What's your pirate name?

I'm Whisky Wendy the Hermit!!

Is it Christmas?

hee hee!!

FG

My Friday Gratitude was riding home last night with the windows down, smoking and listening to the Indigo Girls with my sister. It was totally awesome, dude.

The finished product

Here is Emily's gingerbread house:


And here is Jessica's:

Make the pie higher!

This is a poem composed of quotes by our fearless leader, George H.W. Bush.

I think we all agree, the past is over.
This is still a dangerous world.
It's a world of madmen
And uncertainty
And potential mental losses.

Rarely is the question asked
Is our children learning?
Will the highways of the internet
Become more few?
How many hands have I shaked?

They misunderestimate me.
I am a pitbull on the pantleg of opportunity.
I know that the human being and the fish
Can coexist.

Families is where our nation finds hope
Where our wings take dream.
Put food on your family!
Knock down the tollbooth!
Vulcanize society!
Make the pie higher!
Make the pie higher!


Go ahead, look it up. It's true.

Gingerbread Village!

The houses are ready! Yay!!!!!

That is IT, Tim Russert!

I am not watching your show any more. I have changed the channel in the middle of your vainglorious braggery for the last time. It's the middle of November in one of the most interesting presidential campaign seasons in history, and you choose to spend HALF YOUR SHOW not moderating, but tooting your own bloated horn! You over-latted, bug-eyed, egotistical piece of poop! You have made me do something I really didn't want to do, and that is watch Fox News Sunday. Let me know if you ever decide to go back into politics instead of celebrity endorsements and self-important infomercials about your own show, you swaggering, narcissistic windbag! You, sir, are an IDIOT!

FG

I hear thunder in the distance! It's so exciting!
I'm really thankful for the three-day week, next week. I already have my planning done. Also, my kids want to help me bake the gingerbread houses. Yay!! The holidays are here!

I knew it!

Another reason to hate Starbucks.

List for next weekend

1. Make gingerbread houses for kids to decorate
2. Work on article synthesis for master's class
3. Clean filter for ac/heating unit
4. Clean living and dining rooms, along with rest of house which will again be dirty by the weekend (ok, why again am I doing that?)
5. Lesson plan so I don't have to spend the week frantically planning day by day like I will be doing this week
6. Go to farmer's market for sweet potatoes and green beans, to make yummy thanksgiving dishes (southern style green beans, y'all!)

So the holiday weekend was largely successful. The trees are trimmed, the brush and bulky trash a distant memory (although the sore muscles of the trimming ordeal linger)
and the kitchen light bulbs are changed. The grocery shopping is done and the meals planned although it remains to be seen whether they will actually be cooked. The laundry is at least clean, if not folded or put away.

List for tomorrow

1. Lesson plan for next week, including a formal lesson plan for observation by cognitive coach (asst principal is NEXT week, not this week)
2. Think about working on article synthesis paper for Master's class
3. Clean living and dining rooms
4. Grocery shop
5. Make gingerbread houses for nieces and nephews to decorate on turkey day
6. Clean filter in ac/heating unit
7. fold and put away laundry done last week and this week

You know how it is when you spend three hours doing something you are not used to doing, and then your muscles scream in pain for the next three days? Yeah, I think that's what is coming. I pruned the rosebushes and the two trees in the front yard, and I hurt all over! I cleaned the bathroom and kitchen, and did some laundry. Now I absolutely have to lesson plan tomorrow. You would think I might choose that rather than the pruning, but I didn't. What does that tell ya??

List

Well, yesterday I went to the farmer's market and made the soup. Then I got a haircut, which I needed but was not on my list. I picked up my prescription and threw away the magazines I was going to exchange. I planned dinners for next week and started a grocery list. Then I read magazines for the rest of the day. Somehow I managed to add some more things to the list while I was laying around reading. Paving my road with good intentions I guess. Anyway now I have two days and here is my revised list:

1. Lesson plan for next week including a formal lesson plan for observation by cognitive coach (asst principal is NEXT week, not this week)
2. Work on article synthesis paper for Master's class
3. Trim trees and bushes, and put trimmings out for brush and bulky trash pick up
4. Clean house, clean house, clean house!!!!
5. Grocery shop
6. Make gingerbread houses for nieces and nephews to decorate on turkey day
7. Replace flourescent light bulbs in kitchen (this is a must)
8. Clean filter in ac/heating unit
9. Get rid of tomato plant and re-pot basil
10. fold and put away laundry done last week, do laundry from this week

Holiday Weekend

I have three uninterrupted days of alone time! So naturally, I have made a list of things I would like to accomplish, and most of them won't get done. But here is the list anyway:
1. Go to farmer's market for produce
2. Make soup with said produce (already made the chicken stock, yay!)
3. Lesson plan for next week including two formal lesson plans, one for
observation by asst. principal and the other for observation by cognitive coach
4. Work on and possibly finish article synthesis paper for Master's class
5. Trim trees and bushes, and put trimmings out for brush and bulky trash pick up
6. Clean house
7. Go to Bookman's to exchange magazines for credit
8. Pick up prescription at the drugstore
9. Grocery shop and plan dinners for the week
10. Make gingerbread houses for nieces and nephews to decorate on turkey day
Ok, so we'll see how much I get done.

The Saddest Song in the World

Jeff Buckley - Hallelujah

i heard there was a secret chord
that david played and it pleased the lord
but you don't really care for music, do you
well it goes like this the fourth, the fifth
the minor fall and the major lift
the baffled king composing hallelujah

hallelujah...

well your faith was strong but you needed proof
you saw her bathing on the roof
her beauty and the moonlight overthrew you
she tied you to her kitchen chair
she broke your throne and she cut your hair
and from your lips she drew the hallelujah

hallelujah...

baby i've been here before
i've seen this room and i've walked this floor
i used to live alone before i knew you
i've seen your flag on the marble arch
but love is not a victory march
it's a cold and it's a broken hallelujah

hallelujah...

well there was a time when you let me know
what's really going on below
but now you never show that to me do you
but remember when i moved in you
and the holy dove was moving too
and every breath we drew was hallelujah

well, maybe there's a god above
but all i've ever learned from love
was how to shoot somebody who outdrew you
it's not a cry that you hear at night
it's not somebody who's seen the light
it's a cold and it's a broken hallelujah

hallelujah...

stupid parents

I have about 125 students. Yesterday I noticed that one of them turned in a worksheet packet that was completely blank. This packet had been three days worth of class work and homework, and the kid hadn't done a single problem. So I went through the stack of papers I had graded but not yet returned, and found two more things of his that were incomplete, and by incomplete I mean practically blank. The kid isn't doing jack. So I wrote an email to the parent yesterday, explaining the situation and asking her to talk to her son about this. I want to know what the problem is. Does he not understand the work or is he being lazy? So the kid tells the mom that he did the packet and turned it in, and he thinks he remembers getting two of the same thing and handing one of them in finished and the other one in blank. And the mother believes him. So she writes back asking me to look for the other packet. What am I, @D*%& stupid? I take the time out of my day to investigate this situation, look at the grade book to make sure there's no mistake, and write to the parent asking for help. And this is what I get back. So I wrote again saying I think the three of us need to meet and look at the work he has been turning in. JESUS CARTWHEELING CHRIST I hate this job sometimes.

Ask Tionna

Need a good laugh?
It's like Dear Abby on crack.

FG

I am grateful for November. November means cooler weather, possibly precipitation, and time with my family.