an exercise in hyperbole

'Twas the week before Winter Break and my Tuesday gave to meeeeee:

12 bazillion sick kiiiiids (thanks to the weather going from 70 to 40 degrees in a day!)
11 million "What are we doing today?"s
10 million "Do we HAVE to do something to day?"s
9 thousand students whining about having to read Macbeth or Into Thin Aiiiiir
8 hundred more essays to graaaaade
7 thousand questions about Macbeth Act II. (Honestly. Did they not listen at ALL?)
6 hundred more whining students asking "Do we HAVE to do this? Do we HAVE to do anything today?"
5 mooooore days until we leave for Michigan!
4 faiiiiiiiliiiiing Poetry test grades in 7th period (you have NO IDEA how amazing this is!)
3 times Bryan called Stephanie a bitch.
2 cars I almost hit trying to parallel park
1 New Haircut!:



Tuesday was okay for it being the Tuesday-before-winter-break. My eyes hurt, but we think we've figured out that it's the contact solution I switched to causing it and not an infection or the contacts. If it's not the solution, then I will have to go back to the doctor. My eyes hurting so bad has really put a stop on reading essays. I got 6 of them done today, but I have about 20-30 more to go. That's not too bad, but I'd like to get them done before Friday. I'm going to work my butt off tomorrow to get as many as possible done. My throat also hurt today because apparently, Virginia's weather gods want everyone to be sick for winter break. It was not a pleasant day for me or most of my students and our sinuses. But. The day ended up okay, I'm making some mini cupcakes now. Who doesn't cheer up while making cupcakes? Seriously.

I'm looking forward to going back to Michigan, but worried that we're going to miss everybody. We barely know anyone that lives there anymore and the dates that we have to travel back and then switch between east Michigan and west Michigan seem to be different from everyone else's. I'd like to see some friends while we're there! It's bumming me out thinking that I'm not going to see anyone.
Also, Megan and I (and now David and Mike) have been enjoying playing together on iminlikewithyou.com. If you're on there too, or you decide to join, let me know! I'll challenge you to a game or two.

getting stuff done (finally)

This week I was at school until 3:45-4 PM four out of five days. I had three or four different meetings, progress reports due on Wednesday and Thursday (and the whining & complaining that comes along with them), an armed intruder drill (and only a drill), tests, projects, poetry readings and essays. This means I ended up with the biggest stack of Papers To Be Graded ever, all while trying to start a new unit on Nonfiction Essays which will straddle the winter break.
But. Somehow I managed through the week, I got a lot done and I was determined to have a productive weekend (last weekend I felt exhausted and lazy, which probably added to how much I had to do last week). Yesterday started off the productivity. We did some holiday-related shopping, finally. We started with giving ourselves gifts since we decided on trying to figure out something to get the both of us and we're never good at keeping gifts secret from each other. Then I wanted to go to a few places to figure out a treat I can give my students for bringing back their signed progress reports. The last time they had reports due back it was Halloween, so I gave them Halloween candy and pencils. I was thinking of making a little holiday-related/more-winter-than-Christmas-related bag of candy and other goodies, but I found these and got a brilliant idea:

I'm making mini cupcakes! I also went to the dollar store and picked up boxes of cherry and peppermint candy canes. I think that'll do. I figured the cupcakes were a special reward for my 10th graders since I just about killed them with the end of the poetry unit: a poetry portfolio of 10+ of their poems typed, a poetry reading where they had to read one poem, a test that was pretty long and difficult on poetry AND a poetry essay that was pretty challenging for 10th grade. Most of them survived, thankfully. For my 12th graders, it's a thank you for reading Macbeth out loud and acting in front of the class twice.

I also wanted to see if I was inspired to participate in the Secret Elf bag exchange the faculty was invited to do on Thursday. I did this on Halloween with the Phantom bags and it turned out pretty fun. I didn't have anything in mind though, but thankfully, Target has a ton of winter/Christmas/holiday gift sets that teachers would love. So I made one:

My bag's pretty cute for not really being prepared to decorate it. You should see some of the other bags both this time and last--they were amazing! My Phantom bag had a witch pez dispenser, some office supplies, cute pens, and cold/flu season supplies (airborne, cough drops, lip balm, etc). I thought it was pretty useful. My Secret Elf bag this time is a lot more in line with a specific theme. I hope whoever gets my bag likes hot cocoa. I got them a cute mug with a penguin (or was it a snowman? I can't remember) drawn on the mug with another one sitting on the handle, some chocolate and a set of four different types of hot chocolate (tiramisu, creme brulee, and two others I can't remember).

After all that, I relaxed for a while and then made myself work on school-related grading or planning from 3-6. I actually did it, too. I got a lot of grading done. All I have left are essays and the short answer part of the poetry test.

Last night we went with Shannon and Dan to a cute boutique to see two bands play.
While we were waiting for the second band to start, Dan and David looked at some of the records they had for sale in the store. That's when Shannon and I realized that they looked like twins once again:

The second band was just okay, so we dipped out early and headed next door to the Village Cafe, which we'd all heard a lot about. The guy that does the Food Network show Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives went there apparently. We didn't try the food, just had a few beers and talked until we all got tired.

drrrrr

It was one of those weeks where I felt frazzled and overwhelmed. I didn't have a lot to do, but my brain wasn't quite working right. I would forget things, I would wander around in circles, etc. It just wasn't quite working.
But that's okay. Positive things that make it not really matter that this week was "meh":

• The holiday season has begun which means my new holiday favorite, Pomegranate 7Up, is available once again. 
• And there are only two more weeks until a two week winter break where I not only get to go to Michigan, but Megan will be coming to Richmond to celebrate NYE! Eeeeexciting.
  
• Hopefully while we are in Michigan, I will get to see some friends AND get a new tattoo or two. 
• Netflix watch instantly now works on my computer.
• David got new glasses that are pretty sweet.
• David bought my moped new things.
• We ate some Five Guys burgers and fries and tried out an Italian place I kept hearing good things about that lived up to its reputation.
• Oh, and next week will be better, of course.
  

Here is a Flickr stats meme for your taking the time to read through my increasingly boring blog.

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Megan's tattoo (1062 views). 2nd place is Mike's tattoo, but the picture pretty much looks the same.

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