Long weekend!

I was getting all ready to come home for spring break and then my car, Georgia, and I got in a fight with a concrete pole while we were parking and I had to pay my insurance deductable so going anywhere is pretty much out. Um... so that sucks. I guess it's kind of ironic that people want to come to Miami for spring break, but all I want to do is leave.

So anyway, here is is, $1,400+ worth of damage.

That was last Saturday night and I just picked it up this morning. So at least Georgia is back in commission. Good thing, too, because I'm heading to Ft. Lauderdale tonight to watch the boys' basketball team from my school play the championship game. It's something to do, at least. A couple of my kids play on the team, so it'll be nice to see them and Tiffany's in Sarasota this weekend so it's something good to do.

Anyway, when I damaged my girl I was in a parking garage in CoCo Walk, heading to see Ali's brother's band play. He plays sax (tenor and soprano) in a band called Sol De Mato. They're actually really good--kind of a Dave Matthews Band meets Los Lonely Boys type thing. After the show, Ali, another girl from work, Jo, Jo's boyfriend Richy, Ali's room mate's girlfriend and I all went to this place called The Transit Lounge. It was a cool little dive, with live music and board games! We ended up playing Apples to Apples for, like, two hours or so and then heading home. It was really fun.

Sunday T and I tried to go to the Coconut Grove Arts Festival with Lancelot, but they wouldn't let him in (DUMB) so we took off after only a little bit. Turns out it was a good choice, because right after we got home it started pouring rain. That evening, I drove out to South Beach to visit Marta, Luis, and Abita as Luis' place. I spent the evening out there with them, we had some dinner, I graded some papers, good times were had by all.

Since it was a long weekend, I also had Monday and Tuesday off. Woot!! So Monday I went back to the Arts Festival and walked around a bit. I found a couple of artists from Michigan and talked to them for a bit, plus I saw some really amazing art. Jewelry that was more like sculpture, this guy who carved wooden moving toys, all kids of sculpture and art of all kinds. There was even a sculpture garden with moving animals made of metal. They were cool.

Feeling artsy, I took this shot. In my next life, I'm coming back as a photographer. A drumming photographer. Heck yeah.

Monday ended up being a really lovely day, despite grey skies in the morning, so I figured Tuesday would be nice too, even though it was "supposed" to rain all day. Of course, no such luck. I went to the doctor's in the morning, and then waited all day for the sun come out so I could go to the beach. But, of course, Mother Nature hates me and I stayed inside all day. BOOOO. It ended up being okay, though, because I had essays to grade and work to do.

The rest of this week has been okay--the kids are totally off the wall. It's almost like, if their schedule is disrupted in any way, they forget how to act at school. They're total nightmares, even more so than normal. Gag. One cool thing, though, is that Royal Idol auditions are this week (like a huge talent show for the school) so it's been neat to see the kids doing something they enjoy and are great at, like singing and acting. The auditions continue into next week, so I'm kind of looking forward to that.

Fredy and I are putting a little joke act together, so I'll be practicing that all next week too. I tel you, a teacher's job in never done.

No real plans for this weekend, other than the game tonight. I've got a bunch of work to do, of course, so I'll probably lay low and try to get that done.

Much love.

Sticks Covered in Glitter

Happy February everyone! This month, and in fact it might even be today, marks the one year anniversary of being back in the good ole U.S. of A. It's both impossible and extremely easy to belive. I still have days where I'm not adjusted to being back (all white people still look the same to me, familiar, if you will) but most days I'm very happy. While I do miss a great deal of people and things from Korea, I'm happy to have moved on.


Anyway... Winter Formal was Friday. I went because of Student Council. The kids said they've "had worse" and that the DJ "sucked" but I thought it was nice. The food was gross (especially the Lemon Pine Sol-flavored "cheese cake") but the place really looked beautiful. All the kids' manual labor payed off and the center pieces were great. Nothing says "winter" like some sticks covered in glitter!

There's nothing too important to report, really. I went with Fredy. Not many teachers were there (nightmare). The kids looked beautiful. We all moved on.

I have pics, of course.


Fredy was naughty, I guess. I also kind of love that you can't really see the sunburn I got the day before from standing outside all day babysitting instead of teaching. Hurray for Don Bosco Day. And by "hurray" I mean the opposite of "hurray."


This is a real one...

And just me... 'cause who needs boys?



My hair wins, mostly because I did it myself. Woot!


In other news, the Garcia clan will be down here in some capacity until the 22nd. So last night, after the crazy adventure of trying to find my place, Tio Ramon, Rosa, and Abita came to check out my place and have dinner. We ended up at Cheesecake Factory with this amazing corner table that was perfect because Abita's wheelchair fit right under the table and we could all sit in the booth. T came too. I had fish and chips; the fish was perfect but the chips not so much. The fries were kind of stale or old or something, but I got over it because the fish was so good.

Today at school I almost went ballistic on a kid because a) he flipped me off earlier in the class, 2) he NEVER does ANYTHING for my class but spends an entire day stringing plastic Mardi Gras necklaces together into one giant necklace and d) he represents everything I hate in life. He's the type of person who will succeed in life solely because of his good looks and wealth and not because he's an acutal worthwhile human being, which he's not. He thinks he's hilarious and he's not. He thinks he's the bee's knees and he's not. I can't really deal with him any more, especially since I caught him cheating yesterday. It's now my goal to get him kicked out of school, or at least suspended for long enough for me to gain my sanity back.


Speaking of kids getting kicked out, I lost one of my Juniors this week. Some stuff went down on a class trip and she was asked to leave LaSalle. On the down side, I really liked her and she's totally screwed up her life, but on the upside, she was a horrible writer and I won't have to read any more of her papers! I wish her all the best, though. She's a good kid, mostly.


I've lost four kids since we came back from break, and another is leaving at the end of this month. If I can get my waste of space kicked out, I'll be on a roll and hopefully, by the end of the year, I'll have no students!


It's a nice dream...


Much love.