the new job

So, it has been two weeks at the new job. Exciting. I would like to revoke my previous post about enjoying filing things. I would like to revise it to "filing my things" because I have recently spent a great deal of time filing other people's things and it is not nearly as much fun. I am fairly confident I can now print any size label ever desired by man. Place your requests. I triple dog dare you.

I thought I was unique, but...

I finally decided to update my profile. For some reason it listed me as an accountant, which is certainly NOT true. I would have a job by now. So I type along, happily, filling out things that I like to do. Then I save my changes, and lo and behold, blogger makes each of my interests a link to other people who listed the exact same interests as me. I thought I was such a special individual until I found out my hobbies are nearly universal. Even someone else listed "filing things!" Who knew? I thought I was the only nutcase in the world. But at least my "adventures with my husband" remain mine alone. I think I'm going to go see what the girl who likes to file things blogs about. She's probably an accountant.

missing junior high...

And not the way you think. I spent the first two weeks of my own junior high as "Michael" because I'd just moved and didn't have the courage to correct the P.E. teacher.

I miss TEACHING junior high. Strange, huh? For all the times I've been called a saint for doing it--- you either love it, or you don't. End of story. I loved it.

Many things I recently discovered reminded me of this:
1. Lindsey's friend Tiffanie, who I have heard much about but never had the chance to meet. The Big Butts story of January 29, 2007. I can't figure out how to link straight to it.
2. I don't know this person at all, but it reminds me of the lunchroom at first lunch. I can't explain why.
3. Student bribery and overlooking the rules just for once to get something done? I have!
4. Interesting to me that all teaching blogs have the poor things looking for a release that won't get back to their students or get them fired. The story about the boy who couldn't remember how to spell his name made me happy.
5. This person has a happy balance between repressed anger and joy. I like it. Especially the boy who came back to visit.
6. Junior high crushes on teachers ... such awkwardness...
7. Co-teachers!!! I feel ya, Ms. Cornelius and shrewdness of apes!
8. Mating habits of freshmen. So true. I have told many a boy that deodorant really IS important, especially after P.E. Who knew teaching involved all this?
9. Riso machines. I can change cartridges in the dark. And I have...

Nostalgia. Did you know that when I was younger I used to confuse the meanings of "nostalgia" and "nausea"? Maybe I still am.

vernal falls

I want to make this picture into a poster and hang it on my wall. It reminds me of an awesome, but difficult, hike to Vernal and Nevada Falls in Yosemite at the beginning of this month. It also reminds me how much I've become my mother. When we visited the Grand Canyon I never actually saw inside because my mom had a tight grip on our sweatshirt hoods and would not let us THINK about getting near the railing, let alone the edge of the canyon. I took this photograph and then proceeded to spend the next five minutes nervous that the guy standing on the rock was going to DIE! He dove in, swam around, didn't come out from a little cave for awhile, and then swam WAY TOO CLOSE to the pounding waterfall. I was freaking out, and he wasn't even my child. Heaven help the poor kiddos. They will never see the Grand Canyon either...

family home videos

I have spent my whole life believing that none of my life has ever been recorded on video, and blessedly so.

Spent Labor Day visiting the cousins. It was 106 degrees and 35 percent humidity, so no one wanted to go outside. After we'd eaten ourselves into a food coma, there was little left to do but pull out recently discovered family home videos. Apparently, however, they'd already watched them all at Thanksgiving, when I was on my honeymoon. Nevertheless, we start into them again. Let me tell you- the inlaws are a good time. The videos were from the Christmases of 1989 and 1990- prime real estate. This puts my husband in kindergarten and first grade. Past the giant head of infancy and into the odd "mini-human" stage of life. Anyway. All the cousins are very recognizable, it's just watching their quirks in miniature. The gifts were creative- though we had bridged into a new decade, they are squarely in neon pants and bandannas with beads and the kicker- a denim visor with lace attached. The best part is, the aunts still feel the need to compliment the strange offerings. They still gasp and ooooh and try to get the kids excited 15 years after the fact. If you had dubbed out the aunts in 2007 and in 1990, there would have been dead silence because each kid just opened the gift and stared at it, in a strange "I'm not really sure WHAT this is, but I should definitely go give Aunt K a hug."

In contrast, my family has essentially none of our lives recorded on video. Within the last month a video surfaced that my grandfather had taken of me at nine months- extensive footage of me sitting on the front lawn eating grass. "MA-chelle, does that taste good?!?" The video then cuts out to me, a year or so later, trying to learn how to swim at my grandparents' house. Basically, this is them leaving me in the water (terrified) and then yelling from the side "Paddle with your arms!" "Close your mouth, you'll swallow less water!" while I scream bloody murder. Good times with the family.

Last but not least, a good friend of mine just sent a video she had taken of me midway through college. I'll let it speak for itself:

Not my finest (or most coordinated) moment. I'm glad our eternal judgement draws on more than just surviving video footage...

boxes to the ceiling

Something very strange and cathartic about weeding through your possessions and packing them into boxes. Moving day rapidly approaching. Tomorrow is the day of truth- will all our junk fit in the U-Haul?

If not, spontaneous yard sale in our parking lot.

Good deals, going fast.

i love turkey...

... and not the thanksgiving type. It was my favorite for several reasons, not in any order of importance:

1. Dichotomies and laughable pseudo-westernizations such as above.
2. The bizillion degree heat seemed bearable there. Although this might not be the norm. The day before it had been 45 degrees Celsius, which is like 120 in Fahrenheit. Il-hamdu llilah, as we said there.
3. The mosques were beautiful and the whole skyline was minarets.
4. Sitting in a Victorian imperialist garden backyard eating rice pudding served by locals whose only words of 'English' were "bon appetit!", I simultaneously heard Dean Martin and the call to prayer in the middle of an oppressively hot afternoon.
5. Atatürk. Not only a mother could love this face. He's everywhere.

How could I have waited this long to see the world?

passport to freedom

My husband and I are going on a fabulous European getaway and we are absolutely thrilled. Until this morning, we were also EXTREMELY nervous, as the trip is in a few days, and still... no passport.

Let me explain the last week or so to you:
Via internet and email... You have to submit everything, including the name of your first born, to sign on to check the status, which unfailing for the past 2 months has said "processing". Once you hit the magical "two weeks 'til your trip" mark, you can email. The day I emailed, it said it was taking one day to get back to people. The next day, it was taking two. The day after that, it was taking four days to reply. I checked the following day and they had removed the email address from their site. It's now been six days and still no word.
On the phone... You can't actually call and wait on hold for the next available representative. You have to call back and be hung up on one thousand times first. I dedicate an hour a day or so to my calls to the Passport people. So last Tuesday I spent an hour watching Scrubs and hitting redial, then 1-3-1, which will bring you to the moment of rejection the quickest. "Goodbye!" it says, but it starts to feel like "Good riddance! If I don't get to go on vacation, you don't either!"
Finally, at the end of the second episode, I get put on hold. Every six seconds, it interrupts the classical muzak with important things I should know, such as "We will only answer your call if you are within 2 weeks of your trip." "Because of the high demand for passports due to the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative, we are currently receiving a high volume of calls, please stay on the line." "Passports are not required when traveling to U.S. Protectorates, as you are not actually leaving the United States. These include: Guam, Puerto Rico, American Samoa, Swains Island..." Swains Island?!?! We have Swains Island? Where is Swains Island?
Forty-five minutes later, I come in contact with a live human being who says she will "expedite it". "No ma'am, I can't tell you the next step. No ma'am, I can't give you an estimate of how long it will take. You can drive to your local regional passport center." LOCAL, meaning COLORADO!
At the post office... I remember this man from when we ordered the passports three months ago. He agrees that a passport would be nice at this point and launches off into the familiar monotone list.
"Well ma'am.... (the magic question) Is it within two weeks of your trip?"
"Less than a week."
"Have you checked the website?"
"Yes."
"Have you emailed?"
"Yes."
"Have you called the office?"
"Yes."
"Have you tried faxing?"
"I didn't know that was an option."
"It's a secret option."
"How do I do that?"
"You can't do that. Only I can do that." (pause and looks at me)
"Will you please do that for me?"
(Moves slowly to computer and then begins to hit keys one by one... I'm starting to understand why it's been over three months and still no passport.)
"Date of trip? Husband's Name? Social security number? Date of birth? Place applied? Favorite tie color? Inseam length? Name of firstborn?"
He brings the paper over to me and shows me how he's marked the internal "urgent" box and ask that it be sent overnight priority. I seriously consider giving the man my firstborn as he faxes.
"You might try your congressman..."
Calling Bob Bennett's secretary...
"By any chance, is the passport in South Carolina?"
"Yes."
"Seems like they are all there. I'll call you tomorrow."

At this point, Andrew has spent the time he should have been studying for his exam planning a road trip of where he will go because his passport isn't coming.

What joy and exultation in my home this morning when the UPS Priority Overnight arrives with a package from the state department. I almost hugged the brown-bedecked savior, which startled him a bit. The coveted blue booklet sits before me, answer to prayer and pleading... open it up, and...
his picture makes him look like an angry terrorist. Did I mention he also speaks Arabic? You know we're getting stopped at every checkpoint. I'll soon post pictures of every detention center on both sides of the Atlantic! :)

Bon voyage!

judgment day

The last few days of school- judgment day. Students who were content with their 6% all year suddenly decide that failing my class will keep them out of Harvard and will cause them to fail at life and DIE. And it is all my fault, of course.

Some of my favorites today:
"Didn't you get it? I slid it under your door."
"Well, I was cleaning out my folder and I threw it away. I thought you had graded it. No, it didn't have a grade on it."
"I don't know. I don't think I ever got one. Hey, is that a hamster cage over there?"
"I was absent for that."
"I had to DO that?"
"Do you have any no-name papers?"
"What color is it?"
"Was I absent that day?"
"I have really been good today. Couldn't you raise it?"
"Work is due today?!!?"
"Are you sure?"

I only hold the key to a paradisaical summer vacation, not for saving them from the infinite eternities of fire and brimstone... I am beginning to feel a great deal of sympathy for Saint Peter or whatever unlucky soul is manning the pearly gates.

reality bites...

And then, within the same day, I decide to record the number of times ONE of my students yells out in a 30 minute period. 45 times. For the record, that is an average of 1.5 outbursts per minute. Multiplied by 40 students, that is 1800 outbursts per half hour. 3600 per hour. Seven hours a day, that's 25, 200. Putting this in perspective, that is quashing 126,000 unsolicited outbursts per week. As much as I love teaching junior high, I think I might just love summer more. I can go to the nicklecade and play whack-a-mole when I get lonely. It fulfills the same basic need.

stairway to heaven

Today I watched two 8th graders, one with an Abraham Lincolnesque construction paper hat on his head, do a haunting rendition of Stairway to Heaven. Who wouldn't want to teach junior high? And isn't that the way Led Zeppelin intended it to be?