getting medieval on your sleep

I'm starting to really like my new medieval sleep schedule.

I come home from work at 4 and sleep until 8. Then I stay up to plan for school, watch TV and goof off on the computer until 2 or 3 in the morning. I get in one more round of sleep until 7:45, throw on some vaguely professional looking clothes, and head off to school.

My favorite part? I get to see my husband when he gets home from working nights.

stupid boat

We're watching some stupid Travel Channel show about boats while I lesson plan for tomorrow (first day of the new semester with new students, hooray!). All of a sudden, Nick says, "That stupid boat's kitchen is better than ours. ...Fuck that boat."

I look up, and it totally is. So... like he said, I guess. Yeah.

Back to plotting on how to make twelve year old boys think my class is all about violence and war. Boom! Crash!

hooray for Christmas break!

One of my favorite students made me an ornament. It made my day, even more than our in-class Olympic Games and Greek feast to close out our unit on ancient Greece. Still, I need these two weeks off.

a few words on Newtown

After talking to the teachers on my team about the Newtown shootings, some advice for parents:



Make sure you tell your school-age children to follow their teachers' instructions immediately, every single time. 



Imagine if one of the children who survived had walked out of class to go to the bathroom, saying, "My mother told me to walk out when my teacher won't let me go to the bathroom." Or if they heard the commotion in the hallway and ran out hoping to see a fight. Or if they'd refused to stop talking while they hid in the closet.



It sounds melodramatic, but it's true. Please drill into your kids that teachers give them directions to keep them safe and help them learn.

a brief re-cap of the last month

I haven't posted in a while.

That's because in the last month, I have:

• moved back into my grandma's house from my parents'
• turned thirty
• received a visit from the Hubs
• finally won a callback for a job interview
• been called and interviewed for then offered another job the day before that interview
• accepted the job and started the next day as Kramer Middle School's new seventh grade social studies teacher
• given up on my PhD(?)
• struggled with my husband's decision not to evacuate for Hurricane Isaac
• watched a relative take most of the furniture from my grandmother's living room, where I grew up
• staged a counter-attack my body's fight against its new sleep and work schedule
• been signed in to the DAR
• fought with my husband incessantly about him returning to D.C.
• received a salary offer that's $10,000 too low
• ignored a thirteen year old's question "Why are you dressed like a fucking whore?"
• pre-qualified for a mortgage loan
• realized that my hair is falling out - literally in handfuls

So I've been busy. I promise to do a better job of writing, and going places/doing things to write about. Because I can't be captive to the classroom. Or my soulless, empty living room. Or my husband's phone calls.

I can't be.