Thirsty Thursday

I got home tonight after an hour and a half IEP meeting and just had to have a drink. Instead of reaching for the liquor cabinet I decided to go for a near beer my roommate has stashed in the fridge. YEKK! That stuff is pretty nasty. At least by having a real beer you can hope for a buzz if you have an empty stomach.

So I decided to mix up some of the good stuff and sit on the porch for a while. Beautiful day - close to 30 degrees F. I looked back on the year that I've had so far. It's been a good, nay great year. This has been a perfect experience for me to begin my teaching semi-career. As I knew before going into this year, and really even throughout my college years, I am not going to be teaching my entire professional life. I want to do some other things. I want to see different things and I really think too many years at one profession would burn me out big time. I don't want that. I want to stay fresh. But, back to this year. It's interesting how this is the first year I have really watched TV sitcoms. It seems like on most sitcoms there is a certain theme that the entire episode follows with multiple story lines. For instance tonight on the office it was "Feuds with Superiors". Jim was reprimanded by Ryan. Stanley got into it with Michael. And Andy was skeezed by Dwight. Well it's like that here. The weather started so shatty at the beginning of the year, like most of my 5th graders. After making some changes the behavior improved. Similarly, I decided I wasn't going to sit inside anymore even though it was -25 F and enjoyed the weather. It started warming up and around the same time kids were really improving their behavior. Then, it got cold again, and wouldn't you guess it the behavior slipped. I don't think the behavior is directly related to the weather, but I think there are certain reasons it slips that may be domino-like related events. For instance, it's too cold to go outside for recess so students stay in and can't release their energy. Also with the days getting longer, students are able to be out more at night which sometimes leads to them getting no sleep and the behavior once again slipping. Maybe I'm just looking into it too much. It was a great day though.

Speaking of beautiful days, Sunday I went up on the Tundra for a nice long hike. Much to my surprise I found berries. I have heard so much about berry picking, I just started bouncing up and down on the tundra. Without really thinking about the possibility of being poisonous, I just went down on my knees and started crawling like a homeless man without his glasses scrounging for food. They were incredible. After gorging for a while, I figured I'd either get sick from eating too many or get really sick from eating poison. So I continued my hike. The only problem was there was a creek between me and home. After almost going through a few times I decided I had to go down a ways to find a better place to cross. There I found a dog scrounging on the other side of the stream. I tried calling him over to check the stability of the ice, but he wasn't budging. I was pretty annoyed with myself for not buying the doggie treats that were on sale at the AC Store earlier in the day. (I would have but I think something happened to my pal "Mallie" the big Malamute that kept me company on my walk to and from school each day... haven't seen him for a while) I finally got him to come about halfway across and he didn't fall through so I decided to make a run for it. Just a bit wet.

That's about it til Sunday. Big update coming ya'll's way. And I checked about that answer ma, you were wrong, but thanks for the attempt. In case you are wondering, the people up here refer to themselves as "Natives".

Intriguing I know.