tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153Sun, 29 Sep 2024 03:55:16 +0000politicslifeeducationworksportsparentingteenagersnewsIowaMissouristuff that makes me happyslightly self-indulgent navel grazingNFLtelevisionbaseballstuff that makes my head explodemediarandom thoughtsmusicstuff that makes me laughPackersWisconsinshit that pisses me offstupid peopleObamaimmigrationfootballweatherchildhoodIllinoishealthfamily weirdnessstuff that makes me cryMoviestechnologystuff that makes me say damn straightProgressive Patriots for PeaceSt. LouisChristmashistorycut and pasteSpringsteenfoodliarsfriendshipmoneystuff that makes my heart hurtvacationNew YorkTexasfunhermaphroditeprofanityLeonard Pittslucky bastardsI can't believe we have no Favre tagTeam in TrainingdeerfloodHalloweencampingColoradoEARTHQUAKEcancersummerApril FoolsAriannaBillsBuffaloCaliforniaDowdFred JacksonThanksgivinga long overdue Keith Olbermann taghigh schoolno biking tag?schoolwowAmazing RaceBiggest LoserChicagoDavid LettermanI exceeded the label limit so forget itKrugmanPettySurvivorcop showshopemarathonmetapet goatradiorunningrandom thoughts from middle America since Nov. 8, 2006http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.com (Lonnie)Blogger1058125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-4253194513938686258Tue, 28 Jun 2011 15:35:00 +00002011-06-28T10:35:18.048-05:00http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2011/06/open-thread-word-cloud.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Lonnie)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-2956853479202188501Wed, 25 May 2011 13:49:00 +00002011-05-25T08:49:05.813-05:00Or it might rain, cancelling games, disrupting schedules and making most of yesterday's post moot. I'll always have "Field of Dreams" though.http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2011/05/or.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Lonnie)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-4700250740074224502Tue, 24 May 2011 21:06:00 +00002011-05-24T16:29:36.272-05:00baseballhigh schoolMoviesparentingteenagersA year to the day since the last post, I come here with the need for expression. Maybe no one will ever see these words, and I don't really care. That's not my motivation. It's baseball season, and that has me feeling nostalgic. My soon-to-be-old-enough-to-vote-and-die-but-not-drink-high-school-graduate-by-the-hair-on-his-unshaven-chin son was quoted in the local paper after leading his team to http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2011/05/baseball-bloodlines.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Lonnie)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-1828373556490121373Tue, 25 May 2010 02:47:00 +00002010-05-24T21:47:01.583-05:00Whatever this space is to anyone else, it's a treasure trove to me. I return now and then either to discover or remember; in that sense, I'll never move on. I am writing elsewhere now though, as the change of scenery did me good. For various reasons I'm not making the connection from here to there public, but if you'd like the link, let me know.http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/05/whatever-this-space-is-to-anyone-else.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-3117562110379379517Mon, 12 Apr 2010 01:01:00 +00002010-04-11T20:01:50.337-05:00Random thoughts from the Go! St. Louis Half Marathon, a race I registered for months ago in the  Nike Women's afterglow and then, for reasons mostly medical and partly lackadaisical, didn't train for.  1. What goes up must come down is not topographically true. Nothing like a foot race for realizing the streets I've been driving for 25 years are not even remotely flat: they're all http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/04/race-day-commentary.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-5744243558547827147Fri, 09 Apr 2010 05:20:00 +00002010-04-09T00:20:03.143-05:00"I was going to come up to school and invite u," she texts, and it might even be true.  I know I'd be welcome, even if it turns out I'm inviting myself: we go way back, this girl and I, and though the ties have loosened in the absence of day after school day, we are still connected across place and space and time.  She doesn't blink, I can tell, when my, "This is Ms. P" message barges http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/04/invitation.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-10225409862542041Sun, 04 Apr 2010 02:20:00 +00002010-04-03T21:20:33.387-05:00In my mind's eye, I see his van in the driveway- is it silver or black or faded maroon?- and the question on her face as she pulls up to the house that I likely will never visit and would need a map to find.  I see her walking up steps that may or may not exist to the bedroom where he is but should not be.  I think of 911 and paramedics, rising panic and spreading alarm.  I see http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/04/loss.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-6950842698847793728Sat, 03 Apr 2010 01:45:00 +00002010-04-02T20:45:22.302-05:00educationstuff that makes me happy We're three lines in to the conversation when I realize what she's saying. This is not, as it happens, a rarity, and not only because I'm slow on the uptake: spend enough time talking to the not-quite-proficient and you, too, will someday find yourself two nods and an "uh huh" in before it becomes clear that the Target bag stashed on top of the back book shelf is not full of supplies for her http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/04/blossom.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-7221761413746276371Tue, 30 Mar 2010 04:51:00 +00002010-03-29T23:51:37.340-05:00"It's just the Half," I tell myself, alternately, after, "I'll just pick up my shirt," and, "It couldn't hurt to walk."  Months upon a time ago, I registered for the Go! St. Louis race (exclamation in the trademark) almost as an afterthought. Cincinnati's Flying Pig was the goal, and maybe it still kind of could be, but friends who had been motivated by if-Allison-can-surely-I signed up to http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/03/half.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-976523215484259365Wed, 24 Mar 2010 18:43:00 +00002010-03-24T13:43:41.765-05:00"You can't see me," I am occasionally tempted to remind, "but I can hear you."  The seat backs are tall and the rows aren't crowded and we're all Americans practiced in the art of creating space where there's not much: don't see me and I won't see you, we generally pretend.  But I'm nosy, frankly, and with five hours to kill, if your conversation bleeds through the gaps between my seathttp://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/03/scholarship.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-3922214858110756830Thu, 18 Mar 2010 03:50:00 +00002010-03-17T22:52:21.663-05:00They're working on homework: it's algebra (always algebra) and bio and geo and chem; histories of conquistadors and doughboys running concurrent and intersecting, as so appropriate, with graphic reports on STDs.   It is, on a good day, a "How do I?" from one corner, "I don't get it," from the other and idle blank looks spotted from across the room.  It is http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/03/oprah.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-1239499660869887085Thu, 11 Mar 2010 01:23:00 +00002010-03-10T19:23:01.715-06:00stuff that makes me laughhttp://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/03/excellent.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-4515953757390114409Wed, 10 Mar 2010 03:13:00 +00002010-03-09T21:45:00.888-06:00ObamapoliticsschoolteenagersIt's a stage-managed set-up, choreographed down to the hand-selected crowd of diverse-as-we-can-manage teenagers told to wear church clothes-- whatever that means-- to an assembly in an unnaturally empty high school they don't attend. I don't care. Because despite photo op, despite fund raiser (the true trip agenda), despite political push that just needs a live audience, the fact remains that http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/03/politics.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-78483309849582036Sun, 28 Feb 2010 00:53:00 +00002010-02-27T18:53:02.753-06:00education"You mean people make computer viruses?" he asks, his open expression unmistakably sincere.  He's been listening to some conversation about the perils of Limewire, and once again I'm reminded that common knowledge isn't always. A boy seemingly tech savvy somehow believes that a plague of the internet is generated by nature: it's a virus, after all. It's one part language learner, I think, http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/02/curriculum.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-2180889116876372100Fri, 26 Feb 2010 05:54:00 +00002010-02-25T23:54:13.938-06:00educationfamily weirdnessstuff that makes my heart hurtworkIt's just some Thursday in the dregs of February. A day after day after day.  But then she sits down and asks to talk, and it becomes something else.  She starts in the middle of the discussion, right where we left off last time we plotted her strategy. She is inclined to believe that she is destined for a lifetime of taking orders for sweet and sour chicken, and she does have reason http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/02/senior.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-6270584400349531987Wed, 17 Feb 2010 05:06:00 +00002010-02-16T23:08:44.473-06:00"I'll try to be a good father," he writes, slipped in to the end of an unrelated message. Facebook may be killing my blog, but at least it does keep me in touch. I reply immediately, cautiously  are-you-telling-me-what-I-think-you're-telling-me excitement soon replaced by pleased, nearly aunt-like surprise and for a little while I reflect on this new milestone, this first of the next http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/02/news-despite-supposed-hiatus.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-7599792976527357295Mon, 15 Feb 2010 06:31:00 +00002010-02-15T00:33:08.071-06:00I'm just putting a label on what's already obvious: I'm not writing much right now, and I haven't been for a while. I try, now and then: the drafts folder is full of not-quite-what-I-intended. I'll be back when I figure out how.http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/02/hiatus.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-7766670308239964707Sun, 31 Jan 2010 22:13:00 +00002010-01-31T16:13:39.777-06:00In my heart of hearts, I am generally content with the work-related choices I've made. I chose my degrees based on interest and such-as-it-is aptitude without really any consideration for money or perhaps even job security. I have done what I wanted to do. And I do believe that in our current system teachers are partly compensated in time: I work thirty-six weeks of the year, officially, and I http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/01/tax-time.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-4237657681772084127Wed, 27 Jan 2010 01:33:00 +00002010-01-26T19:37:03.097-06:00parentingstuff that makes me happy"I've only got a minute," says my retired father from the cellphone he uses so rarely I don't recognize the number. I wonder, briefly and in passing, what's wrong: it's nearly the reaction inspired by a phone that rings too early or too late: "Who's in the hospital?" or, "Who died?" In a moment I am stepping into my shoes and pulling my coat, but only to meet him, as instructed, in the drivewayhttp://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/01/father-daughter.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-3694860910202019619Fri, 22 Jan 2010 02:40:00 +00002010-01-21T20:40:13.496-06:00And thus the four became three, before we even met. Standing at a conference room table, the secretary and I sort out a pile of Mexican papers that represent a new family of students. "This is what we'd call the last name," I point out, differentiating family name from the appended mother's maiden, explaining the tradition. We agree that we like the way their culture preserves both names for http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/01/yesterday.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-3156861376908279700Sun, 17 Jan 2010 23:46:00 +00002010-01-17T17:48:56.726-06:00educationwork"Is that a lot of work for you?" Is my pause perceptible?  It's not as if everything I have to do and juggle and reconfigure to fit four new students into into my more-or-less program flashed before my eyes. Instead I'm stuck mid-cringe, wedged between, "You have no idea what I do," and, "I have no idea how I'm going to do it."  It is typical to have a new kid or two in January, at http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/01/four.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-1204154358122450168Wed, 13 Jan 2010 01:47:00 +00002010-01-12T19:53:59.187-06:00stuff that makes my heart hurt He is my object lesson, my there by the grace of God goes he.  Up until a month ago, not even a blink ago in geologic time, his home was an orphanage atop a fault line. But then the paperwork finally emerged from the byzantine Haitian bureacracy and his world shifted on a scale not measured by Richter. He was there, and now he is here-- except, of course, for part of his heart.  Thishttp://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/01/home.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-765392622644113044Mon, 11 Jan 2010 05:28:00 +00002010-01-10T23:29:47.495-06:00footballPackersstuff that makes me cryhttp://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/01/green-bay-45-arizona-51-ot.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-5843195738261825288Tue, 05 Jan 2010 19:27:00 +00002010-01-05T13:43:39.585-06:00baseballstuff that makes me laughIf the embedded video isn't working, click here.I am deeply in football mode now (Go Pack Go!) and my only reaction to the winter free agent ridiculousness that is at the corrupted heart of baseball is a dismissive shrug of my shoulders. But this? This speaks to the Cardinal fan that will always be a part of me. And, it's funny as hell.http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2010/01/hot-stove.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37334153.post-2417802978678808337Thu, 31 Dec 2009 17:41:00 +00002009-12-31T12:08:36.893-06:00stuff that makes me happyTwelve hours from clean slate, from resolution, from here we go again. I'm feeling optimistically curious-- curiously optimstic? perhaps-- for what comes next: eager, rather than hopeful. Because if my 2009 demonstrated anything, it was the power of just doing. A year ago, I had no idea, no intention. But at some point I realized never had doesn't mean can't, so I did and now I do. I don't http://ouropenthread.blogspot.com/2009/12/back-at-start.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Allison)0