Today was the last day for teachers at my school. Next week I have to work some because my contract is a little bit longer than a regular teacher's contract, but I don't mind because it will give me a chance to tie up some loose ends to get things done. After the brunch this morning, we cleaned out my classroom and it took about 4 hours. There was a lot of stuff in there and the custodians started giving me dirty looks after they had come by about 3 times to pick up the trash I kept leaving outside the door. Oh well, it will be nice and clean and organized when we come back from summer break.

The brunch this morning was kind of a bummer. At the end of the whole thing my principal announced that he was leaving and moving to a position at the district office. I am pretty bummed. He is a great guy and an awesome boss, and I have no idea who will be replacing him. This will be my 4th principal in 4 years of teaching, and those of you who teach know how important it is to have a good principal that supports the teachers. Anyway, kind of a stinky way to end the year, but I should have known since I haven't worked a year yet without the principal announcing they were leaving. Anyway, enough gushing over my boss. I am happy for him if he is receiving a promotion and this is a job he wanted. I'm just sad for the rest of us. :(

I hope everyone has a good weekend. I know I will enjoy mine, knowing that I don't have to teach next week. Now, what should I make for dinner? I am running out of ideas. If anyone has any good, simple dinner recipes, please post them here. Preferably ones that include chicken, ground beef, bacon or pasta because those are the things I know I have.

Some simple things that make me happy

1. The last day of school.
2. Naps in the middle of the afternoon.
3. Not having a place I need to be.
4. Sleeping late.
5. Soda and big slushes from Sonic.
6. Having two books I am just starting to read and having the time to read them.
7. The feeling of having a whole summer ahead of me.
8. Having a yard and a garden to take care of (even though Chad does most of this...)
9. My family.
10. My friends.
11. Freebird's.
12. Eclipse peppermint gum.
13. My house.
14. Not having to pack up and move this summer.
15. #14 should count twice, because it makes me REALLY happy.
16. A new niece coming in August.
17. Cherry flavored Chapstick.

Random end of school stuff

Not much is going on here. Tomorrow is the last day of school. Chad is well into his job and liking it. He has decided that the 7-3 shift is better than the 11-7 shift, so he'll be working 7-3 the most while he is a nurse tech. Friday all they have us doing up at school is a brunch and then check-out. My editors are coming up at noon and we are CLEANING!!! Yay! They actually wanted to, believe it or not. The room is really dirty and just needs to be cleaned out. We'll also be doing a little planning for next year...like deciding what the t-shirts should look like and getting white boards for the room. Very important.

So...tomorrow is my official last day with students ending my first year at a new school, and I can say that the first year was great. I'm actually looking forward to next year, which I think will be even better. But not before one awesome summer vacation filled with Hawaii, camp, family and friends. I can't wait!

Memorial Day weekend

It's been a good weekend. Dad flew in on Friday to spend some time with us and my pee paw who lives here in town. Friday night we just went out for dinner and had a little mini-"Office" marathon at our house. Saturday, we had previously committed to some plans with some friends of ours from church. One of them is from about an hour away from here, and his mom has a farm out there with a really nice house, a pond with a diving board and paddle boat, stuff to shoot things with, etc. so about 8 of us went out there for the day and played games, went swimming, cooked hamburgers, and just had a good time. The guys went out to shoot skeet I guess and came back smelling like a skunk. Guess what they had ended up shooting instead? Also the girls drove out to the pond (probably 1/2 mile away from the house) and the driver who will remain unnamed (although it wasn't me) accidentally locked the keys in the car, with the extra key on the floorboard. So, her husband called AAA and they came all the way out from Lubbock to unlock the car, and did not charge them anything to do it. This has convinced me to purchase a AAA membership. Oh yeah the house also had 3 tiny little kittens that were so adorable and I got to play with them quite a bit. So...that was Saturday. Lots of fun.

Sunday was church of course, and dad flew out in the afternoon. I took a nice long nap and we had a game night over at some friends' house last night. Since none of us had to work today, we stayed over there pretty late playing different games and had a blast.

So today we slept late and have just piddled around the house and played some tennis. I made a few reservations for our Hawaii trip, stuff that we want to do and is cheaper to book ahead of time than just to pay for when we get there. It's almost a tease thinking I have to go back to work tomorrow, because it already feels like summer vacation. Anyway, it's been a nice little break before the last push to the last day of school. Only three more days with kids and 9 more days total of work. Hope everyone else had a great weekend!

Fun with plumbing

So, if you've read our blog since we moved in to our lovely home, you already know that our house has issues. Plumbing issues. It's to be expected that not everything is just super perfect in a home that is almost 50 years old, but I have to say that sometimes I feel like we are keeping our local plumber in business. I know, that's very conceited of me. And we are well aware that our problems could be so much worse.

Today I left work at lunch because the plumber was supposed to be here sometime after 1:30. "Sometime" meant 3:00, and he got to work on our first problem which was a leaky pipe behind the wall of our guest bathroom. Luckily, the paneling was still cut open from the pipe that was busted by plumbers in January, so no further wall damage ensued. He couldn't find a leak, but in between the time we called about the leaky pipe and today, both this sink and our bathroom sink decided they didn't want to drain anymore. At all. Coincidence? I have no idea, because I know nothing about plumbing. Obviously.

While I was showing the plumber these two issues (leaky pipe and standing water in our sink), he asked if there was anything else. As a matter of fact, there was. While he was here, could he check the cold water pressure of our kitchen sink? Those of you who have visited us know (and may have forgotten, because it's really not memorable) that our kitchen sink dribbles when it is on cold water, but if you turn the faucet towards lukewarm, it scalds you. This has been like this since we moved in and hooked up our ice maker to the water line. We thought some sediment had gotten jostled in this process and was clogging the cold water. This was true, and the plumber finally fixed this. He had to call in a second plumber to come and clear the pipe, which this guy did while on the roof. I had NO idea that you got to plumbing from the roof. Shows how much I know. Anyway, back to the original problem, leaky pipe. He still couldn't see a leak, but took off the fitting on the pipe joint anyway. Long boring story short, the pipe fitting is round, and we have old copper pipe there, which is not round. Kind of a polygonal shape. So after being here for about 2 1/2 hours, we scheduled another appointment for tomorrow afternoon to finish up the job.

So, I learned a couple things today. One, if you have a minor plumbing problem, save it up until you have more than one thing. They charge by the hour, and a clog only takes about 5 minutes to fix, so we got our money's worth with the multiple fixes in one afternoon. Two, if you are graduating in May and still haven't figured out what you want to do with your life, consider plumbing. I don't think this profession will ever be not needed. Especially at this house.

Glad to be home, and a garden update

It is good to be home and not be traveling anywhere for a month or so. I had a good time in Austin over the weekend. It was weird to be back at my old school with quite a few people I didn't know at all, but most of them were kids that were 10, 11, 12 years old when I graduated so I remembered them as little kids. It was fun, and I'm glad I went. Not much to report though. I did get to spend the evening with Shawn, Emma & the gang. That makes 4 times I've been to their house in 4 months! I think it's time for them to visit us in Lubbock, don't you? I know, gas prices long drive blah blah blah.

I know I've been promising an update on our garden. Something I glossed over a bit in this entry was the incredible amount of rain we got last week (over 3 inches overnight, which is a lot for that short amount of time in this area) and it was accompanied by hail. This did not bode well for some of our plants, especially the seedlings. I can't remember if I mentioned that while Chad was out of town, I was in charge of his plants, and being locked out of my house for the night that it rained so hard I was not able to move the plants under the cover of the porch. But the rain worked wonders for a lot of other stuff, so here are some updates about what these things are doing.

This is the rosebush that wasn't doing too great where it was, so Chad transplanted it a couple months ago to make room for other stuff and it has started producing the most vibrant shade of pink blooms. I cut a few this afternoon to make my house look prettier. Flowers, especially free ones, make me happy. They smell really good too. Rosemary. I bought it as a small plant and it's just started getting much bigger. I think I'm about to transplant it to the ground. It smells delicious. Dill. This thing has just taken off. Dill is super easy to grow and shoots up so quickly. I've started drying it just to keep up with how much it's producing. I don't know if you can tell but the plant itself is well over two feet. When I bought it, it was maybe 7-8" high. Basil, thyme, and parsley. Still researching how to keep these. I've been reading about doing emulsions with olive oil, freezing in ice cube trays, and saving in the freezer in baggies to use when a recipe calls for fresh. Has anyone done this, and how did it work for you? My tomato plant grown from seed! This one really took off. I planted a bunch of tomato seeds and only two have survived. They are finicky little suckers. This is about 6-7" now and I will be transplanting it to the ground as soon as the weather stops being chilly at night. The back garden. You can see between the rows where the rain washed everything. The rows were flooded with water the entire day after it rained. On the two rows on the left are two different kinds of spinach. We like growing spinach, obviously because it likes us. I think I counted 21 plants the other day, and they get bigger all the time. The next row of plants is broccoli. These are doing well too. And on the far right of the picture is squash. These just showed up a few days ago and they are growing super fast. I can't wait until everything is ready to harvest and we can enjoy it! One sad little lettuce plant survived the storm. It's still growing and the bugs seem to be leaving it alone. To the right of this (not in the picture) we have a few cucumber plants growing as well. There wasn't much to see yet so I didn't take a picture of it. This is the other side of the backyard. Chad put these up over the past couple days to grow melons. I think he's planted canteloupe and a few other things...bell peppers, pole beans, and other miscellany. Our friend from church got us all this chickenwire so we are putting it to good use. We may have to eventually put it over the other side of the garden to keep squirrels and birds away.

Stay tuned for the next installment of gardening by dummies. Hopefully, I will have some vegetables to show you!

Also a few of you have sent me articles about this. In case you don't feel like clicking on that link, basically a large portrait photographer altered numerous student photos for a high school yearbook in McKinney, supposedly per school request. Anyway, heads ended up being put on the wrong bodies, apparently one girl looked nude in her photo, and they delivered the yearbooks last week and didn't know this had happened until parents and students started complaining. The photographer (which my school used when I lived in AZ) has agreed to pay for the reprinting of 1100 books, which is $85,000. Poor kids. Poor adviser. THIS is why I get nervous when the yearbooks come out. The whole thing is bizarre.

Have a good week everyone. I am headed to do typical Sunday afternoon things like take a nap and read more of my book.

WHAT?!

As I was driving to work today, I heard a request for an NKOTB song. That's New Kids on the Block for those of you who were not born in the late '70s/early '80s. And it was not one of those flashback things where they play old stuff like "Hangin' Tough" or "Please Don't Go Girl." It was a new song. I was aware that NKOTB was getting back together, since I saw them the other day on "The Today Show." I think they're performing tomorrow on that show for those of you who are able to see it. But I have to say, this new song stunk. Sorry NKOTB, I will not be going to any concerts on your reunion tour, even though I used to be the proud owner of one of your tapes and also a button with all of your pictures on it. I am interested to see if their concerts are populated with 20- and 30-somethings or screaming little 13-year-old girls who like their new stuff. That's kind of creepy, since they're probably in their 40s by now.

Also, I heard from a friend that I used to teach with at my last school that their graduation is the 22nd. That's a whole week earlier than we're done. This is the only time all year that I've been jealous of them. Other than that, I love my job. And speaking of jobs...my principal just told me that he'll be coming in to observe me next week. The last week of the year is not the greatest time to observe teachers or students, because everyone is pretty much done. So that should be interesting. He's come in a lot this year to see what we are doing, so I feel confident, but it's always nerveracking when your superior is observing you.

I had the worst dream last night. I was flying from Lubbock to Austin, and before I boarded the plane to Austin, I left all my carry-on luggage at the terminal. This included my wallet and everything. Anyway, they wouldn't stop the plane, and I landed in Austin with nothing, so I couldn't rent a car or take a plane back. Couldn't call anyone because I didn't have my cell phone. Then I woke up, glad that it was just a dream. Then when I went back to sleep, it continued. Don't you hate that? Anyway, I was back in the Lubbock airport, but it was one of those things like in that movie "Labyrinth" where I could see my luggage on some other escalator or staircase, but then when I went over there it had moved. Anyway, very unsettling, but also eerily accurate to my plans this weekend. And please refrain from telling me what this might mean subconsciously. It's probably some serious mental problem, but I'm just going to say I have a severe fear of not making it to the airport on time and missing my plane. I get that from my mom. Chad always laughs at me because I like to be at the airport so early and I always double-check to make sure we have everything we need, but have we ever even been close to missing a flight because of bad traffic or oversleeping? No.

Well, that's it for this post, which I'll subtitle "Multiple references to '80s and '90s pop culture." Aren't you glad I didn't mention David Bowie's horrendous clothing and hair in "Labyrinth"? Oh wait, I just did. Have a good Thursday!

Miscellaneous stuff

I've been in a very bloggy mood recently. Unfortunately for you, there's not a whole lot to blog about right now (that's very interesting), but I'm sure I'll have written multiple paragraphs by the time this blog entry is said and done. You're welcome.

I want to read A Thousand Splendid Suns and The Kite Runner. My mom, who is an avid reader, says they are two of the best books she's read in a long time. Does anyone own these books and would be willing to let me borrow them for the summer? I'm sure our wonderful public library has them, but then I'd have to get a library card and read it in three weeks, and that would never happen. I've never been able to keep to a timetable when reading. It takes all the enjoyment out of it. I'd like to read a bit this summer while I have the time, and also while I have hours to kill on a plane.

Chad got paid today for the first time since he started his new job. I'm lovin' it. We never reverted back to a one-income budget when Chad quit his job and started school again full-time in November, so I'm glad that we will have two incomes again to recover from that lack of discipline, and also to be able to pay back his nursing school. We also just got our economic stimulus check from the federal government, and used that to pay off some of the debt from nursing school. I am pretty sure that's exactly what we weren't supposed to do with it. We were supposed to go out and spend it on more stuff. Well, we didn't, and I guess now the United States is in even more debt, and the economy is still bad because of people like us who used it to pay off debt or put it directly into savings.

Also, I don't know if I mentioned this or not...but I am headed to Austin this weekend for a reunion at my old school. I was in a singing group there, and it's the director's 10th year, so it's a surprise for her. I don't think many people from my year are going, and I probably won't know very many people, and I'll definitely be the oldest one there. But I do know that if I was the director and nobody showed up to a reunion planned for me then my feelings would be really hurt, and I really liked her, so I'm going, despite any social awkwardness that might occur. I'm sure I'm putting way too much thought into it anyway. So, that'll be my last trip to Austin, which will make 4 trips in 2 months. It's been a busy spring and I'm glad for the trips I've been able to take, but also glad for some weekends off.

A great weekend

My weekend was fantastic. The house was already clean, I didn't have to travel, and the weather was perfect. So basically, I did nothing. Chad and I went to bed early Friday night (since Chad has started having to be at work at 6:45 a.m., we actually get tired at the same time) and I got to sleep in on Saturday morning. I ran a couple errands Saturday morning, went running, and then went to a little party for a friend who graduated with her Ph.D. on Friday. When people your age start getting PhDs you start to feel a little behind on your life checklist, but since I probably won't ever get a PhD I guess I better get used to that. Anyway, the day was fun. It was just so nice to have a weekend where there was so much downtime, especially after the week that had just happened. Now, we are really counting down the days until school is out...only 12 days after today!

I just remembered something else that made my weekend so great...the new Social Security top names of 2007 came out! I've only (?) spent about 20 minutes looking at it so far, but I'm sure that won't be the last 20 minutes I spend. What is so completely fascinating to me about seeing what people name their babies? I don't know, but I'm not alone. There are thousands of other name geeks out there. I love looking up a name and seeing how it has increased or decreased in popularity over the years. I mean, don't you think it's crazy that Hannah Montana's real name, Miley (which isn't even her real name, but I digress...), wasn't even in the top 1000 until 2007, when it was #278? Such a statement about our culture. I don't know exactly what the statement is, but anyway it HAS to say SOMETHING about us and how we choose names for our kiddos. See http://www.babynamewizard.com/blog for more about the fastest risers of 2007, and I think soon she'll be posting about those names that are dropping hugely in popularity.

Thanks for reading and being interested.

Update

Things have calmed down around here quite a bit over the last few days. Only one more out-of-town trip, most of the yearbooks have been distributed, and the sick bugs have passed. After today, there are 13 days of school left, and 2 of those are finals which means early release, so we essentially have 2 weeks of real classes left. All my classes will be turning in final projects or presenting portfolios for their final exam, which means I don't have to write any tests. I can definitely tell I'm losing steam. Anyway, Chad officially started his first day of work today, and he gets off at 3. He actually woke up and left before I even got out of bed this morning. I think that is the first time that's happened since November.

That's about it for now. I'm looking forward to a weekend in town, which means sleeping late tomorrow!

The Longest Day(s), or "A Series of Unfortunate Events"

I think that this post would better present itself as a timeline of the past few days.

Monday, May 5
Receive yearbooks. No one can see them because there is secret stuff in them that won't be revealed until the awards ceremony on Tuesday. Move all 65 boxes into the secured office in my classroom. Really should have appreciated a little bit more being at home with nothing to do Monday night. See Tuesday.

Tuesday, May 6th
6:15 a.m. Wake up, get ready, leave for airport
8:10 a.m.-5:00 p.m. Fly to Dallas, tour printing plant, eat nice lunch, fly back, come home to change clothes
5:30 p.m. Get back up to school to begin getting ready for yearbook distribution beginning Wednesday.
6:45 p.m. Recognition ceremony begins
8:30 p.m. Recognition ceremony ends
8:30 p.m. Move 35 boxes of yearbooks into classroom. Empty boxes of personalized books on to bookcases in room in alphabetical order for easy distribution.
9:45 p.m. Get a call from Chad. Chad scolds me that I am up there doing this by myself with no help. I am tired at this point, not too happy about it myself, and don't really feel like talking about it. By the way, Chad is in New Mexico, which will become more important at 11:30.
11:30 p.m. Finish getting books ready. Go into my classroom office to change message on answering machine. Grab stuff to leave. Leave school keys and house/car keys on floor of office. The only keys to this office are on the keychain of the aforementioned school keys (locked in office) and in the school vault. Really want to say a bad word at this point.
11:31 p.m. Find custodians. They don't have keys or access to the vault (secured room, duh). Call LISD security. She shows up 15 minutes later and finds 11th and 12th grade girls camping out in parking lot so they can sign up for powder puff the next morning. She deals with kids before she comes inside, only for us to find that she doesn't have a key either. All this time I am thinking about who I can call to come get me since Chad's out of town, and who will also be okay with me spending the night at their house and bringing me to school early the next morning so I can get my keys, go home, change clothes, and get ready for the busiest day of the year in yearbook life. I call Lynn and Celia, because of COURSE they don't have anything better to do at midnight than come get me from work and bring me to stay at their house. Oh wait, yes they do...it's called sleeping.
11:58 p.m. Lynn comes to get me. It is pouring rain outside.
1:00 a.m. Go to sleep.

Wednesday
6:45 a.m. Wake up and go to school
7:20 a.m. Show up at school. Powderpuff girls are waiting inside the door. More than one of my yearbook girls notices I am wearing the same outfit as I was at the awards ceremony yesterday
7:21 a.m. Walk in to my principal's office. Become the object of his audible laughter, based on my exhausted and pretty much frumpy/frazzled appearance. Principal gets the magic key from the vault.
7:25 a.m. Get back in room. Amazed at the power tiny little pieces of metal have.
7:35 a.m. Go back home. Change clothes. Brush teeth. Put on make-up.
7:50 a.m.-5:00 p.m. Kind of a blur. Pass out a lot of yearbooks. That's really all I can remember. I did get a couple really nice emails from parents saying how great they thought the yearbook was, and a few of my own students in other classes said it's the best CHS yearbook they've seen.
1:30 p.m. Friend across the hall brings me a sonic drink AND lunch at separate times during the day.
Soon: bedtime.

Are you still reading? Wow.

Lessons learned over the past couple days:
1. Make sure you have your keys in your hand before closing a self-locking door in a practically vacant school at night. Once you've locked these keys in the room twice, it's time to not do that anymore.
2. Never take family or friends for granted, or their hospitality or willingness to help. (Thanks again Lynn & Celia)
3. If you act tired and frazzled enough, people will feel sorry for you and bring you Thai food for lunch and a big drink.
4. Don't wear the same outfit too frequently, especially two days in a row, even if it was just to an evening function the night before. Students DO notice, and they WILL make comments.
5. If it's a funny story less than 24 hours later, it is not a crisis or a big deal and I shouldn't act like it is.

The end. Goodnight.

Hi out there to our loyal blog readers. I know you guys are interested in every minute detail of our lives, so I'm here to tell you about the weekend. Our weekend began on Thursday afternoon with a flight to Austin. We accompanied a student of mine to the UIL state convention where he was an alternate in one of the competitions. Let me just say this was not the most pleasant traveling experience I've ever had. Right after breakfast on Friday I started feeling pretty much horrible. I don't get sick very often, but when I do, I don't want to be on a trip in Austin sponsoring a student. Well, we still had to get him to the competition to see if he could compete. He found out at about 11:05 on Friday that he would not be able to compete because they didn't need any alternates. So, we have already checked out of the hotel, and we have 6 1/2 hours to kill until our flight leaves. Awesome. I kept thinking about who I felt the most sorry for that day...the 17-year-old who had to hang out with his sick teacher and her husband, the sick teacher, who really just wanted to curl up in a dark hole somewhere, or the husband, who had to make conversation with the 17-year-old when the teacher left them to head to the bathroom. Hmmm. It's a toss-up. Anyway, let's just get to the point without being too graphic. We are finally on the plane headed home (thank goodness for direct flights), and my body decides that it is time to purge whatever small amount of liquids I have been consuming all day. I think it was trying to eat that last Pepto Bismol tablet that sent me over the edge. Those things are disgusting. Anyway, much to my delight I did not throw up all over the plane, and I didn't have to use the barf bag either. I actually made it to the tiny little airplane bathroom, and afterwards felt much better. I only wished that had occurred about 5 hours earlier. Sorry. This was probably too much information. On to other things.

Saturday was a good day. I had a lot of high hopes for things I was going to get done since I have not been in town for a weekend in like a month, but the bug still wasn't gone, so I was really useless. I slept late and sat around for most of the day, except when Chad and I went shopping for work shoes for him. Even then I was still pretty weak from the previous day's shenanigans, so we left the shoe store pretty quickly after he found a pair that would work for him. I had to save up my energy for last night, which was prom. My friend who teaches across the hall from me is the prom sponsor, and I had told her a while back that I would help. So I got to take tickets all night and see all the kids all dressed up, and I also got to peek at the hilarity that is high school students dancing. Seriously, it is so entertaining. Anyway, by last night I was feeling a lot better, but I have still not been very hungry even today. And you know if I'm not hungry then I am not 100%.

So all that stuff that I wanted to do, I got done today. We went to early service and when we got home, we got to work. I mowed the lawn while Chad worked in the garden (update about that to come. We've got a ton of spinach and broccoli coming up, plus our rose bush that we transplanted is blooming all over the place!). I did laundry and cleaned the house while Chad folded clothes and made lunch. By the way, I don't know if I have mentioned lately that I have the most awesome husband ever. He is so helpful and considerate and he does stuff like folding laundry, making meals, working in the yard, and washing the car without even being asked! (Okay, well maybe I asked him to wash the car, but it was just once and he was very happy to do it). We even squeezed in a little time for a nap.

So that's about it for the weekend. It started off not so great, but got a lot better. Thanks for reading. Oh yeah, I almost forgot, yearbooks come in tomorrow. This is the part I like the most, but also dread the most...because I get some phone calls from not-so-happy parents about one thing or another. I guess I'll just unplug my phone for the next few weeks.