Today was an atypical August day, beating the record rainfall amounts by triple and with temperatures staying in the upper 60s. It feels like fall, not just because of that, but because I feel like I’m already back at work. Justin and I have been getting up to go to work together for the last two weeks, which is a good routine to be in. I put in 8 hours today and that was just getting packets together for staff who are doing home visits for freshmen. Strangely, I like this routine. I actually feel good about starting this school year, and I’m ready for it. I would much rather stay occupied with constructive activities during the summer (yet still have some flexible time) than sit around the house feeling like there’s nothing for me to do (even though I know better). I like a little bit of purpose to my day, and when I face a stretch of 2-3 days without some sort of plan, I get overwhelmed at the options and face anxiety. I think having 3 big trips this summer has helped me feel travel-fulfilled, and having Justin going to work every morning gets me up and going, too, even when I don’t have a workshop to attend at a set time.

At any rate, I can’t blog long, as there is a bowling match going on tonight that I MUST be part of. Lesley, Dawn, and I are going to face off tonight at the Imperial Lanes. Wish me luck!

I officially checked out of my room, turned in my grades, and completed district-directed professional development yesterday at 4 p.m. To celebrate, I went to Starbucks on that lovely, sunny, warm afternoon and then got my nails done. This time, I even got a design on my big toes just for the heck of it. Afterward, Justin and I went to Jalisco, a Mexican restaurant we like close to the theater. We ordered fajitas and enchiladas, but they charged us for two fajitas and one enchilada plate. After notifying them of the mistake, they just charged us for one entree! We walked several blocks to Intiman and went to Namaste Man, a monologue by a man who grew up in Nepal and a variety of other locations when growing up. He artfully and hilariously describes his experiences in international school and of his lack of belonging in Nepali culture and American culture.

Today is a room-temperature, yet cloudy, Saturday. We slept in (and I’ve been getting plenty of sleep lately!!) after leaving the bedroom windows open all night. I made raisin toast, eggs, and bacon for breakfast while we listened to This American Life. I worked in my garden; Justin went to Lowe’s. Today is laundry, de-clutter, vacuum, dishes, and all-around chores day. Tonight: a bridal shower (read: Mexican food and Wii games). Tomorrow, I anticipate reading and going to Ohana Project. Perhaps I shall even watch a movie (I’d love to go to Get Smart with Justin!). No grading or lesson planning awaits.

Monday (and for two weeks thereafter) I shall be attending a “Summer Institute for Biology Teaching” from 8:30-3:30 at the UW. I expect I will enjoy it, although I will be missing the home visit training and the AP Bio institute.

Well–it’s time to de-clutter. Hopefully I will blog again before two more months pass!

It’s almost 8, but I’m not ready for that yet. I have been working on the same thing all day–a lesson for AP biology–with lots of little distractions (an hour nap, working out, making lunch and breakfast, laundry). Our day started REALLY late (12:30, but really 11:30 to our bodies…). I always get in a bit of a funk on Sundays in anticipation of the next week, and it gets worse when I don’t leave the house all weekend or when I sleep in late (and nap). I feel like I am wasting time or wasting opportunities that the weekend somehow offers. I don’t feel great, so that is making all of this worse.

At least yesterday was productive and the house is (somewhat) clean. Just don’t look in the office. Heh.

Yesterday I started eggplant, mint, basil, tomato, and peppers in those little soil pods. I also turned my compost bin for the first time. I have about 3 inches of soil (yay!) and lots of maggots/fruit flies on top (boo!). I think I need to add more dry leaves or something to it to up the carbon level. Anyway, I can’t wait to get my little garden started again. I see a great Spring Break project coming up.

Time to finish this lesson and get started on something else…

I am staying home pretty much all weekend because a) the weather is “supposed” to be bad–we don’t want to venture over the passes for a hike; b) it’s the end of the month and there’s no extra cash; and c) I have a new semester starting Tuesday and I am ridiculously behind on grading (even though it’s been my life lately).

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I am working on this online bible reading plan to get through the bible in a year. Somehow I like reading it online, and then I thought about getting it emailed to me. However, the site charges $9 a year for the emails, so I guess I need to find another site.

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I finished the Miranda July book, and now I am working on 3 books: Holly Springs, Surprised by Joy, and Omnivore’s Dilemma. I want to get more seriously into reading, hiking, and knitting after my grades are due. Right now those are on hold, like just about everything else (house cleaning, hanging out with friends, etc.).

I am concerned about how stressed I am about work, especially since my visit to the ER last weekend with chest pain and trouble breathing. I still have a dull ache all around my left chest area, but I don’t know what to think about it. I had bloodwork done, and EKG, and a chest xray, but they didn’t find anything (they were worried about clotting). They suggested anxiety and internal bruising from soccer. I don’t know what it is, but it’s still bothering me and I’m worried about playing soccer this Thursday.
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My grad school application is due this Friday. I’m pretty much finished; I just need to print out all of my materials and take in my immunization records and transcripts. I will feel much better about life when all of that is done (as well as my grades).
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Paul, the guy who has lived with us in our garage for the last two years, is in a coma in the hospital. It’s not looking promising that he will get out of it this time. Please keep him, as well as his family and friends in your prayers.

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So that’s the news from around here! I know–it’s all rainbows and butterflies, right? I really am happy–I just have a lot on my mind. That seems to happen as I get older. I want to focus more on the beautiful, positive aspects of life. It’s hard to walk the line between being Eeyore and Pollyanna.

I should be doing so much right now…grading, cleaning, lesson planning, working on my application for grad school, enjoying the lovely sunny weather we are getting. However, the blog calls and it’s feeling rather neglected. I think my blog is jealous of twitter. This is how I’ve been keeping the world updated lately…one mini-post at a time. This post will be a BIG one about what’s going on in my life, and I think I will structure it based on the categories I have to the right here:

Books:
Currently reading Surprised by Joy (C.S. Lewis) and No One Belongs “Here More Than You (Miranda July)–both for book groups.

Music:
Just got DMB and Tim Reynolds: Live at Radio City and Grey’s Anatomy Season 3 Soundtrack for Christmas. In awe at Reynold’s guitar skillz.

Movies:
Depressed myself by watching A Crude Awakening about the upcoming oil shortage. Makes me want to live on a farm.

Trips I want to take in the near future:

I’d love to go to Portland for a long weekend trip to visit Powell’s. I also want to visit The Bridge church and stay at McMenamin’s Edgefield outside of Portland in Troutdale.
Quebec–just to feel like I’m in Old World Europe in the “New World”
New Zealand/Australia: it’s all about the wildlife and scenery….plus they speak English
Kenya or South Africa on adventurous days
New England/East Coast: we have lots of friends and family there
Idaho: visit J’s parents; ski or snowboard; play in snow; sit in hot springs in the cold weather

Knitting Projects:
Finished Anna’s Alpaca fuzzy black scarf. Still working on baby kimono. Might finish when baby is a teenager. Started making baby bib in purple and green jewel tones.

Seattle Weather:
Boring. Just boring. I prefer exciting weather, for instance snow and drastic changes in temperature. At least the past two days there has been some sun! I really should live further inland somewhere if I prefer such excitement.

Education:
I still have bitten off more than I can chew in my current teaching assignment: 3 preps in a high needs school is overwhelming, so I spend a lot of my “free” time working on school related work. Nevertheless, I am applying for a doctoral program called Leadership for Learning at the University of Washington (L4L at UW, shorthand). The program is mainly geared to people preparing for superintendent duties, but my focus would be on leadership for educators at the school-based level. My application is due February 1, and I still have so much to do on it. I have 2, 3-day weekends coming up.

TV:
Not much of this in my life, but I have enjoyed watching the Colbert Report and The/”A” Daily Show with John Stewart this week. I watch it online, though, which means it’s a day late.

Theater:
One of my new year’s resolutions is to actually get to the plays we have season tickets to. Seattle Rep won’t let you in late, and we inevitably get there 5-10 minutes late, at least the last few times. We have one coming up in February. Here’s to punctuality.

Technology:
Not much new in this category. I am working off of Justin’s old Vaio so we can both have wireless in the same room. Since the addition of Lesley’s cat to the household, we have not been working in the office, as we’d have to keep the door closed, and that’s a rather confined space.

Science:
I’m teaching AP Bio this year, so this week I will be working with Sordaria in a mitosis/meiosis lab. Woohoo!

Grrr…
I have too many for this category. Let me first state that I began to dislike being asked how my break was, because overall, it was a pleasant experience with friends and family, but a series of unfortunate events seemed to befall us. Let me explain.

The first leg of our trip went fine, except that I got sick the day after Christmas with a cold, right after having a sinus infection earlier that month. Being sick again meant that flying, which we did 2 days after I got sick, became ridiculously painful on my ears….and we had to do it twice that day. I couldn’t hear normally out of one of my ears, and a few days later (New Year’s Eve) I went to the doctor in my hometown. I ended up having an ear infection and got put on antibiotics that I just finished. Justin got the same bug, but it wasn’t as bad.

The next Grrr….comes from our flying experience. We just made our connecting flight from Salt Lake to Cincinnati, but our luggage apparently didn’t make it. My sis picked us up from the airport (and we got pulled over for speeding on the way to my Papa’s), and we decided to make our return trip to the airport the next morning, since our next stop would put us through Little Rock anyway. No luggage. Flight didn’t make it. “We’ll deliver it,” they said, “between 3 p.m. and 3 a.m.” 3 a.m……still no luggage. We called them. “We’ll deliver sometime today.” 4:30 pm: we got our luggage…2 days late. All of the presents I had for family I wouldn’t see again that trip was in there. Thanks, airline and baggage delivery service, for your convenience.

The time had come for our trip home. I called the night before to confirm that we had a 7 a.m. flight, which meant getting up at 4 to leave for Little Rock. “Yes,” the live person at Expedia said, “that’s correct.” 5:30 a.m. at the airport: “Your flight has been changed to 2 p.m.” Justin discussed this with an agent for an hour; they both made many phone calls. 2 p.m. remained the departure time. The glorious byproduct of this situation is that my parents were able to take us to Cracker Barrel and we has a scrumptious country breakfast (I, of course, had biscuits and gravy).

More rants: Why does UPS try to do deliveries that require signature confirmation on M-F during normal working hours? If I wasn’t there today between 10-2, why would I be there tomorrow at that time? And then, why are you not open on Saturdays?

Running:
Can we skip this one? OK, so I haven’t done much of this since Aaron, my running buddy, left. Also, I don’t have a gym membership anymore, and it’s dark before I get home (any more excuses?), so this isn’t so much part of my life right now, although I’d like it to be.

Church
So since our group isn’t meeting on Sundays anymore, we’re trying to figure out what to do next. For some, it means individual spiritual time on Sunday mornings. For others, it is visiting churches. For yet others, it is a combination of the two, depending on the week. That’s where I fit in. We’re still doing our other activities, but we’re trying to figure out what Sundays should really look like.

Exercise
I’m getting this some days, thanks to exercise videos for abs, buns, arms, and cardio. Yay! I like being sore, as it means I am making progress and working hard.

Food
I like cooking, but I don’t like HAVING to cook. I like being creative and I like having a choice. I think sometimes getting the pioneer organics box stresses me out because it’s like the fruits and veggies are a ticking time bomb that need to be cooked…RIGHT NOW!! We postponed our order for the last month, and I’m a lot more relaxed, although I haven’t been eating as many fruits and veggies. This AM I made blueberry pancakes and meatless bacon. I want to eat more healthily, so I like planning my menu ahead of time.

Friends and Family
I love you all and I don’t see you enough!

So I haven’t blogged in a while, but it’s not because nothing is going on in my life. Oh no. Perhaps too much is happening. I don’t blog as much as I twitter lately, so you’re probably getting my news in little tidbits.

Right now I am in the HW center at my school and sun is streaming through the window onto my monitor. I should have brought papers up here to grade, but I will have to wrok on those later this evening, sometime before my soccer game at 9!

I haven’t played soccer in a few weeks, mainly because so much else is going on related to school. I have a student teacher, and I’ve been at a technology conference the last three days. Since I’ve written last, we’ve had an open house, as well as a walkthrough called “Data in a Day.” I’ve been to science professional development, Spamalot, a movie, and much more. This weekend holds a play at the Rep, and a birthday party for Dawn (happy birthday, Dawn!), as well as lots of grading.

This weekend (and most of this month) has been rainy, but we managed to have a good bit of fun anyway. Justin and I went out for Thai food, went to a photography show in a coffee shop, went for a walk around Ballard, got some tea, and caught a movie on Thursday night. Saturday, after a big breakfast, we went to see Twelfe Night (the first folio spelling) at Seattle Rep and then got ready to have another couple over for bread, homemade potato soup, salad, and homemade plum-peach cobbler. We had fun just talking with our company for about four hours–something we rarely get to do. Today after church we drove up to Capitol Hill and went to the bike store so Justin’s tires could work again, and then we went for a walk in Volunteer Park in the rain. I could have walked for longer, but we were expecting a Craigslister to drop by. Knowing that I had grading to do, I did what I always do in the face of grading–procrasti-baking. Now I am procrastiblogging, but earlier I made pumpkin muffins, which were quite tasty. This weekend I’ve also been knitting quite a bit on my niece’s baby kimono. Who knows when I will be finished with it. The process is quite fun.

This week is going to be extra-crazy, as I have school- or education-related events every night but Monday this week–including Saturday and Friday. While I’m not doing that, I’ll be reading The Great Divorce for the C.S. Lewis book group I’m in.

It looks like the owner of the MacBook Pro I happen to be typing on needs his computer back (*ahem* Justin) so this mini-blog will have to do.

I’m working in my room to get ready for tomorrow, which includes a quiz, a lab, the start of a new project, a field trip, and an assembly. Tomorrow makes up for today, which was rather light on my duties as I had a guest presenter regarding BioTech Expo. I also have a student teacher, which makes life a bit easier as well.

From my room I can see the thunderstorm progress across Boeing field and I-5, There are showers here which surge at various rates, and the lightning a moment ago caused the lights to flicker and caused my monitor to get a greenish hue, which is bothering me and is persisting.

Tonight I hope to get a bit of grading done, but I don’t want all evening to be about school. Perhaps some exercising and knitting will be what I need.

Today I’ve been at my school’s open house for the community, alumni, former and current staff, parents, and current students. There was a staff reception with snacks near the library and a ceremony in the gym at noon with an entertaining swing band. We just got a brand new building, and since my room has a good view, we had a chat room in my area for the classes of 85-89 this afternoon. I was hoping I could have some people sign up on my wish list for class materials which was to be our incentive for having our rooms open today, but no one actually did.

I was also hoping to get some work done in my classroom, but there was always a group or individuals coming through that had questions for me or that I needed to welcome, which is fine. I feel, though, that this afternoon I will be grading notebooks well into the night.

Today has been a busy day already, and it started with the smell of baking bread. This time of year–when the days get a little shorter and the nights get a bit cooler–is great for baking bread. I use a bread machine for this task, which allows me to dump everything for a delicious loaf of bread into the machine and set the timer. I could smell bread at 5:30 this morning, which, on a cool day, is quite a motivator for getting out of bed. My school colleague at our meeting this morning asked if I liked the smell of bacon and if I knew of such a device that could cook bacon each day like my machine does for bread….excellent idea! At any rate, my delicious, fluffy, warm white bread was a filling breakfast after the addition of butter and honey on the thick slices. I had a glass of milk along with it to add some more protein, too.

After breakfast and my morning meeting, I had a lab with my AP students and a lab with my Biology students. My Daphnia finally came in, and students were able to observe them under the microscope and carry out their self-designed experiments with them today. The ones that were left over got added to my aquarium–and so did the beautiful male betta that a student bought for me over his lunch break!

I hope to have a more low-key day after all of the labs today. I got some more new students, which makes it hard for them to participate in lab on their first day. My language arts students are going with me to see Wangari Maathai, a Kenyan woman who won the Nobel Peace Prize and the Woman of the Year award for her reforestation of parts of Africa and for helping the rural poor in east Africa. We were able to get free tickets through a writers program, so I’ll be going to that and then to Lukas’ birthday party.

Before all of that, however, I am going to enjoy a hot cup of tea–a variety Bethany gave me when she was visiting. Here’s to 20 minutes of relaxed lesson planning.