oh, yeah..

new template tomorrow or the next day. Promise.

better late than never

well I just couldn't let the year turn over without one last post. Just about 5 hours left here on the Eastern seabord, and I have to say, I don't really care. When I was little, or even just slightly younger than I am now, New Year's was a big deal. It was a hell of an excuse for a party, at the very least. Now...I just don't see what the big deal is. Am I too cynical? Whatev, Grant and I are just chillin', having a nice chicken supper and perhaps getting drunk together. Wooh!

Christmas was nice, I never went through the stage where I didn't want to hang out with my parents, and I don't think it's going to come along at this point. I got to spend some time with my Grannie before my parents and sister arrived, which was pretty cool. I don't go visit near as much as I should. I think I forget that she's 75, because she doesn't really act it at all. She has a better social life than I do, goes on trips and has bridge nights and whatnot. Pretty happenin' chick. Anyway, presents were great all around, I got a bunch of stuff and some money from santa, which is always appreciated. I'm going to stick most of the money in my savings, but I'll take some to do some holiday shopping this weekend for a treat. I got 2 glass balls, a nice (non ice cream bucket) holder for kitchen utensils, a new set of utensils, a stand mixer, a pair of Levis, new flanner pjs, Sheryl Crow's new cd, and some very nice books. I'm sure I'm leaving stuff out, but I don't have my loot in front of me, so forgive me! I splurged a bit on my shopping, but I just kept finding things that I thought people on my list needed, so what can you do. I still need to have Christmas with Jenn who has some pretty exciting news of her own, and I picked up a little something for Calleen and made a (very, I promise) little something for Tiresa, so whenever I see them I'll deliver those.

The chicken is smelling done, and there are potatoes to mash and a half full Mike's Hard Limonade to drink, so I'm off.
Happy New Year to all! Just because *I* don't really care, doesn't mean you all shouldn't have fun! I promise I'll be back more in the new year, I'm back on highspeed, so all is well.

it's beginning to look...nothing like Christmas

well, not outside anyway. I'm in Halifax, and there's hardly any snow, just some small piles where there used to be banks I guess. Not like Moncton!

Grannie and I decorated the tree last night, I put the lights on because this has somehow become my job, but I like it. It was sort of fun going through all the ornaments, because most of them have a story behind them. I suppose I should start a collection of my own, I'm thinking next year I'll get a tree for sure, I find it really makes it seem more Christmassy.

Thanks for the well wishes! I feel all warm and fuzzy. I sort of want to keep the Christmas layout all year, but I have a feeling I'd get tired of it eventually. Any requests or recommendations for the new year? I should really do a total overhaul, but I think I like this general style with the pictures. I should do something a la D and have random images, but I'm sure that involves some sort of code that I don't know, so we'll see. I'm holding out for www.goatsarebest.com, that way I'll be able to host my own comments and stuff, and upload obscene amounts of pictures!

I really probably won't be back tomorrow, because my parents and sister will be here, so best wishes to you and yours!

holidays!

I know, it's not nice to brag, but DAMN am I glad to be on vacation right now. I'm heading to my Grannie's house this afternoon, and will spend about a week there. My parents and I think my sister arrive tomorrow, and apparently we all get to go shopping Wednesday. Barf! I do have a couple more things to pick up though, so it'll be an adventure. The kitties are off to Grant's house for the holiday, so I've got their stuff all packed up, and the fish are going to be on a bit of a diet over the holidays, but supposedly they only need to eat every other day anyway, so they'll be fine, Jenn is going to come and feed them one day and Grant another, then I'll be home. I cleaned the tank this morning, I think they're happier now. Hard to say with fish. My one new guy is still kissing/cleaning my giant algae eater...I always assumed the big guy is a guy...and the new one is a girl (on some fish, I can tell if they're boys or girls!) ...what's Cletus's girlfriend's name on the Simpsons...Brandine or something? that will be this fish's name.

I watched Olive, the Other Reindeer with my students on Friday, it's such a cute movie. Sort of strange, but funny. Then the other night there was a funny funny show on called Robbie the Reindeer. There are 2 episodes, and again with the celebrity voices - Ben and Jerry Stiller, Hugh Grant...funny. Britney Spears too, but don't let that spoil it for you.

anyway, I'll be confined to ye olde dial-uppe for the next week, so updates won't be daily for sure. I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday, whatever your celebration of choice may be, from Christmas to just being glad to have some time off work/school. Enjoy!

100 things update..

sort of. I haven't actually updated mine, a la Jenn, but I was re-reading it, and my #7 thing is "I want desperately a job, a home that isn't in somebody's basement, a dog, and babies. Probably in that order.". That's sort of exciting, I have 2 things! They didn't go in that order though, I moved out of 'somebody's basement' before I had a job, but I really didn't feel safe living where I was by myself, so it was sort of a necessity. Then I got my job, and while it's not my ideal, it's definitely a step in the right direction, and will hopefully get me where I want to go. Then I can get a dog. And, at some point in the future, babies. ha!

That's my happy thought for today.

snow day: the final chapter

I hope. It's tricky, because I'm not going to school tomorrow morning; I have a dentist appointment. The thing is, I've left my classroom in a bit of a state, because I assumed I would be in before tomorrow to straighten up and prepare for my supply. No such luck. He's going to have to straighten up for me, but my prep is first period so it should be fine. I was going to have them do textbook work, but since we've missed 2 days, I want them to work on their projects instead.

I had one of the worst sleeps ever last night. I woke up about 74 times, and one of those times just happened to be at 6:02, so I turned on the radio just in time to hear the cancellations for today. I could hear the wind all crazy during my awake times last night, so I had a feeling school would be cancelled again. Other than the lack of sleep, I enjoyed my new blue room very much.

Today the only productive things I did were to go pick up my new glasses and some wrapping paper and kitty litter. I'm a fan of my new glasses, I'm just wearing them now to make sure they're comfy. They're similar to my old glasses, but a bit smaller and olive coloured, so not as harsh as the black. My perscription has changed a bit as well, so these are nice and clear. I didn't choose my '2nd pair free' yet, because I have a year to do it, so I figured I might as well take my time. What I usually end up doing is getting a 2nd pair that is decent, but that I don't like near as much as my 1st pair, so I never wear them. I think I'll get a pair of sunglasses, but they don't have actual sunglasses, only clip-ons, and it's hard to tell what the regular glasses will look like tinted, so we'll see.

heavens, Jenn just sent me this link. Poor Willy!

That's about the extent of the excitement in my day, I'm going to go make use of the kitty litter and wrapping paper...though not exactly at the same time. ew.

snow day, part deux

So another lovely day. I had my alarm set for 6 to catch the cancellations, and sure enough, no school due to the impending storm that's to bring us 45cm this time around. I had a look out the window, and there was not a flake in sight. I went back to bed, and woke up again at 10, to lots of snow. I was a bit worried I'd get stuck here again for a couple of days (it's supposed to freezing rain tonight and then more snow), so I went out and picked up a few things...a couple of presents, butter for cookies, eggnog and chocolate milk for fun, magnets, and foam brushes and wide masking tape to get my bedroom painted. Despite my very ambitious plans for today, I only managed to get the painting done. It looks terrific though, "pale cadet" blue. I can hardly move my arms though, there will be no shovelling for me tonight. Painting is hard! I've done all I can by myself, I'll definitely need help doing the main apartment area, it's quite big.

Anyway, in my excitement about blogging, I've just missed the forecast for tomorrow, so I'm not sure if I'll be stuck here or not. I'm covered in tiny blops of blue paint, and I haven't showered or eaten anything proper today. Can't say as I see the point in showering, but I should probably get on the sustenence issue. Do any of you have fun snowday stories?

Just in case you were wondering about the guy...

MSNBC - Saddam's legacy of violence and war. Poorly written, I have to say, but it does give some good info. Oh, and in case you haven't heard..., they caught him.

now what? I wouldn't have even heard about any of this if not for Tiresa. I turned on my computer and tv this morning, but had been watching TLC last night before bed. I then switched to Bravo to watch Urban Cowboy, so didn't catch any news.

Train lyrics

I was listening to my Train cd because I forgot my Christmassy ones at home when I went shopping today. They have some nice lyrics, clever and or nice. I'm going to share them with you. Each bunch is from a different song, you'll have to go buy the cd, or at least go to the website to find out what they are. hehe.

Maybe I’m not but you’re all I got left to believe in
Don’t give up on me
I’m about to come alive
And I know that it’s been hard
And it’s been a long time coming
Don’t give up on me
I’m about to come alive



Hey baby, I don’t wanna be your Superman
I just wanna be your man and I’ll be super, baby
.........
I know you don’t see me like a movie star
And it can’t help much that I don’t have no car
But you’re my favorite thing, by far
That’s gotta count for something



I don’t spend my time with anyone
Who doesn’t think I’m wonderful
Or somewhat cash refundable at times

housework

I just spent an hour and a half doing dishes. now, yes, this is mainly my fault, since I haven't done dishes for about a week and a half. My further plans for today include trying to finish up my Christmas shopping. I don't have anything even remotely interesting to say. hmm.

Tiresa sent me this link, to a quiz that ranges from pretty easy to (in my opinion) quite hard, depending on the questions they randomly choose. I only got 10/20 the first time, but got 15/20 on the 2nd bunch, and entered the wrong answer on one accidentally. Anyway, give it a try. If you're a fountain of useless iformation, this is perfect for you. I...am not. ha.

I'm tentatively planning a Fantasia party for the weekend of the 7/8 of February, or the afternoon of the 14th. Clear your calendars, ladies! I'll keep you posted as to whether it's going to work out, or if I'll have to reschedule.

I have to get dressed and eat something. I'll let you know how the shopping goes. I have my dad done, mom mostly, sister done, Grant...not close but I know what I'm getting, and nothing for my friends yet. Wish me luck.

BBC NEWS | Nursery rhymes put kids 'at risk'

too funny.
from my sister. I'd link to her, but alas, she has no website.

I (heart) Will Ferrell

so I've been trying very hard to find and download the version of "Baby it's Cold Outside" from Elf, where Will Ferrell and Zooey whatsername sang in the ladies' room. I can't. It's sad, because their version was really cool, but doesn't seem to exist outside the movie. If anyone knows where I can find it, make my day and let me know!

While searching for this gem, I stumbled across something which is at least *as* good. The Will Ferrell Apple Switch ad. Good lord, that man is funny. And this does nothing to lessen my desire for an iBook, nothing at all. Anyway, go, watch it, save it to your hard drives, whatever. I did. I'm going to watch it again, right now. Then I'm going to bed.

The plow guy came too, so I was able to get out, and I got out while he was still here, so he cleared out the drifts where my car was parked too. I went out to start it and warm it up while I was clearing a path around it, and the snow was drifted up to the roof on the driver's side, packed up against another giant snowbank. Fun eh? It didn't take too long though, and the plow guy tried to help as best he could with his giant scooper bucket, which I appreciated. So I went out and did a bit of shopping, picked up my mom's main present, and some little things for Grant and Erin (and the Love, Actually soundtrack for myself, DAMMIT, why does that always happen!?). Still have a fair bit to do, but now that I'm free to come and go, it doesn't seem as urgent.

That's all my news. bed now.

the Return of the King

a friend of mine, Mitch, is in Hong Kong, and has a website going. He's also hosting the escapades of a friend of his, Pete, who's travelling through Australia and New Zealand. anyway, Pete was at the LOTR premiere parade thing, and got some pretty neat pictures, so I thought I would share with you all.

trapped: day 2

ok, this is just stupid. I can see that maybe it would have taken the plow guy until last night to get back here, but it's been 48 hours now that I haven't been able to leave my apartment by car. The streets are clear, there's no problem there, just the THOUSAND FOOT SNOW MOUNTAIN surrounding the parking lot. There's a slightly smaller snow mountain out the back that's easier to climb over, but there's a fence there so there's no driving over it either. It's too big anyway. I called my landlord yesterday afternoon to let him know what was going on, and he suggested I shovel my way out. He had not seen the snowbanks. So I said fine, I'll wait. As of this morning, no way out. I thought, surely, there would be a path by the time I got home today; I live above the landlord's store, which he couldn't open yesterday because of the weather. I sort of assumed he would want to open today, but apparently not. So I'm just sort of pissed, I have things to do, none of which I can do on foot. I can't do much Christmas shopping if I take the bus, and I'd sort of like to drive my car every couple of days anyway when it's cold out, to keep it happy. Anyway, I've called him again but there was no answer, and since it's his home number I didn't leave a nasty message, just emphasized that I've been unable to leave for 2 days, I need to be able to get out, I have to go to work etc. It's my week to drive, but I swapped a couple of days with one of my carpool buddies. I understand that it's not entirely my landlord's fault, but it is his responsibility to make sure stuff like this gets done.

I think that's all for now. I almost had to murder most of my period 3 class, they were just ass-ish and disrespectful, very tiring. My other grade 10s were great though, as usual. It's nice to have some sort of balance, and for the love of crap, we're more than half done 2nd term anyway. 8 more school days til vaca. sweetass.

Average Joe

I don't even watch this show, but I started watching tonight, and it's the season finale, and I find myself really wanting to know what happens. I really want her to pick the average joe guy, not the 'mid-season replacement' hot guy, Jason. The hot guy just doesn't seem as cool as the other guy. And, turns out, the average guy, Adam, who is pretty cute anyway, is also .... a millionaire. Yeah. So this Jason guy had better reveal some serious winning qualities, other than hotness.

wanted: new homepage

So, I've had my homepage set to msn, just because it has some useful and not so useful time-wasting stuff on it. The problem lies in when I want to go somewhere else right away, if I try to type in a new address, it keeps moving my cursor to the beginning of the line, so I get useful things like ger.cwww.blog, when all I really want to do is go to blogger. Or any other site. I don't know how it does it, but it's highly irritating. I had finally had enough of this foolishness today, so I changed my homepage to google. However, google puts the cursor automatically in the little search box, also stealing it away from where I want it to be.

Do any of you have any ideas on a good homepage that doesn't have any of these irritating qualities? I like to have some news, nothing too heavy, entertainment, interest pieces, that sort of thing. Is that too much to ask?

trapped!

So I decided to brave the storm, such as it is now, and do a little holiday shopping on my day off / snow day. Wrong. Although it looks like my driveway was plowed this morning, the asshole street plower guy has totally blocked me in. There is a 4x6' wall all around me. I'm not shovelling that crap, it would take me a year and a half. Supposedly the plow guy for here will come back, but who knows when that will be.

I have to do a little rant now.

This same thing happened at my apartment last winter. The only difference being that the plow guy just never came there. This angered my landlord to no end, but his rage didn't do much to clear the driveway, until he ended up just firing that guy and getting a snowblower, and the guy upstairs would do it. I don't understand these plowing contractors; they take on too many customers. Money hungry bastards. Yeah, maybe with this many you can handle it when we get 3" of snow. The thing is, I don't need you to plow when there are only 3" of snow on the ground. I need to you plow, in a reasonable amount of time, when there are TWO FEET of snow on the ground. Like today. If I had had to go to work this morning, I would have been screwed. One of the few joys of living in an apartment is that you get shit like this done for you. I'm not happy. I'm stuck. I thought I could at least go pick out new glasses today, but even that is a bit of a hike, so I'm just stuck. yarg.

On a much happier, and cooler note, Jenn was on the Sunday Night Sex Show last night! Very exciting!

I made myself a giant steak for lunch; this has brought me some joy on this otherwise sort of cruddy day. Snow days aren't much fun if you're completely trapped in your house. I lived in Alberta for a year and a half, 2 winters baby. We never had a snow day, but we did have 'cold days', where the temp was below -40*. That's cold. And that, my friend, is a NO-FUN day off. This is better than that, but only slightly. If it were earlier in the season, and / or we were spending Christmas at my parents' house, I could do some online shopping. I did that a couple of years ago, I sent everything to my folks' place; it was terrific. Zero hassle. I wasn't quite that on-the-ball this year though. I do have a good list now of what to buy people, so it's just a matter of getting out to shop now.

Poetic Voices December topic: Winter

In honour of it being officially winter, with all the snow, and in honour of the Poetic Voices topic, I'm posting a poem I wrote. enjoy!


smell of snow

Thick woolen hands pushed deep into pockets
seeking comfort in their seam-strained depths.
Grey twilight falls heavy and cold
swaddling all that it touches.
Winter fills my lungs like frozen cotton
and ghosts itself into the coming night.
Huddled down in a mound of fleece and flannel
I make my way into the speckled darkness.
There is nothing but the smell of snow
and the unmistakable sound underfoot.

phewf!

blogger wasn't working! all is right with the world again. Oh, and hey, it was snowing like hell here today! I took a picture out my window, after I got back from my adventure trek to Superstore. I had to go out, because otherwise I would have lost my mind. And I wanted to get masking tape so I could paint my bedroom. So I did, and I also got some other things, including 2 shovels. They're both plastic, and one is small with a telescoping handle, to keep in the car. Anyway, I made it there with little trouble, other than the lack of sidewalks. But the walk back, holy crap, I wasn't sure I was going to make it. It's normally about a 4 minute walk to Superstore, and I had to take several breaks on this walk back to catch my breath and turn my face out of the driving snow. It was crazy, mostly everything was closed, visibility was actually about 0.4KM, but felt like about 3 inches. I survived, but my pants were so snowy I left them at the bottom of the stairs in my apartment. The joys of living alone.

I spent the rest of the day making chili and doing basically nothing. The chili was good, especially considering I've never made it before. I have lots, so that's my lunch for this week. I had a nice day cuddling with the kitties, and got some very exciting news from my friend Calleen; she got engaged! Apparently it was all very romantic, tears were shed, so send her your happy thoughts. In other good news, Tiresa got a new kitty, and named her Lily. I don't have anything really exciting going on, so I'll just pass along for everyone else!

In completely unrelated news...one of my new fish is like, cleaning my algae eater. I think. He's either kissing or trying to eat him, I can't really be sure. Cletus, my algae eater, doesn't really seem to like it much. He's much bigger than this other fish though, so I won't worry. See what I mean about excitement in my life?

Francois

As I mentioned, I went to see Timeline with Jenn and 2 teacher friends from school the other night. Good story, cute boys, fair acting. Ethan Embry is in it, he's very cute, but doesn't have a big role, and I'm pretty sure his character is gay. Anyway, there is another character, Francois, who is cute in a very sweet, you want to pet him on the head sort of way. His character is, shall we say, unlucky, so I was sad. But then, I was watching ER, and he's on that! One of the new doctors. So I'm happy that this guy's acting career wasn't limited to 15 minutes, even though he's not a major character on ER.

That's about all my news. I went to Value Village tonight and bought a crapwhack of stuff to put together a still-life in my classroom. I got some really nice little glasses, vases, a teapot, and a few of those things you cook french onion soup in. The most fun find by far though, is a beer stein with "Kevin, you're an OK guy, love Jen" engraved on it. Can we pause here, to appreciate that? Hot damn. I laughed right out loud. I also got some cheap-ass fabric too, to set everything up on. Very exciting.

Nothing is new tonight, except ER. Why is that? Tomorrow is Friday, which is of course, a good thing.

best pork chops ever

I made the damn tastiest pork chops the other day. I have to share the recipe, even though I didn't make it up. I found it on allrecipes.com. I had bought a giant pork tenderloin on sale, and froze it for a rainy day. Said day came on the weekend, so I thawed the badboy out. I cut it into chops, because that way I could grill it and it was a little more manageable. Anyway, it made like 10 chops, I cooked 5. You might want to add more stuff to marinate if you're making dinner for like, an army.

Juice of 2 limes (juice 'em good, with a juicer or a fork), about 1/4 C of olive oil, 2tsp oregano, sliced garlic (I only used 3 cloves because I was cooking for Grant and he's not a *huge* garlic fan like me), and salt and pepper. I didn't plan on marinating, so I only had time to do them for about an hour, but that was enough because the flavours are so strong, and the meat was already really tender...being a tenderloin.

That's all, it was good so I thought I should share.

I did laundry tonight, it was pretty GD exciting. Or not. It is, in that now I have clean undies, and in that I got to read some more of Bill Bryson. I learned this evening that Jean Picard was a real astronomer, and presumably the inspiration for our beloved Jean-Luc's name. Interesting, no? The book is fascinating, so far just because it's making me realize how incredible it is that we're here at all. It also points out though, that there's a very good chance that there are other advanced civilizations out there. Cool. Go have a look around, I've enjoyed all the books I've read so far. I'm always surprised when I see him, I think of him very much looking like the man I did my student teaching with, because they have a very similar sense of humour. However, they don't look anything alike, of course.

Ok, off I go again. T-12 days until Grant comes home for good. T-12 school days until vay-cay. wooh!

you asked for it

well, one of you did anyway. hehe. I teach art, can you tell? I'm so freaking talented. LOOK at those pictures up there! I did those all by myself! in PAINT! lol. I did think about downloading nice ones off Google, but this is so much more fun.

Don't go see Timeline. Good story, poor acting. Cute boys though, so maybe do go, but definitely not on expensive night.

I have to go to bed now.

I'll stop soon

I know, for *not* making a big deal out of the list, I'm talking about it a lot. But I just had the brilliant idea to make it a blog, thus facilitating easy updates. Then I made it festive. I know not everyone loves the season as much as I do, but what can I say. I do. Go see!

You're lucky I don't do the same colour scheme for this page....hehe

What an interesting friend you have Marge. Let's hope something runs over her.

Jacques: Hello, ah, Homer.
Marge: No, no. That's the name of the ball.

Well, the good news is that I figured out why my online banking site wasn't letting me in, and it was an easy fix. Not as easy as deleting all my cookies and telling IE to allow all cookies, but fairly easy.
The bad news is that I had to talk to a guy who sounded EXACTLY like Jacques from the Simpsons where Homer gave Marge a bowling ball for her birthday. He was big on the pauses and accentuating unnecessary words in his sentences. I had to try very hard not to laugh, but it was also annoying because it was like, "ok.....now......click on tools .....beside..... favourites......do you see it?" And I'm like, "yep, ok....?" Then he would wait about 10 seconds and continue, "ok....... now .....down at the bottom......it says ....... 'internet options'.......click on that please......do you see it?" Since I'm not a total computer illiterate, it was a little frustrating. He could have just said, 'you have to allow session cookies'. That would have worked.

Anyway, it was good for a laugh.

updated list

I don't want to clutter the sidebar there with too many details for the Christmas list I've got going, that most of you probably don't really care about anyway...so I've added a link in it to a page that has things a bit better explained.
click

useful information

useful bit #1: Unless you're up for a fairly long and not terribly interesting evening, don't go see The Missing. Grant and I went, and it's not terrible, but it's not at all what I was expecting, which was more of a supernatural, suspense thriller type thing. I also found myself checking my watch several times and wishing I had checked to see how long it ran.

useful bit #2: Start taking your folic acid. My sister got a very handy, although somewhat unexpected, email from a male friend of hers, who is apparently quite concerned for the potential children of hers and those around her. She passed it along to me, again somewhat bewilderingly, with the info that 1/2 of all pregnancies are unplanned, and folic acid is most important before you may even be aware you're pregnant. So start taking your vitamins! I take orange-flavoured chewables every day that I can't find here so my mom gets them for me, and they happen to have 100% of my RDA for folic acid.

good to know.

love actually

I totally forgot to mention that I went to see Love Actually this past weekend. It was OUTSTANDING. Very funny, but not horribly predictable, and everything doesn't turn out exactly the way you think it should. It made me want to sing Christmas carols and cuddle. Go see it.

That's all.

I'm watching Survivor, and if John doesn't get kicked off this time, I'm not watching the rest of it. He's such a bastard; it's one thing to 'play the game', but he takes it too far. If I were one of the other players, I'd beat his ass hard when we got back to the states.

baby pics!

whee!

my mom's been scanning in my old baby pics, which are all on slides. This is especially fun, because I haven't even seen most of them.

and damn, I was cute.

Not much going on really, we're in week 4 of the 2nd term, which is just foolish. I'm pretty tired, I didn't have a very good sleep last night. I did hang some Christmas lights today though, which makes me very, very happy. I also bought some for my classroom. I already have Halloween lights up, which are orange and (they looked dark purple until they lit up) fuscia. I just got a white string to stick in the middle, so it should be festive. My students actually really like the lights, it's funny. Anyway though, I've been neglecting my kitties tonight, so I'm going to go have a cuddle, and then to bed.

ER update

If you haven't watched it yet, don't read this.

As usual, there was lots of stuff that went on that wasn't really integral to the show, so I'll probably forget some things. I also don't know all of the new residents' names.
Romano was trying to fire Pratt, and arranged a meeting with Weaver and Anspaw for after their shift (this is Thanksgiving day of course). Some other random stuff happens, they have this hot-shot VIP patient who they're choppering to a different hospital, and he forgets his watch, so somebody has to bring it up to the heli-pad. Neela said she would take it up, but didn't know how to get there. Romano was there but hesitated, and Frank made a comment about being afraid. Understandably, of course. So that gets Romano's goat, and he takes her up. He has horrible flashbacks, and while nothing bad happens, he heads downstairs really quickly and boots it outside for some fresh air. Once outside, he finds the new red-haired completely incompetent doctor SMOKING A JOINT made from pot he STOLE from a patient. He tells him to get the hell inside and wait there until he gets back. Back on the heli-pad, we see the helicopter behaving erratically, and it winds up hitting its propeller on the building, sending part of it into a nurse's back, sending the helicopter over the edge of the hospital, where it explodes midway down and then lands ON DR. ROMANO.

Let's take a moment.

That's just horrible. I don't think that was a good way to get rid of him at all; it's too cruel.

Nobody knew he was out there, so nobody knows where he is or that he's dead as of the end of the show, when they pull the copter off the ground and see a body. And while the whole awful thing is going on, that stupid red-haired doctor is just sitting at admin, because he's high, and that's what Dr. Romano told him to do. Why couldn't he have gotten crushed? Other things that happened....an HIV positive lady had a miscarriage and had to have a hystorectomy, which was very sad because she wanted to have children....Kovac almost got a patient killed because he snuck him up to another floor without permission and cuffed him to a post, so when the helicopter exploded he couldn't get free. He was ok though. Sam (the new nurse)'s son invited Kovac out to supper with them. I think that's about it. Oh yeah, and Carter is sleeping with some chick in the Congo.

In other news, I left the usb cable for my camera at school, so the pics of fishes and plant will have to wait.

farking telemarketers

the phone rings. It rang a while ago, and there was the telltale pause before anyone said anything, so I hung up. If you ever call me, and don't answer right away when I say hello, I will hang up on you. This time though, it took me a second to get a grip on the phone after I hit 'talk', so I heard someone answer as I was hanging up.

Telemarketer Beeotch (in barely comprehensible accent, natch): Hello, may I speak with Grant *** please?
Me (annoyed that I didn't hang up): No, he's not in.
T.B.: Is this someone in the household? (is that not a really, really stupid question?)
Me: Yes.
T.B.: Hello, this is some beeotch from MBNA Bank, and I'm just calling to inform you that upon approval, you will receive your Platinum MBNA Mastercard; I just need to verify that the information we have is accurate. Is your last name spelled (for anonymity's sake, since not everyone needs to know Grant's last name) J-O-N-E-S?
Me: No, that's not even my last name.
T.B.: Ok, and what is the correct spelling of your last name?
Me: I don't really think you need to know that, and I have no need for any more credit cards right now, thanks.
T.B.: Oh. When is a good time to call back and speak to Grant?
Me: He won't be in until later this evening, and what with him being a student, I can't see that he'll be too interested in a platinum Mastercard either.
T.B.: ...
Me: Ok thanks, bye!
T.B.: Ok...
Me: *click*

As if he had applied for a platinum Mastercard? And if he had, do you not think he would have spelled his own name correctly? They might have to check? Who are they trying to fool here? Having said that, Grant is terrible for not being able to get rid of telemarketers. I do feel bad for them to an extent, I know they're basically real people just doing a job, but I'm not going to apply for a credit card over the phone, and you're not going to fool me into thinking that I already did by saying you have to "verify the information". Get a grip.

wow

for anyone who watches ER....all I can say is WOW, because I know some people are only watching it in an hour. brace yourselves.

I'm going to take some pics of my new fishies and plant.

I grow good fish

and big'uns too.

I returned my 2 silver dollar fish to Pets Unlimited this evening. I'm a little sad to see them go, they're really neat fishes. However, they're also neurotic, and seem quite cramped in my 20gallon tank. The fish guy at Pets U. is in love with them, so that's good. We traded, he gave me some smaller pretty fish and a plant. He wanted to give me a whack of fish, but I don't have room for a lot; I like to not have to clean my aquarium much, so overcrowding is a bad idea.

anyway, I'm tired, I was at school until 10 last night and until after 5 tonight, which if I was working in town, I wouldn't mind so much. I'm going to have some supper and watch good tv.

New thing for the list...

buy me a subscription! it comes with a free gift and everything...

damn

I'm sleepy. alive, but sleepy. We showed SWAT tonight at school for a fundraisier. It was moderately successful, not overwhelming though. They had a real popcorn maker, but the stirrer thing broke so it didn't work all that well.

VIA rail called me, I have no idea why. I worked there like...2+ years ago. odd. I'll let you know. For now I have to go to bed.

domestic goddess

So I grossly under-described the events of yesterday. Jenn and I went to see In the Cut, as mentioned. It was hot. We then went to Sobey's 10 minutes before they closed and bought the makin's for salsa and guacomole, along with some Tostito's Scoops (some of which were alarmingly non-scoopy) and mini pitas. The salsa turned out pretty well, but it apparently needed cilantro. Had we checked recipes before we bought ingredients, we would have known this, but what fun would that have been? It was very mild, with a ratio of 1/2 a jalapeno pepper to 2 large tomatoes, onion, lime juice, and various green herbs I had on hand. But tasty. The guac wasn't as resounding a success, which was odd because we actually followed a recipe for it, thanks to Jenn who actually knew what went in guacomole. It was very limey and garlicy, and not so much avocado-ey, but again, still pretty good. I'm thinking it would be stellar with the hint o' lime Tostitos, which have more than a hint o' lime, but are darn tasty.

Jenn went home around 10, and I remembered that I had half a chicken in the fridge from last week. What to do? Make soup, of course. I put it, some potatoes and carrots in the crockpot with water and a couple of pouches of trusty yellow oxo, and went to bed. Gotta love the crockpot. I had soup for lunch, but hadn't gone in and taken the chicken off the bones, so it tasted like chicken but didn't have any actual meat. It wil tomorrow though, AND, I'm making cheese biscuits as we ... read. Inspired by my sister's roommate Katie. Adding grated cheese to biscuits makes them exponentially better. I'm a big fan as it is, so this is really good. I'm also a fan of making them with whole wheat flour instead of white.

Anyway, I don't know why, but I felt I should share that with you all. Life outside the kitchen is going pretty well; classes are decent, and I've figured out that we can indeed do photography in my 11/12 class, so I'm pretty excited.

Biscuits beckon.

gasp!

I'm just waiting for my crock pot o' chicken soup to heat up so I can turn it down and go to bed, and I realized that while watching In the Cut, which was very interesting, and pretty erotic, FYI...I had my cell phone on. I'm mortified; even though there were only 2 other people in the theatre (who Jenn and I are pretty sure were doin' it before we came in), it would have really sucked if my purse had started playing the Mexican Hat Dance during the movie.

Yes, my sister saw Mark Ruffalo first, and made me watch the movie You Can Count on Me, which was awesome. He's cute, even with the moustache, but looks much better without it. Don't go see In the Cut with your mom though, it'll most likely be uncomfortable for you both. It'll also destroy your image of Meg Ryan as a sweetie pie.

new beautiful song

Ben Folds, of course. This song should be in everyone's wedding, or proposal, or something. This has taken over the number one spot that John Mayer's Comfortable held on my *most beautiful, sincere sentiment ever expressed in a song* list.



I don't get many things
right the first time
in fact, I am told that a lot
now I know all the wrong turns —
the stumbles and falls brought me here

and where was I before the day
that I first saw your lovely face
now I see it everyday
and I know

that I am, I am
I am the luckiest

what if I'd been born
fifty years before you
in a house
on the street where you lived
maybe I'd be outside
as you passed on your bike,
would I know?

and in a wide sea of eyes
I see one pair that I recognize
and I know

that I am, I am
I am the luckiest

I love you more than I have
ever found a way to say to you

next door there's an old man
who lived into his nineties
and one day passed away in his sleep
and his wife, she stayed
for a couple of days and passed away

I'm sorry I know that's a
strange way to tell you
that I know we belong
that I know

that I am, I am
I am the luckiest

Ben Folds - The Luckiest

hottie

Paul Gross is adorable. His new show is pretty good too, it's called Slings and Arrows, and is about the backstage of a production company doing Hamlet. I just caught the last half while making eggs for breakfast, and liked it.

alcohol warnings

Cigarettes have warnings, so should alcohol. Here are some suggestions I got in an email forward...

WARNING: The consumption of alcohol may leave you wondering what the hell happened to your bra and panties.

WARNING: The consumption of alcohol may make you think you are whispering when you are not.

WARNING: The consumption of alcohol is a major factor in dancing like an asshole.

WARNING: The consumption of alcohol may cause you to tell your friends over and over again that you love them.

WARNING: The consumption of alcohol may cause you to think you can sing.

WARNING: The consumption of alcohol may lead you to believe that ex-lovers are really dying for you to telephone them at four in the morning.

WARNING: The consumption of alcohol may make you think you can logically converse with other members of the opposite sex without spitting.

WARNING: The consumption of alcohol is the leading cause of inexplicable rug burns on the forehead, knees, or lower back.

WARNING: The consumption of alcohol may create the illusion that you are tougher, smarter, faster, and better looking than most people.

WARNING: The consumption of alcohol may lead you to think people are laughing ..... WITH you.

WARNING: The consumption of alcohol may cause pregnancy.

WARNING: the crumpsumpten of alcahol may Mack you tink you can tipe real gode.

don't rent this

yeah, last time I was in Fredericton, we rented Hollywood Homicide. It was horrible, I fell asleep, it wasn't funny at all.

that is all.

have I mentioned I hate living alone?

see, I went and got used to having somebody here, even though it was only for like 4 days. *sigh*
I'm watching "Extreme Makeover", waiting for my (free) pay-per-view movie to come on, Bend it Like Beckham. I had bread for supper, and am planning on having popcorn with the movie.

I don't really have anything new to report, this week was pretty good, I'm a big fan of a day off in the middle, it really breaks up the week. I was on my way home today, and saw a huge pink sign saying "Piano Sale!". I thought maybe it was a sign, literally, so I stopped in. They have my perfect keyboard / digital piano, for the low low price of $1399. It's normally $1799, so really it's sort of a deal, but holy crap. They had another keyboard for $348, but it just wasn't nearly as good. As the guy said, it would get me playing again, but I'd be tired of it pretty quickly and wanting something better anyway. I'm holding out for Christmas. The best ones, as far as I can tell, are the Yamaha Clavinova, with this bad boy being the one I saw today.

I'll keep wishing! I realized today that I have to start some serious budget action, I'm not making any money. I know it'll get better when Grant moves back, but I should be able to manage on my own, and I'm not really doing very well. I'm not dying or anything, but I could be better. I've looked at what I'm wasting on, and cable is the first thing that comes to mind, but I don't think I can give that up living by myself. I have a bit more than I need, but because it's in this nifty bundle package, I'm getting like 30 extra chanels, including movies and specialty digital channels, for about $15. I could cancel those, but $15 isn't going to make that much difference in the next month. I might kibosh them when Grant gets home though, since I'll have somebody to entertain me.

Ok, Beckham awaits!

it's hard without the music...

what's old is new again

Hey there and hello.

A while back, the cd player was stolen out of my car. They were really nice about it, they locked the door behind themselves and didn't take any of the dozens of cds that were in the car, just the player. Asses. Anyway, they did actually steal one cd, that was in the player. It was my Ben Folds Live cd, that I had for about 4 days previous to the theft. Anyway, I tried downloading the songs, but because it was a live cd, they had to be the right versions, edited properly, and even when that was decently accomplished, my stupid burner program still puts a gap between all the songs, so it didn't flow properly. I sort of gave up and forgot about it, but recently caved and re-bought the cd. I'm glad I did. My favourite songs right now are Not the Same and Fred Jones pt2. I can't sing along with all of Ben's low notes, but I enjoy myself immensely anyway. You guys should go buy the cd.
That's a fun lyric site too, it has all the talking parts too, not just the singing.

I've updated the "buy me stuff" section for those of you looking to, well, buy me stuff. I realize this is a select group of my readership, but this is as good a place as any to post my Christmas list. Most of the things I want are unfortunately pricey; I'm not sure what to do about that.

I'm also looking (again) into getting my own domain name. I thought about using the octopus title, but it's a bit cumbersome. My other favourite line from that joke (and just a fun line in general) is "goats are best", and you can bet your ass that www.goatsarebest.com is available. It would be fun, for sure, but might it get old pretty quickly? I want something I'm not going to have to switch for a long time. Any thoughts? I don't really want my name in it, I'd like to keep some sense of anonymity.

I'm having a bit of a dilemma lately, and I don't think I'm alone. I love to eat meat. It's really tasty. But whenever I think about where said meat came from, I get sort of sad. Chickens I can handle, I think they have a fairly quick and humane ending, but as far as anything else, even fish, I'm just not so sure. I also have leather shoes and a jacket. What to do?

Too much thinking for one night, I'm done. Happy Thursday!

When celebrities attack!

You (and Bush) are likely too dumb for this

family time

My mom has been visiting me for the past week, and it's been really nice. Nice to see my mom, of course, nice to have somebody to bake bread and make spaghetti sauce with, nice to just have somebody with 2 legs home when I get home from work. (33 days until Grant finishes exams). Tomorrow she's off to Fredericton to spend a couple of days with Erin and then back home.

I'm still enjoying my new classes, the grade 10s are much more mature than my last bunch, which is a pleasant surprise since they're bigger groups. My 9s leave a little to be desired, but they are 14 year olds, so I can only have limited expectations.

I hung up the last of my witches/friendship balls. I had 3 up, and I had gotten 2 more for my birthday from Grant and one from Jenn. Anyway, I put them up and rearranged them, so I now have 3 in the giant window (which needed decoration but isn't in my direct line of sight most of the time) and 3 in one of the other big windows nearest the tv, so I see them all the time. I repotted my calla lily, Mom told me it was "pot bound", so hopefully it will be happier in its new, larger home. I also cleaned the fish tank yesterday. I've been very productive! I'm still looking for a home for my 2 silver dollar fish, which are much, much larger than silver dollars. They're a bit better now, maybe they were just having spells of mental instability....but they still get upset a lot of the time when I open the tank to feed them or anything.

Anyway, all this productivity has got me tired, and morning comes early, so off I go.

who loves you?

A neat thing from D, via Bernie.

In a survey of 4-8 year olds, kids shared their views on love.

Love is that first feeling you feel before all the bad stuff gets in the way.

When my grandmother got arthritis, she couldn't bend over and paint her toenails anymore. So my grandfather does it for her all the time, even when his hands got arthritis too. That's love.

When someone loves you, the way she says your name is different. You know that your name is safe in her mouth.

Love is when you tell a guy you like his shirt, then he wears it everyday.

Love is when a girl puts on perfume and a boy puts on shaving cologne and they go out and smell each other.

Love is when you go out to eat and give somebody most of your French Fries without making them give you any of theirs.

Love is what makes you smile when you're tired.

Love is when my mommy makes coffee for my daddy and she takes a sip before giving it to him, to make sure the taste is OK.

Love is what's in the room with you at Christmas if you stop opening presents for a minute and look around.

When you tell someone something bad about yourself and you're scared she won't love you anymore. But then you get surprised because not only does she still love you, she loves you even more.

Love is hugging. Love is kissing. Love is saying no.

Love comes from people's hearts, and God made hearts.

Love is like a little old woman and a little old man who are still friends even after they've know each other so well for so long.

wise beyond my teeth

I had my 2nd (and last) wisdom tooth out today. I ended up having a cavity too, in the neighbouring tooth, so it was really a fun evening for me. But that's what happens when you don't go to the dentist for 5 years. hehe. I tried to go before now, when I was in school and still had insurance, but I ended up having to get my appendix out on the day I was scheduled to have a cleaning. That's just bad luck. Now I'm just waiting for some feeling to return to the side of my head so I can eat something, I'm starvin marvin.

This week has been good, my new grade 10s are so *very* different from my last bunch. I could leave the room with this bunch and not be worried too much. We're starting researching/brainstorming for children's stories tomorrow, I think it's going to be fun for them.

Matrix was pretty good! MUCH better than the last one. There were also a fair number of funnies in this one, which was sort of nice. There were still some overdone fighting scenes, but the CGI wasn't nearly so apparent as in Reloaded. It was sort of left open at the end that they could possibly do another one, but everyone involved in the trilogy swears that this is it, there will be no more. We shall see. Jenn and I were aiming for the early show, but there were just entirely too many people, so we went to Reitman's and supper at A&W to pass the time until the show started. We came back at 9:20 for the 9:45 show, and the theatre was already packed. We got seats on the side about 6 rows back, sitting in front of 3 guys who were talking about "vids" and some Steve Madden game. One of them was cute, and not all the guys were geeky, it was interesting how many different sorts of people were there. Jenn saw guys dressed up in trench coats and stuff, I missed them but laughed anyway. I had to educate a guy in the popcorn line about the fact that it's cheaper to buy a large popcorn and pop ($8.48, with free chocolate bar) than it is to buy a medium popcorn and pop ($12.17, with twizzlers). Plus, there's the obvious benefit of free refills on the large, should you decide to entirely gorge yourself.

Ok, I need new cotton to chew on, and my face is still numb. boo.

buy me stuff

mmmm...Jamie Oliver has a new book out...

Some of my students can't read the time on my new clock. How sad is that? And they were grade 10s, because all the 9s went to work with their parents, so weren't in class to see the clock at all. I had an extra prep, it was sweet ass. Not as sweet-ass as if the day had been last term, when I had 2 grade 9 classes, or if I taught all grade 9s like some other teachers, but a nice break nonetheless.

Jenn and I are going to see The Matrix: Revolutions tonight. I didn't really like the 2nd one, but maybe this one will be better, and if not, at least I'll get popcorn out of it. I'll keep you posted, I'm leaving now.

tuesdays = new movies

I bought Finding Nemo today, I'm pretty excited. I want to watch it, but not really by myself, so I think I'll wait until my mom comes back next week and watch it with her. I had to work at getting the 'price match guarantee' from Blockbuster, but they did match Wal-Mart's price (which is $23.83, in case anyone is shopping around). I also got a bowl and a snack size sample of goldfish crackers for having reserved my copy at BB, so I feel pretty durn special.

Mom was up last night, after spending the weekend in Fredericton. She's off to Halifax for the rest of the week, and then back to hang out with me. Yay! We went out to East Side Mario's for supper and I had an absolutely delicious meal called something like linguini chicken amatriciana. It was good, whatever it was. I also remembered that 26 things started its new scavenger hunt on the 1st, so I printed off a copy of the things for myself and for mom, and copied and posted them around school a bit today. I've decided that this is a fine time to start a photography club at school, so we're supposedly having a meeting tomorrow at lunch. Should be interesting, I know most of the kids (shockingly) don't know how to make webpages, so I'll have to help out with that, or we could just display the pictures some other way. I'll see if I can't perhaps get some more Rogers email addresses and host some pages on there, make the pictures small enough to store a bunch on there. I'm excited.

What else. My new classes are going well, tomorrow is 'take your child to work' day, so I won't have many people in my grade 9 class, if any. Maybe I should bring Finding Nemo! ha. I wanted a clock and some markers while I was at Walmart, and was so excited to find that wall clocks for some reason are only like $3. I bought 2. I need one for the class because the kids are annoying always asking what time it is, and now (since the fire in garbage can incident) they have to sign in and out when they go to the bathroom or to get a drink, so they need to know what time it is for that too. I'll put the other one in the studio room, for my grade 12s. I've presented the 26 things as a challenge to them too, so we'll see if I can get some neat stuff.

OOOH, Elf starts Friday. My dad really wants to see it. That and Stuck On You. I told him I'd go with him, because Mom isn't so much a stupid comedy fan. I'm also excited for Love, Actually. It looks like a super, fun, cheer you up holiday movie.

I have to make new attendance sheets for the new classes, but other than that I'm feeling pretty good. I thought I might die last week and weekend, but I made it through. I'm not sure what I'll be doing next year, but I think it's a bit early in the game to be worrying about that. I miss English sometimes. I'm going to get my 10s to write and illustrate stories though, or at least re-tell and illustrate a story. I wanted to do it with the last group, but never got around to it. That's the one thing about the 4 term system, I get 4 tries to get my system down pat. I get to see what works and what doesn't, and then give it another go every 9 weeks.

I have a headache right now though, so attendance sheets can wait for a bit. The couch beckons.

as per your request..

The Power Point presentation...

not in Moncton

*sigh*

effing Grant was too busy, and since I'm busy as well, but have a car, I got to go up to Freddy for the weekend. It's ok though, cause Mom is up here too. Anyway, speaking of, we're heading out for breakfast now, so I'm off. Just wanted to let all my fans know what's going on in my continually fascinating life!

I have survived

thank heavens. I made it through all 3 rounds of p/t interviews, and not once was I personally attacked. Yay me. I got home in such a good mood today, around 4, that I decided to paint the bathroom. It's a lovely creamy yellow colour, and has really brightened the bathroom up quite a bit. The trim looks absolutely disgusting now, more a vile grey than anything resembling white, but we'll fix that up later. I'm hoping to get the bedroom done next, but will definitely need help to do the main apartment walls.

tomorrow I have my 2 PD sessions, which I'm looking forward to, and I think I know at least one person in each session, which is also nice. Grant is coming home again this weekend, and I have a whack of marking and filling in of bubble sheets to do, so there probably won't be much going on at all. I had toyed with the idea of celebrating Halloween in some way, but haven't come up with anything yet, and am too tired to at this point.

My bathroom looks terrific though. And the curtains even look better, since they're orange and yellow.

We had the 'how to use power point and email' session today, very useful. ha. After a brief hands-on tutorial, we were allowed to make our own presentation, on a topic of our choice. My teacher friend who was sitting beside me did her presentation on manatees, and it was freaking hilarious. She had a voice over and funny captions and everything. Mine was called "a few of my favourite things - getting to know your art teacher", and I had slides for my family, pets, and Vin Deisel and the Rock. It rocked. ha. I made each slide a different and horrible colour, with completely random animations and sound effects. I earned myself a certificate for my proficiency.

Good tv starts now, I'm off.

new linky link

This just showed up as my blogsnob link, and I thought maybe we'd like it. I'll keep an eye on it, and if it's a good read, add it to yonder sidebar of linky goodness.

and god damn

I'm tired. We had round 2 of parent teacher interviews, for 2.5 hours tonight. It went well, but added to the 2 hours we already did, and the 2 hours tomorrow afternoon, that's a damn lot of parent teacher time. I have to go to a PD on powerpoint tomorrow, did I mention that already? I'm thinking of bringing marking, but that would be sort of rude I think. *sigh*

anyway, I have to go to bed so that I don't collapse in the middle of lunch tomorrow.

hasta luego.

The end of the world?

funny from Jenn. Turn on your speakers, the voiceover is what makes the movie.

T-1 day

I can't believe it, but tomorrow is my last day with my 9s and 10s. And of course, the 10s were not being psychopaths today, we did a review and sort of relaxed, it was nice. Also, one of my grade 9 students may have lit a fire in a garbage can in the school, endangering the lives of students, staff, and the wee kiddies at the daycare that's run out of the school.

Good times.

Tomorrow we're having an assembly, so all of the classes will be shortened slightly. This gives me less time to test, but I don't want to kill them anyway so it's ok. I have to get that typed up though, and email it to myself so I can print it on the swanky laser printer at school.

That's about all my news, sadly. Check this out though. Somebody has way too much time on his hands...

oh, and also, the accused fire-starter is the same boy who put the frog in my pen cup. I'm disappointed.

actually rather depressing

that little tidbit there. I posted it for a funny, but a lot of teachers were like, wait a minute....

hehe

Speaking of not getting paid enough for what we do, tonight we drove 30 minutes out of the way to do parent teacher interviews for the rural folks whose kids go to my school. A nice gesture, sure, but I just got home 10 minutes ago. We have p/t interviews again Wednesday night at school and again Thursday afternoon. Thursday morning is to be spent in an in-school PD on how to use powerpoint and use email. I'm pretty bitter, especially considering that I did a powerpoint presentation in order to get my job. Also, I've had a computer since I was about 7, even if it was the super old-school one where you stuck the giant casette disks in the back of the keyboard part. Point being, clearly, I do not need any amount of tutoring in these matters, and could use my time much more effectively to finish up marking or something. But alas. Friday is also to be spent in PD, but this one is actually 5 minutes away from my house, not at school, and although it won't be useful for teaching art (because there is no such thing as art PD, as far as I can tell), I'm getting a course on digital photography (not useful for teaching because we don't have any cameras, let alone digi ones) and one on positive learning environment/making connections with kids, which should be generally useful. I don't have a problem making connections with kids, but I'm always looking for ways to improve, and there was nothing else worth taking.

Anyway, p/t tonight wasn't bad, I had 9 parents show up, which was more than I had bargained for, but most didn't stay long because either their kids are doing really well, or they're doing decent (no failers parents showed up), and either way, I only have the 9s and 10s for 2 more days, so it's a bit late in the game to be making any drastic changes. Nobody yelled at me or questioned my credentials, so I consider the evening a huge success. We had supper at the Irving Big Stop so I got to have breakfast, which was also a bonus.

Just saw an ad for ER, it looks exciting this week!

I'd like to have a party or something for Halloween, any ideas?

I have detention duty tomorrow, so I'm stuck at school til 5, and should be able to get most of my marking done. I'm not accepting projects after tomorrow (such a bitch, eh?) since I haven't assigned anything new for a week, we've just been catching up and doing textbook work. Tomorrow is review and then Wednesday is a test, so all I should have to mark is the tests. I should be able to finish those up without too much trouble and be able to have some fun this weekend, before jumping right in to 3 new classes on Monday. *sigh*. I've got things set to go a bit better though, I'm giving a more detailed outline with the class supply requirements on it, those being class fee, pencils, a pen, eraser, notbook, and sketchbook. I was feeling all bad making them pay their fees, giving them pencils etc, but that's not the way it's been done before, so I'm going to follow this one thing in the old art teacher's footsteps. I'm also going to make them bring in 2 pieces of bristol board (2/$1 at dollarama) to make a portfolio they can bring home with them. The fee for 9s and 10s is only $10, which doesn't cover much, and gets them all the supplies beyond what was mentioned above, which is a lot of stuff. I also found a 'classroom expectations' sheet that he had the students sign, I'm doing that one over as well. It has really clearly spelled out consequences, what's ok and what's not, which is exactly the same things I've been telling my students, but this one they have to read and sign and give back, so there's no pleading ignorance later.

Anyway, I had planned on a really quick hello and then to bed, and this went long and now I'm sucked in to CSI: Miami, so I'll go watch that in my jammies.

a bientot.

Teachers get paid too much....

I'm fed up with teachers and their hefty salary guides. What we need here is a little perspective. If I had my way, I'd pay these teachers myself...I'd pay them babysitting wages.

That's right...instead of paying these out-rageous taxes, I'd give them $3.00 an hour out of my own pocket. And, I'm only going to pay them for five hours, not coffee breaks. That would be $15.00 a day. Each parent should pay $15.00 a day for these teachers to babysit their children. Even if they have more than one child, it's still cheaper than private daycare.

Now how many children do they teach a day - maybe twenty-five? That's $15.00 X 25 = $375.00 a day.

But remember, they only work 190 days a year! I'm not going to pay them for all those vacations.

$375 X 190 = $71,250. (Just a minute, I think my calculator needs batteries.)

I know you teachers will say what about those who have ten years of experience and a master's degree? Well, maybe (just to be fair) they could get the minimum wage, and instead of just babysitting, they could read the kids a story. We can round that off to about $5.00 an hour, times five hours, times twenty-five children. $5.00 X 5 X 25.

That's $625 a day times 190 days. That's $118, 750.

HUH???? Wait a minute. Let's get a little perspective here.

Babysitting wages are too good for those teachers. Did anyone see a salary guide around here???!

finally

it's Friday. I'm tired, and I'm not having fun with most of my classes right now. They're just lazy shits, and I found out today that one of my grade 11 students FAILED GRADE 10 ART last year. Somehow he is allowed to take art this year? I don't think so. I'm going to find out if this is true, and if it's a pre-requisite, someone is going to catch hell for letting him in. I didn't think to check on that, I thought they would enforce pre-requisites. If art 10 is not a pre-req for 11, I'm going to lobby hard core that it be made so, because this is rediculous. They fail art, or do very poorly, but are allowed to continue on, and sit and do nothing. This particular student is not passing right now, we'll see what happens.

on a lighter note, Grant is supposedly on his way here, although as usual he didn't call to let me know what's going on. I brought the 'ways to maintain healthy insanity' and a really funny thing about how teachers get paid too much, into school today and posted them in the mail room, which gave everyone some giggles. I think Friday Funnies are a great idea, I'm going to try to do that from now on, so if you have any general funnies, or teacher-specific funnies, send 'em my way. They have to be relatively clean, sadly, because the SRC kids have a mailbox in there too.

I'm pretty tired. I'm going bowling tomorrow night with the staff from school. I'm a miserable bowler, but there's a bar there so it should be a good time. I'm going to try to convince Grant to come with, but I'm not holding out a lot of hope, because he's rediculously busy, what with the 7 courses and all.

one final happy note, today it did NOT rain during lunch, first day all week. Also, this weekend is time change weekend, fall back, so it won't be pitch black when I get up in the morning! For a couple of weeks....

beefalo?

yeah, I was out with Jenn the other day, on our way to a movie, and we ate at a new place called Billy Rockets. It's just new, Moncton is the first place to have it. Anyway, their signage drew my attention, they had advertised a buffalo steak souvlaki. Now, I wasn't too sure about that, since chicken or pork is the norm for souvlaki, but I was intrigued by the buffalo steak bit. I inquire, and as I do I see the sign, that they use only buffalo meat, no beef. Interesting. I had a burger, and it tasted...like a burger. It was actually really good, it had bacon and bbq sauce and ranch dressing on it, so honestly, the meat could have tasted like anything and it would have been good....no, I joke, I tried a bit of the plain meat sticking out, and it was just beefy. AND, it has like 1/3 the fat of CHICKEN. Its slogan is 'the way beef should taste'. The buffalo meat people, not the restaurant. AND, they get their meat from a local farm, so it's a win-win. Not for the buffalo, but let's not get into that.

pardon me while I try to find you a link....

here you go. I found one that was called "buffalomeatfacts.com" but wasn't as informative, for some inexplicable reason.

Ok, I got thinking about that because Tiresa was telling me how she made shepherd's pie with ground chicken, and it was quite tasty.

On another unrelated note, I spent my prep period today walking around the school with a box of cookies, and giving them away to anyone I came across. People *love* free cookies, I'll tell ya! It was a very relaxing and fun way to spend an hour, which yes, I should have spent doing something productive, but I've been doing entirely too much of that lately, and I needed a break.

I have to go eat supper now!

a sampling of messages I got this afternoon in my junk mail folder

sender - subject (all spelling is as was)
we...can.. - show..you How..to Get..Free Paysite..Porn
vbpbvpbvpbvpbvpvb@yahoo... - Make An Onine Friend! (yeah, onine?)
Roman - Moises Men Get Huge Guaranteed without...
Beatriz - Williams this seminar was amazing ... (am I the only one who gets junk addressed to specific people, clearly *not* me?)
enhancement - for your member
Martina - Moore feel so much better since I attended the...
Allen - Orion Get Large Males Safely seemed... (what the HELL does that mean??)
fMccoy carrie - Alvarez Are you a 5 minute man? M co... (Alvarez???)
indoubtabout - yourmanlysize ( I think that one's my favourite)

What the hell? Who sends these things? I get SO many more junk mails lately, within the past month or so, then I ever got before. I get like 40 a day, which isn't much compared to some, but is tonnes compared to what I used to get, about 5 a day. Very odd.

rain rain, go away

it's cold, and it's rainy, and I have outside duty this week, and it sucks.

my lunch today was delicious though. it's a toss up between chicken and pizza for supper.

I have to stop wasting time playing on the internet and finish marking projects and get the marks on the freaking computer.

mmmmmm

I made the tastiest supper. I made a pizza with no sauce, bruschetta topping tomatoes, loads of mozza cheese, and cream cheese in the crust. I also have lots for lunches, or supper. I'm also cooking a chicken and made some carrots and parsnips to go with, also for lunches. I'm on duty this week, so the quicker the better at lunch time.

the chicken beckons, but I wanted to share that with you all.

6 more days left in this term

how the hell did that happen? I have 6 more days with my grades 9 and 10, who make up 75% of my students. They take 4 specialties, so each one only lasts 1/4 of the year. I have some stuff still to do with them, my 9s need a lesson on perspective, and my 10s have to finish making masks and do carving, and everybody needs some more textbook work. Of course. haha. On the upside though, the year is 1/4 finished. Isn't that insane? I'm also looking forward to having a new group in, because I've learned what to do/not to do with this bunch so I get to try new things now.

I had a couple of students get mad at me today because I docked them big marks for plagiarism. They're like, but I didn't plagiarise the whole thing! and You knew it was from the book, what was I supposed to do? Um, get info and put it in your own words perhaps? Or, maybe, cite your sources? Just a thought. Beeotches.

Things are basically going well though.

I was up to Fredericton this weekend to spend some time with my honey. All non-honey time was spent marking art projects, then I came home fairly early Sunday to do more of the same. Good times. Jenn and I went to Walmart to buy underbed storage thingies, which I think I'll get as well, and to see the movie The Rundown with Dwayne Johnson (a.k.a. The Rock, but as Jenn put it, "can you smell what Dwayne Johnson is cooking?!" just doesn't have the same ring to it.). Anyway, he's a hottie, I do believe. My dear Vin Diesel has some competition for the favourite hottie spot. I like The Rock because he doesn't seem to take himself as seriously as Vin does. Of course, never having met either of them, it's tough to say. I'd take either, really.

Anyway, my hands are cold from typing and the kitties need some lovin', so I'm off. a bientot.

and you thought your job sucked...

6 jobs you should be glad you're not doing

belated bday gifts!

I forgot to mention, I got my Blue Planet dvd in the mail on Friday! I'm going to watch it tonight, I'm so excited. It has polar bears in it!

hugs to Jenn.

I also forgot to tell you about my exciting outlet shopping trip. I got a denim skirt, cords, dark denim capris (boot cut, how does one boot cut something that doesn't go over boots?) from Gap, and 3 tank tops from Old Navy. The rest was a bit of an expensive disappointment, I regret to inform you. They did have a Lindt outlet though, which I miraculously restrained myself from entering. Ok, I forgot, and we went home. Still, I didn't go in, that should count for something.

here come the visuals

and the story, of course. where to begin?

well, I left here about 5pm on Friday, and trucked up to Fredericton to meet Erin and Ryan for the drive. We took my car, since otherwise we would have only been able to bring Ryan's golf clubs. We ended up leaving a bit later than we had planned, around 9, because we had to get some supper and snacks before we could head out. We stopped in Bangor for the night, since between the crazy drivers and the moose on the road, driving after midnight didn't seem like a very safe plan.

We left again in the morning and continued on to North Conway, seeing lots of this sort of thing along the way. Once we arrived, I snapped some more pics of leaves, since that's what I was surrounded by. Very beautiful, as has been said before, but honestly, not better than the views we get around here. Sure, the mountains helped, but the foliage itself was on par.

Sunday we went horseback riding, and I was able to get some lovely pictures along the way, despite the best efforts of my horse, Moe. I'm fairly sure he didn't like me, he kept walking as close as possible to the trees in an effort to brush me off. I think. He also tried to pick fights with the horse in front of me. He'd get really close to him and then I'd reign him back, to which he'd shake his head back and forth, slow down a bit, and then speed up again. He almost got pooped on, but that was no deterrent. The only thing that smartened him up, and scared the crap out of me, was when Cochese turned around and bared his teeth at my horse. No real fight, but there was definite possiblilty. Anyway, at some point my camera got switched off the action man setting, so I ended up getting a lot of shots like this. I blame Moe, he wouldn't hold still at all. It was a good time though, very relaxing. My ass is a bit sore, but I think it was worth it. They wouldn't let me ride this guy because we were all beginners. I was sort of bitter. He was a beauty, big big horse. My cousin and I have decided we're going to buy a horse. Somehow.

We ate out at a fun seafood place on Saturday night, and I ate the better part of my meal before noticing this monstrosity behind me. It's made out of lobster shells, and I think it's super creepy. I moved it so it was looking at Erin instead of me, which was better. I had very tasty, very thick clam chowder, with oyster crackers. Mom said she's going to bring me some of those, because I can't find them here.

A couple of random pictures for you. The 2nd one is from the Olive Garden parking lot. I thought it said "GLMR", but upon closer inspection, it may say "CLMR", which has a different spin I guess. We stopped at Olive Garden for lunch on the way back, and had slow service but delicious food. I so wish they'd build one closer to us here.

Not much else to report really, got to see the family, which is always nice, ate good food, which is great too. Slept on a hideabed, not so much fun there. Tried Smirnoff twisters, which of course are malt beverages and not vodka beverages in the US, but still remarkably tasty. I had orange, raspberry, and cranberry to go with the turkey. I wanted very much to stop at duty free and get myself some booze, and some for Grant's mom, but we went a different way over the border, and the duty free shop is a gas station, and is not labelled as the duty free shop, so we missed it. yarg.

I'm really tired now, I've updated this page and my family's page and cropped and resized a bunch of pictures, so I'm going to eat and nap a bit. a bientot.

How To Keep A Healthy Level Of Insanity

1. At lunch time, sit in your parked car with sunglasses on and point a hair dryer at passing cars. See if they slow down.

2. Page yourself over the intercom. Don't disguise your voice.

3. Every time someone asks you to do something, ask if they want fries with that.

4. Put your garbage can on your desk and label it "in"

5. Start putting decaf in the coffee maker. Keep this up for 3 weeks. Once everyone has got over their caffeine addictions, switch to espresso.

6. In the memo field of all your checks, write "for sexual favors".

7. Finish all your sentences with "in accordance with the prophecy."

8. Don't use any punctuation marks

9. As often as possible, skip rather than walk.

10. Ask people what sex they are. Laugh hysterically after they answer.

11. Specify that your drive-through order is "to go".

12. Sing along at the opera.

13. Go to a poetry recital and ask why the poems don't rhyme.

14. Put mosquito netting around your work area. Play a tape of jungle sounds all day.

15. Five days in advance, tell your friends you can't attend their party because you're not in the mood.

16. Have your coworkers address you by your nicknames, TootsCorn, Peaches, Queen, Goddess of Sex, Heir Royal Majesty, Dr. Moon, ....

17. When the money comes out of the ATM, scream "I won!", "I won!" "3rd time this week!!!!!"

18. When leaving the zoo, start running towards the parking lot, yelling "run for your lives, they're loose!!"

19. Tell your partner over dinner. "due to the economy, I am going to have to let you go."


And ! the final way to keep a healthy level of insanity.......


20. Send this e-mail to everyone in your address book, even if they asked you not to send them stuff like this.

um, yeah, go pope..

just go, in case you hadn't heard this already, it'll give you something else to stew about.

home again home again

well, I made it back alive, which is pretty good. I had a nice time with the family in NH, very scenic place, lots of leaf peepers out and about slowing down the rest of us, but for a good cause I suppose. Anyway, I'll tell you all about my adventures with the outlet mall and Moe and Cochese tomorrow, because right now I have to go to bed in my bed which is more than 2 inches thick and not resting on metal rods, thank the lord. Who knew hideabeds were so uncomfortable?

god DAMN, another one of my fish died. They always die when I go away. rrrg.

happy turkey day

in Canada anyway. I don't see how I'll be posting much until I get back Monday night, so until then, have a great weekend and don't eat too much turkey. Or do, whichever.

a bientot.

T-1 day

It's almost the weekend. Thank god. It's a long one too, and I'm so happy. I'm not thrilled at the idea of not spending it with Grant, but he's coming home tonight so I'll get to see him before I go tomorrow. Not much to report here I'm afraid, I got my progress reports finished but still have a pile of marking to get through, which is pretty exciting. I'm going to cook myself some supper sort of early tonight so that I can just sit and work until good tv starts. I may have to watch Survivor tonight though, somebody nearly drowns or soemthing. I'm sure it's actually nothing like that really, but they've got me intrigued. I haven't watched it yet though, so I don't know the people at all. I have no idea what's happening on Friends this week, but ER looks excitng, as usual.

I had to give my 11/12 class today a lesson on cleaning up, since it took me half an hour to clean up after them yesterday. I didn't even clean their garbage, I left that for them since they were back first thing this morning, but I did have to clean the paint pallettes and brushes. They did better today, under threats of never getting to paint again. Lazy bums.

so glad tomorrow's Friday.

new music..

I forgot to tell you. I haven't had a chance to listen to Jack Johnson yet, but the rest of my new cds are terrific, and I'm expecting no less from Jack. John Mayer took once through before I really liked it, but I think that's just because I was so used to his other songs, and couldn't sing along to these ones yet.
Anyway, go buy them.

Tuscany

I want to go to Italy. I saw Under the Tuscan Sun, and today there was a travel brochure in the staff room. I want to go! Anywhere, honestly, but Italy looks lovely. Everyone wears linen and speaks with a beautiful accent, and the food and drink look wonderful.

*sigh*

new comments

BlogBack has comments, and since KlinkFamily hasn't been working for a few days now, I'm moving on! Hopefully this guy is a bit more reliable. Sorry this is so short, I have a tonne of stuff to do, progress reports to write up and things to mark. Good times!

new pictures

I'll try to change them up every now and then. I have a variety of media up there too, you like? Chalk pastel, pastel, photograph, collage, and pencil.

On a completely unrelated note, but it's ok because I'm tired, Dare Simple Pleasures cookies are freaking delicious. I've got sugar cookies and almond cookies, and they're so damn tasty. They also make lemon and chocolate, I'll have to get those next time.

It's getting late, I'm driving this week so I have to get up a bit earlier, hence to bed a bit earlier too. I don't know if I'll make it to East Side this week, sadly. We have to put these progress report things out for all of our students, which is a hassle and a half. I'm not giving marks, because we're doing report cards in a few weeks and it'll be too much work. We have to send a report home Friday for each of our students, letting their parents know how they're doing. Good times. Then we have parent teacher interviews, *then* we give report cards. What? yeah.

Bedtime!

why do you lie?

do you think I'm stupid? I'm not.

Everything my students do goes in their portfolios. Big ol' folders. They know this. I marked my grade 9 portfolios and found that some were missing a lot of stuff, so I told them they need to get their stuff in there so I can mark it. Fine. A few days later, yesterday, one of the girls missing stuff in her folder comes up to me and asks if I got her project. I said no, I didn't check your folder again, is it there? No, she says, I put it on your desk. Now, my desk is not the tidiest thing, but it's in pretty good shape, not very cluttered, and I know what's there and what's not. Her project was not. I said, well, I don't know what to tell you, unless someone came along and swiped it immediately after you put it down, then it has very mysteriously gone missing. I have not seen it. And you know you put everything in your folders, I have been stressing that since day one. She said well what do you want me to do, redo it? I said well it's awfully hard for me to mark something I haven't seen! I left it at that.

Today, I walk by her table, and she's working on this same project. I say hey, you found your project. Interesting. She said oh no, I redid it. I took a piece of paper yesterday and redid it last night. I said really? With the same picture as before? That you said was too difficult and regretted choosing? That's sort of odd, isn't it? She didn't really have an answer for me. I didn't push it, but I will talk to her tomorrow, because the more I think about it the more angry I get that she blatantly lied to me. I just want to let her know that it's very clear she's lying; she wouldn't have chosen that picture again given a choice, and there was no paper out for her to take. So even if she's telling the truth, she got paper from somewhere she wasn't supposed to be. rrg. I assume what she was hoping for was that I would feel so bad for having supposedly lost her project that I would just let it go. But I know I didn't ever have her project, so I'm not going to fall into that trap. Anyway, so then it's easier for her to finish the one she started than do a whole new one. I'm really bitter! I can't outright PROVE that she's lying, but she is, so what do I do?

Teachers of the blogging world, please advise!

Punk'd

I have to say, I think Punk'd is really funny. It's great to see famous people look like asses. I also have to say, having just seen Mandy Moore get punked, she seems like a really sweet person. They did a trick on her where she thought they were making over somebody's house (double wide trailer, in fact), but then they dropped an I-beam on it and it collapsed. They then told her that she had given the crane guy the signal to drop the beam, so it was all her fault. The part that impressed me though, was that they're in this fake house, and it's just terrible, but she was being really nice about it, doing a really good job of looking like it was normal that they didn't, for example, have a towel rack, or that there was actually a seam down the middle of the trailer, or that he bought the thing on the internet.

Anyway, I finished my marking of projects, the cats were helping by laying on the projects and chewing on my pencil. I'm going to get back to it though, start on the critiques and artist studies. wish me luck!

one MILLION DOLLARS!

I feel the need to express my disappointment in the Trading Spaces 100 Grand episode. As I had feared, it was just a matter of them wasting $50 000 each. Doug did better than Lori, she spent just obscene amounts of money on stupid things that they people probably won't even appreciate. Her first purchase was a chair for $2300. A chair. Not an antique, not a comfy chair, just a stupid chair. And I'm sure people will disagree with me here, but my feeling is that you don't have to buy something just because you can afford it. Jenn agreed with me that they could have created very similar looks with their normal budget. Doug couldn't have, because he bought them all new appliances for the kitchen, but it just was sort of a letdown. Sony gave both homeowners new stuff, a tv and surround sound system for one, and a new computer and tv for the other I believe. I'm jealous, but it was sort of frustrating to see that amount of money spent on making over a room, and not knocking out walls or installing giant aquariums or anything cool like that. Cause that's what I would have done, obviously. A huge aquarium, built in to the wall.

I had a decent day at work today; it was International Teachers' Day, so we all got apples in our mailboxes from the district. I thought that was nice, I love presents, especially the unexpected ones. I had to bring a bunch of marking home. I haven't done any for my grade 11/12 class, and I have a bunch of critiques I have to go over. I see popcorn and hot chocolate in my future, but I'll have to mark the art before the popcorn so I don't get anything greasy. I've gotten some really really really nice stuff from my students, I'll post some pictures whenever I get around to it.

For now though, I'm going to make some supper and hit the marking. Mort just came over and sat on my arms, I'll take that as a sign that I should stop typing now.

any other requests?

as per Jenn's request, an only slightly goofy looking vampire smiley guy. . Not bad, he looks sort of vicious.

I got some pins so I can hem my curtains, but have decided that I really don't want to do that right now. Or ever, but I'll have to soon because they're hanging over heaters that I want to use, which is why I need to hem them in the first place.

There's some big do across the street at the fire hall, it's an open house and they had a pancake breakfast. They've been running the sirens off and on all day though, and it's getting a bit wearisome. I'm fairly sure they're packing it in now though, so I'll have a bit of peace before I head up to see Grant.

I bought myself some new music for the drive, Future Shop had a bunch of cds on sale, so as promised a few posts back, I bought them. They were all under $15, I got Jack Johnson (I know Erin has it), Sloan, John Mayer (who I'm ashamed to say I didn't even know had a new album out), and Train, because I've been wanting that one for a while. I haven't bought cds for some time, so I don't feel too too bad. I do feel a bit bad though, because I got paid yesterday and didn't see a red cent of it. The beginning of the month brings all kinds of people to my door asking for money....rent, car, insurance, power...cable and phone will arrive shortly, followed quickly by mastercard. Bastards.

I'm going to go have a bite to eat before I head up to Freddy. Did I mention my wisdom tooth is coming in? I can feel it now, it's gross but sort of cool at the same time, I haven't had a new tooth since I was like 12. At any rate, it'll have to be removed because there's no bottom wisdom tooth to meet it and stop it from growing. It's also on a bit of an angle, which would be really cute, I'm sure. I had my other one out (I only ever developed the top 2, not the bottom, and I'm very thankful for that) and it was no trouble. The only problem was that I couldn't take the Tylenol 3s they gave me, they make me ill, so advil had to do me, but I managed. I have baby anbesol or orajel or something now, so I'm all set. It's grape flavoured.

beefcake.....beefCAKE!

My parents got this slide/negative scanner jobbie, and it's pretty fun. Not especially quick, and especially ram-sucking, but it does work and I'm happy because all of my baby pictures are on slides. So Mom's going through them, and has sent me 2 so far, which I've cleaned up and brightened a bit, and uploaded for your viewing / mocking pleasure. Here is me when I was very little, and sad apparently. Here's a beefcake picture of my dad when he was younger. Nice sideburns eh?

It's the weekend, and thank gad for that. I'm pretty tired. It's really cold here! Especially relative to the temperature it has been lately. It's like all of a sudden it's mid-fall, which is fine, but some transition weather would have been nice. The pumpkins are out at Superstore, I think I'll pick up a couple for my classroom, just for fun. Grant's not coming down this weekend, I'm going to head up tomorrow afternoon for the night. He's not going to be able to come to NH with us, so if I don't see him this weekend it'll be 3 weeks by the time I see him next. No good.

I had a nap for a bit with the cats on the floor when I got home from school today. We have a huge (94") window at one end of the apartment, right when you come in. The kitties were lying there in a big ol' pool of sunshine, looking really comfy and warm, and it was quite cold out, as I mentioned. I just sat down with them for a minute to say hello, but the sun felt so nice that I ended up lying down myself and dozing off. I woke up to find the sun had moved off of me and on to the futon, so I followed suit and snoozed there for a bit longer. The cats thought that was great, they're used to me coming home and plonking down in front of the computer every day. I had one cat lying on my back, and the other on my legs. Good times.

I think I'm going to have myself a khalua and milk and go to bed. I made myself a late but delicious supper tonight, scallops and a creamy bacon carbonara sidekick. Quite tasty. I made too much though, so I'll have gourmet lunch tomorrow. I'm definitely sleeping in, and I may have to put the heat on in the bedroom. Seriously, it's cold here. And I have nobody to cuddle with. (insert crying emoticon here). Ha, speaking of, I spend a good chunk of my evening making new smileys for messenger. I'm such a loser. Check 'em out though!



The crazy looking one is from Calleen, I'm not sure where she found it. The rest are from me, and they're all saveable if you'd like to use them. The last one is intentionally blank, in case you're like me and want to make your own. I'm a geek, what can I say. I love getting pictures and fixing them up, cleaning up scratches and stuff. I could have worse hobbies for sure, so I figure I'm ok. I have to go now though, 11:58 on a Friday night and I'm posting about making my own emoticons. sad!