explains it all

to find out how i feel today, go here and click on the piggy.

a new addition to the family

i'd like to welcome...

BLOC PARTY

buying a new album is delicate work. at least, it is for me. it takes time and patience. after first purchasing the album, one must listen to it as soon as possible. if the album has been previewed in its entirety prior to acquisition, it may not require the lengthy stay in one's car/home stereo (wherever music is heard most often). for me, usually the album stays in around a month solid. the first couple of weeks i listen to the new album and that album only; after that i may rotate my listening choices, but it still lives in my stereo. the insert must be thoroughly inspected; this is done best while listening to the album for the first time after purchasing it (please note: looking over album inserts while driving poses a threat to other drivers). if there are no lyrics in the insert, one must look up the lyrics as soon as possible on the internet (again, do this while listening to the album). basically, this is the "soak it up" period. after the basic format and layout of the album is committed to memory, one can begin to rotate listening to the album with others (ps--if you're an expert, this phase also involves committing lyrics to memory).

having said this, i am in the "soak it up" period of welcoming silent alarm to my family. this album has not only been broken in in my car stereo, but has also graced the computer player in my classroom. i definitely can't say i'm disappointed; i was expecting more like "banquet" on the album, but i'm glad it's mixed up a bit. there's even a few good slow songs on there (re: particularly "so here we are"); it is somewhat reminiscant of interpol's debut album, but they've definitely carved out their own path. i dig it.

i'm still recovering

it was a pretty crazy weekend.

i've organized the events into a top ten, from least to most favorite:

10.) running into some ho who insisted she was my husband's "secret" girlfriend and later putting her in her place (J had, I think, one date with her, and what he always remembers about it is that she ordered the most expensive thing on the menu and only had three bites)/this experience is also shared by a runner up for spot #10, the least favorite part of my weekend: making myself puke so i could at least function around 4am saturday
9.) waiting in line for an hour to get into lipgloss
8.) more waiting in line; this time to have my book signed by david sedaris
7.) at lipgloss, while dancing on the stage (IN FRONT OF EVERYONE), falling down with a frenzy of people and slicing my back on what was probably broken glass, as well as flashing everyone my ass as i went over
6.) getting new shoes
5.) obtaining a new friend who i have not yet named
4.) buying bloc party's debut album
3.) enjoying the hilarious work of david sedaris read outloud by the man himself
2.) shakin' my booty for several hours at lipgloss, particularly when the dj played my requested postal service song
1.) and the BEST part of the whole weekend was...NOT pussing out like the weenie mom i am and getting to spend quality time with my sista, laura, and anne

this one will definitely go down in the books.

take your knowledge bowl and smoke it

no, this has nothing to do with yesterday being 4.20, although i didn't hear the end of it from my students yesterday.

'do you know what 4.20 is, miss?' as if i was never in high school

'did you ever smoke weed, miss?' repeat of my first reply

do you like getting drunk or high better, miss?' someone please shoot me

no, today's bowl is all about learning stuff. and timers. and quizzes. i'm going to be next year's knowledge bowl sponsor, even though i was too cool to be involved in this club when i was in high school. but hey, that means i get to get out of my classroom on days like today and take some smart, funny, and dorky kids to a meet at a college, all without using any of my personal leave days. as one of those south park kids would say, kick ass!

two days to go

and then i will be eating, drinking, and dancing myself into oblivion. this upcoming weekend is a much needed break from all my domestic- and job-related responsibilities. i will be splurging on mediocre amounts of food and wine while trying to digest to the sound of jazz; i will be dancing myself into a sweat, hopefully burning off some of the drinking calories i will be consuming throughout the night; i will be sleeping in late, perhaps noon; i will be taking in all the capitalist offerings of a big city; i will be expressing my love for culture and literature by attending a talk by sedaris; i will be very tired when sunday rolls around. god, i cannot wait.

check. her. out.

she has been a work in progress...

but then again, aren't we all?

hi. i'm glad you're here.

just another manic monday

i received a wedding gift recently. i suppose i should say we received a wedding gift. did these people realize our wedding was in july? okay, my anal opinions about puncutality aside, has anyone else heard this bogus "rule" that you can send a couple a wedding gift up to a year after the wedding and it's still considered proper etiquette? i think the wedding etiquette rule-making committee needs to reconsider that one. seems to me that, if you can't remember or think of something to get a couple for their wedding, what is a whole extra year going to do for you? strange rule, i'd say. this is probably making me sound pretty selfish.

i should mention, however, that it was a quite cool wedding gift. it was a huge, pottery-thrown platter with plaid, multi-colored glaze, probably one of the coolest gifts we received. i love pottery; i've been doing a bit myself recently. i bought myself a bag of porcelain and have been using the school wheel. i miss working with clay; it's very relaxing and soothing. it makes me remember happy days in college when my buddy camille and i would, on restless nights, go out to the ceramics building at 2 in the morning, blast some music, and throw our brains out. the building was one big room, very dirty, of course, and when we had mishaps on the wheel we could fling the ruins across the room onto the walls, where they would stick until the next day when we'd have class. it was great for anger management. we could always sweet talk the security guys into letting us stay all night. good times, eh camille?

i had a nice weekend, actually got to go on a date with my husband. we saw guess who, which was quite cute. we rarely get to see movies, so it was a difficult decision. sin city looked intriguing, as did fever pitch. we settled for laughs. we also watched wicker park this weekend; i'd recommend that one. it wasn't the chick flick i thought it would be, and the soundtrack was phenomenal: mum, white stripes, rare postal service and shins songs, definitely check it out. i'm going to denver this weekend for a girl's weekend out, and i'm thinking i'm going to have a really tough time not going shopping for lots of things i really want but really don't need (re: bloc party and wicker park soundtrack CDs, merrell shoes i'm trying to convince myself i MUST have for upcoming trip to ireland, new clothes...) i hate being too much of a consumer.

anyway, it's back to work today. this weekend will probably creep by, since i have something fun waiting for me at the end. at least today i don't have students, just an inservice. sometimes it's almost MORE frustrating dealing with adults, though!

some people's kids, part deux

well, they've gone and done it agian.

some kid sneakily obtained a copy of my junior grammar final and i caught him using a cheat sheet he'd made while taking the test. he was none too happy to have been caught, but remained cocky about it when he found out he wasn't going to be expelled. a student confided in me that he's been breaking into my room all year, copying my answer keys and what not. i am mostly surprised at the audacity of this kid...i would never have thought of risking breaking into a teacher's room to copy a test! seems like an awful lot of work, especially when you can just do this thing called study! freaking amazing! so i had the joy of spending a couple of days re-writing the test so i could make all my juniors take it again, since there was no way to assure he was the only one who saw a copy of the test. i know, i'm such a jerk.

it will be better when i am teaching kids that actually want to learn. i really need to figure out a way to get started on my doctorate.

of poets and other persistent things

I took my honors class to the college last week to hear Mark Turcotte read and discuss his poetry. He was really involving and I enjoyed his writing. I am always intrigued when I listen to poets read their work aloud--I think this is the main reason I will probably never be a professional poet. I am scared to death at the idea of reading my poems aloud. I love to write poetry, and I rarely mind sharing it. I am actually tossing around the idea of trying to get published. But I'm not sure about public readings. Is this a requirement for being a poet? Turcotte did such a good job, though, and he explained that the way he reads his poems is entirely based on the reactions of the audience, such as, the look on a person's face might cause him to pause longer in one area, etc. My favorite poem by him right now is "Indian Boys." I just finished a poetry unit with my juniors, which they mostly hated (except my honors, who thoroughly enjoyed it). All of them loved Ginsberg's "America" poem, though probably only because he talks of smoking pot and getting laid. Lame, but typical.

Here's a newsflash for ya: rubbing a banana peel on warts is supposed to make them go away. I have this beast of a wart on my thumb, and I'll let you know if that is an effective method of wart removal. I've had this immortal fucker burned off FIVE TIMES and am not willing to go through that again. If anyone knows of any other alternative remedies, I'm open to suggestions.

for your reading pleasure

РОДНАЯ ЗЕМЛЯ
В заветных ладанках не носим на груди,
О ней стихи навзрыд не сочиняем,
Наш горький сон она не бередит,
Не кажется обетованным раем,
Не делаем ее в душе своей
Предметом купли и продажи,
Хворая, бедствуя, немотствуя на ней,
О ней не вспоминаем даже.
Да, для нас это грязь на калошах,
Да, для нас это хруст на зубах.
И мы мелем, и месим, и крошим
Тот ни в чем не замешанный прах.
Но ложимся в нее и становимся ею,
Оттого и зовем так свободно - своею

This Russian Soil
In lockets for a charm we do not wear it,
In verse about its sorrows do not weep,
With Eden's blissful vales do not compare it,
Untroubled does it leave our bitter sleep.
To traffic in it is a thought that never,
Not even in our hearts, remote, takes root.
Before our eyes its image does not hover,
Though we be beggared, sick, despairing, mute.
It's the mud on our shoes, it is rubble,
It's the sand on our teeth, it is slush,
It's the pure, taintless dust that we crumble,
That we pound, that we mix, that we crush.
But it's ours, our own, and will open one day
To receive and embrace us and turn us to clay.
--Anna Akhmatova

roots

we spent the weekend with my in-laws.

you never quite know what you're going to get when spending time with someone else's family, especially when everyone has ties and history moreso than you. i have decided, though, after much wavering, that EVERY family has ghosts and you cannot change what's past. you can only move forward. it's usually easier, though, to stay stuck in the present. but, as my husband honestly points out, you cannot waste energy on things you cannot change. i feel each visit kills a little more of the bad taste in my mouth; each visit makes us all more sincere. and it's nice, espcially now that we have a daughter, a little innocent person who doesn't deserve to be subjected to the hard feelings of our pasts. she has brought so many people together in ways she will probably never comprehend. i think that is amazing.

we had a really nice time.

wha' happen? 

you gettin' on or off, kid?

i have stepped up to a new level in my teaching career. i can now add "able to drive mini-busses" to my list of experiences and my resume. that's right. i'm that lady. you know, the one with her hair all up in a bun, still wearing clothes from the 70s, has a cigarette hanging out of her mouth, and growls "you gettin' on or off, kid?" to every little innocent child that rides my bus. it was a very surreal feeling at first. actually, i wasn't quite prepared. i thought i would be driving a mini-van, which would have been much better. but no, apparently the funding for the mini-vans is gone, so we have mini-busses now, complete with those huge mirrors that protrude from the vehicle on every side and the stop sign that pops out. and if i had been able to locate the control for that one, i would have used it! i played around a bit too much with unknown buttons as it is. it was kind of scary, though, being in charge of the lives of 12 of my younguns, having to be extra extra cautious about my driving. thankfully we all made it back in one piece, but it was definitely an experience i never thought i'd have!

top fives for thursday

in no particular order:
1. the rapture--echoes
2. ugly cassanova--sharpen your teeth
3. snow patrol--final straw
4. postal service--give up
5. bloc party--silent alarm***

***this is a fairly new band (at least for me) and i highly recommend you check it out, especially if you are drawn to any of the other bands on my list

the end.

because i didn't want to write about my bad morning

so i'll write about the pope instead.

a few days have gone by, and i do feel a twinge of sadness for his passing. i have a hard time knowing how to feel when people die, especially people that were amazing and good but that you didn't really know. case in point: my mom sobbed when princess di was killed; i only remember laughing at her (my mom, that is) and asking if they'd secretly been best friends. but john paul did do a lot of great things.

i saw him once, pretty upclose. i was in rome for palm sunday in 1999 and attended the mass at st. peters. it was quite spectacular, actually, and i really enjoyed the connected feeling i had with everyone else there, everyone in the world, it seemed like. there is a funny story about that mass. i didn't know that only catholics were allowed to take communion and that doing so without being catholic was blasphemous and a huge no-no. i grew up in an episcopal church and so was quite accustomed to taking communion. so, i partook joyfully in the communion with the pope, unknowingly insulting the group i was with (a choir from a catholic church) and probably damning myself to hell. nonetheless, it was a beautiful mass, and an experience i will never forget.

golly gee, i AM a good teacher!

the jury has met and the vote is unanimous: i CAN teach, huh-huh!

whoopee! i just had my spring evaluation and i am pleased to say it went well. i really wasn't too worried, though, as it was my honors class that was observed and they always perform amazingly for me. plus, we're doing grapes of wrath and i love this book and know it like the back of my hand. i even got to show off a bit, citing my russian knowledge by throwing in a bit of russian vocabulary etymology of большевик and меньшинство and how steinbeck makes mention of marxist-leninist philosophies. i like to discuss those controversial theories, anyway, if not for anything else but to get them thinking.

i do get a sparkle in my eye when i get to have a good, solid discussion about literature, especially with students when you can see the lightbulb go on over their heads. it's a great feeling, inspiring that "ah-hah!" of understanding.

on a humorous note: i was trying to be healthy today and, dammit, it backfired on me. after the evaluation, i got quite nauseous and shaky, although it had no connection to the boring droning of my principal. i ate a whole bag of edamame for lunch, which is usually filling enough for me. apparently my body didn't think so, though, and i really thought i was going to pass out or vomit. i then proceeded to the vending machine, where (double dammit) there was only crap. so i bought some of this crap: a hershey's smores bar and a chewy peanut butter & chocolate chunk granola bar. while the smores bar did faintly cause me to reminisce about times spent by the campfire watching my father get marshmallows stuck in his beard, there was nothing at all granola-ish about the granola bar. it was pasty and gross. but it got me on the road to recovery. my sweet colleague mary from next door then offered to make a run to the ol' dq for a hamburger, a gesture which i kindly accepted. so, my attempt to keep fatty foods at a minimum today has been completely turned upside down, although it was kind of amusing. and a tad bit scary. the only other time this barely-lack-of-food had this sort of effect on me was when i was prego.

believe it or not, i did have even more to write, but my mind is now blank. it was probably the faux hamburger.

oh, monday

i am sunburned and exhausted.

and for some reason, i feel uneasy and disconnected. is this what a weekend of too much drinking and too much time in the sun does to you?

i just want to crawl into my bed, my cave, my hole, and have some peace and quiet. no students, no husband, no responsibilities.

numb.