Saturday, October 11th, 2008
I was just on the phone with my mother, in which she and my father were discussing the location of his frozen bag of peas that he puts on his hernia. My father claims its on his groin. My mother says, on the other hand, if it’s on your groin its on your balls.
I hope you all live in a world where your parents do not discuss groins or balls with you.
Tuesday, October 7th, 2008
R. and N. are apple picking, a family in a van drives up and piles out of their van. They are loud, but excited. Each child has an apple picker as pictured below.
R. and N. try to move to a quieter place, but their noise is a little excessive. But, hey, they’re excited and isn’t that nice?’
Mom: (loudly) Isn’t this going to be fun girls?
Girls: random shrieking and yelling
Oldest Girl: I don’t want to put on bug spray.
Mom: Well, you have to, so shut up.
(N. and R. exchange looks and back further away)
Dad: (yelling so loud everyone in the orchard can hear and holding his head) Oh my God you hit me with that! Watch the hell what you’re doing. What is wrong with you.
Mom: Tell your father your sorry.
Dad: That’s it you cannot pick apples.
Mom: Yes she can! You’re fine.
Dad: I’m bleeding.
Mom: No you are not.
Dad: (getting louder) Damn it, I am bleeding. Look at this. I am bleeding.
Mom shoos the girls away while Dad goes and stares at himself in the mirror, observing his minor scratch. A few minutes pass.
Dad: (to no one in particular, but loud enough for everyone to hear) IT CONTINUES TO BLEED.
N. and R. must run quickly away to muffle their laughter.
Sunday, September 28th, 2008
It’s the end of the year for me. The baseball year, anyway. Today was the last game for the Cardinals in 2008, and while I’ll avidly be watching the playoffs, I don’t have any strong feelings about who I want to win (as long as it’s not the Cubs).
As I watched the Cardinals game, I was simply irritated because they won 6 in a row a month too late. I was fed up with a lot of things and had forgotten why I watch this game with such interest.
I know many people who think and say baseball is boring. R. would be one, and he would add that baseball players aren’t athletes (I guess because they’re not beating each other up?). I have never found baseball boring. I find football boring because 1 minute takes an hour. Baseball isn’t a lot of “action” so to speak, but it is a constant struggle of skill, mental ability, strategy, and luck. (And let’s leave steroids out of the equation, because as I see it steroids are in ALL professional sports).
However, what I love most about baseball is the magic. I think there’s a sense of history and luck and teamwork that I, personally, don’t feel in any other sport. There’s always a feel good story–and I think always a few to offset the opposite. There’s a sense of tragedy as injury plagues what could have been a superstar. A sense of miracle when a nobody has a great streak that boosts their team to the top of the standings.
Baseball is great because in 163 games ANYONE can be a hero. ANYONE can help the team achieve. And there is always a sense that ANYTHING can happen. There are stories, legends, that have survived since World War I. Baseball just has an aura about it. It has something intangible. And while football might overtake the ratings and soccer might overtake the world, for me baseball is truly amazing, truly inspiring.
The playoffs are bittersweet–amazing and exciting, but a signal of the end. A signal of the winter months to come. A signal of the lull in TV and conversation until March rolls around, and the excitement returns and hopes for every team are renewed. In April, anyone can still be in it in October.
Monday, September 22nd, 2008
I dog-sat this weekend and took the opportunity to try and work on my camera skills. I realized that photography is really relaxing for me, and it’s something I need to work on when school is making me want to tear my hair out.
Violet is a great subject. She’s fairly still, but moves around enough to make it a challenge and really practice some newfound understanding of aperture and shutter speed.
She’s not one for looking directly at the camera.
Portrait
Snakes and snails and puppy dog tails, that’s what little boys are made of.
And, my personal favorite. I feel as if this should be captioned: Violet for President
Saturday, September 13th, 2008
There are crickets in my basement. And they are LOUD SOBS. They are so loud that even with the door to the basement closed, they can Wake Me Up. Granted, I am a light sleeper, but still this is ridiculous.
Last weekend we went through all our boxes in the basement and killed a ton of these little buggers. But the cricket-ing continued, so we bought some spray. I am mostly against spraying chemicals in my home, but I am mostly FOR sleeping. So, we sprayed.
Then this morning, a cricket in the basement woke me up. I want him to die. But, I don’t want to feel/hear the crunch.
More spraying next weekend.
All of this cricket drama reminded me of when I was in 1st or 2nd grade and caught a cricket and kept it in the small box that held the cards and the little stick people in the Life game from the 80s. I loved that little cricket. In fact, my childhood was spent mostly unafraid of bugs. I’d pick up worms, lady bugs, and lightning bugs without problem. When does the fear set in, I wonder.
(This blog was brought to you by the “I am trying not to think or write about teaching fund”).
Tuesday, September 9th, 2008
It hasn’t been the easiest week and I can’t exactly put my finger on why. I’m struggling through and I can’t help but wondering and thinking and regretting…
I wonder why I left my EASY, non-time-consuming job… I mean, I know the practical reasons (money, benefits, upward mobility), but it was EASY in comparison to current gig(s).
I wonder why I chose to teach teenagers when I couldn’t stand them when I WAS ONE. I have little patience for idiocy, apathy, meanness, ignorance, foolishness, and lack of respect. It drove me crazy then and it drives me crazy now.
I wonder why I couldn’t have had the drive or the foresight to pursue my love of writing.
But mostly, I wonder why I can’t stick with a job for more than year. Why I can’t let stupid things roll of my back. Why I can’t make the best out of the situations I am given.
I’m tired, I’m frustrated, and the last damn thing I want to do tomorrow is face 8 hours in classrooms full of teenagers followed by 4 hours of my second job also involving teenagers!
What was I thinking?
I
Monday, September 8th, 2008
Ooh, alliteration. I’m not huge on politics, so I don’t know why I keep returning to the subject, but as R. was zoning out to CNN and Headline News and NBC Nightly News and all matter of NEWS, I was silently seething. The news in an election year only proves an idea that I always try to ignore: politics is bull shit.
There were two talking heads from either party–governors or senators or something–ready to support their respective candidates no matter what. Wolf Blitzer shows them a clip of their opponent candidate dissing their party candidate. They are asked to respond. They poo-poo their opposition, they extoll the virtues of their candidates.
They flat out lie. They say anything, and I do mean anything, to prove their candidate will bring change, will fix the economy, will save off from all the evil in the world. Their candidate is the only one fit to lead this marvelous nation.
Again, bull shit.
For the past three elections I have heard both my parents lament the choices they are given. A moderate Democrat and moderate Republican respectively, neither of them feel either candidate offers anything special. And for the past three presidential elections I have heard them wonder if they should even vote when they don’t support either candidate.
Recently, both parents lamented that if only we could take the two candidate’s good points and create one person, we’d have a great candidate.
But we can’t. Instead we are faced with candidates who lie, cheat, and steal. Who contort themselves in any manner of ways to fit whatever demographic they think they’re losing. And really, who can blame them? It’s politics. You want to succeed, you lie, lie, lie.
After all–no one holds you accountable. Sure, someone might talk about how McCain references Teddy Roosevelt when Roosevelt stood for virtually nothing Republicans of today stand for. Someone might mention that Barack has flip-flopped. But no one– candidate, governor on a talk show, former candidates, not one person in politics is really, truly held accountable for the flat out lies. On the Daily show we can see the hypocrisy (on both sides), and we just laugh and shake our heads and say, that’s politics.
And so, personally, I believe the only way things will change–the only way we will get a candidate that doesn’t make us wonder who is the lesser of two evils–is if WE THE PEOPLE hold our politicians accountable for their words. And I don’t just mean our presidential candidates. Every elected member of government should be asked to tell the truth–EVEN IF WE DON’T LIKE IT. If we demand the truth instead of placations and empty speeches, the truth over empty promises and campaigns led by trying to appeal to one faction or another.
Perhaps politics has always been about lying. Perhaps it has always been a money game. Perhaps it has always been a group of people willing to change whatever they believe to fit a poll. Regardless, it is our job as citizens to call for better–to demand better–to not fall for the contortions of a liar. To respect the truth–not just the label of POW or African American. To look for REAL action and REAL change, not words. I truly believe it is up to us–if we leave it up to politicians, nothing is going to change.
Friday, August 29th, 2008
I don’t generally like to talk about politics with people I don’t know. I think politics are personal beliefs. However, I also think that an election year is a great time to discuss politics, reasonably and rationally (not everyone can do this).
In the 2004 election I was a senior in college and my roommate and I watched all matters of debates and interviews and episodes of The Daily Show and discussed what was going on. And I don’t even think that was an incredibly interesting election.
I think, regardless of who you are, you have to admit that this is an interesting election. Part of that is no incumbent, part of that is the historical nature of various candidates, and part of it is that there are a plethora of really important issues facing our country right now.
But, I can’t really discuss it outside of my very immediate family. In fact, my original intent was to write a post about a certain political speech given recently. But, then I remembered I can’t. Working for a religiously-bound private school, I was asked to keep my public leanings private if they didn’t mesh with the religious group’s beliefs–and even then to be careful.
I have written and then deleted things in this post that might incriminate me, that might break that piece of paper I signed.
And, in a small, inconsequential way it does make me feel censored. An uncomfortable feeling.
Thursday, August 28th, 2008
Spelling is important. Who knows, one day you might be on Jeopardy. And you don’t want to be “that guy” who wins, but spells Mozart with two Ts (Motzart).
Wednesday, August 27th, 2008
As of right now, my decision about this blog is simple: I don’t discuss my teaching here at all. That poses a current problem because, man, teaching is ALL I’m doing.
A regular day is a long string of different duties. I’m up by 6, out the door by 7, oftentimes in a meeting at 7:30, then teaching till 3:00. Usually, I’m home by 3:45 (unless there’s an after school meeting), and I see R. for about an hour and we eat dinner before he has to go off to work. Once he’s vamoosed, I’m sitting on the couch with two laptops in front of me, books scattered, papers piled everywhere, putting finishing touches on the next day’s plans, grading papers, or reading what I need to be teaching. At 10, I skip off to bed and the whole she-bang starts over again the following day.
I have to say though, most of it feels good. I like the planning and the reading. And, there’s nothing on TV right now, so nothing better I could be doing. Eventually my work ethic will fade away and I’ll be back to doing just enough to get by. Maybe then I’ll have something of interest to share.
