch her, I'll take some pictures and post them on here so you can see just HOW CUTE Lilly is.

Party...of 3

I had a get-together tonight which should've had more than 3 (including me) but it didn't work out. My friends Amy and Kristin came over we just ended up looking at their Europe travel pictures. It was fun but a little disappointing that more people didn't show up. Oh well. I had dip (thanks for the recipe, Faye!), sweet tea and muddy buddies to munch on. My friend, Kristin said that my sweet tea was the best she's ever had. She said that other sweet teas she's tried were way too sweet and this one was just right. :) This is why I think most people cringe when they hear the words sweet tea and grits--it's because when they try these things, they get people who don't know what the HECK they're doing and screw those things up so badly! No wonder people in the north seem to not like this stuff! They've had bad experiences! They need to just let me come on over to their house and fix them up some sweet tea and grits (with eggs and cheese all mixed up and put on top of toast)! Mmmmmmm!!!! Whenever I talk to someone and ask if they've ever had grits, they make a gag face and say that it's bland and has no taste. I tell them they just haven't had a real southern person make grits for them. They have be shown how it's done, am I right? ;)

It's hard to be "on" all the time..

I had to turn off the Paula Deen show today not because it disgusted me with how much butter she used but it was because of what she was making. She was making chocolate peanut butter cups in a blanket...with marshmallows. The blanket was puff pastry. Hello, my name is Jennifer and I am battling a peanut butter chocolate craving addiction.. Nothing tastes better than chocolate and peanut butter all mixed together, melted together, all of the above. Especially when you add puff pastry and marshmallows to the mix! Good lord, Paula! You're tryin' to kill me! My latest craze on my "free" days is s'mores, except for instead of just using plain chocolate, you put a reese's pb cup/bar segment in it. They now are making reese's candy bars--much easier for making these kinds of things!!! Arggghhh! I will say though that this week I've been doing VERY well. I went out with my friend, Karen to go pick up her daughter at the mall and the friends with her said that they wanted to go to DQ. You're thinking disaster, right? Nope. We pulled up to the drive thru and they took their orders and when Karen asked me if I wanted anything, I said no. She asked if I was sure and I said yes, I'm sure. I made it through a DQ trip without getting anything! There was all this pressure of everyone else getting a blizzard and a cone and I stuck to my guns and didn't order anything. I felt pretty accomplished. Also, today Kyle wanted to go out and get fast food for lunch and I didn't want to say no to him but I did anyway. I said that we really should stay in and eat what we've got. I did want to go out but I just knew that I'd be at a weak point today and actually give in and get something bad so the best solution was for us to stay in. I told him I didn't want to keep him from going and getting what he wanted but he decided to save the money. Good choice. :) That way I didn't have to sit there and smell what he was eating and be tortured. I've been hungry this week but I've been trying to go to the gym whenever I get the overwhelming urge to just eat whatever we have in the pantry. I've been grateful for the big box of individual sized popcorn bags in our pantry because I grab those whenever I feel too munchy. They're only 1 point per bag. They're my saving grace this week. It's so hard to be "on" all the time though. I'm trying not to let it get me down though. Gym is getting extremely boring to me no matter what I do. It's too hot to be outside lately for running. Once it cools down more, I'll get back to that but it's just so hard when everyone I see is not caring what they put into their mouths. My problem is that I care too much and I feel extremely guilty for indulging a little on a "non-free" day. I know I complain a lot about this stuff and I'm sorry if I bore my readers but there's only so much I can talk to Kyle about this too. I'm not even into coming up with new ways of exercising, it's so boring right now. I just know that I have to do it or else I pay for it later. This weight "issue" that I have (even though I've seemed to have licked it pretty good) is still haunting me. It's definitely an emotional problem that I have. Food comforts me even though I might not have any problems/stresses right now. For some reason, I just feel better with food and I have a lot of friends right now that don't understand that, except for the WW people. At the same time, I'm in better shape than they are so I feel like I can't really complain to them either even though I know we're all there at the meetings for a reason: FOOD. Why do I have to eat? Why can't I just detach myself from food and only look at it as an object with no comforting abilities--0nly the ability to make me satisfied from hunger? It's so weird! Maybe I should talk to my doctor about this and they might be able to shed some light on this. Maybe.


Okay, it's late for me. I'm starting to feel emotional because of the late-ness. Thanks for listening. :) I love you all!

Disappointing news

I just found out yesterday that I had to drop my Capstone class (the last class in the program) because apparently, they were monitoring the progress of the students in the program and saw that I was taking more classes alongside this course. You're not supposed to do that but I had classmates this past spring that were doing that and they were able to complete it. The professor/advisor emailed me last night and told me to drop the course ASAP. I promptly emailed him back and said what about my graduation papers being already approved? He had to sign those papers and I had clearly written on there my intentions of taking that class as well as 2 others. He signed the papers!! AND I had paid my graduation fee! I was afraid I was going to lose the money. He reassured me in a reply that I wouldn't lose my money and that it'd just be held onto until I was "really" ready to graduate. In response to the thing about other people getting to complete the course with other classes also, he said that it was a mistake...So, due to their mistake, I can't graduate this December like I had planned. I have to wait until spring. I was really angry at first but now I'm just a little disappointed. However, I keep trying to look on the bright side and think about how it'll probably easier to put more focus on my capstone paper next spring without having other classwork to worry about. *Sigh* the best laid plans...


Oh yeah, we're having to buy a new lawnmower. Our lawn hasn't been mowed in 2+ weeks. Ridiculous. It's gonna be murder.

Malad Gorge in Idaho

I'm standing on basalt rock (volcanic rock).

The sides of the gorge is made up of mainly basaltic rock.

Can't you tell how HOT it was out there just by looking at the picture? It's a bit overexposed.

This is the other side of the gorge that runs under the interstate bridge.

There's a sign we walked by that said "Please keep children under control. Dangerous cliff drops" or something to that effect. It was a bit scary to walk along the gorge because it looked as if one wrong step and you're falling into the gorge...

Back in the pioneer days, some outlaws escaped into the gorge to hide. A couple of them died and another got shot. The outlaws said that the gorge was lacking in food resources while they were hiding in there...well, duh. It still looks that way.

T-minus 3 classes left!

My class grades were posted today and the results are....Psycholinguistics: A...Applied Linguistics: B+. Now I only have 3 more classes to take this Fall and I'm done! Can't wait!


My arms are extremely sore. I think I overdid it at the gym yesterday. Too many chin dips and pull ups and bicep curls. Oopsy! It hurts to raise my left arm although now I just tried to and it's not as painful as it was this morning. I couldn't even do my running today (I tried) because it was jarring my arm/chest muscles too much so I did some brisk walking on a slight incline for about 20 minutes and then did the elliptical machine for 30. You know, throughout my exercising tonight, I kept thinking about the guy that went on the crazy rampage in the LA Fitness gym in PA. I kept thinking about what I would do if all of the sudden somebody came into our gym right then and went crazy with a gun. Luckily I was right next to an emergency exit so I think I could escape rather quickly but why would I even be thinking this? I hate it. It's such a morbid thought but I can't help it because things like that happen when you least expect it just like I'm sure those women in the salsa exercise class didn't expect it. I know this fear shouldn't consume my thoughts, and it doesn't, but I have to be more aware of my surroundings now. Thanks to the crazies out there. It's scary but I have to enjoy my life and not be paralyzed by fear or else I'll never leave my house.

Kyle is doing good. He's ready to be done with night shift, as you can imagine. I'm ready for him to be done with it too. Although sometimes it's nice to just be on my own sometimes at night. I do miss him at night though because my hearing is more alert when he's not here and I "hear" things that I might not normally when he's here. It is nice, however, to have the whole bed to myself. :) hahaha.


Oh! I need to post some pictures of a small road trip that we went on this past weekend. We went to Malad Gorge (about 1.5 hours east of Boise). It was pretty but it was also about 100 degrees outside so we didn't stay long.

Bookwormerific

I went to the BSU library today with Kyle to go pick up some books for my thesis this semester (well, it's technically called a "Capstone paper"). The professors don't call it a thesis for some reason but it's an article that could have the possibility for publication in hopes of turning us into doctoral students. Yeah right! Hell would have to freeze over before I became a doctoral student! I've put in enough time and punishment just getting this master's degree! :)

I got about 15 books or so to get me started. I'm brainstorming on possible topics and the topics are all sorta related but I just got to narrow it down and decide exactly what I'm going to cover in the actual paper. My two possible titles are: The Power of Monolingualism? (meaning, is there really power in only being monolingual?) OR The Politics of Monolingualism (meaning, what does it say about a society that enforces only one language on the people? i.e. the English-Only Movement). This is sorta what I've just become interested in throughout the course of acquiring my degree. I've witnessed ELL tutors (one, in particular, comes to mind) that have said to the children, "ENGLISH ONLY, PLEASE!!!" What kind of message is that sending to the kids? The kids pick up on that too because I've heard the kids repeat it even though their English is limited, they say it and once they realize it, they will then throw their own language/culture down the toilet and lose their roots. It's damaging. Anyway, I've got to narrow my search and figure out exactly how to address this issue. :)

Oh No!

We've been having a guy mow our lawn (front and back plus edging) for $15 each Wednesday. Well I've become extremely dependent on that and so this week was a train wreck for me when he didn't show up on the scheduled day!! I emailed him on Wednesday evening and got a response from him saying he was very sorry but his parents had been in town and Monday was their last day. He decided to play hookie and it put him back a day but he would be there the next day in the early afternoon. Well, Thursday came around and still a no-show (luckily we pay him by the day and not in advance) but still. Our lawnmower is on the fritz right now and we're relying heavily on his services to avoid having to pay a lot of money for repairs for now. So, I was thinking maybe he had too many clients and was so behind that it pushed him behind one more day. Well, here it is on a Friday night at about 11pm MDT and the lawn is still not mowed. Well, I waited til about 8pm tonight when it might be cooler and I tried to at least mow our backyard because that tends to grow the fastest. I got about a little less than half done and then all of the sudden the mower wouldn't start again after I emptied the grass bag for about the 3rd time. I could NOT get it cranked again at all. So, it looks like I will be waiting on this guy again. I guess I could borrow somebody else's mower but oh well.


Other than that, nothing much has been exciting here. I keep checking obsessively for my Praxis test scores online even though I know that it's nowhere near time for them to post the scores but back in my mind, I keep hoping they graded mine fast--silly, I know. I got a pedicure today with my friend, Karen. She took me for one for a belated birthday present. It was a very nice salon and spa near the mall area. It's called Viziato's. It was so fancy in that salon!!! I should've taken pictures but that might've come off as a bit tacky. :) Anyway, my toes are now poiple! It's definitely not a color I would normally choose and I've heard that if I ever wanted to go bold with a color on nails, put it on the toenails! My toes are about the same color as this print--except darker. :) I've gotten back into half marathon training and it's kicking my butt!

Argh..

Kyle and his friend just went to Jack in the Box for their "lunch" at midnight. The old me would've gone with them but I chose not to tonight but that makes it so much harder when they come back home with their goodies and are munching on them behind me as I write this.

That test was hard!

I had my test yesterday for the ELL certification. All I can say is that it was sooooo hard!! I finished about 15 minutes before the end of the testing session that was about 2 hours long. The test comprised of a listening section where we had to listen to sections of speech from English language learners and diagnose what their issues were with the language. That part was a little difficult because some of the speakers sounded really clear and spoke clearly to me but they might have had a slight issue with sounds. The next sections were teaching methods and theories and maybe a little bit of law-related material. By the end of the test, my head felt like it wanted to explode and I was really pissed off at the BSU ELL department because the 2 linguistics classes that I took didn't talk about any of the stuff that I encountered on the test!! It was a good thing that I even spent any time preparing for this test on my own because I would've been totally screwed had I not.

This week BSU is having a very important person coming to give a talk and his name is Peter McLaren. The professors have been hyping this man up so much the last few weeks. One lady in my test session asked me if I was going and she sounded so excited about it but I made up a white lie saying I wasn't going because I'm lazy and didn't want to do anything else this week after finishing up classes. Well my real reason for not going is the fact that I don't want to go to anything extra because it would show my support for this program that did not prepare me at all for this test and thanks to them also, that if I get an ELL job soon, I'm going to be so lost as to what to plan for these kids--I have no tools under my belt to plan fun activities to help these kids learn English and I will be jumping in cold turkey. I realize most education classes don't really prepare you for a lot but my undergrad classes actually taught me how to make lesson plans and even gave me some ideas as to what to do in planning language games. Anyway, I won't know my scores for a few weeks (about a month from now) and hopefully I passed it.

Tiger's going crazy right now...

I'm done with my classes for the summer.

Still have my paper to get done soon.

I have my ELL praxis exam on Saturday that determines if I get certified to teach the subject and hopefully I'll pass the first time around. Fingers crossed, please! :)

I'm tired and don't want to think anymore. I'm thinking about chopping off a lot of my paper that I've written so far because I'm just babbling simply because I got mad at the class and wanted to vent but I don't want to write too much to where the professor can't follow my point: my point that I'm trying to talk about is the way we use language to categorize people and how that's not technically fair because usually those categories aren't based on good things and just on preconceived judgments...but how can we get away from that? It's human nature to want to categorize by color, shape, size, gender, etc. It's confusing to me--we're supposed to treat everyone equal, yet not everyone is the same, but if we make notice of that, we're categorizing...and it just goes in circles from there! ARGH! BLAH!!! Anyway, that's what I want to talk about and I have a feeling my paper's gonna be chopped in half right now and I might have to start over and put more concise language and phrasing in there instead of rambling.


It's late. I'm getting up somewhat early tomorrow to go to weigh-in, I think and then I'm going to pick up a couple of friends at their training classes and we're going to lunch. Then I'm going to take the practice Praxis exam again and see how well I did on it. I only missed 17 out of 90 questions and if I do the simple division problem from that it means that I made an 81 on it but I know that's not how they score it, however, it made me feel good. :)


Oh yeah, I revisited my Body Attack class this evening. It about killed me. The instructor did say that this was a harder routine though and that it's real tough on endurance and range of motion and whatnot. Of course, that class has never been really easy either but I will say this--I didn't leave the room at all. In the past, I've always tried to conveniently miss one song routine to make the class "shorter" to me. This time, I stuck with it and stayed in there. Yeah, I'll probably be sore tomorrow but it'll be worth it. This Saturday will mark exactly 10 weeks before the City of Trees half marathon that I've signed up to do again this year. I've already begun training for it this week and so next week will be my 2nd week of training officially. I'll be looking forward to these next 10 pounds to drop off of me by the end of training (or sooner, hopefully). I think these last 10 pounds will be the last of my weightloss problems...I think I'll feel much better after that and I can just maintain my weight then and not feel so pressured. I don't want to get down way too low.

I guess that's about it.


Night, ya'll!

Correction...

It is now 106 degrees outside...

Hot, Hot, Hot!!!

It is so hot here right now!!! The high for today is supposed to be 101 according to the local newspaper. Usually the temperature here doesn't actually reach it's high until about now (4pm) or a little later but lately it's been about 88 degrees by about 12pm--that's HOT!!! I'm so wishin' for a pool right now. Maybe one day, I'll buy a blow-up kiddie pool and just sit in the water all day. Our poor flowers look so parched even when we do water them! I started feeling sorry for them just now and put out the sprinklers in the backyard. We hired a guy for $15 to mow our yard every Wednesday because it was just getting so hard for me to do it. I was so fed up with doing it. So, we decided to let someone else suffer--haha.


I have a partner from class coming over tonight so we can work on our project that's due on this coming Thursday. Hopefully we can get it done or pretty close to being done tonight. Wish us luck!

Long week of class

I just got done with one long week of class. The class actually lasts 2 weeks and it's only Monday through Thursday but the class lasts from 11:30am-4pm. It's LOOOOONG. The professor is one that I don't particularly care for because of his opinions. He's rather harsh sometimes and very intense. Since I've had him before though, I knew sort of what to expect and readied myself for it so I wouldn't get so offended this time. Well...guess what? He managed to offend me but this time I was able to keep control of myself and even though I was angry, I tried to let go. This time he decided he would talk about the series "Twilight". If ya'll have been paying attention, then you know that I'm quite obsessed with it mainly because it's a fun storyline and I like the characters (namely the leading vampire...hehehe). Anyway, he said that he rented the movie the other night because it was a movie he wouldn't typically rent. He said he enjoyed it. It was fun. Then something possessed him all of the sudden and he said that he was offended by it. DO YOU KNOW WHY????? Because he said, "My people weren't represented." My people meaning the Latino/as. What the heck????? I immediately fired back with something like, "Did it have to include Latino/as to be a complete story?" He said yes and that it didn't show any representation and that was racist. Then people in the class (who haven't even read/watched the movie or any of the books) started chiming in. Now, if I hadn't read any of the books or seen the movie, I would feel as if I had no part in a discussion about the series. Anyway, everyone was confirming or agreeing to this bullcrap that the book was racist in that it criminalizes the dark-skinned people (the Native Americans are beasts who have uncontrollable tempers and the only black person in the movie just happened to be a bad vampire). I got so upset with what was being said about this and I just felt like screaming but I just had to keep my mouth shut because I wasn't going to win since I was a white girl. The professor was saying that this particular interpretation could be debated depending on which side you look at it from. Obviously since I'm white, I'm not gonna see the "oppressive, racist" nature of the series. The author, Stephenie Meyer, is Mormon and apparently her faith had influenced her in writing this story. I read somewhere that according to the Mormon faith, the people of color had the mark of Caine on them and in order to save their souls, they would have to marry a white person to cleanse themselves and their offspring would lighter skin--therefore, cleansing them. Or something like that. So, in this series of stories, it's all about how the pale, beautiful vampires are the utmost in beauty and everyone wants to be like that. I also read that Stephenie Meyer was trying to watch out for racism in her book by not necessarily saying the skin was white but "diamond" colored. Anyway....all this aside, I was so mad that people who hadn't even read these books were making accusations and presumptions that they didn't have anything to back it up with. I was mad also because they were taking the joy out of a harmless story (in my opinion) and this series of stories made me start to read again for leisure. How dare they take that away from me and turn it into racist, white power material!!?? Does that make me a racist for enjoying the story line? I think not. Not every story has to have every nationality under the sun to be "complete". In fact, the stories I've been reading for him don't always include anglos so can I call him on that? No, because I'm white and I'm always represented. What a CROCK OF......


*sigh* Well, that's what I've been dealing with so far this week. I've got a project due next Thursday for the last day of class and a paper also. I probably won't be updating til after that but I will be sure to let you know what kind of other ridiculous argumentative debates we come across between now and then. :)

Holy Bladders, Batman!!

Lately I've been so unmotivated to start back up with my "strict" food watching but now that I've registered myself for the City of Trees half marathon again, I guess I need to get into gear now. I've started my gallon of water per day regimen just yesterday and I'm about to burst at the seams every 20-30 minutes at the very most. Most of the time, it happens at the most inopportune times such as sitting in class (the professor probably thinks I'm trying to ditch his class all the time) or after I've got a full cart at the grocery store. That happened yesterday and I just had to check out (very hurriedly) and shove the cart in a corner next to the restroom and run in. If I keep this up, I may just float away or my body will get used to it and I won't be in agony anymore.


Ugh..anyway. I've got about 4 pages done on my paper and I'm thinking I'll get about a couple more pages squeezed out and that'll do. :)

What happens in Vegas...and in Milford...

My attempt at gambling (with a dollar)...

Sadly, I did not win anything...I ended up losing a dollar. :(

With the parents!

Grandpa, Kyle, me, and Grandma out on the front lawn.

Happy 27th Birthday to me! :)


The Las Vegas Airport was a sight to be seen--slot machines EVERYWHERE!! I tried one just so I could say that I gambled in Vegas. Unfortunately, I didn't win any huge fortune. Darn it! Kinda sad, huh?

The trip to Milford, IN was great! It was nice seeing most of the family for the holiday weekend. We got to relax a lot and not worry about a whole lot. We also ate way too much on the 4th of July--well, at least I did. I felt like puking later that night and ended up taking 4 pepto-bismol tablets to ease the food-induced nausea. ICK! Overall though, it was wonderful and I hope to see the Brown clan sometime soon again!

I also got to see Chris one more time before he leaves for his 13 week bootcamp in San Diego...I'm sad. I couldn't get enough hugs from him before he left Monday night from Grandma's and Grandpa's. I cried a little later that night after we went to bed. He'll be fine though. I know he will. He's a strong person but that doesn't change me thinking about the little baby brother with white blonde, curly hair and a snot bubble being blown out his nose from a sneeze into playdough...

I love you, Chris.

Gotta get started

I had class yesterday and Friday. It's time to start getting my paper ready and finished (hopefully) before next class weekend (July 10th-11th). Now, I'm ready for summer classes to be done but I must say that classes in the summer are nice because I don't have anything else to worry about really. The only thing is the motivation factor but it's not too hard if I'm not teaching/subbing now. :)


We leave for IN on early Friday morning and will get to Chicago, Midway airport around 1pm. Then it's driving all the way to Milford from there. My guess is we'll be getting to Milford around early dinner time or very late afternoon. It'll be fun! I can't wait! I have a couple recipes that I'd like to make while over there for dinner and possibly something for the 4th. :)

Why is it always the ugly ones?

I went with Kyle to his thesis meeting at BSU today since he just wanted the company. I did some computering in the lab while he had his meeting with the professor. When he came to get me, we were about to leave when he realized he forgot something. I was just wandering/loitering in the hall while he ran back to the prof's office and while I was waiting, I saw a strange sight. There was this rather homely looking woman walking down the hallway in a one-piece dress toward me. Without staring and gawking, I casually looked her up and down as her back was facing me. Well, I thought something was a bit masculine about her and I was thinking how unfortunate it was to be that masculine looking when it hit me....it was a man. Just to be sure though, he-she walked back by me and I looked at the arms and the calves and yes, they were very man-ish. Also, he-she was thinning in the hair at the back of the head. He-she hadn't quite mastered the "feminine" walk and so he-she was just loping along the hallway. Those poor ballerina flat shoes were so not made for man feet! They were so stretched out of shape and all strained looking. It was definitely an interesting sight and if I had been tacky enough, I would've taken a picture but I guess I'm not trashy enough. hahaha.

Anyway, so when Kyle and I were clearly out of the building and headed back to the car, I asked him if he had seen this person. He did not but he had heard of a professor that was currently transitioning from a man to a woman and he was gradually starting that process by taking hormones and whatnot. He had been told by one of his professors during a class about this guy so that there were no surprises and extra, unnecessary talking in the building. Kyle said he wished he would've seen this person and that he's sorry he missed out on this opportunity to catch a glimpse of this "transitioning" professor. But seriously, why do these very masculine-looking, blocky males feel as though they need to be turned into women? Why can't they just be gay? I don't understand this concept of suddenly changing your sex. I mean, I feel bad for them because I know it is a feeling that you get early in life (or maybe later in life, who knows) that you're different but I mean, what about going to the bathroom? Do you go into your "real" bathroom, i.e. would this professor be expected to go into the men's room? Or would "he" go into the women's room? What would be considered appropriate for someone like that? Especially since people know that he IS a man...I wouldn't feel really comfortable with a male coming into the women's room but at the same time, other men probably wouldn't feel right for a "woman" to come into the men's room? So, why don't they just be gay and stay their own sex? And then, these people who change what they are, if they're still interested in the opposite sex, how do they deal with that? This is something I'm going to have research about and find out how these people deal with certain predicaments. It's intriguing but I know it's probably a pretty painful process for all who are involved, not to mention the person to whom this identity crisis is happening...I guess though, it's better that we allow these people who feel tortured in the bodies that they're in find who they really are and who they really want to be because if we turn them away and ridicule them for what they feel, that too can cause pain and oftentimes, these people feel so horribly about themselves that they end their life. It's a sad situation but I'm willing to open my mind and accept these people for who they are (even though it's weird, strange and unfamiliar to me).

Book Club!

Last Monday I started this book club thing with a fellow classmate from my children's literature class. She works with the state department of education in the literacy department. I had told her that I was possibly looking for a small job in the summer to make some pocket money. She asked me to do this book club thing for pay since I was a certified teacher and what we do is go to a local library and read a chapter book to kids and do activities with this book. The book we're doing right now is Moonlight on the Magic Flute. It's a pretty cute book and it's a quick read for me so that I can get ahead at least 2 chapters from the kids. My predictions are that this book is going to introduce the young Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. We've already met "Wolfie" in Austria. I don't know exactly what's gonna happen, I just know right now that the 2 children, Jack and Annie have to use the magic flute that they've been provided by Merlin and their mission from Merlin is to help a brilliant artist bring happiness to people all over. My guess is that they are going to make "Wolfie" famous. I'll let you know if my predictions turn out true. :)

5k done!

I'm done with the 5k! It was actually shorter than the normal 3.1 or so miles because somebody put a marker in the wrong place. So the race ended up being about 2 miles or so. I was feeling like the race was a little shorter than normal. I finished in 20 minutes and some change. I guess if the race was its normal length, it probably would've been about 30 minutes, since when I workout and train, I usually run 10-11 min/mile. I got done about 9am and the awards ceremony wasn't going to happen until about 11:30 and I didn't want to stick around for that long so I left with my friend, Karen and we went to McDonald's. I almost feel like I should go running again today to finish up my 5k. My body feels a little short-changed. Hahaha! I guess now it's time to start training for a half marathon! I want to be able to run the whole thing by October!

Another new 'do yet...

Yesterday at Fantastic Sam's (my normal hair salon) was having a killer sale! Haircut, blowdry, style and 7 foil highlight for $35!!! Best deal I've seen there! I decided to partake because normally just a highlight job is $30 alone! It was my first time getting professional highlights and I love them! Also love my new haircut. I'm wanting my hair in one of those A-line cuts where the front of my hair is a little longer and an angle in the front and the back is stacked (shorter and layered for texture). It feels good to have short hair again! I love this hair. I have to use a straightening iron though to make the front lay down right. That's the only thing but it doesn't take too long to do that.