I was just checking out the gym schedule. I have today off and I have to get to the gym. I went to a really early spinning class yesterday and the proceeded to sit around on my sofa the entire day. (That's not entirely true. For a couple of hours I was lying on my sofa, not sitting.)

As a result of this inactivity, my back is killing me. Maybe it sounds strange, but my back hurts more when I am totally sedentary than it does when I'm up and moving around.

So, normally I go to the gym at 5:30 on Monday nights, but if I have the day off (as is the case today) I try to get my workout in earlier. I checked the schedule at all three gyms, and the one that looks most promising is the "Forza" class in Back Bay. Forza is apparently some kind of Japanese samaurai (spelling?) sword workout. I have seen the baskets of wooden sword thingees sitting there a million times and never quite knew what they were for. Well..I guess I'm about to find out.

If I can still move after the class (because I think it might be pretty freakin' hard), I'll let you know how things worked out.

In other news, I am SICK AS HELL OF SNOW. It has been falling non stop in Boston for the entire month of January. Actually, it started back in September. There have been a couple of mild days where the snow on the ground would finally melt away. This would occur, of course, just in time for the next deep freeze and snow storm to move in and take up long term residence. There is snow on the ground that I'm convinced is going to stay there until April. Actually, since April has turned to full-on winter here in New England, it might just sit there until May.

What the hell?

It is really hard to sit here in this arctic freeze and contemplate the concept of global warming. I'm not a denier at all. I'm just saying that it's hard to sit here watching Noah Wylie cry about the polar bears losing their natural habitat in the north pole. Hell....just send 'em down to Boston. They'll be fine.

Guilty as Charged

I got a jury duty summons yesterday. My service date is April 2nd. The last time I was called to serve on a Jury was a few years ago. My service date was set for August. I requested a postponement because I figured it would be better to take the day off of school rather than serve on my own time in the summer. LOL. The funny thing was that instead of getting a new date, I got a letter basically telling me that they would not need me after all.

The last time I went to jury duty, I sat on a trial for almost two weeks. My courtroom was directly one floor above the Louise Woodward trial. The media frenzy was fun and kind of exciting. (Remember Louise...the British Nanny who killed the baby in her care?)

This time I'll be serving in Boston. Last time I was in Cambridge. Hopefully I won't get seated and I'll be dismissed early enough to enjoy a lovely day of shopping at nearby Faneuil Hall.

Can you believe that I was able to confirm my juror service online? Man...what can't we do online these days?

In other news, I went to my thyroid doctor today. He said I look much better than the last time I saw him, when, to use his own words, I was "an absolute mess." He asked if people have told me I look better. Ah...not so much.

It turns out I might actually now be hypothyroid (the original problem was hyperthyroidism). Sometimes the medication can overtreat the hyperthyroidism. The doctor explained that the thyroid is a pretty temperamental gland that is difficult to property regulate. The dosage of medication has to be tweaked a bunch before things calm down. The telltale signs of the hyperthyroidism were apparently my warm hands, bulging eyes, shaky hands, and edginess. This time the doctor remarked that my extremities seem colder, that the shakes are gone, and that my heart rate was really slow. This, he asserts, could be the result of my regular exercise, so he's not sure. But I'm kinda hoping it is hypo because I have packed on a little bit of weight on this stupid medication. Oh well..it is what it is. I'll find out Monday.

Hmm..what else. Nothing I guess.

Stephen is playing some inane war video game on his new laptop. All these guns are firing and people are calling out in shock and pain. Yeah, he's 41.

Latest Musings

I don't blog enough, that's for sure. When I think about blogging, I get all overwhelmed because I always let so much time elapse between posts. Then I wonder if I have to go back and update all of you on everything that's transpired in my life. Because that's such a daunting thought, I opt out of blogging.

But just today a couple of thoughts have occurred to me.

1. Not that much actually happens in my life, so I'm hardly buried under interesting stories that must be conveyed in painstaking detail.

2. Even if I were drowning in wondrous stories of misadventure and mayhem, it would be awfully presumptuous of me to feel as if you were all out there awaiting my detailed retelling of every last detail. To believe that would be to labor (falsely, of course) under the delusion that all of you are in such dire need of a life as to necessitate your holding your collective breath waiting for my next missive. How arrogant of me.

3. It is completely OK for me to check in periodically and just rant on about whatever happens to be on my mind at any particular time. So what if I don't talk about everything that's transpired in my life since my last entry. Because...after all, as I've concluded in thought number 2, you guys probably don't give a crap anyway!

How liberating. So, I'll blog when I can. No more guilt about letting too much time elapse. No more cowering under the girth of all that has been left unreported on or unsaid. Just pure, unadulterated joy of self-expression when the mood hits.

Ahhh.....

(That was a sigh of relief.)

Anyway, I got myself a new phone. Very cute. It is the LG En V. I was thinking about going on the iPhone, but I decided to stick with Verizon Wireless. I know a lot of people have reported having horrendous service, but I have always had stellar, exemplary service from Verizon, so I'm going to stick there. Also, the phone was cheaper than the iPhone, which made me happy.



This thing is cute, cute, cute. It is blood red, which makes me feel fun, yet more grown up than my pink Motorolla RazR. (I grew pretty tired of that thing). The thing I like best about my phone is that it goes online! Yippie. I can bypass the firewalls at school and play around on Facebook on my prep periods! LOL. Now I can keep up to speed with all the silly online antics of my friends and family members throughout the day. No need to wait until I go home. I can engage in that silly, intellectually empty activity on the clock. I LOVE it! I also like that the plan I'm on is relatively reasonably priced (around 65 dollars a month, I think) for unlimited texting to any network, unlimited data usage, and all kinds of other little bells and whistles! I'm very happy with my new little gadget. I'm not much of a gadget freak, and this phone is hardly cutting edge to any hardcore electronic freak, but it does the trick for me. Case in point, during our mindless, pointless, boring, and idiotic staff meeting today at work, I was all over the web. It was great. Money well spent!

Switching topics...

In my ongoing addiction to TV shows I had never seen before getting our cable package expanded beyond our previous ghetto package, I've started watching House.



It's an interesting show. I love House's acerbic wit. He's great. Cheeky, obnoxious, self-centered, dark, and brooding. He's my type of guy. And he's just a little bit gorgeous, isn't he? Must be the blue eyes. OK...enough about that. The show has other merits. I encourage you to watch it to discover them on your own.

I've also become quite the addict of "No Reservations with Anthony Bourdain."



Maybe I have a thing for snarky older guys. Or maybe it's just that I like entertaining TV shows. Who can say for sure?

OK...I think I'm done. I'm hungry and I'm off to make some dinner.

I have tomorrow off. I called in sick so that I can go see my thyroid doctor. I think I need a medication dosage adjustment. Christ...what an annoyance.

Oh..and one last thing. Today the city for which I work had an "Employee Perks Fair" at city hall. The problem is the we teachers are required to stay in school until 2:45. Today we had meetings at other schools at 2:45 until 4:14. The employee perk fair went from 11-4. So, when were we supposed to get there?

You tell me.

Stupid.

It takes a village...

I have a few things to talk about this evening. And yeah, it's Saturday night at 7:44 and I'm sitting in my living room watching bad TV (Stylista on VH1) with no intention of going out. What of it? We can't all be my hip, fashionable, cool, socially sought-after, young-sprite-of-a-thing, painfully cool cousin Bobby, who has been to some happening Christmas party every night since the beginning of December. Some of us are elderly losers who look forward to solitary Saturday nights at home in front of bad shows.

LOL.

Anyway, Lauren, my mother, and I went to Foxwoods casino this weekend. I'm a VERY unseasoned gambler. This was only my second time in a casino.

I got down to Foxwoods and quite honestly didn't know what to do when I got to the casino. Actually, I hit the hotel gym when we first arrived, and Lauren and my mother went down to the Casino. I had to have my mother meet me at the entrance to the casino and walk me through all the money exchanging processes and give me a brief (OK...extensive) tutorial as to how to play the machines. I was totally clueless.

My first series of games resulted in my losing twenty dollars in as many seconds. Honestly. I found out that I had been playing "dollar slots." Every game cost me a dollar. I guess I should have just stripped out of my shirt and handed it to the door attendant at the casino. It would have been easier. Then again, NOBODY needs to see that shit, so forget it. I'll keep it all buttoned up.

Not long after entering into the casino, I found a "Village People" slot machine! Nice.

I won some cash on the thing. It was red hot for a while. Nobody could touch me. I was getting ready to singlehandedly take down the entire casino. I was winning around 200 dollars. I don't think Foxwoods has ever seen anybody on a red hot roll like that. They'll be talking about it for years. And I'm sure they were sweating the loss.

I cashed out and took my winnings to the Hard Rock cafe, where we proceeded to call Reesie. Sorry, Reese...we were about fifteen cheap ass free drinks into the evening by the time we got you on the blower.

Anyway, I found an Irish themed machine and played that with some success for a while. Mind you, when you're playing nickel slot machines, "some success" means that I was winning .25 a game.

I found some machine called "Stinking Rich" with skunks and shit all over it. I played three or four games with a ten dollar voucher. The worst thing is that I keep pressing the button without any idea what's really going on. I just have absolutely no idea what the rules, objectives, or winning criteria are. I just push the button and sit there and gape stupidly while the screen moves to the sounds of inane casino music. Within a few minutes, I was up to around 80 dollars on that machine. Then, just as quickly, they were telling me I no longer had any money to play it.

Huh?

That was the end of my gambling for the evening.

I retired to this bar area. I figured I would have a decent glass of wine, even if I had to pay for it, and then retire to the room.

I was shocked to find that the wine would either cost me 9 dollars if I chose not to play the casino machine located right on the surface of the bar in front of me, of be complimentary if I chose to place the minimum bet (5 dollars) in the machine. I asked to make sure I was understanding correctly. I could pay 9 dollars with no possibility of winning anything, or 5 dollars with the possibility of winning millions.

Yep. That was the case. I chose to play, of course. Naturally I won nothing. But still...I figured I was ahead of the game on the wine at least. I was clearly no longer playing when the guy came and offered me another glass of wine. I reminded him that I was no longer playing, and had in fact only bet five bucks. He didn't think this was a problem, and was prepared to keep pouring just on the basis of my having placed a five dollar bet a half hour earlier. I turned down the wine and retired to the room.

This morning, the three of us had a disappointing breakfast at Panera (Lauren was surprised that I had stated my dislike of Panera, but I have yet to have a really pleasant meal there), and then retired to the casinos for a little more play. We are all painfully early risers in the morning, even on days off. The three of us had showered, packed our bags, and eaten breakfast by 7:00 AM. I decided to try to go back and earn my millions on my previously red hot Village People machine. It was stone cold. I wasted perhaps another twenty dollars on the thing before throwing in the towel.

I returned to the room at 8:00 or so. We had given each other a 10:30 meeting time, so I was able to get in some quality reading, and watched a really horrifyingly bad, but somewhat funny nonetheless movie starring Bernie Mac. That bastard was funny, god rest his acerbic soul.

In the end, I returned to Boston with the exact same sum of cash in my wallet as when I went down there. I guess the experts call this "breaking even" and they consider it to be a small victory on behalf of the player. So I'm pleased enough about that. But even for me, a self-proclaimed non-gambler, the lure was somewhat strong. I had to will myself away from the Village People machine. It was crappy this morning, and I knew it. But I kept telling myself that if I stuck another twenty into it, it might heat up again. Luckily I didn't yield to the temptation, but it was a challenge for me to walk away.

Maybe I need professional help.



Onto this next topic. You should all read this great book! Freakin' hilarious. My favorite part of the whole book is when the author tells of her friend, a middle school teacher for behaviorally disturbed boys, who gets her class in control by threatening to show her wedding video. She did it once before, much to the horror and chagrin of her boys. They started towing a very straight line in order to avoid this nightmare again. Now, all this woman has to do when her kids are acting like jackasses is gesture toward the drawer containing the video, and they immediately start profusely apologizing for the behavior.

Shit...why didn't we hire a videographer for our wedding? What were we thinking? I know we had said it was too expensive at the time, but when I think of the hours of horror I could have inflicted on poorly behaved middle schoolers, I regret my peny pinching ways.

Oh well, there's always the dreadfully boring three-hour film "The Trial of Standing Bear" that can be pulled out, dusted off, and shown for jackasses to watch if their behavior merits the torture.

I think that might be all I had to say.

Well...I'm sure I had more, but I'm hungry and my dinner is ready.

Just a Couple of My Favorite Dudes

This has been one long ass week. And it ain't over yet. I had class Tuesday night, professional development until 5 on Wednesday, and tonight (Thursday) I was at school for parent conferences until 8:00. Jesus....I still have to get my arse through tomorrow.

Tomorrow I have a meeting with my "Girls' Group." I look forward to this group. The kids are talkative, open, warm, funny, charming, and just plain enjoyable. It is a highlight of my week. I'm glad I do it twice a week. It ensures pleasant starts to at least two mornings a week.

Anyway, today at dismissal, one of the GREAT girls in my homeroom, C, dropped the contents of her folder all over the floor. We were all helping her gather her things. I came across pictures of an adorable young man, and she confirmed that it was her much-talked-about boyfriend.

The girls were talking about bringing pictures of cute boys to school for me to see. I then declared tomorrow's girls' group "Bring A Picture of a Cute Boy to Girls' Group" day. The kids are all excited. They all asked me if I was going to bring a picture of my husband. Ha! I guaranteed them they'll be treated to a picture of my "other husband" Jon Bon Jovi. They squealed with delight, so of course I'll have to bring a picture of JBJ to the group. I will skip the picture of Bill Clinton because although I love the bastard, I don't think he's cute. I just stumbled across this photo while I was looking for the perfect JBJ photo and thought it was kind of fun. So here it is.

I am prepping to see a bunch of photos of rappers and hip hop singers that I've never heard of tomorrow. But it will be fun.

The cutest thing is that tonight, one of my favorite parents, a single dad of an awesome daughter, K, came to see me. He comes to every open house, school event, and PTA. We talked about his delightful, peppy, spunky daughter. He was preparing to leave and then his daughter turned and said, "Oh, Ms. B., C is worried that she can't print a picture for tomorrow. Her printer is broken!" I jokingly told her that C could not come to group. She caught the joke and said she'd text her friend back and tell her it wasn't a problem. Dad, who hadn't said anything about this conversation finally chimed in with, "K, you can just print a picture for her tonight at home. What's the problem?" I laughed and asked Dad, "Do you know what this picture is for? It's not for a school project." He kind of sighed and said, "I know. I know all about it. It's 'bring-a-picture-of-a-cute-boy-to-girls'-group day.'" I told him not to feel compelled to allow his daughter to deplete his precious and expensive computer ink supply for this frivolity. He shrugged his shoulders and said, "I can either know that my daughter is printing pictures of Chris Brown from the centrally located printer in the living room, texting her friends and giggling about the fact that her teacher is letting them bring them to the group, or I could say no and she'd sneak off and do it somewhere else where she could get into god-knows-what trouble. The printer ink is a small price to pay for knowing my daughter is up to silly, goofy, 14 year-old antics right under my nose."

I guess he had a point, but what a cool ass dad.

Full Moon?

I'm not really one to follow the lunar cycle, but maybe I should. I can't even see the moon from where I'm sitting and I don't have the energy to move the three fee that it would require me to see it. All I'm saying is that it must be a full freakin' moon. If it isn't, I'm going to find out when the full moon is going to fall and make sure I take a personal day. I want to be as far away from school as possible on any day that they might be crazier than they were today.

I'm beat. No, I'm not just beat. I'm beat down.

The kids have been ridiculous lately. The behavior today was out of control. It has honestly been astounding. I NEVER send kids to the office for discipline. Well...maybe NEVER is too broad a term. I would say that RARELY is an apt descriptor of how often I send kids to the office for discipline. Between F (whose story I recounted on yesterday's post) and the three that I sent to the office today, I've reached a total of 4 kids to the office in two days.

It's not even worth recounting the things that they did to warrant the trips to the principal. If I started getting into the details here, I'd probably undo the benefits of the hot needle acupuncture I had this afternoon. Suffice it to say that the behavior has been BAD. It's not just silly ass kid stuff either. It's really BAD. I'll leave it at that.

I felt really bad, though, because at the end of the day, two lovely girls, D and K, came by to chat. They proceeded to tell me that they've had enough of being clumped together in groups with kids who purposely do stupid and hurtful things to other people. They're tired of being included in collective punishments. (The VP kept the entire 8th grade on a group detention yesterday after school....I do try to avoid these types of unfair group punishments, but sometimes they are effective. The worst part is that the threat of a group punishment is often lorded over a mass of kids in the hopes that the jerk/s who perpetrated whatever offense might feel guilty about seeing their classmates needlessly and unjustly punished and step forward to claim responsibility for their actions. Usually, though, if the kid was jerky enough to commit the original crime, he has no guilt about watching his classmates sink unfairly. That's the cruel irony of the entire thing). They are tired of having their things stolen and tampered with. They are tired of having spit balls hurled at their lunch trays by jackasses in their 8th grade class. They are upset about the fact that I have to lock the door when the class is out of the room, thus necessitating a situation where the entire group has to go to lockers, even if they don't need to get anything from their lockers. But they are fully understanding of the fact that I've been left with no choice, and they said they would do the same in my shoes. They are tired of losing class time for the overabundance of discipline issues that crop up on a daily basis. They're tired of being bullied and then called snitches if they try to stick up for themselves. They're tired of being walked all over by jerks.

When they were going through this catharsis, I felt really badly for them. It is easy for me to identify how the shit behavior inconveniences me, but I rarely stop to think about how it drives the other kids, the nice kids, crazy, too.

Here were these kids asking if I could implement the "100 points discipline chart" (never mind the details, just know that it is extremely restrictive and punitive) because they think it might shape things up.

When I told the kids that I was surprised, because the behavior has only seemed terrible in the past few days, they could barely contain their ironic laughter. They said that the minute the teachers are out of the picture, the bullies are at it in full force. They further confided that my 8th grade teaching colleague has little control over the kids and that things in his room are grim now and only getting worse. I guess that, as his mentor, I will have to find a way to gingerly address this issue.

And let me just say that when the conversation veered in the direction of kids talking about my colleague, I steered it immediately onto more neutral territory. I think it is totally uncool for one teacher to malign or otherwise talk unflatteringly about a colleague in front of kids. Big no no there.

But man....I am in desperate need of a day off. Something. I haven't felt this harried in teaching for quite some time now. It just seems that every little thing is blowing up and coming to a head at the same time. I'm used to putting out a few little fires and one big fire on a daily basis. That's my job. But there are no little fires here. Everything is volcanic proportion and I'm fighting just to keep up with things. Getting ahead isn't even in the question.

Man......

Calgon take me away.

It Goes Beyond the Pop Tart

It was a tough day at school today. My kids seem to be in a behavioral slump. I can't explain why, but they are.

Today we had "bus safety day." A bus company sent over a representative who was charged with the responsibility of meeting with students of each grade level, having them board the bus, and then discussing the basics of bus safety with them. The man who came to do the presentation loaded my 8th graders onto the bus, and then proceeded to read, in a barely audible voice, with the thickest accent I've ever heard, a series of rules. He had absolutely no voice inflection, and the poor guy butchered every single word he spoke. I was surprised and disappointed that my students, so many of whom have themselves struggled with English, were vicious in their reactions to this man. They laughed snorting, vicious, throaty laughs. It was terrible. The principal was sitting right there throughout the duration of the presentation. One student, F, was particularly obnoxious. The other teachers all have a history of having deep-seated conflict with F. But for some reason, I have been saved from having to deal with this behavior. Why? Because, according to F himself, he likes me. Simple as that. I have never been forced to deal with his infamous bad behavior. We have an understanding. And I like it that way.

The principal witnessed his atrocious behavior and pulled him aside to speak to him immediately following the presentation. She must not have lambasted him too firmly because he was back on our hallway within moments. But he was fuming. When I pulled him aside to calm him (which I usually am very successful at doing), he only grew more agitated. He accused me of having "snitched" on him to the principal. I may like to foster close relationships with the kids, but I have to draw a line when they become a little too familiar. I assured him that the principal needed zero help from me in noticing his outrageous behavior, and that I didn't appreciate the tone he had taken with me. With that, he blurted, "What the fuck do you want, Ms. B?"

The movement in the hallway (it was crazy locker time) froze as every student awaited my response. As cool as a cucumber, I answered, "I want for you to follow me right to the office. I don't need to listen to this, and you have no place in 8th grade today."

I then ushered this kid down to the principal.

Look...I get the whole hormone thing. I get that kids at this age are likely to be volatile, but I don't have to put up with being sworn at and to. The kids are always swearing at each other, or about something in general that has pissed them off. When that happens, I remind them that we're in school and we move on. But this kid swore AT me, which was absolutely not going to go down well.

Later, some kids in my homeroom noticed that there were a few packages of Pop Tarts that had been left over from a girls group that I run in the mornings. They were swarming around them, and I shooed them away. Before leaving for lunch, I noticed three wrapped packages of the things. When we returned from lunch, I was on locker duty for a moment while the kids trickled in and out of the room, back and forth between class and lockers. When I came back to the room, the kids were all acting strange. I immediately went to the freakin' pop tart bowl.

Empty.

I was pissed. I made every kid leave their backpack on the floor in my room, taking only what they needed for science class out of the room with them. It was my full intention to conduct a full backpack search following the upcoming class period, when my homeroom returned.

But fuck it.

When they returned, I mused aloud, "I didn't earn degrees at two of the country's finest and most prestigious educational institutions to have my career culminate in shaking down a bunch of backpacks for a miserably, lowly Pop Tart. If you stole it, you need it more than I do. But keep in mind that I'm not mad about a Pop Tart. I'm mad about being a theft victim. But you go ahead. You take that Pop Tart and eat it. When you're tucking into your sugary frosted sweet later today, just know that you're a lowlife and a thief."

Harsh? Probably? But fuck that. I explained that we were beyond the Pop Tart itself and that we were talking about simple, petty theft.

Damn....Christmas Vacation, are you here yet?