A Day at the Lake...

This was such fun to learn.... Thanks, Julie

Grad Girls!

A video blog of "grad school" escapades! Fun!

Cutest Nephew

Lindsi's Video YAY!!!!!!

These are a few (of the many) pictures we took of Anna in Germany.

Happiness with BWP

Here's the video I created as part of Julie's demo. Thanks, Julie. This is awesome!

Animoto Rocks!

This is me and Jeremy from our summer vacation in Blue Ridge, GA this summer. We had an awesome time!

Things I Carry

Here are just a few things:

Safety pins that I bought in Washington D.C.- On my way to meet with Rep. Marshall, I realized that I might have a wardrobe malfunction, so I had to buy safety pins at the Washington Court.  I still have a few left after rescuing eighth graders throughout the year.

Kleenex-I added this to my arsenal after I laughed and cried during Sunday morning song selection a few weeks ago.  Luckily, I haven’t had to open them, but I figure that they may come in handy in a week when I'm in the Holocaust Seminar.    

Bath and Body Works Hand Sanitizer- I have the teeny tiny size because I don’t like having to take it out of my purse when I fly.  

A camera- Usually my camera is in my purse, but right now it’s in my computer bag because of the ISI.  I got my camera for my birthday last year because I wanted a camera that I could travel with.  I have a camera that I love that requires film, but there’s nothing worse than going on a trip, taking picture, and returning home to discover that your picture with the Naked Cowboy didn’t come out.  (True Story.)   So, Naked Cowboy, be on the lookout.  I’m coming for you! 

“Junior,” my iPod- Junior is with me at all times.  If he is not, I am totally lost.  I experience serious withdrawal.  On the plus side, now that I have an iPhone, I can download music to it and then if I am every caught without Junior, I will still have music (albeit, no headphones).  It’s hard to remember what life was like without Junior.  Junior was preceded by Hans.  Hans died last year on 6/6/08.  Oh, how I tried to revive Hans.  I tried putting him in the refrigerator then the freezer.  He valiantly tried to come back to life, but his will to play was overruled by the sound jack gods.  I called the Apple Store hoping that this was not the end of my friend.  But alas my options were to replace him or to send him to be fixed for about the price of a new one.  So, I said goodbye to Hans, thanked him for all of the good times and things that he helped me through, and gently placed him in his little black box.              

Things I Carry...

Okay, so I really had no idea what to write about. This poem just popped out within the last 5 minutes. I don't even think it makes much sense, and I am not sure if I am calling it the right thing at the end. Who knows? If you do, let me know.


I carry you with me
on my shoulder
like a shadow.

An invisible
silhouette leading me
down an undiscovered
path of actions
and repercussions.

You encompass
Evil and Good and the
in between. Which do you
prefer?

With you,
I struggle to find
a balance. To find
a way to interact with
the world.

You are my
conscience, and I
carry you with me
always.

Things I carry...

I always carry chapstick. I can’t stand for my lips to get dry and cracked, and I need to be able to reapply at any point. I’ve actually gotten my husband in the habit of carrying chapstick too. I don’t like scratchy sandpaper kisses, so he appeases me and keeps his lips moist and kissably soft. Ok, enough mushy stuff.

In my car, I carry about 3 or 4 umbrellas because I’m constantly forgetting to put them back in the car after using them, so I over-compensate.

I carry tension with me. My neck holds my tension. It doesn’t help that I’m usually reading or writing something. Even on good days, my neck has little pains. My mom says it’s because I’m getting old and I don’t eat right or exercise enough. I’m determined to get back into a routine after BWP ends. Either way, I don’t feel too bad because I’m supposed to be gaining some weight right now.

There is always a to-do list in my head, and sometimes on a piece of paper in my purse. I am always trying to keep up with so much that I am paranoid I’ve forgotten something if I don’t check my list.

I don’t carry a lot of heavy stuff lately. Laundry baskets are the only item I carry on a regular basis, and since I’m the only human in the house right now, the baskets stay pretty light. You know, I’ve always hated that doorways are barely wide enough for a laundry basket to fit through. It is just wide enough to scrape your hands. It’s been like this in every place I’ve lived. I figure it just can’t be me, it’s the poor design. I usually have too much laundry to buy those cute little round baskets. Those are for little kids to play in. (At least that’s what we did when I was little)

I carry my heart on my sleeve…everyone in this class already knows that. I can’t hide my emotions, and it’s not just because I’m pregnant. I remember being so embarrassed in 5th grade because I balled like a baby at the end of All Dogs Go To Heaven. I don’t even remember the ending, but I haven’t watched it since fearing another waterworks display. It’s funny, my parents were never overly emotional people. I think I remember seeing my mom cry a few times, more out of frustration than anything. She wasn’t the type to cry at sad movies. I on the other hand, cried at the inspiring ending of Cool Runnings. You know the Jamaican bobsled team that carried their bobsled over the finish line at the Olympics. Actually, just about any medal ceremony at the Olympics can get me a little choked up. I know, I’m a big cheeseball, but that’s me! I dread any customer service agent that tries to cross me. I am polite, professional, and determined. I don’t care how many times I get “cut off” I will call back and make sure everything is taken care of, or I will move up the line of supervisors. If I don’t get satisfaction from corporate, it’s hello Better Business Bureau. I get that from my mom.

Things I carry, well I can tell you my load will be a little lighter after BWP is over! I feel like I carry an entire office with me right now, and I don’t have a Mary Poppins bag! My purse is always too heavy, but when I go through it to see if I can clean anything out, I can’t get rid of anything. I need it all, or at least I might someday, and I know that day will come when I stop carrying it with me.

Things I Carry...

Things I carry…

I don’t know if I can sum up the things I carry in one blog. Every morning before leaving the house I scan all the rooms to make sure there is nothing else I would like to take with me. I literally take almost everything in my house. If only I could take the furniture! My car is just a large, rolling version of a suitcase. On a typical day, I carry my purse, my black Circle One bag and another bag of “just in cases.” My day won’t go right unless I have my “just in case bag.” It looks like a total mess to other people, but I know what’s inside of it. All the things that I haven’t filed, don’t know what to do with, or just can’t bare to part with or are in this bag. I don’t have my “just in case” bag today because I’m trying to downsize. So, I took everything out of my just in case bag and put it into my black Circle One bag—just in case.
For example, I have Lindi, Rebecca and Donna’s demo presentations. You never know when there will be pop test over one of these demonstrations and a quick study session may be needed. I also have my acceptance letter to the BWP, just in case someone figures out I don’t know what I’m doing and demands to know if I’m “legal.” E-mails! I print out copies of e-mails and carry them around in my “just in case bag.” Who knows if somebody is going to deny sending me an e-mail! If so, I can just whip it out of my bag and submit it for evidence. I’m really trying to get better about e-mails. I save them on my computer. But having a hard copy is so exciting—like Law and Order: Criminal Intent. Oh yea, I carry around stamps. I just recently bought a stamp that has my signature. You know, to make things official. Next, I want stamps that say “urgent,” “top secret,” and “copy.”
I wonder if some of this stems from the fact that my daddy was a police officer and we often watched Hill Street Blues together. My fascination with the criminal world continues today because I watch all of the Law and Orders, NCIS, ect. I love it when they have someone on the stand and then they go to their bag and pull out some convicting evidence. Oh the rush of excitement!! My daddy says that if I were to become a police officer people better watch out because I wouldn’t give anyone a break. He’s right. After retiring from teaching I may look into a job with the VPD. I need to put an application in my “just in case bag.”
Due to technology, I’ve recently started carrying my iPod in my bag. Now this is crazy—I also have an iPhone with an iPod built in. I sync it to iTunes whenever I download something new. I also sync my “regular” iPod whenever I download something new. So, I have two iPods with the same thing on both, and I carry both of them around. But, I can’t stop because you never know when one might be dead and you can’t get to a charger! Right??
Well anyway, some people may call me a pack rat. But, the satisfaction of knowing I have everything I need at my fingertips is just to much to part with. Perhaps one day when I have to carry around baby bags, toys, and oh yea—a baby, I won’t be so much of a pack rat.

Things I carry - my babies

What do I not carry? I have this fear that I will be somewhere and not have something I need. I carry medical supplies that include Neosporin and a thermometer, feminine supplies, normal money stuff, every lipstick I own because I might change my mind some time during the day, a notepad for taking notes in a pinch, about 50 pens, because what if one runs out, Splenda, anti-bac wipes, anti-bac gel, hand lotion, gum, mints, phone, and I’m sure a lot more. I’ve always carried a huge diaper bag. I never know what the kids will need. A guy whose daughter stayed at my sitter’s house once said that he counts on people like me so that he doesn’t have to bring anything. Why can’t I be more like that? That would be just fabulous to carry one of those tiny purses. Even when I go to church and carry the church purse, knowing the big purse is in the car, I feel naked. In trying to plan our trip to Disney, I’m so stressed about how I will carry everything. I really don’t want to look like a Sherpa, but what if we need things. I know I’ll need diapers, wipes, sanitizing stuff, water, camera, phone, wallet, sunscreen, change of clothes for the kids, but what else will I need??? The stroller has a tiny compartment, so I or my husband will be carrying most of the stuff. What will we do when we get on a ride? I am at a loss, and it is totally stressing me out.

Something else I carry is my children. When Jeremiah was born, Abby-Kate was 2 ½ and weighed about 30 pounds. Because I had a C-section, the doctor told me not to pick up anything heavier than the baby. I asked him if he realized I have a 30 pound 2 year old who needs me to carry her?? Yes, I still carry her. This morning she tried to get me to carry her to the car, but thankfully I was able to decline due to carrying the food. I love to carry Jeremiah. He’s heavy, but he is a perfect fit for my hip. I know the day will come when neither of them want me to carry them, so I enjoy it so much now. When Abby-Kate wakes up to use the bathroom, she always wants me to carry her back to her bed. She weighs 40 pounds, and usually I’m suffering from sleepy muscles, so sometimes it is a strain to lift her, but that is what Mamas do. I can still remembering my mother carrying me to my room when I would fall asleep on the sofa. I want my babies to have those same memories.

Things I carry....

Starting right here…right now
The baggage from the past
Gets routed to the unclaimed area
I do not want it anymore.
Therefore, I will not claim it.
It weighs me down…
Diverts me from my purpose
On this trip called life.
At one time, my baggage
items seemed so important.
Today, those relics from the past
I no longer want nor have a use for.
Therefore, they are sent to
The special place reserved only for
Unneeded baggage such as mine
Lighter than before and unfamiliar with
The freedom of unwanted baggage,
I step onto the escalator of life
Not knowing where it will take me but
Knowing that it will move whether or not
I am in step.
Apprehensive, yet excited… I begin
The next stage of my journey.

Freewriting Topics (Help!)

Hi folks,

A quick request for help here: Lindsi, Rebecca, and I have a list of freewriting topics that we pull from, and we sometimes make up topics based on whatever is in the news that day or whatever we saw that morning, but we'd love to have new ideas for topics from you. We use them for the ISI and for Write Night.

I'll list some of what we have below, and maybe you can respond with some of your own favorites.

Topics:

• Car chaos
• Vacation memories
• What was I/he/she thinking?
• Most people don't know . . .
• Addictions
• Tending one's garden
• Family stories
• Favorite movie lines (Last night I saw part of Jaws again: "We're gonna need a bigger boat!")
• Rainbows
• Dreams and nightmares
• Scary stories
• Where I'm from
• Discipline and punish
• School memories
• Favorite/worst teachers
• Passing notes
• Easter hats
• Competition
• Together and apart
• Pets
• Pet peeves
• Failures
• Band
• Scars
• Lunchroom ladies
• Santa Claus
• Fire!
• PTO or PTA
• Insomnia
• High society
• Unexplained noises
• Look, up in the sky!
• Poetry
• Stereotypes
• Clueless
• Monster Mash
• Intimidation
• Anticipation
• Clutter
• Championships
• Sleep
• Cat Scratch Fever
• Baby bumps
• Literary figures
• Author, author
• And it's gone!

I'm really curious to see what you can add. And I apologize for doing two posts this morning, but I didn't want to bury this one in my earlier post.

Things I Carry

This writing prompt reminds me of a novel by Tim O'Brien. He wrote The Things They Carried. It's a collection of short stories he wrote about his service in Vietnam. I haven't thought about this novel in years, but it's so good. A few of my favorite lines read, "The things they carried ended up carrying them." That was in the first chapter that was just a literal list of things they carried--boots, ammunition, clothes, guns, helmets, navigation equipment, letters from loved ones, half composed letters to loved ones, dog tags, knives, grenades... etc.

Not to belittle O'Brien's experience, I carry keys, hair ties, iPod, clothes, shoes, credit cards, book bag, red little journal half written with prose and poetry, loose papers, pens, pencils, bottle of ibuprofen, jump drive, loose change, memories, scars, memories of scars, emotional scars, sandals, two tubes of chap stick, necklace, and bracelet... Only a few of those things carry me anywhere. Another line from O'Brien: "The dumb cooze didn't get it." He writes that when he would lecture about Vietnam he included a fictional story about the soldiers finding a baby water buffalo. Masochists from the war, they shot the buffalo to pieces bit by bit. At no point did the animal try to run or escape. He just stood there and let them kill him. At that point it was the most god awful thing I think I'd ever read. I was crying and had to skip those pages. O'Brien claims that every time he tells that story someone comes up to him to express sympathy for the animal. He tells them he made that story up, and the listener gets pretty angry. What I love about this is story is that he always calls the angry listener a "dumb cooze" for not getting it. It goes back to the war veterans who can't stop telling and retelling war stories. It's not that they don't know they've already told the story it's that they don't know how to tell the story in a way that makes the listener feel the way the incident made them feel. So they keep retelling it trying to make people understand. O'Brien's water buffalo story, the feeling of killing off the animal piece by piece represents how they felt as soldiers; horrified that they had to kill, terrified yet simultaneously resigned to being killed. Complex emotions indeed.

Writing Supplies and Weight

That's the short answer to what I carry: writing supplies and weight. I haven't been on a scale since the ISI started, and I don't intend to step on one until Wes re-hooks up the Wii Fit, which will definitely chastise me Mean Girls style: "Donna, you've haven't visited in two months!" or maybe "Wow, you've really porked it up, huh?" After I control my urge to throw the thing through the window, I'll start playing on it again.

Writing supplies: I keep a small notebook in my pocketbook for when I need to take notes wherever I am, maybe to-do lists or meeting notes. It's where I keep my shopping list for Christmas. And, of course, I always have pens, at least blue and black ink, but usually purple as well. I'm running low on colored ink pens, so I need to visit Office Max soon.

What else do I carry? A cell phone, particularly now as we await news of our nephew's birth. I always have my laptop with me during the Summer Institute, but other than the ISI or conferences, the laptop stays at home. I carry a book with me anytime I go to a doctor's office or to Wes's office or pretty much anywhere I may have to wait. Any time we go to Whigham or Moultrie to see family a book is in the car in case I decide to read to pass the time or to avoid seeing other people's bumpers up close and personal. Sometimes, I feel like I'm a car proctologist when I ride with Wes.

On a side note, the blog spellchecker doesn't recognize proctologist, but it suggested parasitologist instead. To quote Amy Poehler and Seth Meyers, "Really?!"

What I Carry

Things I Carry...

Last night I carried Gallagher home with me. As I walked across the bridge to my car, I passed one of my former professors. I had him for psychology, and as he smiled at Gallagher, who just happened to be waving at Rebecca from my bag at the moment, I could only imagine the list of disorders he was developing for me. Or not, he was a pretty great teacher, but we should be able to carry more of the postive aspects of childhood with us through life-like playing with stuffed animals occasionally. I'm not suggesting we all shirk responsibility and run around like five year olds, but most of us would be a happier if we carried a stuffed frog in our bags.

I also carry--
-Too many bags
-Often Anna
-Forty pounds I never lost post-pregnancy!
-Pretty pens
-Hand sanitizer
-The baggage of two and a half divorces-not my own
-The knowledge that I can learn from those divorces and not repeat those mistakes
-The feeling that my husband loves me unconditionally
-The belief that my daughter will grow up to be good person
-Regret from words said in anger that can't be taken back
-Friends I can call whenever I need them
-Lists, lists, lists
-My cell phone (when I can find it!)
-Faith in God
-A desire to grow professionally
-A desire to shrink physically
-The constant desire for a yard fairy to cut my grass and pull weeds
-The joy of being a mother
-The annoyance of some people thinking that because I stay home I'm involved in some antiquated relationship with my husband
-The pleasure of having a husband who spent four years earning a Pharm. D. so that I can stay home
-Memories of summers at my grandparents-riding four wheelers, shucking corn, eating watermelon on the bed of grandaddy's truck
-Memories of Germany and my Oma sneaking my cherries and kipfel between meals
-Summers in St. Augustine
-The strength of my Oma
-The stubbornness of my father
-Ponytail holders
-Memories that I'm uncertain of that haunt me-things my mother says never happened, but I'm quite sure they did
-Questions about my childhood that I'm afraid to ask
-A Yearly Planner


So the list is pretty random, but many of these things make me "me." It's impossible to think about this topic without thinking of Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried. I worked with a few teachers who didn't want to teach it because it was about war. It's really more about people. I remember thinking it wasn't what I expected when I read it. I thought it would be about the Vietnam War, and it was in a way, but it was more specifically about the things soldiers carried with them into war, emotionally and physically, and what they had to carry when they walked away. I think in the same way as the events of war shape the way a soldier reacts to life back home, the things in our past influence our reactions to daily life. I know that's a pretty simple concept, but it's one I think we forget about a lot when dealing with other people. We don't know what "wars" they've been in. I do think there's a point when people need to get over it. I mean I understand you being shaped by an event, but what shapes you is your reaction to it as much as the event yourself. But now I'm being cynical, and that's not where I meant to go. I'll "carry" my thoughts somewhere else now and respond to other posts.

I wonder if Gallagher is like Kermit and carries a struggle with his greenness?

What ever happened to...

…Nano pets. I loved my nano baby! There was nothing better than changing a virtual crap diaper!
…Holly Hobby. I used to love the Holly Hobby dolls
…California Rasins. Hello. Hardee’s had them all! That’s why I had to go get cinnamon raisin biscuits everyday for like a year!
…Gerber baby dolls. I so had one!
…Baby Feel So Real. I loved this doll! She was heavy. When you squeezed her, you could feel the bones in her arms and legs and she even had a real soft spot in her head. When my brother and I were a little older, we decided to shoot her up with the BB gun. Turns out she and stretch Armstrong were filled with the same stuff.
…Stretch Armstrong.
…Quints dolls. They came in a pack of five. They were so tiny you could do nothing with them, but I had to have some!

Tom Swifties...

While researching for my teaching proposal, I came across this activity. I thought it was hilarious but not good enough to present.

I give you Tom Swifties.

Tom Swifties from the Associated Content

“I Love Being an AC Producer," Tom Said Contentedly.

The Tom Swifty is a form of wordplay that pokes fun at the excessive use of adverbial dialog attribution.

Say we encounter the following line in a work of a fiction:

"Leave me alone," she pleaded.

The phrase "she pleaded" is dialog attribution. It attributes the sentence "leave me alone" to a female speaker ("she") and also attributes a manner of rendition to that sentence. In this case, we know that "she" spoke pleadingly (and not angrily or menacingly or playfully).

All too often, however, writers will not leave well alone. They just have to go and add an adverb to further modify the verb of dialog attribution. For the above example, this would give us something like: "Leave me alone," she pleaded despairingly/tearfully/abjectly and so on and so forth.

While this sentence structure is formulaic, it was not before the early 1960s that it gave rise to a particular form of word play, the Tom Swifties.

Tom Swifties derive their name from Tom Swift, the courageous and inventive hero of a series of juvenile adventure novels that first appeared in 1910. The series main writer and editor, Edward Stratemeyer, would not let Tom make the simplest statement without adding a qualifying adverb to it. Tom Swift never simply "said." Tom Swift would say something modestly or bravely or eagerly or... swiftly.

A Tom Swifty is a word game, a pun, a parody of adverbial redundancies, i.e. of the writing style that dictates that a verb of dialog attribution should always be followed by a qualifying adverb. The trick is to choose an adverb that summarizes the main statement and, in doing so, results in a funny (let's hope) pun. For example:

"I love pancakes," Tom said flippantly.

"Who stole all the apples?" Tom said fruitlessly.

"Try that direction," Tom said pointedly.

"Go to the back of the ship," Tom said sternly.

"I have a gift for you," Tom said presently.

These four sentences exemplify the traditional adverbial Swifty: statement + Tom said + qualifying adverb.

Daisy Daisy Where Art THou?

What ever happened to my Vera Bradley Daisy Daisy lunch bag?  This has been on my mind since April.  Last year, I had an AWESOME school year except for the fact that I couldn’t seem to remember where I put my personal possessions.  At one point I misplaced my white gold band that my parents bought me for my 21^st birthday.  I consoled myself by buying myself a right-hand ring from Girardin.  (I later found it on my nightstand.)   But the Daisy Daisy lunch bag has remained elusive.  I finally gave in and bought a Cupcake lunch bag, rationalizing the purchase by saying that it was a different pattern.  Secretly, I hoped that if I bought the new one, the old one would show up.  I also thought that since I was moving classrooms, it would show up.  Nope.  To this day, I still don’t know where Daisy Daisy is.  I’m beginning to think she has been taken, but since she was embroidered with my initials, that seems improbable.   On Friday, I finally gave in and bought a Daisy Daisy cooler.     

What ever happened to....

What ever happened to stirrup pants! I loved those pants. I would wear them now if I could find a pair. You could wear them with any kind of shoe and almost any kind of top. When they first came out they were just black, but then all sorts of brilliant colors came about. I had a pair of turquoise stirrup pants. I like wearing colors that make me stand out in the crowd! J I think I got those pants when I was in the 7th grade. The only thing bad about stirrup pants was that you couldn’t wear them in the summer time. Not in south Georgia. But I didn’t really care that it was 100 degrees outside, I wore my stirrups anyway. Can you imagine me at P.E. in my stirrup pants? We had to dress out in middle school, so it was okay. The walk home however was murder. But I played it off pretty good. Of course I couldn’t let anyone know just how hot I was in those things. In the 80s it was all about image.
The 80s styles were the best. My favorite hair accessory—banana clips. I wore one everyday. I had all sorts of colors. And to make them even more intriguing I placed them in a different position everyday. Some days I wore it to the side. Some days I wore in the back. Some days I pulled it high up on top of my head. The possibilities were endless! The longer the hair was, the better the result. Therefore, long hair was a must in the 80s. My 80s idol, Holly Robinson (Peete) wore stirrup pants and banana clips!! Anybody remember 21 Jump Street?
To put the icing on my stirrup pants, banana clip style, I had to go out and buy these metal clips that you put in the front of your hair to create waves. You could sleep with these in your hair or simply walk around the house waiting for the desired wave intensity. I opted for both. So my banana clip had 75% of my hair in it, while half of the top was curled to one side with waves. I looked just like Holly!
I don’t know what ever happened to that style because it was so fabulous. I’m waiting for it to come back so that I can once again relive the 80s fashions. Everyone seems to want to relive the 60s and 70s style, but noone remembers the big poofy dresses of the 80s. Am I the only one that went crazy over color mascara?? Who says that eyelashes can’t be blue? And your eyelids can even be blue too…..if you’re an 80s child!
All those crazy 80s movies showed us what 80s fashion was truly about. Pretty In Pink, Ferris Beuller’s Day Off, Risky Business. For some reason, I think that my life would have been deprived if I had not seen Ferris Beuller’s Day Off.
Stone washed jeans were a staple in the 80s. But, stone washed jeans were not like stirrups. A pair wouldn’t do! All of your jeans had to be some version of stone washed or they simply could not be worn. The variation of stoniness was vast in the 80s. So, all of the stone washed jeans did not look alike. And whoever decided to make stone washed jean skirts was a pure genius! This took things to another level. This is where wearing two pair of socks at the same time came into play. Blue top, stone washed jeans skirt, pair of white socks on top of a pair of blue socks, with white shoes. Too cute! Don’t forget the previously mentioned hair. On this day I would be wearing a blue banana clip.
Oh the 80s. I wish that I could go back and relieve the brilliance of L.L. Cool J., New Edition, Cindy Lauper, Prince and of course Michael Jackson. Kids of today can hope that they can experience this kind of utopia in their lifetime!!

Whatever happened to...

When did it become socially acceptable to become commonly rude? When did seeing how rude you can be to someone become such a game? It makes it hard to go in public at times because of the effort it takes to deal with the rude actions of people. Who died and said that it was okay to let your kids run wild, whine loudly and bother other people when in a restaurant? If my children misbehaved in public, not only would they lose the privilege of eating out, but of also doing whatever was planned afterward. When did the pendulum change and it suddenly became the thing to see how much disrespect you can show your teacher. One of the most draining aspects of being a teacher is the constantly evolving mind games that kids today play. Do they get up one morning and said “How can I make this day almost impossible for my teachers to deal with?
When did it become acceptable to act like a real patoot to those around you in the movie theater, the checkout line, even on the highway? There is like an unwritten code that the youth of today buy into that allows them to say what they think. What happened to moderation in all things. And appreciation of what you have because you worked hard for it? I am from the “good old days” and although there are many new things in society today that I appreciate and are becoming increasingly difficult to live with… rudeness, last of caring for people and possessions and loss of respect for positions that people hold are not among those.

P.S. Whatever happened to my brain...you know that saying "to just let your mind go...well, i did and it hasn't found its way back yet! I miss it!

Whatever happened to...

Whatever happened to summer?

Long days spent at the pool and pink-iced animal cookies inhabited most of my days. Baths weren’t necessary if you had been to the pool. In my 5-year old mind, I had spent most of the day in one of the largest bathtubs around. Gator was the game of choice, and I hated it! Two kids would be the gators, and the rest of the kids would stand on the ledge of the pool. The “gators” would start in the pool on the opposite side of the kids standing on the ledge ready to jump in. Once the “gators” started swimming to their side, the kids would have to jump in and try to swim to the other side before they got them or touched the other side. If you were caught, then you turned into a gator. This all took place in the deep end, and I was never really a good swimmer so I hated it. Another memory of my days spent at the pool involves my sister, Jill, and my childhood friend, Brittany. Brittany was a pro at doing back dives off of the diving board. I had always been envious of people like her. On this particular day, Jill and Brittany were determined to get me to do one through peer pressure. Now, I competed in gymnastics so a back-handspring was no problem. Standing on the tip-end of the diving board, I psyched myself out for about a good two hours. I would swing my arms to go backwards and eventually end up jumping to the side. After much coaxing to return back to the tip-end of the diving board, I did. I was determined. Swinging my arms full force, I went backwards smacking my head on the diving board as I entered the pool. That’s right, my hands went right by the diving board, but my head was unable to clear it. Here’s the problem: back-handsprings in gymnastics are very different than back dives off the diving board. The whole dynamic of them are different. However, this was the least of my problems. The smack on my head had caused me to black out. So, there I was…sinking. Jill, being the heroic big sis, dove in and pulled me out. As you can imagine, this caused quite a commotion among the parents, especially mine. Once I was out of the pool, I was fine and somewhat embarrassed. An immediate trip to the hospital followed next. Even though the doctors said I was fine, my mom and dad wouldn’t let me go to sleep until the next night. Every precaution was taken. Since that day, I have tried to steer clear of diving boards. We don’t really get along.

Hair Bands - What ever happened to them?

Whatever happened to the hair bands from the 80s? I watch “Where are they now?” and have seen some of them, but not all. Just the other day, I was listening to Winger. I remember how in love I was with Kip Winger. He had massive amounts of chest hair, but it worked for me. Where is he now? What about the band Slaughter? I remember seeing them in concert and thinking the lead singer was wonderful. What about White Lion and Europe? I saw both of them in concert. I tried to just Google them, but I still can’t find out where they are now. Apparently some are still active. I remember when I saw Poison for the first time. I was in love with Bret Michaels. He seemed to use as much hairspray and makeup as I did. Now, I look at him on TV and wonder what in the world happened to him. I even saw a special on Sebastian Bach from Skid Row. He was on Broadway. Interesting. I loved that music, and still do. My poor daughter has to listen to Hair Nation on XM on the way to school in the mornings. I guess I like listening to it because I have such amazing memories of concerts, boys, cars, boys, music, boys… I think you get the idea. Anyway, I would love to write a book/movie about my stories. I used to watch the show My So Called Life and thought about how similar my stories were to those on the show. I always liked the bad boy, but he and I were both usually dating someone, so we stole quick hand touches in the hallway or hidden rendezvous in the park. I was infatuated with the bad boys, but I had the “regular” boyfriend so I always had a date for important events. I just recently reconnected with a guy that I met 21 years ago. He was definitely the bad boy. I was dating a friend of his when we first met. Now, we chat on Facebook about the days gone by. Isn’t that a hair band song? I remember now; that is from a Skid Row song, I’ll Remember You. It is funny to talk with someone who knew me back then, big hair and all. He is still the same person, and that is funny considering it has been over 20 years. One might have thought he would have improved with age, or at least learned how to spell. Sadly, no. I even find it funny that he has the knowledge to use a computer. That is probably mean, but he never seemed like the smartest guy. He was fun to be with, but not because of his brains. Oh well… that is a story for my book. Stay tuned!

What ever happened to ... Mayberry?

What ever happened to Mayberry? The Andy Griffith Show was always the example of our tiny little town. The way people lived and the morals that people displayed through their actions were critical traits that define their town and ours. People trusted each other. What ever happened to people trusting other people? We have become a society filled with contracts, prenuptials, and locked doors. Growing up I was taught that if a person is not as good as their word, then they are not much good at all. Living on a farm, we transact a lot of business. I remember when we would cut hay, my grandfather would always get a man to bring his equipment from Pearson to cut and bail it. My grandfather would always cut hay on halves. The guy that cut the hay got half, and my grandfather got half. They always shook hands and that was their contract, a simple hand shake. Now you need a team of lawyers, a ream of paper and a notary public to take care of the same business. Also growing up, I can recall never locking the doors to our house and we always left the keys in our cars, even in town. (I think realistically if we had not left our keys in our cars, we would have lost them. I lose my keys all the time!) People never knocked at our house, they just walked in and were greeted with warm smiles and always something to drink. What ever happened to this? Now we not only lock our doors, but we have a deadbolt and a security system too boot. I guess the deeper question is what has happened to our society? We have gone from being a culture who builds relationships on trust to being a society who is taught to trust no one. What ever happened to the good old days? What every happened to Mayberry?

Whatever happened to a clean house?

Oh cottage,
why do you betray me,
revealing my clutter,
my lack of time,
my refusal to straighten you?

Once you boasted clean lines,
a dust-free zone,
greeting me with Pine Sol scent,
prompting a smile when I entered.

Last night I saw messy blankets,
unemptied trash bags,
wrinkled clothes awaiting a hot iron,
dishes resting in the sink,
and tears threatened.

I miss your clean version,
the polished version,
not the messy rough draft
with no clear message.
I need an editor for my house.

Your unswept, unmopped floors
embarrass me.
Dust settles everywhere,
and I long for someone else to visit,
someone armed with Pine Sol,
Pledge,
scrubbing bubbles,
bubbles that will clean all,
rinsing away proof of my neglect,
making me love you again.

Fairy Godmother,
I'm waiting;
I have the prince,
the carriage,
the ball gown.
I want the clean house.

For Every Thing There Is a Season

While I haven't been in education very long (15 years), many changes have occurred at the school level. Whatever happened to these items that I remember having in my early years of teaching? Let's retrogress to the teaching technology of the 80s and 90s.

1. The machine that you placed a carbon on and cranked by hand to make copies for your students--you know, the one with the purple ink that you loved to smell--I can't remember it's name because it has been so long since I've seen one much less used one.

2. Risograph--I think this is how you spell it. It's a step up from machine #1 because it could make hundreds of copies quickly, and you weren't required to hand crank it.

3. Dot matrix printers--these were great! You always had to make sure the paper was on track, and when it printed, it made a grinding noise. Well, maybe grinding isn't the write descriptor. The noise, if you were printing a long document, would lull you into a relaxed state because it was so repetitive. And you could tell when the printer came to a shorter sentence or was printing a single word. The BRRRRRTTTT sound it made would be just a BRT with longer stretches of silence as the print cartridge glided across the paper.

4. Paper for a dot matrix printer--the sheets were always attached to each other, and you could make banners with it easily. I loved printing out these banners and then coloring them in with my Crayola markers.

5. Computers with DOS operating systems--I've forgotten every key stroke that I had to learn to run one of these babies. I actually resisted learning how to use a computer until my last quarter in college (Spring 1992). I took a fiction writing class that semester and just could not endure the multiple drafts on my Brother typewriter.

6. My Brother typewriter. Man, I loved this typewriter. I wish I still had it. It was an electric typewriter, and I got it one year from my parents for Christmas. Typing was the best class I took in high school. I use it daily. I used my typewriter all the time as well. I typed every paper in college as an undergrad on that Brother typewriter, and any time I ran out of correction tape, I would cry. Thank goodness I typed well and had few errors. I even used it to type worksheets for my students my first year teaching.

7. Chalk boards--Can I just say that I don't really miss these? Whenever my fingernails would hit the board as I erased something quickly, my face and body would contort and I would begin my chicken dance. The squeal of nails on a chalkboard is worse than water boarding in my opinion. Other interesting accessories that came with the chalkboard were long pieces of wood covered with athletic socks to use as erasers. For some reason, these long erasers were preferable to the short black ones I used to clean by beating them against the telephone pole for my teacher in elementary school. I suppose in another ten years I'll be able to add dry erase boards to this part of my list, but not quite yet.

8. Small tape recorders that have the buttons at the bottom you use to play/record/fast forward/rewind/pause--I actually had three of these in my closet that I donated to the school library this year. They were great when students had to record something for an oral history project, for instance, but they were bulky and took up too much room in my supply cabinet. Now I'm writing a grant for podcast recorders. If the grant goes through, we'll be able to record small group discussions and use the recorders for collaborative or individual student projects which we can then post to the school website.

When looking back over my list, I realize that all of these changes have occurred because in some ways, educators have decided to work smarter and not harder (one of my mottoes). Instead of resisting the computer age, I joined the 21st century and am especially interested in how I can help my students use these new tools that are displacing the old methods of communicating in and out of school. Unfortunately, educators are too often Luddites who are either too scared or too set in their ways to change. Some technology tools I foresee working their ways into schools include social networking sites (Nings, Facebook, Twitter) in some form. Many schools block these sites for student safety reasons, but students are still using them at home. The resistance will be there until the Digital generation currently in schools becomes the ones running the schools. By then, we'll be focusing on applications no one has invented yet, and the arguments we now surrounding the use of technology in schools will be laughable.

Reality

Reality

When I think of reality, I automatically think of all the reality shows that tell us how empty and mundane our real lives are compared to the ones we view nightly with rapture, amazement, and a bit of jealously. Baldwin left the Celebrity show because of 125 bug bites. What a wush. And what about those real housewives? I don’t know about you but I’ve been “house-wifing” a long time and never had experiences like they do. John & Kate and their 8 will continue their “gig” long after the divorce.  Let’s not forget the pioneer of reality – Maury and who’s your baby. And then there’s my life.

DUH, what can I say? I get up early, study and work all day, come home, my tail dragging, to flop down for a quick “senior rest”, then up to do more of the same. My nights are filled with phone calls, online teaching and grading and trying to keep the place free from condemnation by the health department.  My stolen free moments are watching a Law and Order episode and reading a book. I can spend at least an hour nightly, laying in bed, devouring Literary Potato Chips. However, it was not always like this.

There was a time in my life that I could travel the world and not have to worry about costs, schedules, or things “normal” people did. I delivered babies on the weekends. I cooked, sewed, volunteered, worked, and helped take care of the needy wherever they could be found. I was a wife, lover, mother, friend, confidant, and so much more. Hey, I was Super Woman disguised as a busy person, living life to its fullest.

I remember having two New Years, jetting across the International Date Line, returning from Switzerland. Oh yes, this is the time Michele jumped out of the car, singing the Hills are Alive with the Sound of Music. Going to Brussels? Amsterdam? Not a problem – here are some good places to go. Monet showing in Italy? Great, let’s take Michele – she loves Monet. And what’s the deal with Mona Lisa? She’s so much smaller than I had imagined.

One year I was taking a course in multiculturalism. I needed to experience a different culture, like living in Minnesota is NOT different for me!!  Not a problem – the Poor Man’s Market in Hong Kong is great for that.  Training needed in Japan? Here I go, with Bunny Foo-Foo in tow.

India, Russia, Israel, Venezuela, Panama, Belize, Mexico, England, France, and all the other places sometimes blur together. Places, people, cites – all seem to converge as I begin to think of the artifacts gathered at each place.

I’m left wondering what is reality? Is it now? Was it then? Maybe it’s today, and only this day that is reality.

 

Oops!

OOPS!

I remember being so excited when I got my cocker spaniel, Romeo. He was so adorable with his long floppy ears and wavy buff colored hair. His eyes looked like two almonds with long eyelashes all the way around them. I loved him the first time I saw him. He was just 6 weeks old when I bought him from a kennel in Savannah. He looked like he was the shy one out of his brothers. That’s why I picked him. I thought our personalities would match. But I soon learned that he was not in the least bit shy!
He cried the entire way home. I felt so sorry for him. Once we got to my apartment in Waycross, he sniffed around—and then “went potty” on my carpet. Oh no! So I lightly tapped him and he started squealing like a human baby. I felt so bad for spanking him. I soon learned to just take him to the spot, say, “No, no” and then sit him by the door. He was trained in a couple of months with a few accidents here and there.
But my oops moment came one Saturday afternoon. I decided that I wanted to go visit my family in Hahira. So I packed up my stuff and put Romeo in the car. But I forgot something, so I needed to go back inside to get it. But I thought it would be awful to leave Rome in the car with the windows rolled up. I was afraid he might hit the gear shift and start driving off if I left the car on with the air conditioner running. So I rolled the window down. All the way down. Now I understood the possibility of him jumping out, so I put his leash on him and tied the other end of his leash to the door handle. Problem solved. I went back inside and when I came out I didn’t see Romeo in the car. I panicked. I ran down the stairs and once I got to the car I saw Romeo dangling from the car door. He tried to jump out but because the leash was tied to the door handle he just hung there, clawing and scratching trying to pull himself back up. Poor Romeo….all I could say was Oops, I’m sorry!
Having a dog is a great way to entertain yourself; they provide you with opportunities for a lot of Oops moments. Romeo has entertained me immensely over the past 8 years. He’s chased babies, caused me to break my front two teeth, been attacked by a cat, been kicked out of a vet office. You name it; Romeo has a story for it. I don’t remember a time ever being bored with Romeo. We have kind of morphed into similar beings. When I get home the first thing I do is let him out. Then I get in my recliner and he gets on his sofa and we both take a nap. Then we get up and eat something. He begs for my food. Yes, I give in and give him some. At bedtime, he knows what to do. He gets in his bed and I get in mine. Too bad he doesn’t talk. But the looks he gives me usually say it all. If I ignore his looks for too long, he barks. Loudy. Just once. If I ignore that he will do it again. He’s a clever fellow. Sometimes I think that having a dog is troublesome, but if I have to leave him at the vet overnight things just don’t feel right. His presence is definitely missed. I don’t every see myself without him.

Spiderman Oops

My most memorable “oops” comes from my intolerance of rude people and my need to speak my mind. Back when Spiderman was in the theater several years ago, my sister Leah and I decided to go see an afternoon showing. We rarely did things together as our schedules did not allow it, so we were both excited to be spending time together. After we purchased snacks and drinks, we walked into the semi-gloom of the theater. Choosing seats in the middle, as we shuffled down the aisle, the two guys in the row above us turned around and spoke. Two of my friends, Blake and Derek, were sitting in front of us. We spent the three minutes before the lights dimmed talking about the reviews we had heard of the movie. As the theater’s consideration announcements came on, Leah and I settled back into our seats and dug into our snacks. As the movie began, I heard a slurred male voice shouting, “Spiderman! Spiderman!” Rolling my eyes, I whispered to Leah, “Great, some drunken idiot is in here. I hope that’s all he’s going to say.”
As the world of Peter Parker unfolded before our eyes, Leah and I were drawn into the movie. Pretty soon, we were watching Peter struggle with his alter-ego, Spiderman. Soon, when Peter began to flash up on screen, the drunken idiot began to yell, “That’s that Spiderman!” “Watch out, Spidy’s gonna get you!” in an Adam Sandler like voice. After the third time, I started to get really agitated. I’m one of those who can’t stand for people to talk during a movie or tv show. The man continued to yell at the screen, making me think I was at home watching an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000. I squirmed in my seat, commented to my sister that we should go say something, and grew increasingly angry. Leah was also becoming frustrated and agitated, and as she has a strong addiction to nicotine, got up to smoke a cigarette, leaving me sitting alone in the theater.
Almost immediately after she left, the drunken idiot started up again, this time making lewd comments about Mary Jane and sex. I had had it! I marched down to the front row where the man was sitting with his friend, leaned into his aisle, and angrily hissed, “This is not MST3K! Be Quiet!!” Endorphines surging, I flounced back up to my seat, noticing Blake and Derek laughing so hard they were crying. I whispered as I shuffled back down the aisle, “Sorry, but I couldn’t take it anymore.” This made them laugh even harder which made me ask, “What?” Finally, when he could breathe, Blake leaned back to me and choked out, “Monica, he’s retarded!” and erupted in peals of laughter again.
Mortification flooded me as the realization of what I had done hit me. As I sank back into the seat, I fought back tears. Quickly, I sat back up and told my snickering friends, “I didn’t know! I didn’t mean to!” to which Blake replied between snorts, “I know, that’s why it’s so funny!!!” The tears won at that point.
Leah returned shortly afterwards, and questioned me as to why I was crying. I explained what happened to her, and of course, she laughed too, and told me that I should have listened to her and not said anything. The movie theater was silent for the rest of the movie, but I was too caught up in my own inner turmoil to appreciate it.
Leaving the theater the moment the credits were over, Leah and I rushed out to the car. Cranking up the car, I looked up and noticed a guy getting into the car in front of me looking at me sheepishly. His companion walked with a limp and his arms were held at odd angles. It was the man I had yelled at and his handler. I threw the car into reverse and squealed out of the parking lot.
Before an hour had passed, I received several laughing phone calls and messages from various friends. Of course, Blake and Derek had immediately called everyone they knew to relay my humiliation. News of my story moved quickly and for a while, at every friendly gathering, the highlight of the evening was a re-telling of my worst oops.
Years passed, and I was able to forget my shame somewhat, until one of my best friends called me up. “I have something to tell you,” she said in her ‘you are not going to believe this’ voice. Not knowing what was going on, I said, “What?” Amanda worked at an assisted living facility for mentally handicapped people, so I was used to her calling me up with stories. “Last night, a group of us were at dinner and began talking about funny things that happen when we take clients (patients) out. I told my story about the guy who peed in the wal-mart magazine rack, and one guy began telling us a story about the time he took a guy to the movie theater.” My heart dropped and astonished, I cried, “NO!!!!” “Oh yes,” came Amanda’s smug reply. “He told us all about some girl who was upset about his client talking in the theater and how embarrassed he was. Since then he hasn’t taken any of the clients to the movie.”

So, with that conversation, my ‘Oops’ came full circle. Moral of the story: be careful before you go correcting people in public.

An Oops moment fix

I’m so having a hard time with this topic. I am in random mode this morning. I’m thinking about the cards that are made for parents that you can leave at restaurants. Basically, they apologize for all the oops that your kids do. Oh, my kid poured out all the salt. Oops. My kid threw all the sweetener on the floor. Oops. My kid stabbed the person behind us with a fork, oops. My kid spilled his water all over the table. Oops. So, you leave the card behind and it apologizes for your kid. Great idea!

What about when I accidentally blew the horn at a woman at a stop sign, thinking she was in another world. I was the one in another world. I had my radio on too loud and couldn’t hear the ambulance careening toward us. That is what we need, an Oops button. When you are on the road and you do something dumb, you just press that button and people know you didn’t mean to do it. That way they know you weren’t trying to be rude or mean.

Oops She Did it Again...

I’m wondering if this is what popped up in Britney Spears’ head as she realized she was knocked up a SECOND time by Kevin Federline.
I’m wondering if this is what popped up in Britney Spears’ head when she got a divorce from Kevin Federline (or in homage to my earlier nickname extravaganza, K-Fed). Remember the less than 24 hour Las Vegas fiasco?
I’m wondering if this is also what popped up in Britney Spears’ head when she realized all those times she went out in public looking like a freak-a-zoid and cause field day for the paparazzi.

What happened to the days when Britney Spears was almost cool? I stress the word almost.
Maybe her first hit single was alluding to her future life…”Hit Me Baby One More Time.” Maybe that’s what the crack pipe says to her. I’m just sayin’. Perhaps Spears was a science experiment to see just how quickly someone could go from young and innocent to a complete train wreck.

Let’s just take a look…it’s quite possible that I like this better than the original. DISCLAIMER: If you are offended by flatulence, you probably shouldn't listen.

Oops! Did I do that?!?!

Ok, so thinking about all the times I've screwed up in my life has been so much fun. Really. I just love to think about what an idiot I tend to be at times... ; )

My favorite (is that possible? to have a favorite?) "Oops!" moment happened the Sunday after 9/11. That would have made the date September 16th. I was scheduled to sing at church that Sunday morning. We were staying down at our river house on the Altamaha River, and we had a 30 minute drive across the county to church. I was scheduled to sing that morning, and I wanted to get there even earlier than usual to practice. Mama and I were rushing to get out of the house, and I was still trying to decide what to sing and what shoes went best with my dress! I finally decided on my new brown leather stacked sandals. They were so cute... they had cutouts of flowers and designs all on the top part of the shoe. Totally not in fashion now, but they were the bomb back then. So, I was still not used to the stacked nature of the sandals since they were so new! We get in the car - for some reason we drove my car and not mom's, and we start out. I make it maybe 100 yards from the house and all of the sudden my foot is twisted up under my gas pedal/brake. I look down for a split second... The next thing I hear is a loud CRUNCH! And a WHOOSH! And then this thick powdery stuff starts billowing out into the car. I hit a TREE. A stationary, 300 year old tree. And while I was only going about 15 mph, the impact was enough to deflate my airbags. Mama practically screamed at me trying to make sure I was ok. I remember getting out of the car in what seemed like slow motion and realizing what had happened... and I remember Mama screaming just standing there crying. We were literally burning from the air bag powder, the seatbelt left abrasions on our chests, and we were shaking from shock. It was so surreal. We walked back to the house, Mama called Daddy to tell him what had happened. He was already at church, so he told Jonathan (our music director) that I wouldn't be there to sing, and he headed home to us. All the while, my car horn was piercing the still, morning air. When I crunched in the front end, somehow the horn got jammed. So, it was going off for what seemed like hours until Daddy got there and clipped some wires to make it stop.

And while it may seem like not a big deal, I can't even begin to tell you how that one "Oops!" incident affected my mother and me. It was an extremely rough week for us. Six days earlier was the tragedy of 9/11. I spent the majority of that day in limbo. I didn't know whether I was going to lose one uncle or two. One was in Gainsville, FL, hospitalized after a major heart attack. The other was in the Pentagon at work that day - and we didn't know whether or not he was alive or dead.

That week turned out to be rather traumatic for my family... my uncle who was in the hospital did pass away, my uncle who was at work in the Pentagon on 9/11 was alive but suffering from PTSD, and my stacked sandals caused my mom and I to have a complete emotional breakdown and caused my wallet to get lighter by a few thousand dollars.

Oops!

I guess I can blame it on the fact that I am a guy, but I have had my share of oops moments. Moments where my brain shut down temporarily and I had a complete laps in judgment. I think my grandest oops and most expensive oops came when I first started driving tractors when I was about 11. We had several large John Deere tractors and during the summer, all of them needed someone to drive them. It was an awesome experience driving a tractor. What I loved even more was fueling up the tractors. We had a large fueling tank that had a hose similar to the ones you use at a convenience store, and a pump handle to pump the diesel into the tractor. We typically all fueled up at the same time each day, but I wanted to be a big boy and fuel my tractor up by myself. So I get to the fueling tank, but I am not tall enough to reach the pump handle. So I look around, and I see a smaller hose, more on my level, and it is long enough to reach the tractor. So I go to town pumping my tractor full of fuel. I jump back into the seat, proud of my accomplishment, and I head for the back field. All of a sudden I hear the engine start to make a very unusual grinding noise. Then the grinding turns into a framing, and then into a very loud, smokey, beating sound. I turn off the engine, and I radio for help. I will leave out the next part because; let’s just say papa was not too happy with me. Come to find out, the small hose that was on my level, it was a black water hose. I had filled the tank up with water and I blew up a $90,000 John Deere tractor. Talk about an Oops moment. It is good thing I was the only male child, the only one to carry on the family name, because I think that was the only thing that kept them from killing me that day.

Oops, the Random Version

Okay, that is the lamest title ever, but I didn't want to have the exact same title as anyone else. I think Carrie Beth was just dancing to Brittany's "Oops, I did it again." Actually, I'm not sure what she was dancing to, but I almost cried watching her and watching Nikki and Jennifer laugh. Fun times, fun times.

I'm kind of in wrap-up mode now even though we still have almost a full week.

Yay, the meds were remembered. I forgot we planned to write that on the board under the topic.

Heidi, can I just say, "Yum!" I love asiago cheese bagels. [On a side note, the spellchecker on Blogger wanted me to replace "asiago" with "Asian."] My favorite lazy day activity is to sleep in and then go to Atlanta Bread Company for an asiago cheese bagel, seared, with cream cheese. Yum. Although it hasn't been a lazy day, the bagel rocked! I don't care what Jennifer says about a foot smell.

Yep, I'm the goober who forgot to mute my phone. How embarrassing! Oh well, it was my Southern white Asian peep, letting me know she is back in the building.

I wonder what Full Throttle tastes like. I noticed Wendy drinks it every morning. I've never had any.

I wonder if Lindsi wants to do the BWP Recovery Plan starting the Monday after the ISI ends, maybe replacing breakfast with a two-mile trek around Valdosta Middle School at 7:30 a.m.? I certainly have to start getting some exercise into my day and return to starting my day with a granola bar instead of a splendid spread. I still think, though, that the splendid spread is an important part of community--something about breaking bread together.

I wonder what will matter to this group after we disburse in July . . . writing retreats? Write Night? pot-luck dinners? responding groups? a children's story club? a poetry group? happy hour? professional writing retreats? conference presentations? Saturday seminars? I wonder what I'm missing, what we should offer that I haven't considered. Each group has its own identity, and yet we also need a way to connect people across groups, to let 2009 Fellows meet 2008 Fellows and 2007 Fellows and 2006 Fellows and 1995 Fellows. Okay, that's just too much to think about right now. I'll return to it later.

Oops!

I think that I commit a plethora of oops on a daily basis.  By their very nature, oopses (Would that be the plus of "oops"?  Does oops even need to be made into a plural?  Such deep thoughts for 8:35 in the morning.) imply that you did not mean to commit them.  But I would argue that you can, if fact, commit oopses intentionally.  

Some oops are more flagrant than others, like when you accidentally run a red light.  Really.  I did that once.  I wasn't as lucky as a friend of mine who didn't get a ticket.  I did.  But on the plus side, I also didn't get creamed by oncoming traffic.  

Other oops just show your stupidity, like on picture day when I sprayed hair spray into my damp hair thinking it was leave-in conditioner.  Darn you Aveda and your spray bottles that always seem to clog.  Then again, I guess I could have labeled the bottle.   

"My stupid mouth" to quote the great philosopher John Mayer, have been responsible for its share of oopses.  I realized that I might have offended some people with what I said about the student video yesterday.  I don't regret what I said; I just don't think that I supported what I said very well.  (I'm probably going to dig a deeper hole here.)  When I was blow drying my hair this morning (I do some of my best thinking as I am straightening my hair), I thought some more about what had bothered me.  One thing that I realized was that private schools, because they are allowed to admit or exclude whomever they choose, also might not have to follow the same rules that public schools do?  Then I wondered if that was the case, would he have been better served in a public school?  Another thing that had bothered me was that when the papers were returned to the students, they were returned face up and with huge letter grades.  I realize that this was from the perspective of the student, and things might have been dramatized, but that bothered me as well.  I wanted to ask, "Is that how your teacher really marks and gives back your papers?"  If so, I could see how having a learning disability would be exacerbated in that environment.  (Alison- I know you never thought I would think so much about that video.) Anyway, if I offended anyone, I apologize.  

I want to leave on a lighter note.  I'm trying to think of a stupid thing that I've done recently.  Surprisingly, it took less than a minute to think of something.  First I have to set it up.  Back in March, I took my truck to a car dealership that shall remain nameless for an oil change.  They did not put the oil plug in correctly and as I drove home, like Hansel and Gretel (They're the ones who left crumbs, right?), I left a trail of where I had been.  But with oil.  I returned recently to get another oil change.  I know you're thinking, Why would you go back?  Well, they are the only dealer of this type of vehicle in town.  And they have a service record for my truck dating back to 2005. 

So, I get out of my truck at Movie  Gallery and notice liquid leaking underneath my truck.  I'm ticked.  So, I drive home and park on the street because the oil stains are just starting to fade. (I totally skipped that part; they also had to send someone to scrub down our driveway.)  Anyway, I call the dealership and tell them my predicament.  They send a guy out because I refuse to drive it in.  The guy tells me, "It's just from your air conditioner.  If it were an oil leak it'd be on the other side."  I disagree and show him my evidence.  "She that there, that is from an oil leak and it's on the same side."  He laughs at me and assures me again that the liquid is coming from my air conditioner.  I imagine they'll charge me for it the next time I come in.  

Did I tell you about the time my backwindshield wiper didn't work, and I paid $35 to find out my window was down?  Oops!                 

Just the fact that I'm writing on the blog today may turn into a big oops, but we'll see how it goes.

Oops doesn't make me think of accidental stuff, it makes me think of stupid things. Some accidents are stupid, but to be an oops there is an undefinable characteristic that you just know. An oops can also occur when someone is just a moron.

I'm not sure what radio station I was listening to this morning, but they had a segment called "Easy Questions." When the announcers started talking about it, I thought, so what they just call people and ask them questions? Appears I was right. This morning's question was what is paper made from? Three people didn't know, two hung up on them and only two even attempted to answer. The answers given: styrofoam and aluminum. Yep, these two individuals thought paper was made styrofoam or aluminum. This wasn't a multiple choice question. It's not like those two things were there and they randomly yelled "A" or "D," nope they came up with these on their own. I call that an oops.

So maybe I'm focusing more on dumb moments, but here's another. I went to the Farmer's Market yesterday to grab a few things. It was around 5:30, so they were getting ready to close, and only one line was open (of course when they're all open there are still only two lines, so...). Anyway, the couple ahead of me was having trouble checking out. They had a credit from something, though I'm not sure how you get store credit at the farmer's market, and the girl behind the counter was beyond confused. She asked another clerk for help, and the woman came over to explain the transaction. Then the girl behind the counter couldn't work the calculator. She yelled over a large pile of produce, "Yoar calculator ain't workin'!" The other woman responded, "Yea it is, you just ain't got enuf sense to use it." Now I'd have been a little offended if someone had told me that in front of five other people I didn't know, but this girl giggled and said, "You probly right. I failed math twice last year. I can't hardly count. If that machine don't tell me how to give change, I can't do it." I left a little disturbed and went to mom's house to recount the event. It's a good thing the girl was cute, because she doesn't have much else to work with.

My dad's life is full of oops moments. No, I'm not about to get serious; don't disengage. When he and my mom got married, they had twice baked potatoes a their wedding. Apparently the restaurant that catered the dinner felt that potato skins were too plain to repackage the spuds in once they were mixed with everything else, so they had small cardstock like containers that they stuffed. Mom says the containers were shaped kind of like a potato, but not so much that you shouldn't have noticed they weren't. Well, Daddy didn't notice. My dad sawed through his "potato" and ate that cardstock. He says with all the butter and cheese, he never really noticed until he saw that no one else had eaten their potato skins. Oops.

Another of his oops moments would be when he got in a fight in high school. It was rare for me dad to go more than a month without getting in a fight at school, so most of his teachers had little patience for any absences or injuries that resulted. He fought someone at lunch one day, and when he was allowed to return to class, he found everyone taking a test. Daddy says his hands were really stiff and sore, but the teacher refused to believe him. She told him he could go to the nurse when he finished his test and refused to let him just take a zero. So he sat down to take his math test. He found out later that day that his hands were broke--both of them, in the same place. Yea, he failed his math test.

My papa also has quite a few oops moments. When he was in his early twenties he was stationed in Germany where he met my Oma. Being a young military guy who had never been far from home, he was living it up. He has all kinds of stories about bring arrested by the MP's or hiding in the wine cellar at the restaurant my Oma worked in until the German police gave up searching for him. But my favorite oops story of his is probably when he went by Oma's restaurant to pick her up after work one night. She lived in Ludwigsburg, and like most older German towns, there is a town square where markets and festivals are frequently held. In the center of this square is a statue of King Ludwig. On this particular night, papa had had a few too many drinks (he doesn't drink now, but I think he met his lifetime quota when he was in the military). As he and Oma walked across the square, he spotted the statue. "That man looks cold," he proclaimed, and proceeded to slide across the ice in the fountain surrounding the statue, climb the fifteen foot structure and give "the man" his jacket. Everytime we go to Ludwigsburg our family talks about how that man would have never survived if papa hadn't kept him warm.

A student of mine had an oops moment that I love to tell. Joe was an endearing kid who tended more toward mischief than trouble, but managed to find his fair share of both. He came to class one morning with a tatoo on his left forearm. I asked to see it, and was surprised to see a very poorly done piece that looked like it said "toe." When I asked him the significance of the tatoo, he said, "It's my name Mrs. Elliott." Um, "That says toe," was my response. He shook his head, "I knew somebody was gonna notice that." As the story progressed, I found out that Joe had done the tatoo himself--while he was drunk, and he couldn't quite tell where the top of his "j"'s hook began--so he just put a line crossways and hoped he got it right. Turns out he put the line a litte lower than the top of the hook and his arm now read "toe" instead of "Joe."

My most recent oops that was substantial enough to remember would have to be catching the oven on fire. I had made sausage rolls for someone earlier in the week, and I didn't notice that some of the grease from the sausage had dripped to the bottom of the oven. A few days later when I went to preheat my oven, I set the temperature to 425 and left the room. When I heard the oven beeping to let me know the temp. was set I entered the kitchen to find my oven looking like a gas firplace. Flames filled the inside and smoke was starting to escape from the vent. Panic flooded me and images of my neighbors house burning down when I was in high school filled my mind. Anna was in the living room, and I was torn between standing in the yard with her and calling the fire department or putting her in her bed and putting out the flames myself. For a long time Backdraft was one of my favorite movies, and all I could envision was me opening the oven door and being engulfed in a rush of flame as the oxygen hit the blaze, my child stranded in her crib. (In case you haven't noticed, my mind tends to be melodramatic.) Logic won out, and I put Anna in her bed and went to the flames, fire extinguisher on the counter, baking soda in hand. All of this took place within less than a minute, and in reality the flame was probably nowhere near as large as I imagined. I do check the bottom of my oven for leftover "stuff" now, and I've also checked our fire extinguishers to make sure they aren't out of date. Oops.

I have to just post because I'm a freak and I don't want it to have "666" posts

Food

Yesterday my mother told me I looked pregnant. Now that is something no woman wants to hear when she's definitely NOT pregnant. So today I have two enemies--food and Mama. I'll probably make up with food first. Just kidding!! I love my wacky mama, but pregnant? Please! I thought that my dear daddy would come to my aid and heal my broken spirit. I said, "Daddy, do I look pregnant?" He responded with, "You could stand to lose a pound or two." Ouch! So make that three enemies. Being one to never give up, I asked my brother who came back with, "Are you trying to tell me something?" So I finally gave up and went to the kitchen to fix a very small plate of food. Only in the Gregory family.

Food...

Most of my friends hate to go out to eat with me. I am one of those people. You know the ones… they ask the waiter five million questions, change their order two or three times, and are so picky the order they finally stick with must come on separate plates minus something or other and with extra something else. Yep, that’s me. I’m just picky. I can’t help it. There are foods I like, and probably just as many that I despise.

Ok, I may be over exaggerating just a little bit. I don’t think my friends truly loathe going out to eat with me, they just pick on me the whole time. My really good friends have developed coping mechanisms for dealing with my craziness. They always let me order last so I have ample time to look over the already familiar menu of our favorite local restaurants. The last time I met Bridgett at El Toreo for dinner, she already had my mild salsa waiting on me. Nicole knows where I’ll drink Diet Coke and where I’d rather have water or tea. (She’s just as picky as I am about her Diet Coke. We can’t drink the ones that are over (or under) carbonated or sickly sweet! And we NEVER drink Diet Pepsi! Ughhh!) She will normally order my drink for me if she’s the first one there. Sonya always warns the waiter – “She’s gonna ask you questions, get ready for it.” These questions can range from the opinion-getting “What’s your favorite thing to eat here?” to the oh-so-inquisitive “What exactly comes on the Chicken Francisco?” to anywhere in between.

My strange methods and modes of ordering:

• If I ever get a salad for a side, I have to ask if there are boiled eggs in it. If so, I ask for no eggs. Or onions. Or tomatoes. I also get honey mustard and ranch dressing for my salad. Sometimes I go for simplicity and order a Caesar salad.
• I only order a Pina Colada or Miami Vice from El Toreo if the female bartender is working. She makes the best ones... none of the others compare.
• At Texas Roadhouse, I like to order loaded mashed potatoes. (If you haven’t had them, they are awesome!) However, they are piled so high in the bowl that I can’t stir all of the “loaded” into them. So, I ask for a small saucer, and I dump them out on it and stir.
• Also at Texas Roadhouse, if I want to order ribs, I ask if the server has had anyone order them on their shift. I then ask if they raved about how good they were or if there were any complaints. (You see, while I love their ribs, sometimes they tend to overcook them and they’re dry. Yuck.) (YAY Jenn for remembering this!!! I knew I loved you for some reason!)
• At Sonny’s I ask for my fried okra extra crispy. I don’t like smushy fried okra.

Ok, so I feel like I’ve painted a really crazy picture of myself. But that’s ok. I’m really not that bad. I don’t think. : )

Foods I hate:

• Ground beef. I’m just not a fan. It’s a texture thing.
• I don’t like any kind of hamburger steak or country fried steak. (texture)
• I only eat hamburgers if they are kind of thin. I hate big burgers.
• Eggs. Ick. (I only eat them if I can’t tell they are there… like when you use them to hold together a casserole. If they are scrambled in something, forget it.) I’m so bad that I ask the Japanese restaurant to make me fried rice without the eggs.
• Sausage like Bratwurst, Kielbasa, or regular big-link sausage. (I can sometimes eat small breakfast link sausage, and I’ve just embraced sausage patties and ground sausage like in Nikki’s awesome sausage/cheese/croissant yummy goodness.)
• A few vegetables – artichokes, brussel sprouts, lima beans, black-eye peas, collard greens, turnips…
• Super spicy anything.
  

So, foods I love:

• SQUASH! Yum!!!
• Bacon! (Yay, Rebecca!)
• Chicken ANYTHING
• Most vegetables… even weird ones that some find offensive like mustard greens, asparagus, broccoli, rutabagas…
• Steak… well done.
• Shrimp, crab legs, fish. (I don’t eat any other kind of seafood.)
• Pretty much any carb. I like carbs. I need to not like them. They’re totally not good for your waist. : )
• Cane syrup on my pancakes! No maple, please.
• Coconut… and nuts in general. Those are two things that many people don’t like and I can’t get enough of. (P.S. – I make the best coconut cake known to man… it is amazing if I do say so myself. I was famous for it at my school. It was my Granny’s recipe… and boy did she know how to cook!)

Food

Food is awesome. As you can probably tell, we are very close friends. Food, especially in the South, is considered a past time. Social events, family get-togethers, holidays, church activities all involve some component of food. One of my fondest memories of food is every October; our little country church has our annual homecoming. This includes a special service with dinner on the church grounds. We have this almost 300 foot long table under a shelter and people from miles around bring their covered dishes full of great food to fellowship and reacquaint themselves. I remember being just tall enough to look over the table at all of the food, as far as the eye could see. Another custom in the South, children cannot fix their own plates. So I would wait for my grandmother to fix mine for me. I would tell her what I liked and she would place it on my plate. If you went home hungry after homecoming, it was your own fault. Several people we known at homecoming for making special dishes. My Aunt Imogene would always bring Bar-B-Qed goat (and the world’s greatest coconut cake), my grandmother made her signature dressing, Lawanna made an awesome fruit salad, and Ms. Orie always brought deviled eggs. Food unified us. It was the soothing balm applied to our lives that helped us forget, just for a moment, that we had troubles and trials.

From campaign fish fry’s to family cook-outs on the river, food has always been a dear friend.

Here is a great recipe that you might enjoy. It was my grandmother’s favorite.

Grandma Sirmans’ fruit cake recipie

You'll need the following: a cup of water, a cup of sugar, four large eggs, two cups of dried fruit, a teaspoon of baking soda, a teaspoon of salt, a cup of brown sugar, lemon juice, nuts, and a bottle of whisky.Sample the whisky to check for quality.

Take a large bowl. Check the whisky again. To be sure it is the highest quality, pour one level cup and drink. Repeat. Turn on the electric mixer, beat one cup of butter in a large fluffy bowl. Add one teaspoon of sugar and beat again.Make sure the whisky is still okay. Cry another tup. Turn off the mixer. Break two leggs and add to the bowl and chuck in the cup of dried fruit. Mix on the turner. If the fried druit gets stuck in the beaterers pry it loose with a drewscriver.Sample the whisky to check for tonsisticity. Next, sift two cups of salt. Or something. Who cares? Check the whisky. Now sift the lemon juice and strain your nuts. Add one table. Spoon. Of sugar or something. Whatever you can find.Grease the oven. Turn the cake tin to 350 degrees. Don't forget to beat off the turner. Throw the bowl out of the window, check the whisky again and go to bed.

Food

Food has always been an issue for me. I LOVE FOOD! When I was a little girl, I was beautiful, just like Abby-Kate. Then, around 8 or 9, my grandmother started keeping me. She didn’t have the ability to say no, so if I asked for a dozen doughnuts, a bag of Doritos, and a coke, that is what I had. So, I became a nice little marshmallow girl. Around 14, I went to Weight Watchers with my mom and slimmed up. After that, I was just healthy, but the girls in high school were stick thin, so I always felt like a cow. In college, I was fairly secure with my weight until I met my ex-husband. He made me feel like I was HUGE. After we got married, his personal mission was to make me skinny, and he succeeded. I worked out constantly, and he monitored everything I ate. I longed for food, but he wouldn’t let me. Can you believe I was so controlled??? Ridiculous. We would visit family for the holidays and I would just look longingly at the pumpkin pie and dream about having it. I literally went to bed every night with my stomach growling. Looking back, I almost think of it as self-mutilation because the pain of being hungry did something for me. Anyway, I endured this for five years, and then I broke free. Soon after, I met my husband, who is extremely healthy and naturally thin – don’t you hate that! He loved to eat, and he took me great places to eat. He still eats a bowl (huge) of Bryer’s vanilla ice cream every night. Just sickening. I was so excited to have the freedom to eat again, and that I did, all the time. I ate things I had never felt comfortable eating in the past. I felt no pressure to be thin. Apparently, I need that pressure, because I gained almost 100 pounds. When my husband and I got married, I was at my heaviest. I really didn’t’ realize it until almost 9 months later, when we took Easter pictures. I looked at them and was shocked. Who was this girl??? She wasn’t me. I decided to do something about it. I started Weight Watchers and lost all the weight. I learned how to eat healthy, occasionally having things I want – like right now, knowing that I have the will power to eat healthy when I choose. I can remember when I started Weight Watchers, and the leader talked to us about why we eat. I remember thinking, “I eat because it is good.” I simply like food. I haven’t been in this type of situation – where I have amazing good food every day, so I should probably have A LOT more will power, but it is so good!! I say that, but I just went and threw away my plate because I feel guilty. Sorry Brenda. I recognize I shouldn’t worry so much about my appearance, but that is my flaw, and I have to live with it.

I think Abby-Kate will be a lot like me when it comes to food. She likes the same things I do. My favorite moment was from a little over a year ago when she looked at me and said, “Mommy, I love cake.” I responded, “Baby, I understand, Mommy loves it too.” I never want her to suffer from the weight issues I have, but I also want her to be free to be herself. My husband looked at her funny one day when she took a huge bite of cake. I immediately became furious because I felt like he was criticizing her. Of course he wasn’t, but I had seen that look from my ex-husband, so I thought he was looking at her with disgust. I have to realize I have my own issues that have nothing to do with her.

Okay, all this makes me want to be Wendy and not eat right now. I ate so much yesterday!!! Breakfast was so wonderful, lunch was great, and my mom had an amazing dinner for me. Also, the petit-four (sp) and the birthday cake were awesome. Now, I feel like I am still full, but here I am eating, because it is good, and I won’t have this tomorrow; although, I know Heidi will provide a fabulous breakfast also.

I really love cake. I don’t care what kind, just cake. I have become quite a connoisseur of cake. Harvey’s in Tifton makes an amazing cake. They use this wonderful whipped icing that tastes like you are eating Cool Whip. Oh, so good. I also love caramel cake, it if is made correctly. There is a lady in Tifton who makes outstanding caramel cakes, but they are $35 a cake, and I can’t afford that very often. Plus, I have to meet her at Cracker Barrel or somewhere in town, so I always feel like it is a crack deal or something. In a way, it is, because that cake is addictive.

I also love good dressing. The Holiday Inn in Tifton has wonderful dressing. I’m not too keen on their giblet gravy, but that doesn’t stop me from eating it. Shady Lane in Tifton has the best chili dogs and ice cream. Growing up, my grandfather used to take me and my cousin Greg to the Shady Lane after we finished milking. Oh how I looked forward to those trips. Those trips also included stopping by Harvey’s to buy hot sausage and macaroni for my great grandmother. That was what she loved to eat. We would take it back to her and she would cook that for us. Who eats just hot sausage and macaroni now?? Regardless, it was wonderful!

As a woman, I feel as if I am judged by my cooking. Whenever there is a get-together, I feel that I have to over-compensate with food to make sure there is enough of everything, and that everyone will like it. Tomorrow, my group has lunch duty, and then I have a church party to go to tomorrow night. I’m a nervous wreck, trying to make sure I have the perfect food that tastes good. Why do I care??

Warm, cold
Hard, soft
Dry, moist
None of that matters.

The way you feel on my lips
The sensation in my mouth
The way I move my tongue on you
I close my eyes to enjoy the experience.
How can something be so good?

You satisfy me
You fulfill me
You give me happiness
You comfort me in times of need
You give me pleasure beyond measure

What are you?
Cake

Meat...it's whats for dinner

I cooked dinner last night. I didn’t really feel like cooking, but I came up with something easy because I knew that we were both hungry, and J doesn’t really like to go out to eat and I didn’t wanna eat something unhealthy. Well…I cooked some random quesadilla thing. No recipe. Just threw some stuff into the middle of tortillas. I used bell pepper, onion, tomato, cheese, black beans, and sour cream. It was pretty good. Jeremy takes several bites, assuring me the whole time that it was "soooooooooo good." Finally, he goes “what kind of meat is in this?” He had the most akward face when he said it too which is why I just started laughing out loud. I mean I almost had a Wes moment and spit my food out! “There IS no meat!” I told him. Then it was like he changed his mind and didn’t want it anymore, because it had no meat. I like meat, but I could probably live without it. What it up with men thinking that every meal has to be loaded with meat? He ended up eating all of his...and about half of mine, he made up for his brief moment of vegetarian food rejection. He made sure to tell my mom that I made a "DELICIOUS new recipe!"