I'm about to have pepperoni pizza ...............besides the doughnuts I had this morning, I'm about to devour a pizza or at least  4 pieces.

 I bought a dozen of Krispy Kremes dougnuts this morning after my 2 hour cardio workout while waiting to pick up B's mail............ So far I've only eaten 3 doughnuts, but that's going to change now that I'm drunk and hungry.

Just want some opinions. I teach Grade 6 and I need some opinions on my next Language unit.

Background: Just finished an "essay" connected to a novel study about bullying.


Option 1: start new novel study (Hoot), connect it with Biodiversity in Science. Writing focus will be persuasive essays. Novel study will continue into the new year so they'll have a 2 week break from the book.

Option 2: short story unit. Explore all elements of short stories. Writing focus will be developing ideas and writing their own short fictional narrative. Unit will be finished by the Christmas Break. Start novel study in January and have it go continuously.


I'm leaning more towards the short story unit so I can do the novel in January in it's entirety and start persuasive writing when we get back in January. Also since we just did an entire novel maybe a break with short stories.

The thing is, this job might end in the end of January and I REALLY REALLY REALLY want to do Hoot as a novel study but I think I shouldn't plan for what I want to do but rather plan for my students.

Just curious about other's thoughts, although writing this has really heplped me make up my mind.

After Halloween costume clearout sale as well as other sale items like this great cute skulls underbust corset:



At our etsy shop HERE

Went to a dance last night... I had something totally unexpected happen. There is a beautiful young Asian woman who is a FANTASTIC dancer. She's dating the local rockstar~ The best male competitor in the area. Anyhoo, she was sitting out a dance and I asked her. We had a lovely dance...nothing exceptional, just very nice and sweet. I pride myself on the smoothness of my dancing and my gentleness to my partners. Afterwards, she gave me a HUGE hug and thanked me profusely for the dance. I was blown away.

I had a very good time dancing, got in some lovely dances, and best of all, didn't have an upset stomach for the first time in I can't remember.

I thought I'd tempt fate and for breakfast, have some granola bars I'd bought as a healthy Halloween treat for my )non-existant) trick-or-treaters. BAD IDEA. The tummy pain and bloating is back. The gluten intolerance seems more and more likely a culprit.

Ok teachers,

I'm having a brain fart. I read a book the other day and one character was Frank N. Stein. Clearly a play on words for Frankenstein. What is this called when someone does this, ie: has a character named Frank N. Stein who is Frankenstein?

I frist thought pun but don't think that's right. I tried to explain it to the class but didn't know how to label it.

Thanks :)

Hey all!

I'm studying here in Paris for the semester, and next week my friends and I have a week off. We want to explore France--we've already been to Normandy and the Loire Valley, but we want to explore other areas.... Any suggestions?

Maybe even some other places in Europe, as long as it's cheap? Suggestions with cheap travel is a must, as we're all pretty much broke. BROKE, broke, since most of us are living off an allowance from our universities/personal savings. I would totally appreciate it!!

Thanks!

I'm so nervous and pleased with myself for using "fuck" five times in an online class discussion about ethics that I can't sleep. I soooo hope my professor initiates something official.

It's about time my sociology background comes in useful.

God, I'm such a fucking undergrad.

So it's been a busy week, and I've fallen behind again. Yesterday I spent half the morning at a coffeehouse talking with a local architect, whose firm's design I'd kind of torn apart at a recent Design Review Board meeting. And last night was my Board's annual Preservation Awards ceremony. It went well ... everyone had a good time, I had some interesting conversations, and I got to spend an inordinate amount of the evening hanging out by the buffet table. :)

Anyhow, since the weekend's almost here I realized I needed to catch up with some more photos from last Saturday ... so here you go:

( Photo-heavy post ... )

For those of you new to my life, Leo Strauss is my god, whether I like it or not. Kenyon's poli-sci department got me at a formative time in my life, and I'll never fully escape it.

So when my ethics professor asks us about the minutia of the ethics of the Nuremburg Trials, I completely flip out. Any reasonable, virtuous, educated, mature person KNOWS that what the Nazis did was evil and needed to be punished. The fact that someone even has a language to ask whether the trials were good demonstrates that something is fundamentally wrong with this whole "ethics" game. Ethics tries to drive a wedge between morality and reason. It exists only to pervert the line between good and wrong. It's everything that is fucked up about the enlightenment / liberal project. What the fuck ever happened to virtue?

Notice anything about the above sentiment?

It's true. Deep down, I'm an elitist neo-con who takes it hard and deep from Aristotle and Plato.

These are some photos I took inspired by Halloween. Enjoy.

( Trick-Or-Treat )

The only class where getting high is required to understand the material.

A scene from Godard's Weekend...

Emily Bronte: "Be he black or white, I demand the death of the crocodile, murderer."

Woman: "This isn't a novel, it's a film. A film is life."

Emily Bronte: "Cover the flowers in flame, stroke their hair, teach them to read..."

Man uses a lighter to set Emily Bronte on fire. She burns to death.

Woman: "It's rotten of us, isn't it? We've no right to burn even a philosopher."

Man: "Can't you see they're only imaginary characters?"

Woman: "Why is she crying then?"

Man: "No idea. Let's go."

Ok, that might be an overly dramatic title. I was given a commission to finish a sweater vest for a lady: He neighbor had started it and made it about 2/3 of the way up the front and back, and then "became late" as they say in "The No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency" books. Anyhoo, client asked that I finish it for her so she could give it to the daughter (Her's or her late neighbor's...I never was never clear).

I finished it mere minutes ago, including some surruptuous repairs of a couple of the more glaring errors of the late lady's work. It hasn't been blocked yet, but here's what it looks like. (Lovely purple heather merino wool: Cascade 220 heathers~ col #2450 if you're curious). There is something especially joyous about completing work for someone who's passed on: It's as if I was saying, "Look, death didn't REALLY stop you!"

I'm happy with it. The photo doesn't thankfully show the apparent differences in our knitting...suffice it to say, I have a bit more experience and the top of the sweater is a bit more even and mistake free than the bottom. I'm sure the client will be delighted.

I'm going to Niagara Falls, Ontario on Saturday ( tomorrow ) to meet up with gregoid and rogonandi while they are on their cross country moving van adventure from
i have no clue, Maine to Edmonton Alberta.

I am still working on how I am going to get there but yes I will be going :P

Hi, 2nd year student teacher here (I'm doing foreign languages teaching).
At the moment I'm writing a critique and a lesson plan.  One of the questions I need to answer in my critique: "How can James Bruner's idea that we understand experience through three modes of representation (enactive, icon and symbolic)  help you in planning this lesson? How can you use his ideas in your teaching?".

Maybe it's just the way the criteria is phrased, but I am really baffled. I cannot seem to think of a way in which I can use the "enactive" stage in a German class. I can think of examples for Science and PE of course, but not languages. I always have this problem when we're asked to use psychomotor objectives too.

Can anyone give me an enactive->iconic-> example?

Anyone have any websites/resources for timed reading fluency passages?

So in this area, it's typical around Christmas for teachers to have students learn about Christmas around the world and how it's celebrated. It's the way they get in multiculturalism in for the December month. I want to do something different with my 5th graders though. The idea is exchanging letters with another class in a different country to discover how those students celebrate the winter holidays, and not just Christmas, as well as special traditions in those families as well, things that the Internet wouldn't always tell. Each of my students would write a letter that I would then collect and send out to another classroom. I know it seems early to ask, but I'd like to be able to have them do the project and have letters to see before our Christmas break in late December.

Are there any 4-6th teachers in other English speaking countries that would be willing to do this? My students are in rural WV for reference.

x-posted around.

One of my middle school students told one of my high school students that her scary story lacked originality and descriptive language. lol

I love this guys Stormtroopers 365 project twist.

Ok, anyone who's been reading by blog as of late knows that I've been kvetching about a very upset tummy for quite a while. Being a self employed craftsman with only catastrophic health insurance... I've kind of laid low, and hoped it would sort itself out. To no avail.

A casual mention on Facebook of how terrible I felt after only eating one small muffin yesterday morning led an aquaintance to mention that his spouse as Celiac disease: a gluten allergy/intolerance that causes damage to the intestinal villi. I went down the list of abdominal symptoms and had EVERY SINGLE ONE. FUCK FUCK FUCK!!!!! I was a bread baker...I LOVE my gluten!!!! Poo! Nasty foul smelling floating tan fatty Poo!!!!

I've gone 24 hours without grain, and I'm feeling decidedly better. Time to find a way to get the tests done. They look expensive. Still...I'd far rather it be Celiac than Cancer.

The thing that is really getting me...Oats. oats might be a possible yes/no grain. I LOVE oats... My horses eat oats. (Ok, I'm leaving that in... this happens to me all the time... I can't get used to the singular: My one horse eats oats). I eat oats.

I can easily handle the diet, and I'm sure I'll get used to spelt. Grumbly badger.... now with less gas.

WAIT A MINUTE....BEER? I CAN'T HAVE BEER?!? THAT'S NOT PLAYING FAIR!!!!

Hello all!

I can't believe I just found this community! I wanted to share some of my Halloween fun.



Jack o' lanterns. The Corpse Bride was mine and the double faced one is my husbands, it says AOD which is his bands name.

( WARNING: Cut contains a lot of October Halloween related Photos )

People easily categorize me as a nice guy, and I don't dispute that, I am. But truth be told, I can also be a vindictive bitch. Most people never see that side of me. It's mostly reserved for ex's that burned me, or for people who have gone out of their way to be cruel for no apparent reason. But there was once someone who knew me so well, they knew all the right buttons to push and my retribution was swift, and satisfying.

We had been friends for years. The kind of friends that are so close you finish each other’s sentences, know what the other is thinking, and unintentionally alienated other people by speaking in our own language (mostly a volley of movie quotes that would end with us in hysterics). He didn't so much change over time as open my eyes to the real person he was. Selfish, delusional, the kind of person who has to blame everything on other people to wash their hands of any responsibility. We had our final blow out and in the process broke our friendship beyond repair. We then entered the phase of sides. Where whether you mean to or not, you make your other friends choose sides. I played fair, he played dirty. He tried ruining other friendships of mine with people who didn't know him well enough. Once the dust settled, and the friends that hadn't already stood behind me refused to take sides, he turned his back on everyone and was alone, exactly as I told him he would be. But it wasn't enough. He took his cheap shots, and would not just let us go our separate ways.

If you saw his smug smile, and heard the tone of his voice you'd understand why I needed my revenge.

Months later I'd be sitting outside a cafe that the two of us for years used to frequent almost daily. I was reading a book when I looked up and saw his car coasting by. To my surprise he turned his car around and came back. We both said hi, he asked if he could sit with me, I told him he could. I asked him how life was and he filled me in (of course never asking how my life had been). He told me he had met a guy online, and this guy was everything he wanted but the guy had yet to meet up with him in person. I sat and listened to him talk about all the details of this guy’s life story. I smiled and nodded, listening intently, asking a question here and there. He never did try to reconnect; he just wanted someone to listen all about this new guy. It was infuriating to me. When he left, I knew we wouldn't be buddy buddy now because of this impromptu coffee talk, our bridges were long burned and the taste of ash hadn't even been washed out by the time this happened. When he drove away I smiled, and smiled and could not stop smiling.

I drove home smiling, logged onto the computer smiling, signed into the fake profile and told him that I wasn't interested, I had met someone else. Of course it wasn't "me" that was saying it. It was the guy he had just spent 30 minutes to me talking about. That guy never existed. I made him up, used a fake picture of someone that would be his type, sent out the bait and it worked flawlessly. I just never expected that he would tell me of all people about this guy. He would feel the sting of rejection for all the shit he put me through. I know it says something about a darker side of me, but I couldn't help but smile the entire time.

People easily categorize me as a nice guy, and I don't dispute that, I am. But truth be told, I can also be a vindictive bitch.

My boyfriend and I have always loved monsters and have a special affection for the tall, awkward, misunderstood Frankenstein. Our good friend Glen Hetrick and his studio Optic Nerve made a dream come true and turned us into monsters! I made my dress myself and my hair was done by my friend Shelby Hood.

My base color and some shading was airbrushed on. Wax was used to cover my eyebrows and MAC carbon and Lancome waterproof eyeliner was used to draw them back on. Lipstick is just black greasepaint that was set with translucent powder.



His makeup.....a bit more complicated!

That's Boris Karlof on the left and my boyfriend Adam Kilss on right!



( More photos this way..... )

Added for fun, here is Adam without makeup, posing with two of his paintings:



He's also a talented tattoo artist and was lucky enough to have a customer who shares our passion for these monsters (work in progress):



Thanks for looking, I hope you all had a wonderful Halloween!!!

Pain pain pain, fever, cough, every muscle hurts.... the flu must have arrived.
Have quarantined myself, I will not be responsible for others suffering.

Doing my best to not let the anxiety it triggers overwhelm me too.

It's a struggle.

This pain and the anxiety it causes will not last forever. It will pass.

Last week I accepted a 3 day assignment for a 5th grade class. (I teach in NYC). This could quite possibly have been the worst class ever. You could have put 6 teachers, and John Dewey himself in the room, and it wouldn't have helped. I called to have one student removed and was told that the people who are in charge of that were in a meeting. Since we had 20 minutes left before I was to go on a prep, I let it go. Not even 5 minutes after the class returned, I needed to call and have him removed. The assistant principal came up and basically told him "Don't do that again." I went back to my desk and was helping the two kids who actually were doing any work, when a fight broke out between two girls. The AP was still nearby and heard the screaming. She and whom I assume was the principal then made the decision to split the class for the remainder of the day and the next two. I was sent home.

I received a letter today informing me that the school filed unprofessional conduct charges on me. Yes, I was unable to control the class. Does that make me unprofessional? Surely I am not the first substitute to be unable to control a class.