The Girl of 510

My e-book is on Amazon for 99 cents!

2011-12-29T11:32:00.004-05:00

Hey everybody! It's been a long time since I posted here. I just want to stop by quickly and let you know that the book I wrote in high school is now available for download on Amazon.com!

You don't even need a Kindle to get e-books. If you have a mobile device, you can get the Kindle app and download books. It even works for computers, and I know you have one of them now, so you have no excuses! ;-P

It's a funny book that is only about 90 pages long (some of which are artwork).

Here is my official summary:

When Megan realizes that she and her friends have a lose-lose situation regarding their afterlives, she concocts a plan to set things right - a very BAD plan.

And now, the link: http://www.amazon.com/Once-Upon-Very-Plan-ebook/dp/B006R2NRVY/ref=sr_1_3?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1325173038&sr=1-3

Go make me proud!

Check out my video.

2009-12-02T15:45:00.002-05:00

In my teaching ESOL class, we are doing group presentations about foreign countries so that we will be able to understand our future ESOL students better. My group's country is South Korea.

The way the presentations are set up, small groups of our classmates travel around to each group member's center. The presenter at each center ends up giving the same lesson 5 times. I can't stand doing that, so I made this video that I can play for them instead. :-)

Montessori

2009-11-05T11:14:00.003-05:00

Recently the pastor at my church invited me to come see the Montessori school that is run within the building. He knows I am an education major and thought the experience would interest me. I had heard of Montessori schools before but knew little about them. Plus, I was skeptical of a system that I assumed had religious leanings. But surprisingly, at the moment he invited me and I accepted (intending maybe, one day in the future, to go – if I had the time), the head of the school showed up and my moment to investigate had arrived. Thus began my tour.

First the woman, Dora, took me to the toddler room. Odd things filled it – shallow dishes of dry lentils, miniature mops, brooms, and dustpans, a child-sized old fashioned sink with a removable basin, and various other items you wouldn’t expect to see in a classroom, especially one designed for two year olds.

Then we went onto the lower elementary classroom. I had never heard of such a thing. There were only two elementary classes – lower and upper. The children worked together in three year age groups. In the lower elementary classroom, there were some typical items – a bookshelf, small tables and chairs, pictures (all famous and classical though), and a plant or two. Then there were stacks of pink blocks, rows of red and blue wooden rods, more bean dishes, tiny pitchers for pouring water back and forth, and boxes and boxes of game pieces for various subject activities. In the upper classroom was more of the same, only at an advanced level. My mind was being blown. Dora narrated the trip with anecdotes praising the children’s focus, their work ethic, and their joy in learning. She told me that they all pursued projects of their choosing with minimal guidance and that there were few discipline problems even though they could converse freely with their classmates. I started wondering how it all worked, and I still don’t fully understand the method.

Next she took me outside. There I discovered that the children tend to rabbits, chickens, and a pet parakeet. They do community service projects, such as painting chairs for the church’s silent auction (although the school is definitely not run by the church – they teach the children the Big Bang theory), and they learn to grow plants, among other things. The children are also allowed to climb trees in the woods nearby, and they have an old fashioned wooden play set – not one of these new “safe” plastic ones.

Through further study, and by asking Dora many questions, I found out that the Montessori method’s success lies in several factors. One is minimal lecture time. An observer will rarely find a teacher speaking endlessly to the whole class, or even to one student. Students receive lessons about how to properly use the materials, and then they guide their own work and a pace they can handle. The teacher is more of a guide who is there when the child seeks him or her out. Another reason it’s successful (and that the teachers are able to produce such impressive and well behaved students) is that starting from a young age (preferably around 18 months), children are given repetitive tasks that challenge them at a level they can handle. This develops the child’s focus as well as skills (fine and gross motor, critical thinking, etc.) and work ethic. The children learn to enjoy performing tasks and will seek out new and more challenging ones on their own.

My favorite thing about Montessori is that it nurtures the development of the whole child. This system doesn’t just produce students who can read, write, and do math. These kids learn social skills, how to interact peacefully with his or her peers, how to serve the community, how to take care of him or herself and be independent, how to care for animals…I could go on and on.

I was surprised and disappointed to discover that my textbook does not mention Montessori at all, not even in the section about learner-centered instruction. It continues to baffle me that a system that has time and time again proved its efficacy is overlooked by so many. It scares me that most of those people seem to be in the teaching profession.

I bought a bike rack for my car

2009-09-23T17:52:00.005-04:00

After many weeks of trying to fit my unwilling bike (and just barely succeeding) into the back of my car, I finally bought a bike rack, which I am happy about.

I haven't driven all the way to school yet - about 45 miles - but I foresee much easier trips. They'll be easier still once I get the spring-loaded pole to make my bike frame "standard" so that it fits more easily onto the bike rack.

Right now it fits awkwardly, like this:

It's still workable though. I just need to practice hooking the rack up to my hatch and fastening the bike in.

It'll be nice to get back the use of my backseats. I'd kept them folded down in a 60-40 split so that the bike would have enough room. I was so happy at all the extra space that I vacuumed and washed my car yesterday to make Eliza (my car) look spiffed up and new.

Now taking those long bike rides around campus will be so much easier. I usually avoid doing "extra-curricular" bike riding, since it's so annoying to take the bike in and out of my backseat. I can finally explore the pretty neighborhoods around my school! I have wanted to for the longest time, and tomorrow I plan to during the break between my afternoon and night classes.

Another good thing about having the bike rack is that hopefully it will provide an incentive for car to stay the hell away from my back bumper. I am so sick of other drivers tailgating me when I typically go at least five miles over the speed limit. Surely these people cannot have to be somewhere THAT badly. I get to annoy enough of them in return though, by tapping my breaks and slowing down about 20 mph if that doesn't change their attitude.

Ah, traffic.... :-)

Once I really pissed off this one woman. She came up behind me in the fast lane on the highway going about 90 mph (speed limit's 65) and I was hovering around 72-ish. She makes no effort to slow down until she realizes that I am not going to suddenly jet off in a burst of speed. She's right up behind me and starts waving her arm frantically in the "GET THE FUCK OUT OF THE WAY" motion, even though there are two other perfectly traversible lanes. So I looked at her in my rearview mirror, put on a lovely smirk, and shook my head "no." Still, she kept on waving her arm, progressively harder and harder, as if the ferocity of her motions would change my mind. She got a little too close to my car for my liking after that, and I slowed down about 15 mph. This REALLY pissed her off and finally she swerved angrily around my car, gave me a dirty look as she passed me, and she raced up the highway to piss off different drivers. I did not stop laughing for a good five minutes. I love how some people think they own the road.

Amusing anecdotes aside, I really have to finish an essay for my afternoon class tomorrow, as well as my Friday work.

I will leave you with another picture of my bike rack for your enjoyment:

My memory box(es)

2009-07-20T10:08:00.025-04:00

This morning I set out to find my window sticker from my beloved Volkswagen, Eliza, because I wanted to find out how much gas mileage she gets. It just occurred to me that I could have Googled this fact, but I am glad I overlooked that option. This way was so much more fun.

The last time I recalled seeing my window sticker, it was among the things in my memory box, which has now, I suppose, become its own memory drawer in the bottom of my dresser. This habit of collecting things began in fourth grade when everyone who received awards at the end of the year got a large yellow envelope in which to contain them. I put next year's awards in there, too, since it was convenient, and I even began saving interim reports and report cards now that I had an easy place to store them.

I never imagined what it would turn into. The contents of the envelope kept growing until I graduated high school.

I love how my handwriting changes over the years. It's a good interaction.

Soon after I received the large, yellow award envelope, a purple crown royal box somehow came into my possession:

I don't know when I began filling it with random objects, or which objects inspired the beginning of this collection. All I know is that over a decade ago, I started to do this, and I distinctly remember thinking how good it would be in the future when I wanted to remember things I'd done.

Even then I knew how poor my memory can be for details - unless I have memory cues, of course.

Here are some of the objects I found inside my boxes. (I have two - the crown royal, and a Rubbermaid container. My collection has grown a lot.) I want to share the stories behind them, because where's the fun in keeping them to myself?

When I was three or four, Nana and I made a book together out of construction paper. Her story was about a lost butterfly, and mine was about a mean ghost who scared everyone. And I mean EVERYONE:

I was really into The Aristocats at the time, clearly. I remember pretending I was Marie - that little white one in the picture - and running around the house on all fours. If I remember correctly, I also requested that Nana serve me milk in a bowl so that I could lap it up, but I could be ~~entirely correct~~ mistaken...

I went through a similar phase when The Lion King came out. Gooood movie.

Jumping forward in time a few years, I found what I believe is the world's longest pencil shaving. I created it in my 6th grade geography class. It is one of my treasured possessions. :-)

Oh, and I also found my Groucho Marx glasses. I think they make me look dashing:

Here's another tribute to middle school boredom - a drawing I did of Mickey Mouse:

Sticking with the art category, here is a man I made out of coiled wire in my 9th grade art class. He's riding on a toboggan.

One of the coolest things I found was an origami paper box my internet friend Quinny made for me when I was in 8th grade. We met because she read and reviewed my fanfiction, and soon after, we began to chat on AIM everyday. She became one of my good friends. We spent a week or so devising a plan to come visit each other - she lived in Ohio - although we never ended up doing so. But, to my amusement, when I opened the Christmas package she sent that year, I found this:

When I opened it, I found a quarter inside. It didn't quite cover the cost of a plane ticket.

The last bit of artwork I thought was interesting enough to appear here is a drawing I did of my friend Alexa in high school. Her lunches used to consist mainly of candy, so as a joke I drew this one day:

Using this carefully planned out diagram as proof, I claimed to my friends that Alexa's food choices were actually healthy. Clearly refined sugar was necessary for her body's functioning.

Once I finished looking over the bits of my artwork, I realized that I've been to quite a few theatrical events over the years, and these are only the tickets I managed to find; who knows how many more were buried in my boxes.

I also found a lot of playbills, including one from a showing of The Graduate, in which Morgan Fairchild starred. I wasn't able to attend this one, but my parents brought me the playbill as a souvenir, and guess who signed it specifically for me?

Aww. :-)

I also found two unique collections of mine. The first is a collection of promotional buttons, mainly for movies. My interest in them began when I received one for the sixth Harry Potter book at Target shortly before it was released. Then I kept finding them everywhere.

My other collection is...corks. One night I noticed a cork from my parents' wine bottle on the counter. It had a cool design on it, and I couldn't believe they were just going to throw it away. I decided to keep it, and from then on my parents would ask me if I wanted to keep a cork before they threw it out. I started getting them from restaurants and stores too. Now I have almost 200. I have no idea what I am going to do with all of them.

My "magic" wand is another of my favorites that I found. I bought it from Alivan's online. It's too bad I never had this when I was ten. I used to play wizards with my friends all the time, and the wand surely would have been more fun than the sticks I used to settle for.

When I ordered it, I chose the option called Finneas Choice Wand, which used to only be 17 dollars. Somewhere in my Harry Potter loving mind, I thought this would be more authentic than choosing one from the list, since I would be adhering to the rule that "the wand chooses the wizard."

I ended up with this redwood wand:

In another moment of Potter fandom, I wrote a fictional letter from Albus Dumbledore to Severus Snape in my high school computer class. I had to make up a holiday party letter to show my proficiency in using certain features in Microsoft Word. I thought a Hogwarts staff Christmas Party announcement would suck the blandness right out of this assignment. I love the PS. the best:

That class turned out to be pretty useful, even if most of the assignments were boring. I ended up getting Microsoft Office Master Certified for free!

To finish off the high school items, I have this flipping advertisement thing, that I won in that same computer class. It amused my friends and me for hours:

...this certificate from when I entered the French National Contest (or Le Grand Concours, as the French call it). I got first place in my school, second in the state, and fourth in the nation! Chouette. :-)

...and this letter that my neighbor Rachel sent me during senior year after I got Eliza. I used to give her rides home since we lived so close, and we had fun making use of the fact that the main office would deliver letters we sent to each other's classrooms. I always enjoyed receiving them:

Yeah, Rachel and I had some good times. The best I can remember involved two lightsabers we bought at Goodwill one day after school. She told me that if I ever wanted to have a lightsaber fight, call her. Well, one afternoon I just happened to look out my window and see a bunch of the neighborhood kids having the most epic lightsaber fight I'd ever seen in my life. Immediately I grabbed my lightsaber out of my closet, called Rachel up, and we both ran outside to join in. I'll never forget that.

On a completely random note, here are two fake birth certificates I made for my cats one day. A lot of my jokes center on my cats. I will have to share the story of the NAACC soon.

I am not sure why I decided to give Abby so many names (way back in the day when we got her), but the reason Groucho has so many is because Abby does. All those names make them practically like royalty.

Also, the reason Abby's parents can be (mostly) identified is due to the fact that we got her from a family friend, whose girl cat Mia wandered outside one fateful day. And Groucho...well, we got him from a pet store, so there's no way of knowing about his parents.

I found so much more than all that in the boxes. There was also...

a cipher I invented in 7th grade so that my friend Kristin and I could keep the contents of our secret notebook hidden even if we lost it
programs to my old orchestra recitals (I am former violist and a current cellist)
application essays
a kazoo
birthday cards, thank you cards, and holiday cards
foreign money
my valet key! Been looking for that
little pink plastic parachute men
a pack of balloons

...And a ton of other stuff.

It's been an adventure sorting through bits of my life for the past decade or so. Sometimes I feel like I haven't done a lot of things until I sit and think about it. I realized today that I have done a ton. I will continue adding to these boxes so that I won't ever forget the important things about my life.

I advise everyone to start their own memory boxes. Mostly they do a lot of sitting around while occassionally you open them to stuff something in. But later when you take the time to sit down and look through them, you might spend an entire morning laughing and smiling and remembering things you'd thought you'd forgotten.

And the best part is sharing the stories inside with others.

Busy day

2009-07-19T20:53:00.005-04:00

Today I did about a billion things.

For real.

I woke up, went to McDonald's to meet my friend Laura - who works there - for her break. I got a free fruit and yogurt parfait, which was a pleasant surprise. It wasn't only a surprise because I didn't expect to get one; it was also a surprise because I didn't expect something from McDonald's to be so tasty and healthy too. I loved the blueberries and strawberries in it.

Then I had to drive back home, which takes about 45 minutes. If you take the scenic route, that is. This morning after I left McDonald's, I had a spontaneous urge to take a couple backroads back home, because I knew they connected from Laura's town to my town. I thought it would be a fun and interesting change from my normal driving routine, and I was right. I'm glad I tried it out.

I saw people on Sunday drives in convertibles - many of whom sped past me, because apparently going seven miles over the speed limit just isn't fast enough. I saw wide, open fields. I saw cows and old farmhouses and what I can only guess were originally built to be plantation homes. It was peaceful and relaxing, especially when I turned on my iPod and hit shuffle. I love singing in the car.

During the drive, I got a call from my grandmother. I was surprised to find out that my uncle invited us over to celebrate his youngest daughter's first birthday, since her birthday was a month ago. But I wanted to go anyway, and once I got home, I rounded up my sister and headed over to Nana's house to pick her up.

Before that, though, I had to witness something appalling. Sort of. I didn't actually look at it completely. My cat Charlie, the fluffy white lazy thing that spends most of his time lounging around in front of our sliding glass doors, murdered a bird. Then he dragged it into our porch and ripped out its feathers and left it there to die. My sister discovered it when she glanced out the sliding glass doors as I was drawing this octopus in a garden, inspired of course by the Beatles' song:

Then when my mom went to take its poor little body to the trash can outside, she nearly stepped on a baby snake that she was pretty sure wasn't black. That is a likely sign that it was poisonous, so this inspired us to go snake hunting. We were unsuccessful, unfortunately.

That is when we took off for my uncle's house with Nana, where we ate delicious pizza and cake, hit balloons around the foyer like they were volleyballs, and had an intense toy car race (during its course, I attempted to sabotage the race by using a bulldozer to ram them farther away from the finish line). Chloe and I also discovered that we love Pick up Sticks, and that our five year old cousin Joshua is abnormally good at that game. I say abnormally not only because he was five, but also because he had never played before. It was amazing the moves he could make. He is a bold player. Most of the times, I was so sure he was going to move the other sticks. Then nothing happened. When I tried to imitate his boldness, my results were not nearly as pleasing. :-(

Still, after we left, we went on a quest to find our own set of Pick up Sticks, so we went down the road to a strip mall to try a dollar tree. No luck. We tried Toys 'R' Us next, assuming that there was no way they couldn't have such a basic game. When my sister asked, "What if they don't have it?" I even joked to her, "What do you think they're going to say? 'Um...yeah. The craziest thing just happened. We kind of stopped carrying toys.'"

I should have held my tongue. Among their bazillions of games, there was not a stick to be found. I had one last hope after that, and its name was Super Target. Down the street we went again, surprised that games like Buckaroo and Cro-Magnon had apparently replaced classics like Pick up Sticks.

Super Target failed us as well. I ended up walking down to the cooking section after a stroke of inspiration and grabbing a set of bamboo skewers. They only cost 99 cents. We haven't tried them yet, but I have high hopes for them.

We also picked up two packets of seeds at Target. I've been wanting to grow veggies all summer, but every time I tried to find seeds, the stores were sold out. I kept being told that I waited too long. I'd given up on the idea until I saw the display case in Target. So when Chloe and I got home, I planted my pumpkins and she her zucchini.

These are our pots/Dixie Cups:

I can't wait till they germinate! I love growing pumpkins. I had a bitchin' awesome patch going on a couple summers ago until the weather decided it would get the best of me. It rained heavily for about a week every afternoon. My poor gourds contracted root rot and died. I was so disappointed and I didn't have the drive to try again until this year. I'll keep you informed of their progress.

Man, I still can't believe I am not done with the stuff that happened today. I feel tired just writing all this.

Then I went on a bike ride with my sister, got chased by an afghan, whose irresponsible owner decided that the leash law wasn't important today, came home, and ate crab.

Life is good.

:-)

And to make it even better, here is a hilariously deadpan photograph of my sister from Toys 'R' Us today:

She really wants one of those motorbikes.

Oh, and soon I will be reading my teaching textbooks from last year that I kind of neglected to do more than skim over. This may or may not be a result of parties that needed attending, parties that needed throwing, rock walls that begged me to climb them, and various other, ah..."inconveniences" of college dorm life.

Here they are:

Teachers, Schools, and Society: A Brief Introduction to Education

Why TESOL?: Theories and Issues in Teaching English as a Second Language for K-12 Teachers

Click if you're interested in being transported to Amazon.com to learn more about them.

I am excited about reading them. I have been meaning to for a long time. It's funny that I know I will enjoy it, but just the thought that it's schoolwork makes it seem somehow unappealing.

I'll have to get over that.

Panoramic Pictures and Some Water Shots

2009-07-12T19:57:00.014-04:00

Today I went on a trip with my grandma and sister to a lake. It was the perfect opportunity to take some beautiful panoramic pictures. Enjoy! And don't forget to click them if you would like to view them in their entire awesome glory.

This is on our way down a hiking path toward a boardwalk along a lake. It's a different lake from the one at which the subsequent panoramas are set.

Here is a view taken during some of our first few moments at the other park.

This is my favorite one. This view is from the opposite side of the lake, down where we found some hungry ducks and cool shade.

Okay, apparently I lied about the other panorama being taken during some of our first few moments, because I took this one earlier.

I would rank this one as a solid second favorite. I love the clouds, especially.

Nothing is particularly wrong with this one, but for some reason I am not fond of it. Least favorite for sure.

Now for the water pictures. We came across a fountain on our walk and I decided to try out a Best Shot setting I hadn't used before - softly flowing water. I wasn't sure that a rushing fountain qualified as softly flowing water, but I gave it a shot anyway and overall I was pleased.

I am having an inordinate amount of fun with this camera.

:-)

Panoramic Photos

2009-07-10T22:34:00.003-04:00

You may remember this commercial featuring an adorable kid showing the world how easy it is to create a panoramic photograph on Windows Live Photo Gallery:

This idea intrigued me the first time I saw the commercial, but for some reason, I pushed it to the back of my mind shortly thereafter, and it remained forgotten until this evening when I decided to seek out the video online to see exactly how panoramic photos are made.

Unfortunately, I do not have my camera with me, so I can't practice with new pictures at the moment. However, I already have a few vacation pictures that were fortunate enough to overlap, and I used them as practice. Here is my result:

The image looks a little odd at the tops and bottoms because of the angle at which the computer had to "stitch" the photos together. Chris did not take these pictures with as much precision as someone who sets out to create a panoramic picture, so the end result looks slightly weird. The dock is not supposed to be curvy, for one.

But you get the idea. Even this slightly distorted result looks awesome. I love panoramic photographs. I think they will change the way I do photography. I can't wait to get back to my camera and test this out some more.

And it really is as easy as the commercial makes it seem. I found that video on YouTube, and less than ten minutes later, I had Windows Live Photo Gallery installed and I was choosing pictures to turn into a panoramic.

Because the commercial is not meant to be instructive, here is another related video I came across that shows a fictitious panoramic photography competition between Alexa, the girl who made the tent, and a 70 year old man. It ends up being a teaching tool (to a certain extent) as well as an amusing video.

We love Peggle

2009-07-10T01:54:00.011-04:00

I hear those words every time I babysit for two of my favorite kids, B- and L-. (Dan - as you can see, I am taking a leaf out of your book.)

A few weeks ago, I introduced them to a highly addictive game called Peggle. You may be familiar. If you're not, I have to warn you - set aside a large chunk of time to play this game, because you won't want to stop until you finish. And then you'll want the sequel, Peggle Nights.

Both of which I own.

:-)

Today the girls finally finished the trial levels and reached a Peggle Master they've never met before - Spork Splorkan. They loved that he looks like some alien from Monsters Vs. Aliens (don't ask me which one, because I have no idea), but they loved his space blast talent more.

A space blast occurs when you hit a green peg. It explodes, illuminating all pegs within a short radius. It's really useful. It also makes a cool noise, and you should have seen the looks on the girls' faces when they did their first few space blasts.

Oh, wait...

These were the looks on their faces.

(I couldn't resist trying out my good ol' (new?) Casio - this is Best Shot Portrait mode with flash.)

L- has the most vivid facial expressions.

...especially in this picture. She looks unimpressed by what B- is showing her.

I wish I knew what the dialogue was for this picture...

...and for this one. Unfortunately, I forgot. It seems like subtitles would be fascinating, judging by the hand gesticulations B- is providing. Perhaps she is imitating Splork Sporkan's tenticles?

And here we have B-, doing a lovely pose in spite of my recommendation that nobody pose, since the natural pictures were interesting enough.

Today, we finished three of Splork's levels. I can only imagine how their faces will look when they see the next magical power...

My Casio Exilim EX-S5

2009-07-08T21:18:00.009-04:00

Yesterday, my camera finally arrived via Wal-Mart's Site to Store service.

Here's what it looks like:

This is the first digital camera I have bought for myself. My old one was an antiquated hand-me-down that could barely function.

This one is much more satisfying to use, especially with its helpful feature called Best Shot.

As you can see, there are many scenarios from which to choose, including portrait, scenery, children, pets, flowers, and night scene. I was most interested in seeing the outcome of the night scene feature, so this evening I went for a walk to try it out.

This picture was taken in regular mode using only the flash:

It's dark and slightly grainy. The darkness is understandable, because it's, well...night time. But check this out:

Same street, same camera, same darkness. The only problem is that the camera takes a few seconds to process the image, and during that time it's difficult to hold to camera still. I am still trying to figure out how to solve this problem without carrying around a big honking tripod wherever I go.

Here's another instance of the different between flash only and best shot:

Flash only:

Best shot:

Again, there's the problem of shaking - but soon I will figure something out about that.

Overall I am impressed. Casios are a good buy. I also love that it's so small, I can store it in my sunglasses case. It's a great way to protect it, because it seems so scratchable.

Now I can take pictures of my downtown excursions and my cat-walking endeavors!

I have taken on a new project

2009-07-02T11:12:00.007-04:00

That is not my cat. And, just for the record, that is not me, either.

This is my cat:

(Abby)

And this is my cat:

(Groucho)

And...well, we don't have any pictures of the other cat. But he looks mostly like this:

(Charlie's stunt double)

All three of them have now begun training. That's right - training.

My sister, Chloe, and I are doing our best to leash train our cats.

Crazy, you might call it. You may even laugh at the task we've undertaken. In fact, sometimes I laugh at it. It's the third day in and while there have been some improvements, we haven't seen leaps and bounds (haha, cat joke) of progress.

I'll give you a cat-by-cat report.

Abby: She has had the most leash experience. We have even taken her around the block. Don't mistake this for success, though. We ended up carrying her nearly the whole way. I am not concerned about this at the moment, since the websites I read about cat leash training said to introduce the cat to the route in that way. She is more interested in the grass than the sidewalk. Every time we set her down, she walks toward the grass with the eventual goal of running under a bush. I am not sure if she just doesn't understand what we want her to do, or if she is intentionally being a pain.

Groucho: We have only harnessed him up twice. He's an old cat and seems alarmed by the concept of wearing the harness. I wonder how he perceives our attempts to train him?

Charlie: He is generally an agreeable cat. He allows us to put on the leash and harness without complaint. However, once we bring him outside, he finds a lovely spot in the grass or on the sidewalk, plops down, and declares it nap time. We haven't been able to get him to budge. He won't even freak out or explore like the other cats.

Soon, I'll have pictures of our "walks" to share. In a few days, I am getting this camera:

So in the meantime, while you are eagerly awaiting my photographs, here's a link to a website that will instruct you to leash train your cats as well:

Cat leash training

Tons + Tons of Pictures

2009-06-02T14:55:00.013-04:00

It's raining here, so instead of passing the time outside while Chris is at work, I am inside on his couch editing my blog layout. I have found something closer to what I want to keep, but there is still something off about it.

I am glad that I can finally make banners, though, and that the banner shows up in its full size. I've been wanting to make them for a while now.

Today I feel like writing, but before I throw myself into my newest story, I thought I'd make a new post here to update on what I have been up to since my car-bike excursions into the city.

I've been obliging my friend Laura's ~~demand~~ request for "Tons + Tons" of pictures:

Here I am, expressing shock at finding a red phone booth this far outside of London.

Here's Chris, being silly at a university we visited.

Chris likes to take sneaky pictures (which we have discussed before) and here is a prime example. I caught him taking it, however, as evidenced by my eyebrows.

We also visited the capital. I wanted to access the secret office that Chris told me lay beneath the white doorway I am pulling on, but sadly it would not budge...

Chris plays a game with squirrels (although I am not convinced they are aware of their participation...) called "Touch." The object of the game is to touch a squirrel, and simply for my own amusement, I point out all the squirrels everywhere we go so that he will chase them. He didn't let me down on this particular occasion, but he did miss the squirrel. Here he is, pointing angrily at it while it chirped down at him in squirrel language, equally pissed.

We found this cool distorting mirror thing in downtown OKC. I thought it would be great for a picture.

That night, we went to a nice restaurant called Abuelo's for dinner. Just because my family won't believe me (I usually am a chicken fingers and mac and cheese kind of girl), here's what I had for dinner: a chicken enchilada with some kind of cheese sauce, and a beef enchilada with ranchero sauce. I also had some delicious mashed potatoes, but I forget what the chef put in them.

And I had a chicken empanada when we went to On the Border a few nights later.

(But I wasn't brave enough to try Chris's veggie-filled wrap thing...)

We have also gone horseback riding on a trail near a red lake and a forest. I rode an old horse named Molly and Chris had a stubborn, younger horse called Quincy. At first, Chris couldn't get Quincy to trot, which I considered a good thing, because if his horse wasn't trotting, my horse, who was behind his, surely couldn't (narrow path), and I wasn't sure I was ready for trotting.

But finally Chris got the hang of bossing Quincy around, and he was trotting along the trail. After some initial freaking out - it felt like I was going to fall off with all the bouncing Molly was making me do - I started to enjoy trotting. I encouraged Chris to keep Quincy trotting as often as possible because it was so fun.

Here we are on our horses. Chris had the camera, so there are none of him, unfortunately. (I didn't think I could manage steering a horse and taking pictures at the same time.)

Now I feel like a real cowboy - I mean, cowgirl.

More pictures to come later, this time of our trip to a small zoo near the place where we rented the horses.

I haven't written in a few days...

2009-05-20T16:13:00.000-04:00

...so I thought I'd mention that I'm in Oklahoma right now. Some of you may have figured out where I live, but if you haven't, let's just say it's not here. Haha. Not that there's anything wrong with Oklahoma.

This is my second (almost) full day here and so far it's been interesting. I am here for a month visiting my boyfriend, and it turns out he's not fond of cars. He's been making me bike everywhere. We've been pretending to be cars while riding on the road. Apparently this is legal if you follow all the same laws as cars do, but it can be annoying. More precisely, it's a mixture of scary, exciting, and frustrating.

Sometimes cars will go well out of their way to avoid us. This is wonderful. However, there are always those assholes who, for some reason, think it would be hilarious to drive too close to the girl who doesn't quite know how to do this yet, and that's when I get frustrated. I wonder why the hell I'm on top of an overpass on I-35 on a bike next to a rail that's too small on a bike lane that's too narrow.

...that was a lot of prepositions.

But it's also exciting because I've never had the balls/inclination to do it before.

Another bonus of traveling to Oklahoma at this particular time is that back home, it's been raining nonstop for three days. I know this because I keep getting texts about it and I see everyone's bummed out statuses on Facebook.

I am glad to be in the sun.

But you know what's weird? There seem to be no clouds in Oklahoma when it's sunny...back home there are.

Another weird thing is the shape of the water towers. They are much sturdier because of tornadoes. None of that golf tee-shaped business I'm used to.

More updates later. I am on vacation; don't want to do too much blogging! :-)

The best quote from today

2009-05-14T12:08:00.000-04:00

My co-worker Bobbie is OBSESSED with Twilight. I thought I'd met crazed fans before, but Bobbie is a special case. She can't go more than three hours without talking about the books (I timed her today). And that was a record for her.

Holly, my other co-worker, and I usually are the ones who end up hearing her Twilight talk all day. Sometimes the boss's son Billy gets ~~subjected to it~~ delighted by it, but usually he's pretty lucky and has chores to do.

Now don't get me wrong, Holly and I love Bobbie. It's just that we don't love Twilight. At all.

So today I was asking them if they had any ideas for how I could injure one of my characters in a book I am writing. I need her to have a long-lasting physical scar. Every few minutes, someone would toss an idea out, but they never hit quite the right note.

Shortly after the three hour period expired and Bobbie began talking about Twilight, I came up with the perfect idea for my story*:

"Holly," I said, "I figured it out! My character gets injured because someone stabs her for talking about Twilight too much!"

Holly laughed. Bobbie heard me. She laughed too, but not as much as me. I about laughed myself into a coma.

Sometimes I think that the three of us should make a work-related sitcom.

- - -

* I am not actually using this, just for the record. :-P

I finished my wiki page so you better read it! >:-O

2009-04-27T08:54:00.001-04:00

Hahaha, just kidding.

But just in case you're interested....

http://elementaryed.wetpaint.com/

You should check out the lesson plan page. And the student activity page. The teacher resource page is also nice.

*twiddles thumbs*

But it's just a suggestion...

:-)

Elementary School Mathematics

2009-04-21T13:06:00.000-04:00

Finally, I bring you the math games I've learned! But I would also like to share other cool things I've learned in my Elementary School Mathematics class, because it's the most kick-ass college course I've taken so far.

The point of the class is to teach elementary ed majors how to communicate mathematics to little kids. To teach us how to do this effectively, my professor spent the semester demolishing the old ways we thought about math, and rebuilding our understanding from that rubble.

To make us understand why we would use games to teach kids math, we first learned that there are four basic levels at which new information can be presented:

1. Concrete level: hands on activities for learning

2. Semi-concrete level: visual representations of new material, such as pictures or videos

3. Semi-abstract level: representations for things involved with the new material, such as using four tally marks for 4

4. Abstract level: directly showing a concept and having students practice it: 2+2 = 4

The idea is that you have students begin at the concrete level and work their way up as they gradually begin to understand.

Another interesting thing I learned is that math is a spoken language and functions in a grammatical way. Just as the sentence 'Sally ran home.' has a subject, verb, and a predicate, so does the mathematical statement '3+4=7.'

3+4 is the subject. = 7 is the predicate, and = (equals) is the verb. All inequality signs are also verbs. Operation symbols, however ( - + / *) are not verbs; they are part of the subject or predicate.

There's so much mathematical language. I also learned that it's better refer to a multiplication symbol as "groups of" instead of "times" because it will mean more to the student and cause less confusion.

The reason for approaching math this way is that 1. it relates to something the students are already being taught and probably already understand 2. when mathematical statements are read aloud as sentences, they no longer sound foreign to students - they sound like things the student is being told to do, or a question that the student is being asked.

3+4 = ____ would sound like: "What does three plus four equal?"

But before a child can begin to add or subtract, he or she must be able to conserve numbers. Number conservation occurs when a child understands that the number of objects remains the same even when they are spread far apart, or arranged otherwise.

I borrowed a video from this website that demonstrates how to test a child for the ability to conserve numbers. The little girl in the video cannot conserve numbers and you can tell because when the tester rearranges the white chips, the girl thinks the white row has more, even though the two rows are identical in quantity.

Now for the games. The first game is called "Sticks, stacks, and bunches." This game is used to teach base 10 and place value, but it can be adjusted for play in any base. You need Popsicle sticks and a die for this game.

First, you draw a chart on a whiteboard or a piece of paper. It will look like this:

Next, you pick a number. We'll pick 4.

You use this number to determine how many sticks make a stack, and how many stacks make a bunch.

To play, you set a goal, like, "The first to make 3 bunches wins!" You can pick whatever you want as a goal, depending on how long you want the game to last. Then you roll your die to see how many Popsicle sticks each team/player gets each time. Once you get your sticks, make sure you're transferring them over to the next stage when needed.

For example, when a player gets 4 sticks, you move them over to the "stack" column to become 1 stack. Then once the player gets 4 stacks, they move to the "bunch" column.

Once the students have mastered this game, you can present it in a new way to show how it relates to place value. I'll show you the new chart in base 10 instead of base 4, because it will show you how our number system makes sense:

I thought this was the coolest thing when my professor showed it to us. It's just like playing "Sticks, stacks, and bunches" if you picked the number 10. There's even another column called "superbunches" that you can add once you become an advanced player. It represents the thousands place, and - to return to our example - when you make 4 bunches, it would equal one superbunch (but only if you picked the number four!).

________________________

The next game is called "Yes, no, but," or the YNB Game. I'm not sure how this can be used to teach math, but it's a fun logic game to play.

Here's how you play:

You make up a fairly large number. In my class, we used numbers in the low thousands, with four slots: _ _ _ _

Let's use the number 3106 for teaching purposes. I have this one in my notebook because it's from my game with my partner. :-)

Stephanie first guessed 1234. You pretty much always begin by guessing, and see what you get from there.

I responded with BNBN. One letter corresponds to each number. You give someone a Y if their guess was the right number in the right position. You give a B if the number is in the wrong position, but it is one of the numbers in the answer. And you give a N if the number is not in your answer.

The rest of our exchange looked like this:

Stephanie Megan

5163 NYBB
3176 YYNY
3186 YYNY
3106 YYYY

__________________________

The other blog-worthy technique I learned is not a game. It's a way of teaching children how to work with shapes, and learn perimeter and area. Some geoboards can even be used to teach children to tell time.

This is a geoboard:

You use them with rubber bands to create polygons. You can create all sorts of wacky or simple polygons, like these:

Finding the area of a square or rectangle is so easy that I will not even bother explaining it. So I will show you how to find the area of figures that seem complex.

I have taken one of the geoboard patterns from above and drawn three rectangles on it in paint. Now instead of funky shapes, we have diagonals. The total area of each of the two larger rectangles is 2, so the orange area is 1. The smaller rectangle only has an area of 1, so when it's cut in half, it becomes 1/2. Add 1 + 1 + 1/2 + 9 to get the total area.

Isn't geometry fun?!

:-)

Mobile Uploads

2009-04-20T13:20:00.000-04:00

I have had these pictures on my phone for the longest time and today, during an especially boring physical science class, I emailed them to myself. It's amusing for me to look back and see a pictorial representation of what I've been up to for the past few months:

This is what happens when my friends I play Scrabble:

One day at the beach, my sister asked me if I would turn her into a mermaid. I did. I turned her into the world's most fat-ass mermaid.

A few days before Christmas, I went to visit two of the kids I babysit. Upon my arrival, Emilee, a first-grader, ran up to me and excitedly showed me this letter she composed for Santa:

The elementary school I volunteered at had a cool program they offered students at the end of each year: pay $20 and get your name and hand print permanently affixed to the wall. Apparently, Harry Ball's parents could afford this:

I was driving back to school one day and stopped at a red light. Somehow, magically, at the right moment, I noticed my current mileage and got a giggle. I took a picture as quickly as I could, before it had a chance to change:

For their April Fool's prank, my friends Justin and Logan started an ironing business in our building's elevator. Don't worry, the irons weren't plugged in - but our RA believed us when we said they were!

I did a group project a couple weeks ago in my Teaching Diverse Populations class. Our project was about different new year's celebrations around the world. We decided to bring in food to ~~get an A~~ make the presentation more enjoyable, and as one of our items we brought grapes, because in Spain they eat twelve grapes near midnight. I thought the bowls looked cool all set up like this: (And yes, I know there aren't 12 grapes in each bowl. We are only college students. We could only afford 6 per person.)

This was supposed to be an entry entitled "Italian Fail" for the website FailBlog, but I am not entering it because the picture quality is poor.

My boyfriend and I were walking in downtown Orlando, checking out a few places through the windows, when we spotted this place. Originally Chris was saying how we just had to come back to this place tomorrow, it would be great, blah blah...but then we read the menu. And we noticed a few things. I know you can't read much in this picture, so allow me to explain. Instead of "cannoli," this restaurant apparently sold a "camoli." Also, the place offered no lasagna. That must be against the law or something, to be an Italian restaurant and offer no lasagna. Finally, there's the creme bruleé, or, as this place likes to call it, cream brulé. Why would an Italian restaurant NOT offer lasagna, but then offer a French dessert?! If that wasn't bad enough, they had to go and misspell it...sigh...

Lastly, we have this picture. I know it doesn't look like it, because I altered it on Picnik, but this is a picture of the ladies' room floor at work. We use cheap paint that chips away easily, and due to some oddness, it chipped away in the shape of what I believe to be a wizard-ish storybook character. I thought it was awesome, so I took a picture!

The floor is really red, but it looked so much better in "nightvision." :-)

I almost forgot, I have one more. But this one isn't from my phone:

Hehe.

The day of embarrassing photographs

2009-04-14T12:32:00.000-04:00

Today I have several embarrassing photographs to share with you. The first one is more hilarious than embarrassing, in my opinion, and it involves my World of Warcraft character, Sofiya.

This one requires a bit of background. Okay, so in WoW, there are certain titles you can earn that go either behind or in front of your name. For example, my uncle's character is called Amaramas, and he has the title "Merrymaker" from the "Feast of Winter Veil" quests (AKA Christmas). Thus he becomes "Merrymaker Amaramas."

So now that we're good on that, I must tell you about Leeroy Jenkins.

No, wait. I'll let Leeroy Jenkins tell you about Leeroy Jenkins. I couldn't do the tale any justice:

Because of Leeroy's greatness/epic fail, the creators of WoW decided he deserved a title, which other players can earn by succeeding where Leeroy failed: Killing 50 rookery whelps in 15 seconds.

There was no WAY I could have done that on my own. The whelps were much higher level than me and would have burnt me and eaten me with ketchup. But I wanted that title sooo badly. I decided to ask two of my uncles, whose characters are much higher level than mine, to help me out. They agreed, and, long story short, we they succeeded.

I was so thrilled to have my new title. I was Sofiya Jenkins! I was also a 48, which is an unusually low level at which to attain this glory. Therefore I was even more badass.

I hurried back to Stormwind, a main city of the alliance side, eager to show off my new title. When I got there, I saw the city's fountain and I got an idea. A wonderful, hilarious idea. I went to the bank first to empty out my backpack; I would need all of its space for this.

Then, as the picture shows, I jumped to the highest tier of the fountain, took off all the clothes the game would allow, and I began to dance.

All was bitchin' awesome until I noticed a familiar face in the crowd that had gathered around me: my Uncle Pat's character, Homwrecker.

I don't think I need to explain much more. Just read the conversation in the bottom left hand corner. All the ones that say "To [Sofiya]" are him.

Next we have a few photographs of my boyfriend, Chris. We Skype a lot. And he has a bad habit of sneakily taking unflattering pictures of me while we Skype. He thinks it's hilarious.

And I think THIS is hilarious:

And this:

Especially that. :-)

These are also pretty good:

I love it when he gets kissy:

Hehehe. I like you sooo much cupcake!

My Elementary School Service Learning Project

2009-04-10T20:55:00.001-04:00

For the past three days, I have spent copious amounts of time at a local elementary school. Fifteen hours, to be exact. It was for a service learning requirement in my teaching diverse populations course. I had to work with ESOL students for five hours, and a group of "at-risk" kids for ten. Apparently "at-risk" includes gifted children, so since the school I went to is an A school, I chose them for convenience's sake.

The funny thing is, without requesting a single specific teacher (mostly because I'd never been there before and knew no one), I ended up volunteering in two fourth grade classes. I'm sure that you, my loyal reader, remember my previous service learning experience in which I was also assigned to a fourth grade class.

As a result, I have become fond of fourth grade. They're relatively mature, competent, and old enough to be fun to be around, but not old enough to have become little bitches just yet. Conversely, I would never teach second grade. My fourth graders have reading buddies who they visit every couple of weeks or so, and yesterday happened to be a scheduled visit, so I tagged along. These reading buddies were second graders. I sat beside Madeline's group and Alexandra's group - two students in the fourth grade class. Alexandra's group was the first I observed, and her second grader was obedient and sweet. I thought, "Aww, maybe I could teach second grade too! They don't look so bad!"

Then Alexandra and her buddy finished their book. They wandered off to find a new one and Madeline came over with her buddies and sat in Alexandra's abandoned spot. At first things seemed to be going all right, aside from the occassional distraction from one of the second grade girls (poor Madeline had three buddies) whose glasses had broken; she was trying to fix them with a glue stick, despite Madeline's and my guarantees that this would not work. Once the glasses-girl started talking and interrupting ("How can I fix these without having to go to the glasses store? I don't want my mommy to know I broke them..."), the other two girls started straying off task too. Madeline is a shy girl, so her quiet protests of, "Come on, you guys!" while facepalming didn't accomplish anything. I sat quietly to see if Madeline would eventually come out of her shell. The little girls really went out of Madeline's control when they saw a page in their book that showed a girl baby without a diaper - I think it was being changed or something - and erupted into laughter. They laughed for five minutes straight and kept laughing every time one of them pulled the book away from Madeline to get another look. I was glad to see Madeline rolling her eyes at them and not giggling like an insane person. I learned a valuable lesson about the perils of a second grader's maturity level, and fourth grade earned another brownie point.

Grading papers was interesting and infuriating. The interesting part was that I got to see what fourth graders were capable of. The infuriating part was the lack of parental involement I sensed from some of the students' work. One example: most of the children's handwriting was TERRIBLE. I can't even quantify how many times I wrote, "Please practice your penmanship! :-)" or "This was messy, be neater, please," on students' papers. I know those kids' parents see their work because their teacher makes them sign it every night. So then why on earth would these parents see the state of their children's handwriting and think, "There's nothing wrong with this! It's perfectly readable!" If my child had bad handwriting, he or she would have a notebook to practice writing in every night. There is no excuse for papers that are so bad that they're unreadable.

It scares me how many parents dump the responsibility of educating their child on teachers. It is not entirely up to teachers to ensure a child's success. The child does not belong to the teacher. I don't see why parents can't grasp this. Then parents have the nerve to march to the principal's office when bad report cards come home and demand to know why Little Johnny is failing math. Most teachers are competent and caring. It would be a rare instance in which it's truly a teacher's fault. Usually it's because of a lazy student combined with parents who take a hands-off approach to their child's academia, thinking that the child and the teacher can accomplish everything alone.

So, parents: Sending your child to public school for 7 hours a day does not absolve you of parental responsibilities. I bet most parents in America don't even know what their children are studying, and that's sad.

I learned that I am definitely not going to be one of those teachers who sugar coats reports to parents. I am also going to be a teacher with high expectations; I can tell just from the way I spoke to the kids.

Now for the topic of the teacher's lounge. Oh, man - the teacher's lounge. One of my professors told us never to go in there, because it was cliquey and created a barrier between you and your students. That was entirely correct. I decided to eat in the teacher's lounge during my volunteer experience though because I had to see for myself if my professor was right. Plus, I intend to eat lunch with my class when I am a teacher, so I thought this would be a good way to experience the teacher's lounge and not feel guilty.

I worked with two different teachers during my stay, and they both were professional and pleasant and composed in the classroom. But when they stepped foot into the teacher's lounge and grouped with their fourth grade teacher buddies, it was like high school all over again. They talked about other staff members behind their backs, one of whom I knew, and who was awesome; they mocked their low-performing students, some of whom were self-contained ESE and couldn't help it; and they were blatantly rude to other teachers who walked in and who they didn't like.

My experience made me wonder if all teacher's lounges are like this.

Then when all the fourth grade classes went to recess, the same teachers re-grouped and turned the picnic table into their own outdoors version of the teacher's lounge. Once, one of them said, "Thank God we only have two more hours till the bell," and there was a student right behind her, waiting to ask her a question. Students shouldn't hear that sort of thing from their teachers. Teachers are supposed to be role models all the time, even when they think no one's listening or looking.

Don't get the wrong idea about my outlook on my volunteer experience, though. I had plenty of good experiences. I plan on volunteering in elementary schools as much as possible. Meeting a new class and getting to know the students is incredibly fun. Through volunteering, I learn what to do, what not to do, what works, and what flops.

One of the coolest things that happened from this experience is that my teacher's goal for the assignment actually happened: she wanted us to learn what culture is, seeing as the class is called Teaching Diverse Populations. Discovering culture is the point of our semester paper. And I did. That was one positive thing I got from the teacher's lounge - I learned about the culture of teachers.

The Trip that Almost Wasn't

2009-03-29T12:44:00.000-04:00

I know I said that my next post was going to be about the math games I've learned in my education classes, but that was before I made this video. For my Technology for Educators class, I had to tell a story in Windows Movie Maker using pictures and a sound file. Mine is a true story. :-)

Islands of Adventure

2009-03-24T13:26:00.000-04:00

Last Friday, my boyfriend Chris and I went to Universal's Islands of Adventure. He hadn't been to Florida before, or to any of our theme parks. He's from Oklahoma, where they only have tumbleweeds.

See?

We saw lots of cool things. In Seussland, Mrs. McCave was hanging out all her Daves' shirts to dry:

Then Chris saw the Green Eggs and Ham restaurant. He was so excited:

But, sadly, it was closed.

Then he saw "a crazy Jamaican guy" (his words) on a sign. It made him want to be crazy too:

A few people who were walking by stopped to chuckle at Chris's pose.

- - -

The lines weren't that long that day, so we got to ride lots of rides:

There was a cool playground in the Jurassic Park section. We climbed through the rope courses and played in the amber caves:

We also found a tunnel:

In our spare time, we made silly faces at the camera:

I even had time to do some exercise:

I had no idea I could lift that much!

Then suddenly the day became serious. Just as we were leaving, I asked Chris what he'd done with my hair tie, which I'd lent to him to hold a plastic bag shut. He'd kept his camera in there during the wet rides to avoid damaging it.

Well, he searched through his pockets, looked at me with a face only this picture can describe....

...and he said, "I losed it."

If the confession hadn't been so cute, I might have been annoyed with him. :P

- - -

**Coming next time: I am going to share some cool and helpful games I've learned in my "Teaching Math to Elementary Students" class!

Braces? What braces?

2009-01-23T00:49:00.001-05:00

Oh yeah, people. Check this out. I am sexy again. Except...that retainer does kind of make me talk like a dork. But I am working on that.

Of Death Knights and Bobbie's Questionable Ideas

2009-01-18T12:15:00.000-05:00

A few days ago, my friend Ben let me make a Death Knight character on his account. Death Knights are...interesting. They're the newest class on WoW, having just come out a couple months ago with The Wrath of the Lich King expansion.

Being a Death Knight is cool for several reasons:

1. You get to start at lvl 55. I have never reached 55 normally. This felt awesome.

2. You are amazingly overpowered. For example, you can grab stuff out of the air with a rope thing, pull it in and murder the crap out of it with your range of runic spells.

3. You get a free horse (which you have to steal from a dead guy after you kill him) and it runs across water. You can also run across the water without the horse.

The list could go on for a while, really. But don't think there aren't downsides to being a Death Knight.

Observe this picture: (Click it to make it larger.)

See that floating dead woman? I had to murder her. She was an innocent resident of Havenshire, the town the floating Death Knight home looms over. I had to kill 10 innocent residents of Havenshire for a quest, and by the time I was done I had a sick feeling inside, like I'd punted a kitten across a football field.

See the text there in the bottom left corner?

"Citizen of Havenshire says: 'I almost...made it...' "

If that wasn't bad enough, right below that The Lich King (the big boss man of all the Death Knights) starts invading Syllandria's thoughts (Syllandria is my Death Knight's name) and whispering stuff to egg her on:

"The Lich King whispers: 'Kill or be killed, Syllandria. Mercy is for the weak.' "

So...yeah. I still have a lot of Death Knight quests left. I wonder if I can stomach them.

Meanwhile at work, Bobbie is filling my head with worries about the apocalypse. That's right, the apocalypse. 2012. Mayan predictions. All that jazz.

She casually brought it up to Steven and me yesterday as if it would not cause us to shiver in our boots, or however the saying goes. She talked about the Mayan calendar, catastrophic events, and, most importantly, the planets aligning.

*insert spooky music here*

Yes, Bobbie seemed to be concerned with planetary alignment yesterday, but rather than having a freak out about it, she proposed a solution that would save us all.

"We have to get everyone on one side of the earth," she said. "Then we'd all jump - on three, you know? And then we'd fall out of alignment."

I.
Am.
Not.
Making.
This.
Up.

Steven and I just looked at each other. We didn't know what to say.

That is until I said, "Um, Bobbie, I don't think it works like that."

She got all shy but still believed in her plan, "What, I think it might work. If we all jumped..."

I think at that point Steven and I just dissolved into laughter.

My Sister's Haikus

2009-01-10T22:43:00.000-05:00

My sister recently had to write a series of haikus for her 7th grade language arts class. She was telling me about one of them when we went to play mini golf tonight. It was called "Ponds."

It went a little something like this:

"Ponds"

The small pond was small.
Glistening in the hot sun,
the big pond was big.

Naturally I mocked it.

She responded by saying, "A lot of famous people start out with really stupid stuff, like those people who splatter paint on stuff. Or..."The Scream." Yeah, "The Scream."

I lol'd very much.

Here are her other two haikus in case you're interested (also, in case you happen to be a talent scout):

"The Forest"

Prairie dogs running,
mice nibbling on the earth,
tall trees blocking sun.

"Sand"

Sand is wet sometimes,
it can be yellow or red.
sand is very soft.

- By Chloe

"I'm gonna have to plead the...what was it again?"

2009-01-09T23:13:00.000-05:00

I was asking Brent if he did...a certain thing. (Not THAT certain thing, folks. But it is questionable for sure...) Something that I shall not discuss on this blog because it is not appropriate for the younger readers I'm gonna assume that I have. And thus began this conversation:

Megan

did you?

11:09pmBrent

Either way you'll think I'm playing mind games with you

So I plead the Second

11:09pmMegan

the right to bear arms?

*runs*

11:10pmBrent

I know my amendments damn well

I plead the 21st as well

11:10pmMegan

so do i

you plead the repeal of prohibition?

11:11pmBrent

Damn straight

An american man's gotta have his 6 pack of beer with him at all times. *hic*