I'm so excited! Jeff and I used to walk to these when we lived in Ypsi Township and when there were fireworks.  Now, we can't walk there, but we are still going to go.

In other news, I still have all of my teeth, at least for two more weeks.  They were honestly going to pull my tooth (in the front of my mouth) and have me walk around like a fool for 6 weeks while the gum healed.  Uh, no thanks.  Ghetto Dentist is going to make me a "flipper" (that is a fun word to say...say it over and over! It's fun!) which is like a retainer, but with a fake tooth on it.  I can put the retainer over the hole in my mouth while I wait for the gum to heal and the permanent bridge to be made. 

Fortunately, the dead tooth has stopped hurting.  Unfortunately, a molar on the other side of my mouth is now hurting, I think in protest to being used so much these past few weeks.  Fortunately, I won't have a hole in my mouth.  Unfortunately, I have to take a day off of school to get this done.  Fortunately, I will get some groovy drugs after the tooth is pulled, so I won't care about missing school or anything else!  It's all good.

If nothing else, I accomplished something today:  I fixed a Perkins Brailler.  None of the keys could be pressed, which is a huge problem.

Braillers look like old-fashioned manual typewriters, only they have nine keys:  a "return" key (it drives the kids crazy when I use that old-school term :)), a backspace key, a space key and the six keys that make up the dots that make up Braille.  If you take out the five million screws on the bottom, the little plate comes off and you can see the insides of a Perkins Brailler (named for the Perkins School for the Blind, a $30,000+/year school in MA that once upon a time educated Annie Sullivan).  I fiddled around and thoink! out came a bead.  I wiggled the keys and sure as shit, they were working again.  I asked the student about the bead and he said something about a cousin making necklaces.  Good grief!  So now I have 3 working braillers again.  I am beyond thrilled.

In other good news, our annual birds have babies again!  Every year, the same bird family (I am delusional convinced) comes back to our house and makes a nest in the same spot.  Normally, they bring some friends, but I guess the friends are summering some place else.  Anyway, they built their nest and have been busy flitting around the past few days.  When I was outside getting laundry this evening, I heard the distinct "tweet" of baby birds.  Marvelous! I love spring time!  I just hope that the birds don't fall out of the nest.  That happened two years ago.  Buddy found them, naturally, so I had Jeff scoop them up and I put them in a nest that I made out of a Leopold's six-pack box.  They huddled together, but something found them the next day and ate them.  I had Jeff get the box down and we had a funeral for them wherein I said the Jewish prayer for the dead (that I grabbed on the internet) and they went to their eternal reward.  I think that sometimes, you can't save something, and all you can do is make them comfortable at the end.  I hope I did that.

The newspaper was all acquiver over some special ed rules changes.  Most of the really silly ones were dropped, thankfully.  But I decided to look at the rest of them and to my, uh, shock & awe, I noticed that they wanted to monkey with the VI teachers.  I ran around like a crazy person (well, ran around the 'net) only to learn that right now, we can have "no more" than 8 students in our room if we are a classroom teacher (like I am) and no more than 10 on our caseload if we are a teacher consultant.  The new rules will make teacher consultants responsible for no more than 12.  Goodness! I'd hate to see the papers if something REALLY awful was about to happen!  Interestingly though, I learned that the teachers of the hearing impaired are limited to no more than 7 kids.

We have our final field trip of the year tomorrow at the Visions Conference up at WCC.  I am meeting the kids up there because I have quite the day planned--my tooth is coming out at 2pm.  That tooth has been causing me endless problems and I finally got fed up and called my ghetto dentist.  The ghetto dentist (not cuz he's IN the ghetto, but because his office looks like it flew in from post-WWII Berlin) had scheduled me for an August extraction.  August?!? I called in APRIL, friends.  So I called today to fuss, and actually got an appointment for tomorrow! I'm beyond thrilled!  I'm eating up a storm today because I know that I won't feel like it tomorrow when I am walking around looking like a hillbilly with no tooth.

At long last, my income tax refund from the city of Detroit arrived.  It is for $31, which will likely be spent on beer in the next few days.  You see, when I realized that this bounty was coming my way, I immediately earmarked it for beer.  I look at it as a gift* from the city of Detroit for teaching its children. You're welcome, my fair city.  You are welcome indeed.

(*Yes, I know it's an overpayment and not a gift, as such.  I need little fantasies in my head to keep it going.)

So far, this has been a lovely weekend.  Last night was the Ride Around Town and all the fun that brings.  Bitches--the mayor rode with us!!! The motherfuckin' MAYOR!! That was SO AWESOME!!  I got to meet the Mayor!  He was very nice and friendly.  I've always voted for him, but he doesn't know that.  As I biked home, I crossed the street (after it cleared) on a red and thought cockily, "Go ahead and ticket me, bastards.  I know People now."  Hee hee. 

It was really cool!  I got to meet some of my ArborUpdate peeps and that was way cool.  Also, the famous Dave was there!  We just needed the Kitchen Chick and we could have had teh Ann Arborz famous bloggers!  That would have been sweet, I gotta say. 

At the end of the ride, we got cheese from the Get Downtown folks.  Yum! I avoided the goat cheese (because as we know, I think goat cheese tastes like sweaty ball sacks), but the brie and the cheddar ROCKED.  Then I picked up burritos from BTB and brought them home to Jeff.  I was tired (but had accumulated about 19 WW activity points :)) and promptly went to bed after I made banana bread for my mother's day lunch.

I dragged my ass out of bed to help with the Project Grow plant sale today.  Beforehand, I ran through the farmers' market.  Holy shit--there is a lot more stuff there at 8am as opposed to 2pm.  Very lovely.  Then Mom came over and I fed her my semi-famous mac'n'cheese (featured at all dinner parties), spinach and the banana bread.  Buddy got lots of pets and lovin', so he was happy.  After Gramma left, Buddy and his momma took a lovely nap. 

I hope everyone is having a good weekend!!

It is apparently teacher and nurse (go tiffofirechick go!) appreciation week!  I kinda think of every day that I get my paycheck and no pink slip as "teacher appreciation week", but whatever. 

So far, I have received:
1) The biggest piece of shit "electronic desk calendar" from our parent organization.  Seriously, someone took a dump in a box, slapped a calendar face on it and that was that.  I just cracked up when I saw it in my mailbox.  I have a student (a.k.a. my Retirement Plan) who inquired about it and I promptly gave it to him.  Undoubtedly, he will sell it for $500.
2) Some rose-scented body butter from the school...it's a little strong, but very pretty.  It will help drown out the pee smell in my class.  Have I mentioned that? The pipe from the boys' bathroom runs through our classroom and along about 12:30 every day, the back of the room smells like pee.  Fortunately, I can easily scoot my chair to where the kids sit and avoid the odor.
3) A cute little leather bound notepad with my school's name on it from the student council.  Sweet.
4)  The best was from the kiddos...the art teacher had them make cards for their homeroom teachers.  Obviously, the word "appreciate" had to be used a minimum of two times because they made sure to mention that they really appreciate me and appreciate all I do for them :) Awww....!!!
5) My gift to myself:  another personal day tomorrow! I know. I am really a horrible teacher.  Honestly, in 3 years of teaching I can count my absences on one hand. 

Another reason for a "sleep until noon, sit on my ass all day"  day personal day is that we had a field trip today and as we know, field trips make me tired.  We went downtown and made ceramics.  Of course, my 6th grade girl "sculpted" the infamous "Huck" (okay, his real name is Hunter) and, since she finished early, his younger brother "Shay".  I do wish you could see Huck...sooooo clueless.  It really is darling.  Sadly, Hunter "graduates" from the 8th grade and onto high school in just a few short weeks.  Happily, his younger brother is only in 5th grade so he'll be around in the fall.  If possible, he is even denser than Huck.

For my part, I sculpted a heart with our room number and names on it and Mr. Peoples sculpted an ashtray, complete with a pipe and a cigarette.  Quite stylish, even though smoking is bad for you.  Another student (totally blind, and not mine) sculpted about the most phallic looking "fountain" that I've ever seen.  All he has to do is hook up some sort of pearly-creamy dispenser and make it shoot out from it and my retirement plan student could sell it for about a thousand dollars at some porn shop.

and I am glad!  I have 3 personal days and have taken none and they go bye-bye if I don't take them by the end of the year.  The teachers at my school tend to squirrel away their days and take them all in June, but I think that's bullshit.  What, 10 weeks of vacation isn't enough for you?!?! Sheesh.  That is why people accuse teachers of being lazy or, as one columnist said, "teaching is just welfare for adults".  (Seriously...I forget the dude's name, but he basically said that anyone who teaches is just collecting the checks. If I can remember his name, I'm going to find him, rip off his head, and shit down his neck.  Don't tell my kiddos that I said that--I'm quite gentle and loving when I am being Teacher Patti.  But as we know, when West-Side Patti be comin' out...watch it!)

I am going to spend the day with my wonderful Jeff (who also took today off) and Buddy.  Law & Order comes on at 2 and 3 and I can't wait!  That is my perfect day...sleeping in with the family, watching L&O reruns and perhaps napping.  I am a simple soul.

I'm just trying new things left and right, aren't I? I made a wonderful strawberry-rhubarb crisp this weekend.  It was goooooooo-ooooood!  I had to make a recipe from Animal, Vegetable, Miracle for my book club, and I picked that.  I wasn't sure I'd like it, but I really did! 

Pictures from NYE 2008 (oops, at first I typed "3008") are FINALLY up at my Flickr account, if anyone cares to look at them. Remember--the camera adds 10 pounds.

I was one of those very picky eaters as a child.  My poor mother had a heck of a time trying to get me to eat new things. I still specifically remember when she fed me lamb and told me it was beef.  Uh, no. I spit it right out.  I know she tried asparagus with me, and I'm sure I reacted similarly.  (This kind of behavior may be a clue to you as to why I am an only child.  :) )

Anyway, I picked up some asparagus from the farmers' market today and it wasn't half bad.  I had a recipe for asparagus sandwiches (good bread, olive oil, asparagus, cheese and then broil until the cheese melts) and it was rather tasty.  Also, everything except the olive oil was local! Go, me!

I bought a bunch of stuff at the market today...onions, potatoes, spinach, basil, cilantro...now I have to figure out what to do with it this week!  I also saw my garden plot for the first time.  It's, uh, big.  I will need lots and lots and lots of help with this one, since I tend to kill plants. Speaking of killing things, I so far have not killed my worms in my worm bin! They look happy (as happy as worms can look) and I chatted with them for a bit, explaining that I was moving their home to another spot and that I hoped they liked it). 

In other news, Jeff and I had a blast at our MST3k meet up last night!  I can't believe that that show started 20 years ago...!!!!  We watched The Day the Earth Froze and, true to its title, earth did freeze, but not until the very end.  Until then, we had to endure a guy dressed up like a bear looking like a fool a dancing bear, a wicked witch and Sampo.  If you do not know what a Sampo is, don't worry...neither did we.

I have added a goal to my list (refresher for those who aren't keeping track and Jebus Crips, that's everyone!:  *can as much as possible during this harvest season [with the ultimate goal of one day putting away as much as we need for the winter], *use a worm compost bin [done! the little dudes are happily living in my backyard in their little container, munching on some lettuce], *learn to sew, *develop some sort of greywater system for my runoff greywater, * learn to parallel park [consistently on this list since I was 18).

Given that gas prices are about $50,000 per gallon (oh, not that much? sry), I am trying a new "only drive to school" goal.  I figured it out, and 20 minutes of each working day pays for my gas to and from school, which isn't so bad.  I am trying to ride my bike everywhere around town, and on Monday I walked up to the drugstore when Jeff needed some Claritin and today I rode my bike to Morgan & York to get some bread for dinner.  We'll see how this goes.  I'm am basically lazy, but I will try my best.

I did find a GREAT MOTHERFUCKING GOAL people!  I am reading Animal, Vegetable,  Miracle and it's pretty good.  I am reading it for my Slow Food Huron Valley book club (which all of my local friends should join...for real), after putting it off for several months. I was afraid that it was be elitist--I mean, come on, Barbara Kingsolver has a shitload of money from her books and her husband is a college professor--but she's refreshingly down to earth!  Go, Barbara, you go!  (I must admit that a major fault of mine is that I tend to get irritated by folks like that...I mean, if I had a shitload of money from my books and my husband was a college professor, well shit--I could can and garden all the time, too! But it's not like that and I'm liking it in spite of myself.)

Anyway, my girl Barbara turned 50 while she was writing the book and talked about having a huge ass party for herself.  Sistah invited 150 guests.  Jesus!  That's awesome!  So I started thinking and decided that I'd like to have 150 people to invite to my 50th birthday party.  I'm 36, and I keep in contact with every person I've ever met (which can be either very cute or very annoying) so this is feasible.  So please mark the calendar for 3-17-22. Thanks.

In other news, we had a fabulous field trip to Wild Swan Theater today.  They kinda specialize in special ed kids, and had sign language interpreters on the stage, and had little headsets for my kids so that they could hear the director narrating the action in the story. They let us come on stage afterwards and have a "touch tour" and everyone in the cast was awesome!  We then had lunch at the student center and got to see a "real college bookstore".  They were shocked and appalled that you have to buy your books in college.  We also found out that you have to buy your cap and gown for graduation.  That was a new one to me!  On the way back, before the kids all crashed out in their seats, the subject of my hair came up. For some ungodly reason, it fascinates them. I happened to take out my scrunchie and they marveled that "Ms. MST3k's hair is down!"  I was advised that I should get braids in my hair, which led to a discussion on white chick hair vs. black chick hair.  Nonetheless, the girls insisted that I get my hair braided.  Too, too fun!

Reason #1:
The kids get orientation and mobility services about once a week.  Since the weather is nice, they have been going outside.  Today, they brought me back these:

                        

One of the boys was so cute...he had them behind his back so I did the Mom thing and pretended not to notice until he gave them to me.

Reason #2:
30 more school days until summer break :) :) :)

Once again, I shamelessly copy from the badmovie and booniverse worlds!  I have three books that I've been meaning to review. While I do read books quite quickly, I did not read all of these this past week.

We had a lovely weekend around here!  Jeff & I went to Frankenmuth on Friday evening so that I could go to the Ragtime Festival.  I absolutely love that era and its music.  They have a sing-a-long (Jeff didn't sing, but I did.  I'm sure that you'all were cringing as my voice rang out across the land :)) and show silent movies. As I'm sure I've said before, I love silent movies.  They had one from 1902 that was, well, a guy in a pig suit.  But it was funny, I swear. Another one from 1902 had a guy get a clarinet stuck in his head.  Pure genius, honest. 

I have been going to Frankenmuth since I was a fetus, I guess you could say, given that my mom went there when she was pregnant with the magical lump of cells that, upon its first breath outside the womb, became me.  One of the great things about Frankenmuth is that it really hasn't changed, even after all of these years.  The city where I grew up has changed beyond recognition and most of my childhood places are gone.  Frankenmuth, however, has stayed relatively similar.  I have wonderful memories of my mom taking me out of school early so that we could drive up to Zehnders with my grandma.  We have pictures of me standing in front of Zehnders in pigtails and I could, if I wanted to, reenact that exact same picture today.  It's a lovely thing.

Anyway, for the first time ever, I didn't get the famous chicken dinners; instead, Jeff and I hit the Black Forest brewery.  That was some good beer, folks!  For dessert, I got a scoop of vanilla ice cream and dumped the raspberry lambic beer over it.  Can't beat that with a stick.  After dinner, we drove into town and walked around a bit.  Since we had time to kill, I dragged Jeff to the Frankenmuth Museum.  I didn't realize that the original settlers came there to force the Native Americans into Christianity, so I fussed at the little statues that spoke to us about this.  Then I questioned aloud why no Jews or people of color were included in the founding of the town, and Jeff made me be quiet before I got us kicked out.  I do admire their self-sufficiency though...the town was determined to be self-reliant from the first.  Good for it.  As gas prices rise, I hope that our little town of A2 will adopt a similar self-sufficiency, only without the mandatory conversion to Christianity thing.

At the end of the self-guided museum tour, I bought some handmade soap that I found in the gift shop.  The cashier told me that there was a famers' market the next day, and that's all I needed to hear.  I dragged my ass up the next day and drove the 1.5 miles into town.  It was a sweet little market...I got some eggs, some honey butter (that was too rich for me, so I gifted it to my pal, cherydactyl), potato seeders for my garden (the farmer was way helpful and assured me that I could really grow my own potatoes) and, on a whim, rhubarb.  It just looked so pretty! From the same lady, I got the most AWESOME fruit spread, made from raspberries and rhubarb. I made pancakes this morning and put it on top and it was the yummy.

On the way home from the 'muth, Jeff and I stopped at Westwind Milling, where I stockpiled some flour.  I think the cashier (sweet kid...only his second day at work) was completely flustered by my huge purchase.  Either that, or he thought I was some crazy survivalist stockpiling flour until doomsday, when I would sell the flour for large sums of gold. 

Once you use their flour, though, you can't go back.  I swear it's got something magical in it.  I also got some cornmeal and rice.  I love that place!!

I then dragged Jeff to the Ann Arbor Farmers' Market where I got black walnuts.  Have you ever had black walnuts?  We broke the nut cracker on the damn things.  Come to find out, they have like the hardest shells known to man and can only be opened by special nutcrackers or--no kidding--hammers and chisels.  Huh.  If I ever get them open, I'm sure they will be delicious.

To round out our culinary weekend, I made a cheeseburger pie for dinner.  This is straight from Betty Crocker's 1960 cookbook and friends, there ain't nothing healthy about this lovely dish.  There is lard (well, Crisco shortening) in the crust (but made with oh-so-yummy Westwind flour), a pound of beef, 1/2 pound of cheese (mixed with egg and milk) but BOY OH BOY is that some good cheeseburger pie! 

In sum, I have some questions:
1) What can I do with fresh rhubarb?
2) Other than latkes, does anyone have any other ideas on using potatoes as a main dish?
3) How the FUCK am I gonna open those damn walnuts?!?!?!?!??!

Holy MOSES my class is crazier than bedbugs.  I mean that in a good way.  You see, all year we've been having Friday Movie Day.  I couldn't get a kid to do his homework, and I came up with the brilliant idea of paying the kids who do do (hee hee, I said "do do") their homework with "checks" and having them put their "checks" in "bank accounts".  For some ungodly reason, they loved this idea and really got into it.  I even got my one kiddo to homework about 80% of the time, so it's all good.  And, I sneak in little lessons about interest, taxes and so on. It's win-win.

Anyway, I realized that just banking money would get boring, so I have them "buy" their way into Friday movies.  Friday movies serve two points--the kids get to chill, and I get to work on stuff for next week's lessons.  Again, win-win. 

All week they've been asking me to get the Bee Movie for Friday.  So, I dragged my ass to the video store on Wednesday and rented the DVD.  I plopped it into the DVD player on Friday and started writing up homework assignments for next week.  Suddenly, I realized that heads were drooping, eyes were closing, etc.  I woke them up and asked them to please stay awake, as this was their treat and I really can't have them sleeping in class.  (There are several reasons for this, not the least of which is that I would die if the principal walked in and saw that.  The principal did not a special ed class in "her" school and tried to put us out both before and after schools started last fall--long story--and I just know she would somehow make a scene if she happened in and they were all in La-La Land). 

A few minutes later, they were all half-asleep again.  I got a little snippy, I'm not proud to say.  I said, "Okay guys--if you don't want to watch this, we'll just do math."  That woke them up--they were like, "Cool! Can we do more fractions?" And these dudes were SERIOUS. 

So, I turned off the DVD player, flicked on the lights, got my lower functioning & total blind student on his little basic math set up and off we went.  They were so into it that we made it through turning mixed fractions into improper fractions and vice-versa and how to multiply fractions.  They were as eager as lambs and it was just so bizarre.  I told them that I loved them, but they were crazy kids, which delighted them.  Then, since I felt bad about getting snippy, I gave them each a giant Pixie Stick to take home.  I admonished them that they couldn't eat them in class cuz then they'd spaz out and give me a headache, but to enjoy them over the weekend.

Has there ever been a class that would rather do fractions than watch a movie??? I'm not complaining here, mind you...it's just funktacular.

In other news, Jeffy and I got back from a trip to Frankenmuth, two farmers' markets and a flour mill.  More to come!

Momma left the computer on in our room, so I am using it!  There are so many cool doggie sites! I have looked at some hot Jack Russell-on-Jack Russell action great cartoons for doggies and also some education sites as well! Oh boy! That is my favorite thing!

Before she left for WORK this morning, my momma told me she was feeling happier.  That's good!  I saw her at 1am when I woke her up by tapping her on the arm when I couldn't get under the blanket.  She wasn't so happy then! And I saw her at 5am when I threw up and Daddy woke up and said, "Buddy's throwing up." By the time Momma put on her glasses and saw me, I had eaten my throw up, which I thought would save her the hassle of cleaning it. Oh boy! Was it ever good!  Momma put a towel over the spot and went back to bed! I love eating throw up! It's my favorite thing!

Anyway, I have been thinking about my Momma being crabby yesterday.  I think her problem is that she was a "goth" kid in her formative years and  never got out of it.  She tended to feel the world's pain then and now.  For example, when she hears of a doggie getting hurt or being neglected, she gets really sad.  She also feels bad about the economy because lots of people are suffering! That's my least favorite thing! And my mom gets sad, too. She said that when she gets gas for her CAR near WORK she sees that people only put in $5 or so because that's all they can afford.  And someone at her WORK had to return a bunch of bottles and cans to afford gas.  Momma was really sad.  Momma is really really sad when she sees people like that asshole who was driving in front of her in Ann Arbor yesterday.  The woman, Momma said, was the typical housewife with the "holy shit my husband might trade me in for a younger model" fake hairdo, on the cell phone, drinking Starbucks and ignoring her kids while driving in her huge luxury SUV.  The woman just had her stupid DVD on for the kids and was just chatting on her cell the whole time.  Momma is bothered by things like this, even though she knows she shouldn't be, because it's just not fair!  How come this lady gets a life of luxury while the parents of Momma's kids have to struggle?  It makes Momma sad.

See, like I said, Momma feels the world's pain!  I don't though--I am a carefree Jack Russell terrier with a great life!  And guess what?  Momma bought a HAMMOCK yesterday! Oh yes oh yes!  I can't sit in it, but I can sit out with her while she swings in it.  That's my favorite thing!  

Well, I see the my girl and nextdoor neighbor, Georiga, has barked me an email!  My favorite thing! Time to sneak outside for some lovin'! My favorite thing!

I love you all!
Buddy

I am in a bad mood for absolutely no reason.

That is all.

For all of my local peeps...
...I mistakenly bought unsalted Calder Dairy butter.  I have tried and tried to like it, but I just can't.
Anybody want it? Practically the whole tub is left.  Just let me know!

Sometimes, a teacher must crush dreams.  It is inevitable.  I have a student who is a born entrepreneur and who I jokingly call "My Retirement Plan".  Kiddo is talking about the big house he'll have one day, his superfly clothes, the car he will drive when he gets older (he is just low vision and might pass a driving test...hell, I'm sure there are worse drivers on the road!!).  For some UNGODLY REASON, our art teacher told him if he becomes a car designer, he will make $400,000 per year.  That really pissed me off because while I believe in supporting my kiddos, I also believe in being realistic. I have been trying to convince him that $40,000 for a car designer--or any job for that matter--is pretty darn good these days.

To enforce this point, we did a mega-story problem today, where we looked to see what a $30,000 per year salary could buy.  We took out taxes and figured in for rent, car payment, gas, food, electricity (I forgot to include insurance, oops) and he ended up with about $35 per month leftover. Needless to say, I think I crushed my little man.  I also--gently--reminded him that in most jobs, you only get a week or two of vacation (this was in response to some light whining that summer break is "only 77 days" when it "should" be 90.)  I suggested being a teacher if he wanted more time off, but he quickly disabused me of this notion :)

Anyway, he recovered enough to decide to clean the blackboards at the end of the day (I didn't ask and indeed, those poor little boards have not been cleaned all year).  I gave him a giant pixie stick and some chocolate Chex mix to take home.  All was good in the world.

Oh, the reason this is titled "Law Manifesto" is that I stumbled upon this while I was cleaning out my Word files.  Some of you have seen this before, but I think it's a real treat (she said modestly).  I wrote it in response to my experience in the legal world and, while it is quite cynical, I thought it was what SHOULD be taught in law school.  Because really, all of that shit about Torts and Civil Procedure went in one ear and out the other.


Have a happy evening!

We had a fabulous weekend at my house!  Friday night found me at the Slow Food dinner at the Unitarian Church.  I felt very loved, as I knew several people there, three of whom asked me to eat with them.  I was delighted to eat with my friend Kim with whom I discussed the possibility of a summer ladies' tea (with booze) party for the BLOGGERS!  How fun! As we know, I love hosting parties, so....

On Saturday, Jeff & I made our annual pilgrimage to the Smithee Awards!  I got to see my peeps, including booniverse, badmovie, MattQ (who I do not think has a LJ?) and I FINALLY FINALLY AT LONG FREAKING LAST got to meet my girl***, lunargeography in person!!!  YAY! It was an awesome show, srsly, as the LOL cats say.  Speaking of which, there was a lovely clip from a show called Corspegrinder which was about cats eating food made out of people--MADE OUT OF PEOPLE!!!!!  (Insert your own Soylent Green joke here).  Jeff & I also plan to rent Nemesis 4 or whatever it was, because once you see that robot penis go into the woman's belly button, your soul is destroyed and it doesn't matter what you do for the rest of your life. 

A few Smithee pictures can found on my Flickr page.

*****(I sincerely hope that no one is ever offended when I use the word "girl" to describe pals of mine. I mean it with the utmost love.  I actually got it from one of my teacher friends at school, who always calls me girl.  Also, my boss--the fantastic L--calls me girl all the time, which is also where I think I got it from.  Hopefully, no one is bothered by this). 

Tonight, we ventured to the Corner for the Rat Pad.  Yeah, yeah, I'm not supposed to be eating leavened bread, but I rationalized that beer is not actually bread, and besides wine is used in Seders, right?  So, there.  Anyway, it was a good beer!  I also got to chat with my pal, Georgina, of the Clogging (and many other things) Fame. 

Anyway!  One thing that I must brag about...I have some wonderful friends!  Once again, my pal Cynthia (along with her church) donated a bunch of food for my kiddos.  My plan is to have snack time during 6th hour, after which I will send them home to their unsuspecting parents :)  I also got a snack donation from my Smithee friends! Awesome!!  Those giant pixie sticks will keep those kids sugared up from now until doomsday.  The beauty of it is that I don't have to deal with the sugar comas or the spazzing out that will undoubtedly ensue!  Win, win.
 

(You need to know the "Why Is Blue" icon to get this connection.  Just check my comments and you'll be fine)

The Fabulous (and now fairly well-known amongst my friends) Mr. P (my teacher's aid) decided to bring in his BBQ today to grill out.  Our assistant principal said it was fine as long as we didn't burn the school down (we didn't), so P and I headed out to the grocery store during prep.  I got my non-pork, all-beef hot dogs and he got something called "hot sausage", which are (not to be obscene) kind of horse-dong sized.  (He made me try one and my mouth just about ignited from that hot, hot sausage, but I digress.)  We also got chips and cookies...none of this was in any way organic, local or healthy, mind you, as we went to a grocery store in the 'hood, which carries nothing that is organic, local or healthy.  That is another rant for another day though.

We fired up the grill and grilled.  And by "we", of course I mean "Mr. P".  I haven't had hot dogs since the Hebrew National that I had at the Tigers game last year, so I had two (10 WW points), but only one bun (3 WW points).  I'm not even putting in my points for my chips, because I had about 1/4 of the bag.  We also fed some of the other teachers and staff.  One of our kiddos ate four hot dogs, two handfuls of chips and five cookies. Of course, she is 12 and will gain no weight from this and in fact proudly informed me that she planned to eat four pieces of pizza for dinner (Grrrrr.........). 

After lunch, we watched a video on the rain forest.  At about the same time, the kids started standing up.  I was like, "What?" And one of them said, "Sorry, Ms. MST3k. I'm going to fall asleep if I keep sitting." And murmurs of "Me too" followed from the others.  That was kinda sweet, standing up so as to not fall asleep, so I thanked them and said that it would be "nap time" after the video was done.  When it finished, I left the lights off, put on a book on DVD and they drifted off to dream land.  Someone even snored a little.

I was feeling tired and sluggish myself, but I knew I couldn't tuck myself into my desk, so I scrounged in my little class fridge and found one of P's Red Bulls.  I cracked it open and poured it into a cup and....

...uh, it's not red.  What??!!?  What the hell?!? It was kind of pee colored.  Oh shit.  I hope I didn't fall for some kind of trick. I hope you'all don't email me to say, "You fell for that yellow Red Bull trick? Girl, that was pee!"  Seriously--why the hell isn't it red?!? Shouldn't it be red?!?!  It's called red bull.  I mean, I know there's no bull in it (right?) but it should be RED!!!!  Anyway, I didn't care at the time and drank it.  It gave me wings all right...but now it's given me a stomachache.  Or maybe it was the (not)Red Bull, chips, hot dogs and cookies that gave me the stomachache.

Whatever, my stomach hurts.  And I think I'm starting to crash.  I still don't understand why it isn't red. I will ponder this as I try to nap.  Goodnight.

Cribbing from my online pal nicklngn, I am instituting an "Ask Me April", which gives YOU, my online (and RL) friends to chance to ask me...well, anything.  If it's something super freaky, I may have to answer you privately, but please ask away.  Except for the bodies buried in my backyard I have nothing to hide, honest! :)

In other news...we started adding fractions with different denominators in school today.  We had to take a "licorice break" when the kids were ready to smash their heads on the desk, the floor, or me.  They now expect to be super math students, and so they get irritated when they don't learn something right away. So, we had a nice talk about how it takes time, they didn't learn long division in one lesson, etc.  Remember, these kids couldn't do multiple problem addition or subtraction problems in September.  They don't remember it, of course, and keep asking for algebra.  ?!?!?!?  Ack...I have a long summer of relearning algebra ahead of me!!!

Tonight, I went to a beer class at the Corner Brewery.  Oooooh, fun and goodness!  We talked lots about HOPS.  I am a huge HOP HEAD.  Love love love them!  We talked about growing hops and I thought, hey! I am starting a Slow Food unit with the kiddos and we are growing shit in a greenhouse in our room and I know! I should have them grow hops! We could grow grain and barley too!  I'm sure the Board of Ed wouldn't mind.  We could even start our own little beer operation, right there in our middle school, and help ease our budget woes.  Again, I'm sure the Board would be thrilled...what's the you say? My contract says that I can't come to work drunk? DAMN!!!! (And yes, it really says that. It also says that I can't assault other staff members, which really sucks, cuz the Aryan math teacher who I think is a Neo Nazi in his spare time could really use an ass-kicking from the half-Jew!)

Otherwise, we learned about different kinds of beer, toured the brewery and did a beer tasting of 9 different beers.  I had enough beers such that, on the way home, little miss farm fresh stopped at White Castles.  Yeah, yeah I know.  But they were go-od!  I went over my Weight Watchers points, but I really don't give a shit.  I haven't had the Crave since last summer and they were just as yummy as I remembered.  Sadly, I didn't have enough cash for a "sack", so I had to get individual little burgers and an onion chip order.  I shared everything with Jeff and Buddy, because I didn't want to upchuck  am generally a nice person :) :)

Anyway, it is bed time. Think of a fun question to ask, and please ask away.  I mean Jebus Crips--one of my kiddos is on this whole "why are we here? where do we come from? where do we go?" kick and if I can try to answer that at 8:30am, I am certainly happy to answer other questions!