still here

i have decided not to give up on blogger and through the generous offer of my husband and his ever-growing knowledge of html, hope to have a working blog soon that is just as nice looking as it once was. basically it needs html botox. Hopefully all will end well. cross your fingers.

html must die.

I can't get blogger to do what I want.... this sucks.

Thoughts of redemption, rebirth and renewal!

Happy Easter to all dear friends and family.

May I just say...

I am both shocked and appalled that my own husband, Nathan, is siding with the computer and accusing me of cheating on his quiz, thus omitting my score of 70 from the scoreboard? OK, yes, cheating isn't too much a stretch of the imagination given my past gaming experiences between the ages of 6-20, however, I thought he believed I was making a real change. Also, any points that the computer might have subtracted because I was "accidently" watching over his shoulder should be added back in full because of the lively questions/answers I thought up and contributed as he was writing the very quiz in question. I think Abigail will be on my side.

Life is ironic.

(Rest assured: not a reference to the oh-so deep thoughts of Alanis. A Talent, with a capital T.) The last six months of my life have been centered around a test known as TAKS (formerly TAAS). My school is a part of the BluePrint Plan here in Austin, which basically is trying to take junior high schools and elementary schools and turn their scores around by intense study, higher academic standards, experienced teachers, etc. etc. I wish the goal was to help increase the perspective of kids and make learning experiencial. But it's not. The main goal is to bring up test scores. It just is. As much as I personally disagree with this kind of higher-scores,-oh-it-must-mean-the-kids-are-finally-learning! mentality, I have committed to my job, so it's what I do.

Anyway, the big test we've all been getting ready for all year WAS scheduled for Tuesday, the 25th. If you live here in this fabulous little city you know that we had a detrimental ice storm Monday night and every single school for miles and miles had to be closed Tuesday, and into Wednesday. AISD probably hasn't taken a bad weather day in 5 years or more, and the day we are forced to stay home is the big day. For us teachers at Dobie, it felt like a pleasant reminder that the TAKS test is remarkably far away from the center of the universe.

HA HA HA. So there. We all got a day and a half off work and the kids had so much fun in this bizarre-for-Texas weather that they weren't scared witless on the day of the test. I like happy endings.

Wow.

I just realized it has been a month, yes a month!, since my last blog... which is entirely too long. A month isn't too long when it comes to dying your hair. But blogging? Different story.

I partly blame my job, which if you're someone I talk to on any sort of regular, or even semi-regular basis, you already know. It's basically shaving years off my life. Now, I know it is a very noble thing to teach middle-school kids who live in the ghetto. Just maybe not my very noble thing? Actually, what's killing me is the politics and test-driven agenda, not the sweet lil gangstas, as I affectionately call them.

Today I got a contract agreement to sign on for next year, which I plan to sign and return, even though I know in my heart that I may not be there in the fall. I was meant to be an interior designer, I know it! That sounds like someone who drops out of medical school to become a Mary Kay Representative, I know. I can hear myself. But, if I don't start doing something creative soon, I may forget how to be creative altogether. Like a language you don't speak for a long time. It feels that serious to me.

Just got home

from my friends' home (the other Nathan and Amy.....don't ask), and had a conversation with my good friend Stacy. We were just talking mostly about how easy it is to get very attached to the things we surround ourselves with. As an example, Nathan and I are looking at new couches because our old one has a huge, gaping tear from where Abigail accidently chewed a hole in it when she was chewing on her foot (again, don't ask). The small, accidental chew-hole grew more and more gaping and now, whole pieces of stuffing fly out on a regular basis. All that to say that I found a couch I like at IKEA that is very versatile and functional, and of course, very cute. I keep thinking about getting that couch, how I can't wait to get it, I can't stop showing the website to my friends, etc. So this evening, I just began to realize how couch-crazy I was getting. Our culture is saturated with materialism. Yet there are children who sleep on rice sacks! Something is wrong with that. How can I get so "American" that I want to puke?

In some ways it reminds me of a movie (Far from Heaven) that Nathan and I just saw the other night at the Drafthouse. The setting was this perfect, 1950s, Norman-Rockwell painting-type family, and just under the surface, everything was broken, and falling apart. It made me so sad, and yet I think we still behave like that today. We are broken people, with problems, and our couches have holes with the stuffing coming out! Why can't we look just below the surface, and embrace each other, flaws and all? I may be one of those people who is worried that if the outside isn't pretty enough, what will that say about underneath?

OK, it's not wrong for me to want a new sofa, just wrong for me to be obsessed with it. As a side note, when you blog after 1:30 in the morning, you may get a little confessional.

Help!

I've been sucked into the world of reality television. I never thought something like this could happen to me, but here I am. I've been hooked on Joe Millionaire, Star Search, Meet the Folks, trashy dating shows of all shapes and sizes and even American Idol, where tonight Nathan and I were surprised to see a guy we went to college with who actually made the first cut and is going to Hollywood! The scary part is not how easily this old schoolmate made it into the world of crappy pop, but how unsuspecting I was when I began to casually watch these addictive shows. I was only experimenting, but now I can't stop. It's become more than a guilty pleasure; it's a nightly event! I think I need an intervention.

People all over the world, join hands.

Happy MLK Day!