Contrary to Popular Belief

Well, just once you had thought I had completely abandned the whole blog thing, here I am. So what has happened over the past 3+ months? Hmmmm..

I turned 27. Pretty uneventful.
Had Christmas. Pretty low-key.
Got real with God. Pretty cool.

A lot of the past 3 months has been such a blur. My time seems to be completely taken up by school work. I've been teaching after school since October and even the past 4 Saturdays has seen me teaching at school. I cannot wait until March when the big BYS state exam is over. It's been pretty stressful on both students and staff, so March cannot come soon enough.

My time at school is pretty much spent on school work with no time to even think about updating my blog. However, I picked up a new laptop today and with the glory of wireless internet and the number of wifi hot spots on Park Ave, I'm geting signals all over the place. It's back in contact with everyone again.

Anyways, proably the coolest thing that's been going on is that I've finally decided to get real with God. This year, I'm grabing life by the horns and not sitting back and accepting what comes my way. Instead, I'm activley pursuing what God has for me. I've been hitting up Father's House on Saturday nights and Bethel again on Sunday morning. I never thought that double-dipping church on the weekend was something I would admit, yet I freely admit that I enjoy it oh too much.

Well, I can't think of anything else to say right now. I think there's so much to say, I don't know where to begin. So I won't. ALthough, keep my Uncle in your prayers. He's gotten a pretty grim diagnosis and is undergoing some pretty heavy duty chemotherapy. He just turned 60...today actually. The family is taking it pretty tough, but the God I believe in is capable of anything and everything. Nuff said.

Keep in touch kids...it's been real...

I iz here (yo)

Well, I'm here. It has been over a month since I've updated this thing. It has been so incredibly busy on my end this school year. Last year, I had a nice big gap in my day that allowed me to get work done. I also had my after school time intact as well as my "free" periods. Not so this year... there is always a meeting, conference, something to be done. Today is our Superintendent's Day and I have been at my computer entering grades since noon. It's 4pm. The building is empty except for me and I still have stuff to do.

Oh well, I have finally made some progress in my work, so I suppose I can rejoice in that.

What else is new? Nothing. It's been pretty much 50 hours a week at school, and then don't think about school at all during the weekend. I go from one point of non-stop activity to absolute inactivity on Saturday and Sunday afternoons.

It's kind of hard to blog when there is nothing bloggable to write about. All I can say is I'm still here and I still check up on everyone's blogs and myspaces and all that crap. If you want to check out my friend's site (www.myspace.com/ianscampbell), he's a heck of a singer. Him and I used to hit the karaoke circuit every weekend. Amazing how I would do karaoke in a heartbeat, but would rather gnaw off my own foot than go line dancing at the (ugh) "Roost". What kind of name is that anyways?

Anyhow, he's got a couple of songs posted up there...It's hard sometimes to tell the difference between him and Frank Sinatra, but I find it humorous. He out singing and performing for hundreds, sometimes thousands of people on the weekend, but he's the same old schmuck to me...

good bye everybody. keep on keeping it real.

My week is a nutshell

Ok boys and girls. This quick post is pretty sweet.

I looked down at phone inbetween classes on Wednesday and noticed a missed call, voice mail and text message from my precious little brother indicating that I needed to call him IMMEDIATELY. With a mild panic in my mind, I called him only to find out that he had the greatest idea of all time. Boston Red Sox vs. New York Yankees (barf) this Saturday in Boston. Few ballgames have meant more or had a greater impact than this one will. After an evening of hurried bidding and finger crossing, we had the tickets. Chris and I met the seller last night and, under the cover of darkness at Cobbs Hill, made our transaction and, to quote a modern day poet, "Whoop! There it is."

SOOOOOO, In about 8 hours, Chris and I will be tearing down I-90 in the sporty Saturn Ion headed towards the slice of heaven known as Fenway Park. It will be nationally televised on FOX this Saturday. So, if you'd like to tune in and watch the antics while you try to convince yourself that you don't know those two clowns on the tube, feel free.

Cuz I'm gonna be in Boston.

p.s.) George Steinbrenner supports terrorism. Go Sox!!!

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There's not much substance to this blog. It's 9th period on a Thursday and Friday could not come fast enough. Tomorrow is the first real pay day PLUS 8 hours of meetings ($29/hour) PLUS maybe two weeks of summer school pay still owed me PLUS maybe 20 hours for designing the summer school curriculum PLUS maybe the rest of my Professional Development pay from the summer. I know it's a lot of maybes, but if some of them could work out, it would be oh so neat.

It will be nice to hop buses to the mall on Saturday and finally be able to get some much-needed school clothes, supplies and birthday gifts. Can you believe little Chris...butthead!... is turning 21 on Tuesday and mother dearest is turning (2+3) X 10 on Sunday. Sorry. Had to do it.

So, I have SO much paper work to do this afternoon, I have a huge list of things to accomplish by the end of today. For once I don't have to run around after school and I have the opportunity to do some things. I hope to have my work done for the weekend so I will have no worries...no troubles...

Quick flashback: Summer was good. Too quick. I taught Summer School and it went OK. Like I said, still awaiting some $$$ from that. It's nice to be back though. Fell off the sobriety wagon a couple of weeks back, but I'm back at the helm with the reins in hand. One day at a time. It's hard sometimes when you have such a big-picture outlook on life, but it truly is one day at a time. It's kinda nice when you take that approach to certain things. I can't sit here pissing and moaning about yesterday or worry about tomorrow. Today is what is here now and today is what I can control.
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Ok. Well that was yesterday. I gave up and saved it until today. Now it is Friday at 7:30 am and scarily enough, I've been here for an hour already. Today will be a good day. I will rejoice and be glad in it.

PAYDAY! I called my bank and found out that it looks like all those "maybes" fell into place, giving me much more than I had anticipated. Sweeeeeet! I don't know why I bothered to pick up where I left off, because I have to go now and get ready for the day. Middle schoolers on Friday... how do YOU think they're gonna act. They're not like those sweet little pre-K kids who get to play all day and take naps and have snack time. Must be nice. Yeah, I get classes of 32 and 33 students at a time and OF COURSE they're all on the same page at all times.

Oh well. I got paid.

I'm back and the same as ever...

Hey kids. Long time, no blog. Let's try to get caught up here. Summer meant teaching the Summer Literacy Institute for Math and English Language Arts. I was hand picked to write curriculum for the entire district, so that was pretty cool. It'll be even cooler when the $$$ that's still due me comes down the pipeline. Summer school ended mi-August which gave me about 10 days off before I was back into school for some workshops. Two more days of meetings and workshops and getting all ready for the first day of students tomorrow. Exciting and harrowing at the same time....

I feel a bit unprepared, mainly due to the fact that a lot of necessary information continues to be handed out in the untimely of fashions. I only got my class roster this morning and I still had to type up my course criteria sheets get everything approved and copied. Thank God we only have two days. My classes aren't even getting textbooks until next week, but it's business as usual here at school. Now that I have been able to cross a lot of these things off my list, I feel a little bit better about tomorrow, but I have my fair share of reading for tonight to get ready for tomorrow. This year I have 9th graders for homeroom, three sections of 8th grade math and 2 sections of Algebra II Honors (10th-12th graders). It should be a good year, at least I hope so....

April, keep your chin up. Teaching in the inner city schools is never easy..I spent a year at the toughest school here in Rochester. You have no idea the influence and impact you have on these kids. I taught a couple students I had when I was at Madison over the summer (Madison is the inner city school I was referring to). They all mentioned how I had influenced them when I taught them (years ago). Keep your chin up and enjoy your sun. It'll be snowing before us brave northerners know it.

Beth...Tomorrow is the big day! Best of luck...like a certain professor both told us: "Teaching is the most exciting thing you can do with your clothes on." Keep your staged play drama areas clean and in order, don't forget snack time and recognize that not every student will think Pepe is the greatest Muppet ever.

everyone else, I'm back. I don't know how frequently I will be able to update this...but it'll be more frequently than every three months. Let me know you're alive (and awake)...

One step closer (not that god-awful crap song by Linkin Park)

Wow. I'm a little revved up here.

1:55pm and all the seniors are graded. Now I have 26 more to grade. It was a looooong exam, with my last student finishing up over 3 1/2 hours after he began. It was funny. I had about 2/3 of my class take the entire 3 hours on their exam. The students that did not stay the entire time are the ones who NEEDED to stay the entire time.

ugh. frustration. Plus I'm out of CDs, so I need to find some good internet radio before I freak out even more.

I'll keep you posted... It's 1:57 and I'm reaching for my red pen...

3:00. I decided to grade all the exams I knew would be crappy first, so I could a.) be happy when I'm done and b.) make sure I have enough red ink. I'm getting a delirious now...I'm just about the only one here and need to leave by 4:15-ish to get home and change and make sure I can get a ride to graduation tonight...I also gotta find my ticket in my classroom, which right now resembles the Bermuda Triangle (or as us math geeks call it, The Bermuda 3-sided polygon) back to grades


3:49. Done grading. Still have to bubble in final grades...which will take no time at all. I think I'm going home to make sure I can crank this crap out and get ready for graduation. We'll see.

later kids.

All you haters can step off....

That's right. I said it. For all the grief and dirty looks I get for not regularly posting to my blog, you suckas can enjoy two posts within 24 hours. My daunting list of to-do's is significantly smaller than yesterday. Summer school work is done for now, room is much cleaner than yesterday, some signatures have been collected but I still have more to get...

My exam starts in less than 2 hours and I'm kinda freaking out.... 1.) I hope I've prepared my kids (geez...kids...they're 10th, 11th and 12th graders) enough to do well on the exam. 2.) I have to grade it IMMEDIATELY. There is no time to waste because graduation is TONIGHT. Between my class and the two other sections taking this exam, there are 14 seniors. This exam will determine, for some, if they graduate and for all of them, the type of diploma they receive. Hopefully I can make it to graduation. Since it's a Regents exam, we need a minimum of 3 people grading it. If it was a local final (created within the building or district), I could easily grade it myself. Unfortunately the other teacher of the course is on maternity leave and her replacement is older than dirt. I think he might have been living in the tent next door to Moses.

great.

So, that's my day. Almost there...but I am still freaking out...In fact last night when I got home, I sat on the couch and just fell asleep. My phone rang at 6:30pm and woke me up in a frenzy (not 5-iron, but more of a 3-wood driver). I thought I overslept since I woke up to daylight. I was actually talking to myself saying, "My phone says 6:30 but it's daylight out!" It took me a good 30 seconds to realize what was going on and recognize that I am OK.

By 11:30 this apprehension will be replaced with the furious scribblings of red pen and disapproving facial expressions and bodily noises (groans...not gas, you freaks)

so, if you think my last post was wierd, sit down. This day is gonna be bizarre....Bizarre in the membrane, bizarre in the brain.

yeah, I know what I said. Step off, hater.

this is gonna be quick

yes, I am alive...barely. then end of the school year is kicking my...butt big time. I have so much work to do, not only because finals are almost done, but I also have graduation to take care of. Plus I'm designing summer school for the entire district (25% of it) and that is due today, so I sat behind a computer for, oh 10 hours yesterday and still am not done yet. Plus, I have to proctor another exam today, pack up my classroom, call the parents of students who failed my class, write a letter to kids who passed but failed to meet the criteria to continue in Honors math, more summer school stuff, pull my hair out, close up my gradebook for the year, return all my library books, cry, run around school and collect signatures from random people and possibly go camping this weekend.

and all I wanted to do this morning is hit snooze just one....more.....time....

ugh.

will I write again later? perhaps. life is a rollercoaster? life is a tornado and I'm caught in an updraft. Hopefully I'll end up in some Oz-type land where the rigors of high-stakes standardized testing don't apply and I can hang out with some cool munchkin-type people. I would tower over them and then I could be their ruler and command them to clean my classroom and take care of my business...

wouldn't that be grand???