Suppertime!

Tonight, Heidi, Brent, and I took a cooking class at our local Sur La Table. The class was entitled "Early Summer Farmer's Market Dinner"; essentially, a full meal you can make using mostly produce found at local markets. I've been looking forward to the reopening of the city farmer's market, so I thought this class would be apropos. I also though I would share my experience with the blogging world, being inspired by my sister's awesome food and photos. Although, as a disclaimer, I need to say that I was shooting with the camera on my cell phone, so the photos aren't nearly as pretty as the food was. The dishes, especially the carrot soup, were really terrifically colorful.

There were twelve students all together, and we were divided up into pairs or groups of three to make the different courses. Before we started cooking, the chef (who was aptly named Scot Rice) gave us appetizers to tide us over during the introductions - a Spanish frittata with a tomato-almond remoulade, two cheese selections with garlic crackers, and, my favorite, watermelon and cantaloupe cubes sprinkled with cilantro, lime juice, and rum (whoops).

Here's the dinner:
We made
- Roasted Grape Tomato Crostini with Green Garlic and Goat Cheese (my favorite dish of the night)
- Carrot Soup with Parsley, Shallot, and Orange Peel Gremolata (my other favorite dish)
- Lemon Risotto with Prosciutto and Thyme
- Garlic-Roasted Broccoli and Cauliflower and
- Prosciutto-Wrapped Halibut with Fava Beans, Sugar Snap Peas, and Pea Shoots


Here I am, enjoying the soup (I liked the chef's presentation idea of putting the soup in drinking glasses - it looked nice and worked well for a buffet).


These two people, Brent (Heidi's husband) and Noelle (a microbiologist from Pennsylvania I met tonight), and I were in charge of the dessert: Orange Muscat Zabaglione with Raspberries and Thyme Shortbread Cookies. The alcohol was a little strong in the Zabaglione for my taste, but I loved the cookies and will definitely make them again.



Here's the chef dishing up the dessert and here's Heidi enjoying it:

All in all, it was a fun and delicious evening. I'll be meeting Janelle at the farmer's market tomorrow morning for some shopping. It's a little early in the season for produce, but I feel inspired to do some baking tomorrow night. Mmm!

"What Did I Just Do?"

What I've Done on my Summer Vacation (so far)

* Convinced the AVID lady at the district that I really did want to take the train to Chicago, and yes, I am aware that it is a 30-hour journey that starts at 4:45 am (she apparently has no faith in my knowledge of geography or traveling velocities).
* Started cooking dinner again instead of take-out every day!
* Read three novels
* Spent three days at school to make my classroom look like this:

(which included organizing and filing papers from the past two years of teaching - glorious!)
* Spent one day in my classroom to make my desk look like this:

* Watched "The Valet" (recommended!) with Teresa (who's back - yay!)
* Watched "Waitress"
* Watched "A Midwinter's Tale"
* Watched "Sing Faster!"
* Went to IKEA again to get shelves
* Installed said shelves, after moving my desk near my kitchen:

* Discovered that getting shelves level is tricky when you're working alone, but by golly I did it!
* Saw "Thoroughly Modern Millie" with Heidi (also back - yay!) and Virginia, Spanish teacher at my school
* Saw "Saturday's Voyeur" with Heidi and her new husband
* Watched the Tony's with Janelle and Donavon ("Spring Awakening" and "Coast of Utopia" - no surprises there!)
* Went to the doctor for my first checkup since, well, ever
* Was told "your cervix is stellar!"
* Got four shots and two blood samples taken
* Found out I am TB, HIV, and syphilis- free (no surprises there, either)
* Began reorganizing my library (including the closets!)
* Met with Heidi and Katharine daily this week to begin some serious writing work in anticipation of creating our play about teaching.
* Enjoyed said writing meetings in this glorious place:

* Wrote three pieces I rather like so far, and revisited others from before.
* Am gaining confidence in my abilities as a creative writer.
* Discovered the Community Writing Center
* 30 minutes on my elliptical every day since school got out!
* Am finally starting to feel rested, capable, and organized again.
Hurrah for summer!

The Naming of Cats

Yes, it's an old one, but it's true!



(from here)

They Say It's Wonderful

Two days in, and I am truly enjoying summer. It's in the good way too - where I'm staying productive and busy so I don't feel guilty, yet I'm balancing it with delightful non-stressful days.

For example, I'm getting up around 8:30, exercising, eating breakfast (I really like Raisin Bran Crunch right now), playing "Super Mario Sunshine", running errands, and going to school.

Yes, still going to school. Consumed with field trips, grades, assemblies, and general end-of-the-year craziness, I decided not to rush the cleaning of my classroom. We're required to box up and clean out all surface areas in the room (including walls and bulletin boards), cover bookcases and such with butcher paper, and stack everything off the floors. I've rushed that the past couple of years, throwing papers into boxes thinking that I'll file them "later". This year, though, I decided the time had come to get organized again, so I'm doing it with leisure and pleasure. I've put in a couple of hours each day, so it's slow going, but it's rather relaxing to sort and file without any students or lessons or grading to worry about.

Pick a Pocket or Two

This is just... weird.

Apparently, a new theme park has opened in England. This may rival the ride (yes, ride) Mercedes and I enjoyed at the Cadbury factory and the "multimedia" castle tour Emily and I found in Dover. Now you can experience 19th century London in Dicken's World.

I think my favorite part is Fagin's Den:
"So how has Dickens World presented Fagin's Den? As a children's playpen, of course, where young' uns can muck about on slides and climbing frames and bounce off soft, colorful walls."
(from this article)

Which, especially given my current commute listening ("The English Novel" - a 24-part lecture series), makes me wonder just what other British tomes may inspire theme parks? The Jungle Cruise remade for Heart of Darkness? "Thornfield - Bertha's Haunted Mansion" (complete with firework show every night at sunset)? Six Flags Over Canterbridge?

Weird.

A Boy Like That/I Have A Love

Today was happiness for me - I visited our newly-opened Ikea!
Janelle and I went there after the end-of-the-year faculty party today at school. She's never been, and I was almost giddy at the prospect of being able to shop here whenever I want. Well, kinda. The store was crazy - it officially opened two days ago, and there were cops directing traffic and the store was swamped with people. The screaming kids were what really got to me. There was one cute one, though. Janelle brought Donavon along with her, and aside from a lot of squirming, he was pretty darn cute.


With four days left, school's been getting more and more interesting. It's really quite exhausting to try to teach, especially when the system works against you. My kids basically figured they were done learning the day they finished the state tests - two weeks ago. I've also been working long shifts - there's been stuff going on in the auditorium in the evening every day for the past two weeks - concerts, dance recitals, awards night, etc. Yesterday was our first annual film festival (hosted by Ben and me), and I was thrilled when it ended both because it went well and because it was the final after-school event I had to work.

Other excitement these days include someone dumping an entire bag of flour in the hallway during locker clean-out today, one of my kids bringing a knife to school, a group of eighth graders declaring a day "mob day" and trying to beat up seventh graders, training my new stage crew, doing a ton of paperwork-type stuff for the district, trying to get things settled for the AVID conference in Chicago, and so on.

I've got a stack of papers to grade over this holiday weekend, but it should be my last of the year. Next week should hopefully go quickly - Tuesday's the ninth grade field trip to our local amusement park. Janelle, Kelley, and a few of our other teacher-friends all volunteered to chaperone. Free admission and we just have to ride the bus with the kids? Not bad. The rides there are kind of lame (I'm not into roller coasters), but it's fun to hang out with the others.
Wednesday is the farewell assembly and yearbook signing, Thursday is the ninth grader's last day, and Friday is the end for everyone else.

Seven and a half weeks till Russia!

Unexpected Song

I've been feeling a little melancholy about my summer lately. Don't get me wrong - I'm counting the days left as fervently as my students. But I was missing a "big picture" for the summer; something I can be proud to claim on my "what I did..." back-to-school essay. I'm sure part of it is the wistful thoughts that are cropping up as the anniversary of the Shakespeare Institute of last summer draws near.

But I have found a cure! And acted on it with remarkable swiftness. I, friends, am going to Russia!

Yes. Through the Cross Cultural Solutions volunteer program, I will be spending three weeks in Yaroslavl, Russia. It sounds like I will mostly likely be working in one of the city's orphanages, which news immediately brought up suggestions of hepatitis shots from my mother. I'm so excited I grinned all day.

It sounds like a great program, plus I'll be there over two weekends (Hello Moscow and St. Petersburg!). It is all very suddenly, but it also feels very right.

NOW I'm excited for summer!

(I don't know what building this is, but I will in two months!)

In the Light of the Virgin Morning

Last week, I walked out of my apartment to drive to school and discovered a completely flat front tire. Fun! Luckily, my parents taught me well - none of that weak-girly thinking for me! In ten minutes' time I had the flat off and in the trunk, and the spare on. I was covered in grease and had to run back inside to change. Remarkably, I made it to school with about 30 seconds to spare before the bell.




While I'm uploading photos, here are some from the Shakespeare Festival:




My three actors who performed "Romeo and Juliet" (they're performing the Prince's final speech here, with saxophone accompaniment.)


The students had the option of dressing up for extra credit. Some of the costumes were pretty good:


while others were more... creative.

It's May

(photo from here)

Hey.

Another school year is coming to a close, both rapidly and not nearly soon enough. With less than a month to go, the tug-of-war for my students' attention - okay, fine, for my attention, is becoming apparent.

My English class took their state tests last week:
"What are we going to do the rest of the year?" one of my students asked as he passed the booklet forward after the second section.
"Go back to Romeo and Juliet," I replied cheerfully (and sincerely - I am enjoying discovering that play again along with my students).
"But we'll be done with the state tests!" he exclaims.
"Yeah, but I don't teach for the sake of the test. I teach to make you a well-rounded, literate person."
He groaned and let his eye-rolling propel him farther down into his seat.

Speaking of Romeo and Juliet, the Shakespeare festival went well. I've got photos, but I've lost my card reader yet again, so the photos are stuck on my camera for now. But we had fun and my three actors did a fine job performing.

We also finished selecting next year's stage crew. I had 18 applicants, a good mix of 7th and 8th graders. I based the decision on GPA (they had to have a 3.0 to be considered) and on teacher recommendations, and wound up selecting 5 students to join the one (two, if she looses the SBO elections) eighth grader I have this year. It'll be a good group, I think, although my techies this year are shaking their heads in dismay that next year's techies are almost all girls. Granted, they're not your typical stage-crew-types, but I'm still excited. And, hey, nothing wrong with breaking stereotypes, right?

So, yeah. I'm tired, for a Monday. The changing weather (80s, 50s, snow, 70s, 40s, and now warming back up again) isn't helping, but it's keeping me on my toes. The rainstorms Saturday set up a mood to suit my latest reading ("The Tenant of Wildfell Hall" by Anne Bronte), while the sunshine Sunday let me walk to church. Both were pleasant.

16 days to Ikea. 18 days left of school. I can make it.

Frogs Have So Much Spring Within Them

Ah, Shakespeare Day. Or what should be, at least. His day of death, his probable day of birth - it ought to be a holiday, don't you think?





Since last I posted, I enjoyed a wonderful spring break in Denver, hanging out with my sister and the rest of my family. Hanging out with my sister included hanging out with her husband's new puppy, Jem. Here's a picture of Jem and her owner, courtesy of my sister's blog:
Shopping, eating, playing games - it was the usual delightful family get-together. And here's the miracle - I wasn't sick! Nor have I been since then. I don't know why, but for the first time in my memory, I finished a production in health. Go figure.

Since then, I've kept busy by rolling straight into the next production - the annual 9th grade Shakespeare festival is this Friday, so we're rehearsing a 20-minute version of Romeo and Juliet, as is our tradition. I did myself a favor this year, and instead of trying to incorporate all of my Advanced Drama class into this production, I only cast three students in it. Yes, we have to rehearse after school, but three actors are easy to cope with, and these guys are pretty good.

It never stops, though. I'm also taking applications for and selecting next year's stage crew (although I don't know what I'll do without my crew from this year. Especially Chris, my sound guy. He's fantastic - far more so that your typical ninth grader).

Midterms are this Friday, but miraculously, I am totally caught up with my grading at this point. I KNOW! Four days early and I even have the daily participation points in the computer. You would think I know what I'm doing or something.

The state Criterion-Referenced Tests start on Monday - a stressful time for the students. Then again, it's a nice way to temper the spring crazies, too.

Speaking of, we had a riot at our school a few weeks ago. After school, so we weren't too involved (alas!), but three kids were tasered and several arrested. Fun!

I've also been taking my AVID class on a couple of field trips. We toured a big, private, religious university earlier this month, and a small private liberal arts school last week. They seem to see the possibilities that are out there, finally, and they're excited.

Two favorite moments from the field trips:

1) During a Q&A, one student asked "What's the school dress code?" The admissions rep replied, "Um... I don't think there is one. No one really cares what you wear." And with that answer, I think I saw their minds explode.
2) I witnessed, perhaps, the iconic junior-high school moment: Claudia, a bright young woman, sitting front and center in a college admissions Q&A, asking an intelligent, mature, and well-phrased question about going into medicine, while clutching a Hello, Kitty! doll in her lap.

I love this age group!

Michael Jordan's Ball

My friend and mentor, Heidi, taught me a lot about risk taking. Teaching - good teaching - frequently demands that you put yourself on the line. For me, simply accepting my current teaching position was one of the most courageous acts of my life. I hated my own experiences in middle school, so much so that the thought of stepping back into that environment, even if it was to teach, was scary enough that I almost didn't take the job.

I'm glad I did. Not only has it purged most of the bad tastes of my own early teens, but at Dead President Junior High I have had the chance to conquer even more middle-school demonic memories and hang-ups.

Mocked in choir in 8th grade for not singing in tune?
I sang a duet with Janelle at a school assembly last year.

A wall-flower at the few dances I attended?
I am one of the chaperones of choice for school dances, largely because I dance too, and the kids love it.

Shy, overweight, and excluded?
I dance every year in front of the entire student body for the Winter Assembly.

Over and over again I have faced my hang-ups and embarrassments and successfully and humorously relived them, usually in front of the entire school. I love it, honestly. I don't get embarrassed anymore. Yesterday, though, I faced my biggest inhibitions.

Our principal thought it would be swell if there was a faculty women's basketball team that would play against the school's girl's varsity team. Being male, this was a way of building school spirit that alleviated any participation on his part. So, the girl's coach, Amber, begged and caroused her way around the faculty and found nine other women who would play. Including me.

I don't think some of you understand how scary agreeing to this was for me. Most of my humiliations in middle school came from gym class and jock-types. This was the bravest risk I've taken in at least a year.

But I did it! I donned a sweat band, purchased some capri pants to play in, laced up my tennis shoes and put myself out there. And I didn't just sit on the bench the whole time, either. Of the 30-minute game, I played for at least 10 minutes, and I even touched the ball a few times during the game.

I went into it with no pretenses. I told my classes that I had no delusions of being good at this. (My exact words were "I suck." They laugh, I continue, "No, I'm not kidding. You don't understand the magnitude of my suckiness. I am truly terrible at this.") They asked why I was doing this, and I answered them honestly. They get risk taking, and they understood why this was a big deal for me. I think that's one of the important aspects of my teaching philosophy, that honesty.

And get this - we won! 37 to 26. It was a close game up to the end, actually. The girls were vicious, Janelle was aggressive, Kelley was amazingly fast, and Amber was tall. That helped. As did cheers like "Respect your elders!" "Run slower!" and "Only Four More Minutes!" from our team at the end of time-outs.

So, yeah. I'm proud of what I did. The entire school was there, and I played a sport in front of them all. Go me!

Here's some proof:

Look! I'm actually holding the ball, about to do something with it!


The girl's team. They're a lot scarier when they're playing.


Our team. We're not that scary.

By the way, do you note the purple hair? The cast of Honk acutally did it - 860 people came to our Thursday night show, and almost 800 came Friday night, so I dyed my hair last weekend. It prompted the student announcer to nickname me "Dennis Rodman", and I think helped distract the other team. Especially when paired with the yellow t-shirt, orange pants, and green shoes. I might not have played well, but I looked stunning!

I'll post more about the show soon, I promise. I think I need more time to decompress it before I can sort my thoughts into blog form. But it'll come, I promise.

The Color Purple

(Auditorium, about 3:00pm. Janelle, Kelley, and I are going over "business" with the kids before starting rehearsal.)

A kid: When do tickets go on sale?
Me: At the door. We don't advance sales, since there's no chance of selling out.
Kids: What do you mean?
Me: Our auditorium seats 1500, guys. A good night for us is 500 people. 700-800 is a great night.
Kids: We can do better.
Me (about to argue, then reconsidering): Why not? Go ahead, make this the first show we sell out.
Kids: (cheers and applause) Yay!
Me: (Making a rash decision) In fact, if you sell out... no, I'll do you one better, if you sell out the three center sections and the middle balcony, I'll dye my hair purple.
Kids: (louder cheers) Yay!
A kid: No, blue!
Another kid: No, green!
Yet Another kid: You should shave your head!
Me: Hey, I made the terms. I choose purple.
A kid: The kind that washes out the next day?
Janelle: She'll keep it for at least a week.
Me: (aside) Gee, thanks, Janelle.
Janelle: (laughs)
Me: (teasingly) Anyway, I don't have to worry. We never sell out.
A kid: Yet. You mean "yet".

Here's hoping I have purple hair for Easter!

Spread a Little Sunshine

We had our first attempt at a run-through/tech rehearsal today. The good news is that some things are really clicking well - thanks to a long painting session on Friday (7 hours!) the set is almost finished. The lights are getting there, the props are almost done, and the mics are working fairly well for us. On the other hand, some of my leads don't know their lines yet, the chorus is lackluster and look either bored or scared on stage, and the dances are far simpler than we'd like, simply because it too the cast far too long to get down the basic moves. Ah well, come hell or high water, the show opens in a week.

Janelle has reached a laissez-faire stage and encourages me to do the same. Kelley is really stressed. I'm not sure if this is because I asked her to help with the props, so she has a lot more of a lad for this show, or if she is just disappointed in how the dances turned out. I tend to bounce back and forth across the spectrum that stretches between their emotions. On one hand, I know how the students perform is virtually out of my control. They'll either do the extra work it'll take this week, or they won't. Then again, I found out last week that 1) Channel 2 news will be covering our show for their morning broadcast (at 5:-freakin'-56am!) AND we have over 1700 elementary school students coming to the Tuesday shows AND one principal volunteered to pay for buses for their ENTIRE SCHOOL to come. So, given that kind of publicity, I feel like I owe it to those audiences and to our reputation to have the best possible performances. And they're not there yet.

Spring fever is hitting, though. It's sunny, it's warm, and I just want to walk and walk and walk outside. Not yet, though. I shall live in the auditorium for a bit longer.


In the meantime, I find this game suits my dazed mindset wonderfully.

Sitting Becalmed

DWAs, a state-mandated writing test, were this week. My instructions to my English class included what to do following the exam:
"You can do what you like as long as you 1) stay in your seat and 2) stay quiet."

After finished, one of my students lowered himself to the floor, making sure he followed my instructions the whole way down:


News on other fronts:

The musical's going fine. I'm stressed, but no more than usual for this time of the show. I spent Saturday shopping for the set. Six gallons of paint (various shades of brown and green), two sets of venetian blinds, a bamboo curtain, and many, many paint rollers later and we're off to a week of painting. Venetian blinds, you say? Yes, inspiration struck. I am going to make them into giant blades of swamp grass.










I hope.

Books

I'm enjoying a much-needed three day weekend right now. In fact, I've been trying to recall the last time I had a three-day weekend and I didn't go out of town, and I honestly can't recall. After a heinous end-of-the-week, though, it's been lovely to have some time to myself.

Yesterday, Janelle and I went to the temple, then rescued Donavon from his dad and went to lunch at Cafe Rio. I ran some errands, then joined Janelle, Brent, and Donavon for "Casino Royale" at the dollar movies. I had seen it over Christmas, which worked out well because I got to take Donavon out to the hallway to get him to sleep while Janelle got to watch a movie. Nice.

Today was spent getting things done. I've accomplished four loads of laundry, some housekeeping, tax work (and realized I'm missing a 1099 form - drat!), a few errands, and some reading. I had the chance to curl up in my reading chair (avec chat, of course) and finish "The Moonstone". Speaking of books, in my browsing tonight I stumbled across this:

The instructions were
"Look at the list of books below.
* Bold the ones you’ve read
* Italicize the ones you want to read
* Leave unchanged the ones that you aren’t interested in.
* If you are reading this, tag, you’re it!"

However, since there really isn't a book on this list that I wouldn't read, I shall only mark the ones that I have read. I'm not sure where this list originated, but I like tracking what I have read, so here goes:

1. The Da Vinci Code (Dan Brown)
2. Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austin)
3. To Kill A Mockingbird (Harper Lee)
4. Gone With The Wind (Margaret Mitchell)
5. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (Tolkien)
6. The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring (Tolkien)
7. The Lord of the Rings: Two Towers (Tolkien)
8. Anne of Green Gables (L.M. Montgomery)
9. Outlander (Diana Gabaldon)
10. A Fine Balance (Rohinton Mistry)
11. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Rowling)
12. Angels and Demons (Dan Brown)
13. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Rowling)
14. A Prayer for Owen Meany (John Irving)
15. Memoirs of a Geisha (Arthur Golden)
16. Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (Rowling)
17. Fall on Your Knees (Ann-Marie MacDonald)
18. The Stand (Stephen King)
19. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (Rowling)
20. Jane Eyre (Charlotte Bronte)
21. The Hobbit (Tolkien)
22. The Catcher in the Rye (J.D. Salinger)
23. Little Women (Louisa May Alcott)
24. The Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold)
25. Life of Pi (Yann Martel)
26. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Douglas Adams)
27. Wuthering Heights (Emily Bronte)
28. The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe (C. S. Lewis)
29. East of Eden (John Steinbeck)
30. Tuesdays with Morrie (Mitch Albom)
31. Dune (Frank Herbert)
32. The Notebook (Nicholas Sparks)
33. Atlas Shrugged (Ayn Rand)
34. 1984 (Orwell)
35. The Mists of Avalon (Marion Zimmer Bradley)
36. The Pillars of the Earth (Ken Follett)
37. The Power of One (Bryce Courtenay)
38. I Know This Much is True (Wally Lamb)
39. The Red Tent (Anita Diamant)
40. The Alchemist (Paulo Coelho)
41. The Clan of the Cave Bear (Jean M. Auel)
42. The Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini)
43. Confessions of a Shopaholic (Sophie Kinsella)
44. The Five People You Meet In Heaven (Mitch Albom)
45. Bible
46. Anna Karenina (Tolstoy)
47. The Count of Monte Cristo (Alexandre Dumas)
48. Angela’s Ashes (Frank McCourt)
49. The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck)
50. She’s Come Undone (Wally Lamb)
51. The Poisonwood Bible (Barbara Kingsolver)
52. A Tale of Two Cities (Dickens)
53. Ender’s Game (Orson Scott Card)
54. Great Expectations (Dickens)
55. The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald)
56. The Stone Angel (Margaret Laurence)
57. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Rowling)
58. The Thorn Birds (Colleen McCullough)
59. The Handmaid’s Tale (Margaret Atwood)
60. The Time Traveller’s Wife (Audrew Niffenegger)
61. Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)
62. The Fountainhead (Ayn Rand)
63. War and Peace (Tolsoy)
64. Interview With The Vampire (Anne Rice)
65. Fifth Business (Robertson Davis)
66. One Hundred Years Of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)
67. The Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants (Ann Brashares)
68. Catch-22 (Joseph Heller)
69. Les Miserables (Hugo)
70. The Little Prince (Antoine de Saint-Exupery)
71. Bridget Jones’ Diary (Fielding)
72. Love in the Time of Cholera (Marquez)
73. Shogun (James Clavell)
74. The English Patient (Michael Ondaatje)
75. The Secret Garden (Frances Hodgson Burnett)
76. The Summer Tree (Guy Gavriel Kay)
77. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (Betty Smith)
78. The World According To Garp (John Irving)
79. The Diviners (Margaret Laurence)
80. Charlotte’s Web (E.B. White)
81. Not Wanted On The Voyage (Timothy Findley)
82. Of Mice And Men (Steinbeck)
83. Rebecca (Daphne DuMaurier)
84. Wizard’s First Rule (Terry Goodkind)
85. Emma (Jane Austen)
86. Watership Down(Richard Adams)
87. Brave New World (Aldous Huxley)
88. The Stone Diaries (Carol Shields)
89. Blindness (Jose Saramago)
90. Kane and Abel (Jeffrey Archer)
91. In The Skin Of A Lion (Ondaatje)
92. Lord of the Flies (Golding)
93. The Good Earth (Pearl S. Buck)
94. The Secret Life of Bees (Sue Monk Kidd)
95. The Bourne Identity (Robert Ludlum)
96. The Outsiders (S.E. Hinton)
97. White Oleander (Janet Fitch)
98. A Woman of Substance (Barbara Taylor Bradford)
99. The Celestine Prophecy (James Redfield)
100. Ulysses (James Joyce)

There are some missing, and some that seem odd in this company, but book-worshipping is fine in all forms to me.

Homework

Midterms!

After a weekend of grading a lovely stack of papers (see photo), we rolled into parent-teacher conferences this week. No real crazies this time, and I only got yelled at once.

Actually, I had some really nice compliments from parents for my hair color/cut (darker brown with red in it/bangs) and for my teaching ("You're the happiest person at this school"). My favorite was the dad who said he was glad his son had me for a teacher because "You seem really... awake". I think he meant energetic? Enthusiastic? Or maybe my colleagues do what I've longed to do at times - take a little cat nap behind my desk while the students do book work.

My sister posted some "ew"-invoking photos of her finger injury from pumpkin-carving for Halloween, so I thought I would share some photos of my finger injury. While setting up my classroom for AVID parent night last night, I pushed a table out of the way. As I moved it, a chair on top of the table fell off and I tried to catch it, jamming my finger. I don't think it's broken, but it is nicely swollen and bruised. Being my right hand, I'm finding it difficult to do the little tasks like, say, writing. I am enjoying the enthusiasm of students to do favors for me, though. I've had many volunteers to take roll, write on the board, lift objects, etc. It's nice having help.




The swelling









The bruising









As straight as it gets

The Little Things You Do Together

First, happy birthday wishes to my sister!

And now for the travel report:

New York was marvelous. I flew out on Friday morning, taking a personal day so that I could get into the city before midnight. JFK is not my choice of airports - the flight was smooth, but we sat on the runway after landing for about an hour, then baggage took another hour to arrive. Still, I got to Jason's place around 7:30pm, which is not bad at all.

We split leftovers from his study group that afternoon (a sandwich and a salad from Grey Dog's - always a favorite) and talked for the evening. We rented some movies, but were both rather tired from the week, so instead we got into our respective (and respectful, for those relatives of mine who still don't believe me when I say Jason and I are just good friends and as chaste as chaste can be) beds and talked until falling asleep.

Saturday morning started off slower. We got bagels from a place around the corner and ate breakfast in the lobby of Jason's dorm. He studied tax law (did you know that if you have a loan forgiven you have to report the amount on your income tax report?) and I read "The Moonstone" (I'm going through a massive 19th century Brit-lit phase). We then trotted off to Lincoln Center to see "Voyage", the first of Stoppard's "The Coast of Utopia" trilogy, starring Jennifer Ehle, Ethan Hawke, Billy Crudup, and others.

The play was interesting, there were some lovely moments, and a few nice Stoppard-things (the weighty-symbolic minute item, the desire to see the play again immediately to enjoy the cyclical time-structures). Some of the actors were hard to hear at times, which made me reminisce about Frances de la Tour in "History Boys". To my surprise, Billy Crudup was quite remarkable. He gave a strong performance as a nervous, brilliant geek-revolutionist, and was my favorite part of the show. That and the lockers that surround the auditorium for patrons to use to store coats. :)
To my surprise, this show also made me a little sad for all of the things I used to know. Thanks to IB, I spent quite a lot of my junior year of high school studying Russian literature and history. I always feel bad about the knowledge I forget. As I read the program notes, I remembered studying all about the Decemberists and Turgenev and "souls" and such. Quite a bit came back to me as I watched the play, but not all of it. But then there's nothing like a Stoppard play to make one feel cowered by true genius.



We tried for tickets to the other two plays in the trilogy, but they were still sold out. I actually wasn't too sad about that. I'm glad I saw one of them, but I didn't need to see them all. Instead, we went to dinner at a fun place called Jane and criticized the people sitting by us. Out of earshot, of course. My manners aren't that bad. We got dessert at a chocolate bar and then saw "Dreamgirls" at the movie theater across the street.

Sunday we went to church, followed by a quick lunch at Bed, Bath, and Beyond (Did you know they had cafes? We figured it's part of the "Beyond". Given that kind of marketing, the store seems to have given themselves leeway to delve into any sort of sales they desire!), then off to see Kristen Chenoweth in "The Apple Tree".
I adored the first act of this show. It was just lovely in it's simplicity and had Mark Twain's humor to boot. The second and third acts unfortunately paled by comparison. I think the performances stayed strong, but the book itself was much weaker. The "The Lady or the Tiger?" had wit and "Passionella" had charm, but "The Diary of Adam and Eve" melds both. It was worth it for the first act. Plus, our seats were actually very good despite being in the back row. I could see the sound board from where I was sitting, which sounds like a bad thing but wasn't. I like watching the "hows" as much as I like seeing the stories themselves.

We found dinner at a not-wonderful Italian place west of Times Square, then killed time and warmed up in a Starbucks. We both talked to our families. My parents, snowed out of their plans to go to Denver to see my sister this weekend instead went the opposite direction to visit my mom's family. They sent me this lovely picture of the family dinner I interrupted with my phone call.



"Company" was the last of our plays and the best. It was the same director as "Sweeney Todd", who used the same device of actors-as-musicians, but it worked much more effectively in this show. We laughed about the Patti LuPone-type of character actress who spends most of the show stalking about the stage, dinging a triangle (Mrs. Lovett in "Sweeney", Joanne here). Having the other characters play instruments with and for each other really heightened the main character's isolation through being single, and was beautifully pulled together in the final song. I love "Being Alive" anyway, but this performance was outstanding.
The set design provided a metropolitan, sophisticated, cool atmosphere without encumbering the show with set changes. In fact, it proved that with strong text and good actors, there is no need for the audience to see a bar, an apartment, a bedroom, or even a bed. It worked and it worked well. The actors also made good use of dramatic pauses, and I was reminded how powerful doing nothing and saying nothing can be on stage. I miss being able to create moments like that. It just doesn't happen in junior high theater, though. The scene between Bobby and April was also just wonderful, like "Apple Tree", it's beauty was in the simplicity, yet it was simple in deliberate, calculate, complex ways. Oh, I love it.




The other nice thing was that the show started at 7:00, being a Sunday night, so we actually got back to Jason's dorm by 10:00 and were awake enough to watch a movie. So "Death on the Nile" it was. What a silly, fun, character movie that is!

Monday morning I made myself scare to give Jason some more study time. I planned on hitting my favorite SoHo stores, but was slightly encumbered by the freakin' cold weather. Wind chill of -2! Minus 2 I say! So my shopping was a staccato series of dashing outside until I froze or until I got to the next store. I enjoyed myself, though. We rendezvoused for lunch at a Thai place near NYU, then browsed through the Shakespeare and Co. bookstore (they have a cat!). I got a copy of "Freeing the Natural Voice", which was just republished (Camp Shakespeare memories). Then we said our goodbyes and I hopped on the A train for JFK.

The flight home was uneventful, thank goodness. I got my bag, left the airport, noted how warm it felt (32 degrees!), and drove home to be enthusiastically greeted by my poor deserted cat.

And thus it's back to reality. I actually had enough energy when I got home from school today to make a sweet potato soup. This was in honor of several chilly days (something was up with the broiler at school, so my classroom hovered around 60 degrees all day). I also had plans of getting to bed before ten, but that was before I started this very long post. Since I have an early-morning meeting tomorrow, plus a field trip to take my 42 kids on ("Othello" - Whoo!), I shall bid you all good night now. Happy New Yorking!

A Way Back to Then

Hey there!

Yes, I've been neglecting my blog duties. If it's any consolation, I offer the excuse of YET ANOTHER cold. My third one in a row, actually. And this one included the fun of totally losing my vice for three days (I took half of that time off school. The other days I needed to be there, so armed with a portable whiteboard and my mad mime skills, I worked my way through classes with no vocal instructions. The kids, out of pity I think, were very nice to me).

I'm better now. My tonsils swelled quite a bit towards the end, so my dear dad phoning in a prescription of antibiotics for me. Medicine is a wonderful thing.

To make life even more exciting, my poor cat is now also on antibiotics. She developed an anal sack abscess (ew) that ruptured (and again, ew). So, one trip to the vet later and my cat is on drugs, too! A comparison:
Mine: Small white pills
Natasha's: Pink liquid
Mine: Once daily for 5 days.
Natasha's: Twice a day for 10 days
Mine: Tasteless
Natasha's: Bubblegum flavor
Cost: About equal.

Strange, isn't it? But I'm getting pretty swift with the syringe now, after raslin'' her down for it twice a day. It's the holding of the wet cloth to her bottom that I also have to do twice a day that she really hates. Poor beast.

On the theatrical front, "Honk"'s going pretty well. It's a tricky phase right now - we've been focusing on the music, running the songs over and over. It's necessary right now, before we can move on to blocking and choreography, but the students are getting bored. I wonder sometimes if this boredom is particular to junior high - the show is so far away (to them) that there's just no tangible reward for all of this work to keep them enticed. It'll come, but they have to rely on our promises right now, and that's hard for them.

I've had to miss a lot of school lately for conferences/meetings, which I like less than you might expect. It takes twice as much work to set up for and clean up from a sub (more if they're the incompetent time who can't follow step-by-step instructions), plus it's quite the juggling act to try to keep classes in roughly the same place on block schedule. Miss a day and suddenly the whole schedule's out of whack. Some of these conferences were okay. Well, I'll rephrase. The occasional part of each of these conferences was okay. A lot of sitting. It's strange how used I've become to being on my feet all day.

I'll post again soon. I'm actually going off to New York this weekend to visit mon ami and satiate that Broadway bug. This time it's "Company", "The Apple Tree", and Part One of Stoppard's "Utopia".

Au revoir!