happy halloween!

I dressed like a witch for school today and it was awesome.  I wore a black skirt and top,
black and purple striped knee socks, dangly skeleton earrings and a black witch's hat
with stars on it.  And I made green foam come out of a jack o'lantern so that it looked 
like it was vomiting out of all of its orfices.  A pretty decent halloween overall :)  
Hopefully we get a few trick or treaters tonight, then we're going to watch Harry Potter
and eat pumpkin pudding...mmmmmm :)

The guy who teaches math to the eighth graders has been cracking me up recently with
things I've overheard him tell them.  Today he walked in late (as usual) and one of the 
girls was like, "oh! you aren't late today!"  He was like, "oh yes, I am, just not as late as 
I was yesterday, and I'll probably be later tomorrow, see, I'm trying to teach you about
inequalities..."

On Friday he had them all spread out around the room doing an activity.  As I walked 
through he was telling them, "If you work well, then maybe I'll put some music on..."
(excited chatter) "have you girls ever heard of Liberace?"

I dressed up as Pippi Longstocking for a Halloween party this past weekend.  it was 
pretty amazing...I wired my pigtails and hairsprayed them red.  And I wore red and
white striped tights.  The only thing missing was Mr. Nilsson...I couldn't find a 
stuffed monkey :( 



Schedules at school have been all over the place recently...it is really hard to schedule labs around the boys and girls basketball practice schedules, but I think we've been successful.  it just means I have a 12 hour school day on Monday, which I guess is what the kids do everyday.

The 9th graders had a Greek festival on Friday which was fun.  They all dressed up as Greek gods and goddesses and gave short speeches about who they were, then we ate Greek food and they had posters and such around...they were all cute.  Some of the more entertaining moments:

student playing Medusa:  "and then I died when my head was decapitated."  (as opposed to decapitating...something else?

Greek goddess who claimed her death was because: "I commited suicide unto myself."  (again, as opposed to commiting suicide against someone else?)

Greek goddess who tried to tell us that her brother was Herphaestus, but it came out as "Her-feces."

They are all pretty fantastic.  I like them :)

i'm occasion. i mean caucasian.

Today the eighth graders' warm up question was "what happens when you mix oil and water? why does this happen?" Here was the initial response--

Favorite Student: "I don't know! My science teacher last year, she was your color, but we didn't learn anything."

Me: "My color?"

Boy with Girl's Name: "You mean Caucasian"

Favorite Student: "What? Occasion?"



It's always good to start first period laughing :)



And suddenly people are telling me I look like Audrey Hepburn...Casey this past weekend...and the Head of School told me the same thing two days later. Weird. I'm pretty sure Audry Hepburn didn't have blonde hair. Hrm. I'm remembering a story from my mom about when she was teaching first grade...one of her students saw Olivia Newton John on television and told her parents that it was her teacher.



I am angry that The Office is a rerun tonight. It isn't even a good one. It's one of the ones that's painful to watch because it's more awkward than funny. Oh well.



Oh. And I am addicted to online word games. Like Boggle and Text Twist. In the absence of extended cable we have been gathering around Melissa's computer to play Weboggle...we are turning into old ladies. Sometimes we even watch Wheel of Fortune and drink tea.

odds and ends...

One of my eighth grade girls is going to "give me a lesson" tomorrow during snack time...
she was appalled when I told her that I wouldn't ask a boy out.  Apparently this requires 
a personal tutoring session from someone who is obviously a relationship expert...

I managed to blow a fuse today during science class.  Sweet.  Apparently a computer, two space heaters and a microwave all on the same outlet isn't a good idea...  It was okay until Cold Girl plugged in a second heater to warm just herself.  Then the bag of popcorn stopped popping and I knew we had a problem.  But not a big one...at least I still had the popped bag from the previous period.  All was well...they were still able to make observations of the two bags (with similar masses...but different volumes)  I also got to use my aquarium today to play "sink or float" with cans of pop.  The kids thought it was cool, and the president happened to walk through while I was doing it and stayed to watch...it was pretty sweet.  Though they all begged me for a can of pop afterwards.

This just in:  pi is a really big number.  Or at least according to a certain sister of mine...
casey: if you were to count all of the picture that me and whit were in, it would be like...a lot...
whitney:  yeah, like pi...
:)

And apparently State College becomes the third largest city in PA on game day.  Actually, Beaver Stadium itself might become the third largest city, but I think a city needs at least like a post office or something, so let's just say State College.  That is so crazy.  I think it's one of my favorite statistics ever.  The game was good, just a little chilly.  And the Blue Band is pretty much amazing.  I am going to post pictures if I figure out how to.  It was homecoming, so they had an alumni band too...and this baton twirler guy was there and he was ridiculously good.  As in twirling a baton in each hand and one on the back of his neck.  I just want to know how you discover this talent if you are a guy.  I suspect that it has to start with juggling and go from there.  Do moms really sign their sons up for baton lessons?  I mean, obviously there's nothing wrong with that...it's just not the norm...

Once again, nighttime bicyclists need to get smart.  Today's tip:  don't bike the wrong way down a one way street at night while wearing black.  The mullet scored him even more negative points.

I had an eighth grader ("Relationship Expert") tell me today that styrofoam and iron were different because styrofoam is like a cotton and iron is a gas.  In complete seriousness.  I am not sure if her background is just that bad or what exactly I'm dealing with here...most of my other students could tell me not only that iron was a metal, but also that it was an element on the periodic table.  Hmm.

busy week...

Just some highlights from the past few days...
Wednesday we successfully celebrated "Whisper Wednesday" for an entire period!  I started
whispering at the beginning of class with the 8th grade girls, and they thought it was so great...to 
the point that they told me to whisper when I started talking in a low voice that wasn't a whisper.  
And then we finished early since they were so focused, so I told them they could work on their
review sheets, and they worked silently for a solid ten minutes!  It was amazing.  Now I just need 
to get the eighth grade boys to buy into it...they are the talky ones.

That was also the day that Favorite Student fell on his head when he leaned out of his chair to get
the pencil he dropped...since he is so short, his feet didn't touch the floor when he leaned over.  
It was rather humorous.

Wednesday night was somewhat of a fiasco.  In a nutshell, one of the boys put someone's pants in the toilet.  This resulted in all of the boys (those who weren't at the CC meet) sitting in the bathroom for over an hour, waiting for someone to fess up.  One of the kids in the bathroom was supposed to go to the Pens game with Cody and John and Favorite Student...and it was past the time that they were supposed to leave.  After asking a bunch of other kids who didn't want to go or couldn't since it was so last minute...I ended up going, so as not to waste a hunderd dollar ticket.  And it was great...I'd never been to a hockey game before.  As a matter of fact, the bulk of my hockey knowledge comes from Emilio Estevez via The Mighty Ducks...so I learned some stuff too :)

And, as usual, FS was endless entertainment.  As we were leaving in a sea of people he turned around to look at me and Cody.  "oh okay," he said, "I was just checking to make sure Miz Book didn't get snatched."

Thoughtful kid.

This morning the boys had to go back and sit in the bathroom again...meaning that one of them who was supposed to go on the field trip could not.  Cody, Leah and I bravely led our 11 students to the science center...I drove the van, which wasn't as bad as I expected (not quite like driving a whale on roller skates, as I once heard it described.)  Actually, it was pretty fun.  Except that the brakes are bad.  That makes for some good times.

The science center was great...the kids got lots of cool free stuff from the companies who had booths set up there.  Then they had a hilarious time with the wall coated with phosphorescent paint so that when you stand in front of it and a light shines on you, it takes a picture of your shadow.   We laughed at them a lot and took a bunch of pictures.  They're pretty fun :)

And now i have approximately 2 million things to do before school tomorrow...:-p

procrastination

 I've suddenly decided that anything is better than doing what I'm supposed to be doing.  Hah.  Actually, what I'm supposed to be doing isn't really that bad, but I have decided to wait.  I mean, put it off...

So someone described my body type today as a pencil.  A pencil with boobs and earrings, to be exact.  I found that rather humorous...and it reminded me of the black pants I used to have in high school that my sisters called the "pencil pants."  I believe those were also the pants that made them decide to call me "square butt."  And I'm sure everyone reading this is now wishing that they weren't...:-p  

Okay, so I need to build a ramp for Hot Wheels cars.  Yesterday I went to Walmart and bought the cars...after much deliberation I decided that there probably was a difference in quality between real Hot Wheels and the generic ones (even though I'd be spending 5.47 as opposed to 2.96.)  This was confirmed by my roommates, both of whom have brothers and have played with Hot Wheels cars.  I feel slightly deprived...:)

So yeah, a ramp.  My Walmart trip was followed by one to Home Depot where this young guy helped me with his most interesting project of the day...  However.  He claimed that I needed to buy the C-channel with the holes so I could screw it down.  True.  However, all they had with holes was this heavy duty stuff which was sort of expensive.  I really only needed the smaller stuff made of aluminum.  I am convinced that I can put a nail through aluminum.  Heck, we put all kinds of nails through the zinc roof when we built that house in Jamaica.  I think I might need to go back there tomorrow...

I just wrestled the food processor twice while Melissa and Lisa were making lasagna.  I won both times :)  It requires several words of incantation, some hand waving and a polka to get the blade to come off once you shred anything.  

Oh!  I need to post some pics from this past weekend...I saw the diet Coke/Mentos guys in real life at the Science Center!  It was amazing.

What's for dinner? fishkabobs.

It's with a heavy heart that we mourn the passing of some treasured members of our household. Though they were only with us for a few days, they made our mantelpiece look cool, and thus, they will be missed.  Control, Alt(on) and Delete were pronouced dead this morning at approximately 7:15am.  They seemed so happy and frisky yesterday...I suspect foul play.  Especially since they all apparently died together...though they lived in separate Mason jars.  That is suspicious.  

I totally scored a 10 gallon aquarium on the way to school yesterday.  It was a happy day :)  Bulk pick up week for trash + me = treasure hunting!  hah!  It had way more gravel than necessary though, so it was sort of heavy to carry...so I ditched it in our front yard and went to school.  Then I took it in the car this morning and cleaned it at school.  It is amazing (even though the gravel smelled like fish)  and it does not leak.  It is going to be perfect for density demonstrations :)

In other news, I continue to strike a sense of awe and wonder in the hearts of my students...today it was with my recitation/singing of the books of the Old Testament, followed by the 50 states.  Then I showed them the flash animation for the Element Song (I can't sing that one...yet).  My performance prompted deep questions like "Where did you go to school??!?!?"

Some skills, my friends, are not learned in school...

2.5 minutes

Four cups of coffee and an hour in the car from home to here.  That has to be some sort of record.  Or I just have amazing bladder capacity.

Sarah and Nate's wedding was this past weekend, so we took a little road trip out to Ohio.  It's supposed to take 4.5 hours but we managed to make it more like 5 or 6 each way what with our food and restroom and shopping needs.  We managed to find the scariest rest stop in West Virginia on the way there.  All we wanted was coffee and a bathroom.  They had coffee...but just coffee...and styrofoam cups...with cheap creamer and sugar.  They also sold these lovely animal figurines...since I'm sure folks often stop at a truck stop and figure that while they're there they might as well buy a decoration for the apartment.  I suppose it could have been a last minute wedding gift.  Or something.  It was at this point that Lisa noticed the room labeled "Adults Only."  We took that as our signal to exit as quickly as possible, which we did.  Thankfully Target/Starbucks was mere miles away.

We also, at some point in our journey, discovered another spectacular restroom facility.  I did not get to experience it, but Melissa hiked up her pants before going in so that they wouldn't touch the floor.  She proceeded to touch as few surfaces as possible.  They obviously had forgotten they had a bathroom and thus had not cleaned it since before the dawn of time.

Barring those experiences, it was a lovely trip...the fall colors were amazing, the wedding was beautiful and I ate myself sick on dessert at the reception.  Always a recipe for a good time.  And thus, another friend is married.  Met a guy and married him in a little over a year.  That is crazy.  Just shows how much you can plan your life :-p  And as one wedding concludes, another friend becomes engaged :)  and yet another is pregnant...exciting times.! :)  I think I am content to sit back and watch for a little while at least.  One new thing at a time please.

"Ponder this for a moment...

 ...your occupation, at this moment, is God's calling on your life."
I was reading old articles from relevantmag.com and this line struck me.  It's awesome.  and a little scary.  and it makes me really really thankful, because right now i have a job that i actually enjoy doing, and that is the best thing ever.  (okay, maybe not EVER but it's pretty darn good)

Some quotable quotes from school today...

at lunch--
Loud Perpetually Complaining Student: why is my hot dog green?
me: don't ask questions, just eat it.

at the student council debates--
Secretarial Candidate:  vote for me...because i'm black...
(as were all of the other candidates and the vast majority of those in attendance)

at dinner--
cody:  CHRISTINA!!  USE YOUR INDOOR VOICE!!!


in other news, this japanese guy broke the world record for reciting pi.  to 100,000 decimal places!  it took him 16 hours!  that is insane.  i told my juniors about it and one of them was like, oh, can you do that?  i think he was seriously asking if i could compete with this japanese guy.  i should have just started spewing out numbers and telling them that that's what pi is equal to...

and finally, i decided last night while driving that i would like to personally issue glow in the dark uniforms to bicyclists who insist on wearing all black and riding at night.  you have to have a death wish to even consider riding a bicycle here period, why you would add the extra challenge that comes with stealth biking, i don't know.  melissa says we can do it if it's in the form of glow in the dark paint balls.  hah.  that will teach them.  BAM!  if we can get one good shot that knocks them off the bike, then we can shoot them while they're down and complete the application.  sorry sir, just doing our part to save the world, one bicyclist at a time.

i guarantee the neighbors think i'm crazy

what would you think if you saw someone walking through your neighborhood at 7:20am carrying
two cookie sheets and two bowls full of stuff?  what if you saw the same person a few hours later 
carrying a toaster oven and just walking nonchalantly down the street?  ...yep, that was me today.  the lesson didn't go quite as i'd envisioned it, but i suppose it was worth it...maybe if i beat them 
over the head with metric conversions, then they will understand?

calling parents makes me nervous.  it takes me forever because i have to plan out everything i'm
going to say, and then they don't even answer the phone.  the nerve!  so far they have been receptive
though.  even when i had to be like...um, yeah, your son is failing science.  i'm convinced that if i 
establish some good parent contact now, then maybe i can avoid future problems...

Favorite Student was interrogating us at breakfast today as to how tall we all are.  
"i'm 5'5'', " i told him.  then i picked up my foot to show him my heels, "but i'm wearing these today, so
i'm taller."  then cody asked him how tall he was.
"i'm 4'6"," he said proudly, paused, then picked up his foot to show off his black air jordans, "but
i'm wearing these today, so i'm taller."
that made us all laugh, harder than we probably should have :)