Just to Put it Simply...

From one of my student's responses:

"In conclusion, everyone might think you're a weirdo and you might die alone. Just sayin."

haha, I love the bluntness.

Time to Wake Up

Okay, I've been terrible on keeping up on blogging. I spent all of this time in the summer writing, so I guess my brain wanted to take a break in August. But here's the thing, my brain really needs to wake up now.

School starts tomorrow. Tomorrow. And I'm still having trouble remembering what I need to do to start teaching. And I'm really struggling with my math. I don't know what it is about subtraction, but it kicks my trash on a daily basis. One time, in college--yeah, college--the teacher asked what 26 minus 14 was, and called on me. I didn't know, and I couldn't do it in my head fast enough. Talk about embarrassing. Brie wouldn't even help me. It was pathetic. (Remember that Brie? Yeah, thanks. :)

And that's kind of how it is right now. It's all moving just a little too fast for me to catch up and get my feet under me. The funny thing is, I actually don't feel too stressed out, but I'm thinking that's more of a bad sign than a good one. It means I've probably forgotten something important. But, no matter what, I'm diving in tomorrow. Head first. Let's hope I don't drown.

Fitting in the Squares

I was in a writing class for four weeks this summer, and this is writing project #1. It's a fictional short story I wrote about teenage girls and crossword puzzles.

Fictional. This is not a story about me or anyone I know, I made it up. Although I do love crossword puzzles. :)

Anyway, it's not too long, just click on the link, read, and please, leave me a comment and let me know what you think!

     Fitting in the Squares

In Honor

It's been a year since the trading of my favorite Brave of all time. Jeff Francoeur's 4-year career with the Braves amplified my love for the team like never before.

And while now, the Braves are actually winning--they're in first place in the NL East, and Jason Heyward is holding his own in right field--earning an all-star spot after only being in the majors for 3 1/2 months, and part of the time out with a thumb injury, I still miss "Frenchy".

So in honor of the trade anniversary, I thought it would only be appropriate to re-post what I wrote a year ago. Enjoy!

A Tribute to the Traded

My Worst Nemesis

I hate the dentist.

I say this as my teeth are clenched and my stomach nauseates automatically.

It started with the orthodontist. Before my evil orthodontist I had never had any problems with my teeth. No cavities, nothing. Then echoed the rotten news: I needed braces. And when I finally trudged in to get metal glued to my teeth, it started with this awful goo I had to put in my mouth for an entire minute. This goo looks like bubble gum, but, by golly, it certainly didn’t taste like it. It was terrible. Especially if they mess up because the bouncy dentist girl didn’t put enough goo in the teeth tray, so she marches back to have you do it again. This time with the tray so full that part of it starts to ooze down the back of your throat, but you can’t say anything, because 1, you have goo in your mouth, and 2, if you do remove it there’s a wasted 30 seconds of tasting the despicable stuff. I don’t actually remember them putting the braces on my teeth, but I am sure it has only been blocked out because of the agony of it all, not because it went along smoothly.

Since the years of braces, the dentist has just gotten worse. I don’t know what happened to such stable teeth. I brush regularly, and get my flossing in occasionally too. Yet, somehow—I suspect the tooth fairy may have cursed me—I end up with quite the dentist visits. And through the hours spent in a dentist chair through multiple cavity fillings, root canals, and crowns, I have not become friends with my dentist. (Yet the hours I’ve spent at my mechanics, have made us seem like the best of friends.) Not the dentist.

I hate the dentist.

Ursula

I once had a teacher like Ursula. I'm surprised to look back years later and relate with this moment more than I ever thought I would. Teaching adds a whole new dimension to school.

I am a snake ready to strike.
Don't look at me the wrong way.
Don't say anything to set me off.

Today I've hit my limit,
Like a thermometer ready to burst,
My face red hot and steaming.

Too many things gone wrong,
In my perfect teaching world,
Piled papers even slithered to the floor.

It's your fault, your bad karma,
Which started this whole mess.
And now homework will be my venom to sink into your skin.

hahaha (creepy witch cackle)

Holy Ground

My brother would be disappointed about the basketball hoop that sits knee-high on a table. The basketball lays strewn in the sand beside it.

When Russell walks across a basketball court the sky gets brighter and Hallelujah tunes chime loudly. Really. He makes sure people realize what holy ground they are walking on.

To him, a home basketball court means carefully sweeping all the rocks off the carport before play begins. Making sure he is using the outdoor ball. Marking the free throw line with chalk. Shooting from all over the court. Trying trick shots from behind the picnic table. But making sure Little Red, our teenage beater car, is parked behind the basket so the ball bounces off of it and he has less running to do chasing the rebound.

Then, he lowers the basket to practice his trick dunks. He pulls a 360, a one-handed, and who knows what else before my dad yells out the window to raise the basket and try dunking for real.

Brother’s always been a basketball man, never going anywhere without his girlfriend, “Spaulding” and basketball shoes. You never know when you’ll find a pick-up game.

Dear Flag Football Team Man

I don’t know if you remember this moment, but occasionally it still burns inside of me, my face getting red and hot. Let me first explain a bit about my life. I grew up with a mom as athletic and determined as they come, and a dad whose unsympathetic ways and high expectations forced me to do my best at everything we did. Sports, from football to bowling, were on our television the majority of waking hours when we were home, and if we weren’t, most likely we were out playing them.

My dad taught me to throw and catch even before I can remember, and I was throwing a perfect spiral by sophomore year. (Notice I said perfect. I could do it before, just not every time.) I grew up scoring volleyball matches, keeping the book for little league, and tallying fouls and baskets for basketball. I could name all the cities and mascots of the NBA teams by the time I was in fourth grade. I knew more rules and strategy than most of my fellow male counterparts.

Now yes, I didn’t necessarily keep track of player names and team records for sports, and I got a little too involved with my own sports, social life, and schoolwork when I was in high school, so maybe the learning curve died down a bit, but when I went to high school football games, I was actually in the stands watching the plays develop. Watching what they did, and trying to figure out what they were going to do next. I was the girl in the stands who had to help the cheerleaders know whether they had to do offense or defense cheers. I was the girl who walked along the fence line with my dad as he taught me more about football. I was the girl who, when younger, would spend her time playing football behind the bleachers with the boys, rather than being in the group of girls giggling and pointing at the cute boys on the field.

In college, I was the one who only missed one home football game. In fact, I still haven’t missed more than one. And that was against Northern Iowa. Does that really count? I was the one who had to get there an hour before just to make sure I could watch them warm up. I was the one who knew all the players and called them by their first names like I knew them. I was the one who knew all their positions, who started every game, who was the most entertaining to watch block, etc.

I had been officiating for BYU Intramurals for two years by now and I had read the rulebook more than three times through. I checked it nightly, just to make sure I got the calls right. I knew where to go when the quarterback went back to shotgun. I could tell when to go back farther because he was going to throw. My colleagues looked to me when they had questions. They trusted me. Other teams knew me. They trusted me. I had reffed game after game after game before I showed up for yours.

And so why did your one testosterone filled statement, because you lost and you blamed me, hit me harder than all of that background and fill me with doubt? Why, in front of your wife and daughter, did you think it was okay to yell inches from my face, and point and accuse me of not knowing anything about football? Why did you go on to say I didn’t know anything about sports at all because I was a girl, and girls know nothing? And why, with my face fire-engine red, fists-clenched, and jaw tight, did I simply turn and walk away?

Trucks, Tractors and Trails

Grandpa’s truck started out as an old blue Ford that would drive slowly by my house. Normally you could hear the rushing of traffic on the highway in front of our house, but you could always tell when it was grandpa because the engine noise slowed to a crawl. He would drive by carefully checking the water in the irrigation ditch, checking the alfalfa fields, checking the beef cows in the fields behind us. He was always checking—at six in the morning while the sun was rising, until six at night when dusk was setting in. Sometimes you could even hear his dusty old truck in the wee hours of the morning as he went off checking on cows that could be calving.

That truck was his loyal companion. And the place on the carport was always left open for when grandpa came home. It was rare for me to ride beside him in the truck. It probably could have happened more, except my idea of fun was not to forge my way through the wet and heavy hay fields to change sprinklers and dam up ditches.

However, when that chance did come it was usually on our way to feed the baby calves. Grandpa would pick me up and we’d bump along to the barn just down the road. Grandpa would break up a hay bale and give me the pieces to stick in the feeding trough by the calf pens. We would continue all down the row until each calf was a proud new owner of their very own chunk of hay.

Then, grandpa would let me go back all by myself and give them handfuls of corn kernels. That was my favorite part: sprinkling those kernels on top of the hay as the calves were eating. I loved it because by this point the calves had come forward and started to eat. Sometimes, if they were really distracted, I could even pet one. Occasionally, they would look up at me with their drool covered mouths and snotty noses and try to eat right out of my hand. When we had finished, I would climb back into the truck and head back to tell grandma and mom how brave I had been while feeding the baby calves.

It seems like whenever I felt most connected to my grandpa we were on a ride. Along with his farm truck and baby calves, he’d let us ride the tractors with him as well. One time my little brother and I both got to go help grandpa cut hay in the chopper. It was the field at the end of the property, and after a couple of rows of chopping, grandpa let us take the steering wheel to turn down the next row. It was difficult, especially as a youth, to make the turn, get the tractor steering straight, all while making sure the chopper part was still on the right path to scoop up the hay and shoot it into the back trailer. And apparently it was a little more than two kids could handle, because we soon heard a whooshing sound and the tractor stopped dead in its tracks.

We had broken the tractor. Grandpa looked back, while our gazes followed, and we saw the frayed and broken cords and cables that connected the tractor to the trailer. He turned to tease the two of us about how we could dare to break his tractor. The giant smile on his face as he climbed down to assess the damage convinced us he wasn’t really mad, and we tried to put the blame back on him. Later in the week, driving past that tractor still sitting in the middle of the field with only have the hay picked up, I smiled as I remembered the three of us crammed into the tractor cab.

A smile stays with me now as I ponder the times when grandpa allowed me to ride with him. There were the times on the 4-wheeler with Grandpa. Whether it be driving the miles home from the sand dunes, bouncing to trail after trail, all the while following the power lines to make sure we were still headed in the right direction. Or me white-knuckled on the back as we climbed the steep hill by our little red cabin in the mountains, I always knew I was safe with grandpa.

And years later, as I picture the gold Ford of my later years slowly putting by my house, carrying a four-wheeler, a shovel, his knee high water boots, old farm parts, or whatever else he needed, I think of a man who was strong and unwavering. A man who always packed what you needed, and gave you a ride to remember.

Addicted

Heidi’s diaper bag consists of two diapers and a package of diaper wipes. The rest? Candy. She has Ziploc bags full of them. Starbursts, Skittles, and around Easter the gummy bunnies I love so much. Going anywhere with Heidi you can always count on candy. And lots of it. Going to movies with her there is no need to buy treats, she’s smuggled them in already. The only time this candy is a disadvantage to me is when I’m trying to cut back on my addiction.

You see it all started during essay time at school. If you’ve ever tried to grade 150+ essays then you may know where this is headed. It’s literally impossible without a snack at arm’s length as you go. However, popping them in your mouth as you get going can help you get into a rhythm, but you tend to lose track of how many you’re eating. Which led me to scarfing down the three bags of Starburst jellybeans in only a week in March 2010. Yep. Three large bags. By myself. I didn’t share one.

It kick-started my addiction. And soon, every morning at eleven ‘o’clock as my students wondered out my door and left me alone with my prep period, I went crazy trying to find some sort of consumable sugar to satisfy my cravings. I scoured my cupboards and at first, I always found something to keep me happy. But, as time went by, and my husband discovered the infamous Jellybean Bag Incident of March 2010, I stopped buying treats to try and prove I could stop anytime.

I couldn’t.

I’m sure my students noticed a decline in my mood. They may have been shocked to find out it was all because of candy. (In fact, maybe I should have told them. Maybe I would have Skittles suddenly appear on my desk every morning to guarantee a smiling teacher.)

I got headaches. Sometimes, when it got really bad, I had to scavenge the office secretaries for treats. Finally, I gave up on trying to quit altogether, embraced my love of candy, and bought a huge bag of salt water taffy from Costco. That got me through the rest of the year.

And now that school is out, you’ll find me with the occasional bag of Mike and Ike’s hidden in my purse or a box of Mini Charleston Chews in my nightstand drawer. I don’t need candy at a certain time everyday anymore, but I don’t think my addiction is gone, I probably just hide it better.

How to Ride Your Bike

Next time Phil takes his bike out, Caden, our four-year-old nephew, informed him how to really ride it. All he needs to do is take the front wheel off, lean back on his back wheel, and pedal really fast. After that, fire will come out, he'll go super-de-duper fast, and win the race. It's that easy.

So, Here's the Thing...

Sometimes I like to write.

Sometimes I'm funny.

I've had some claim I'm more funny when I write than I am in real life. And let's face it, I'm not funny.

However, I do want to write more. So, in an effort to inspire myself to write, I'm making some blog changes. This blog will now become my writing blog. Where I write about anything I want. And hopefully you'll make comments. (I love knowing at least someone is reading.) Sometimes I may even be funny. I guarantee there will be times when I'm not. But, hopefully it'll keep me writing. So watch for some changes coming.

I am starting another blog that will be more like my scrapbook blog to document the life of Filangela. If you want to read it, you're more than welcome to, just send me your email address by leaving a comment, facebooking, emailing, or whatever other communication you can and I'll send you an invite to my new blog. There will be pictures on that blog.

There will be lots of words on this blog. You've been warned. :)

Pillow Top Desks

My ninth graders are watching The West Side Story to wrap up our unit of Romeo and Juliet. My students are always full of energy 1st period at 8:00 in the morning. (Sarcasm, in case you missed it.) And today was an especially energetic day for them. I gave announcements and started class, and I don't think one word came out of any of their mouths. Poor tired children. But, I was feeling it too. Thank goodness for Friday.

I turned out the lights and started the movie. You all remember what it was like in high school/junior high. Desks were used more for pillows than writing sometimes. Picture it. Head down on your arms, eyes shut, mouth open, drool coming out of your mouth making a small puddle on your desk. You've been there.

And that is exactly what was happening for one girl in my class. Her desk was in the back of the room, right in front of my desk. So, there I was minding my own business grading papers at my desk. I would look up and watch some of the movie and then go back to grading. It was one of those moments when my head was up when all of a sudden this girl's whole body jerked and she jumped almost out of her desk. With her curls bouncing, her head flew up, and then smacked back down onto her arms which had been holding her head. Her desk shook and rattled nosily as her legs bumped against the sides.

Her head came up slowly after that. Her two friends turned to her with questioning looks on their faces. And I, being the only one that had seen the whole episode, and being the mature teacher that I am, slowly started to chuckle. This laughter, as this student looked around tiredly trying to figure out what happened, turned to louder bouts of giggling as I pictured her jumping and smacking her head again. Her friends figured out what had happened, started laughing, and soon my face was bright Radio Flyer wagon red, and tears were rolling down my face and I couldn't stop laughing.

Seriously one of the funniest falling asleep school moments I've ever seen. Thanks for making teaching even more fun, girl who fell asleep today. Loved it.

Cookies

I had a cookie today. It was a sugar cookie. It reminded me of the sugar cookies I used to buy in high school for 25 cents. Remember those? Mmmmm...they were good. We would get them at lunch. Or during Bradshaw's accounting class. Or before Jazz Band. Or during Journalism. Man, I loved those cookies. Sometimes I would go all out and order the double chocolate one. Or even the regular chocolate chip. They were all some of the tastiest cookies I've ever had. And today, I had to eat two sugar cookies because they reminded me of them. Except these had sprinkles. But yum, they were well worth the nauseating feeling I have now because I ate them so fast. I know. I'm feeling sick and I still want to go check and see if there are anymore in the faculty room. I guess, even now, I can't turn down a sugar cookie at school. I heart cookies.

"Giving February the Cold Shoulder"

This is dedicated to Todd Crabb who found this inspiring article and sent it to me. I've written one slightly similar, Grr...to February, and have tried to make a collection of literature that proves it's not just me More Proof. So, here's another that dives into exactly how I feel in February. Let's just say thank heavens it's MARCH! I'm so glad. So, here's the article to welcome in another month:

"When I walked out of my apartment this morning on my way to work, there was no mistaking the month. I felt that familiar sensation of dirty NYC slush creeping up my pant legs and heard the flippity-flap of wet denim on waterlogged shoes. Everywhere I looked I saw the dour faces of people, both rich and not-rich, all of whom looked like they had been standing in a Soviet-era potato line all day in the teeming rain. As I struggled to keep my umbrella right side out in the howling winds, my phone rang, and while I was trying to answer it, my phone and headphones fell into an icy puddle. My burrito bowl-to-go broke free of its soggy paper bag on a suicide mission, joining my personal electronics in their watery grave. At that point I couldn't blame it. As I write this, my feet are still wet, and will remain so for the rest of the day. Congratulations, February 2010. I hate your guts.

All Februaries are without a doubt, the Worst Months in any given Year. Unpronounceable. Cold. Gray. Barren. A dumping ground for feature films. The month when you have finally used up all the tasty frozen preserves that you slaved over in a burst of super green eco-energy last summer. Now all you have left is freezer-burned hamburger meat, and you couldn't care less. The whole month is like freezer-burned hamburger meat. Put some ketchup on it and choke it down.

Forgive me if this sounds cold weather-centric, but it is. I have never spent a single February in my life anywhere even remotely warm or conducive to normal human activities. I have no idea how you conduct your February business in places with things like "sunshine" or "cacti." Maybe you spend your February days being productive and harvesting rainbows. I really have no idea. But I'd like to point out that at this very moment my skin is literally translucent, like a fish that lives deep under the sea, beneath a rock that is located deep inside a cave.

It costs more to live per day in February than any other month because there are only 28 days across which to spread your expenses. Unless there are 29 days, which is just plain stupid. May God help you if you are a Leap Year baby, because you have to spend your whole life explaining why Leap Years exists in the first place, and the moment you try, you instantly become the most boring person in the room.

February makes you just want to give up. You could almost picture yourself coming to work in pajama bottoms. You know, the ones you were wearing when your kids were home with that stomach bug that they got from being in a tightly enclosed space with 25 other infectious mucus machines all day, because the weather was so bad that no one could go outside.

Nothing good happens in February. Nothing much happens at all, in fact. Punxsutawney Phil gets dragged out of his cozy tunnel on the second day of the month and suffers a groundhog heart attack on national television (unidentifiable to the casual viewer). It's all downhill from there.

Well, occasionally there's a big sporting event, and there's always that big President's Day White Sale. And okay, I'll give you Black History Month. But allow me to counter with National Hot Breakfast Month. Space shuttle disasters. National Children's Dental Health Month. The beheading of Mary, Queen of Scots. Pauly Shore's birthday (Feb. 1st, as if you didn't already know).

And thanks for trying, Local-Community-in-Which-People-Live, but your plan to keep us fit and entertained throughout February is not going to work. We can all pretend that we're having fun at your made up Ice Carnivals and Winter-Scapades, but let's look at the facts.

Fact: Don't try and trick me with a "Fest" in February. I see what you're trying to do. Nothing you can deep-fry and put on a stick is worth standing around in the blistering cold for. Not even Mars Bars.

Fact: I can make hot chocolate at home, only at home I can put delicious booze in it too.

Fact: Skating around and around those ice sculptures in a circle isn't going to make them any more interesting. Plus, it's cold enough to have ice sculptures. Enough said.

February also happens to be the month in which personal grooming habits cease to be a priority. There may be a slight uptick just prior to February 14th (more on that later), but after the anticlimax of Valentine's Day, after all the bon-bons are picked over and the new Valentine Dustbuster your husband gave you so that you could vacuum more efficiently lies dormant, everybody finally gives themselves permission to go to seed.

According to some sleazy sleaze-peddler, more people start extramarital affairs in February than any other month of the year. Well, no doubt. February makes you question everything you think you know about yourself and the people in your life. My husband, for example, suffers greatly in February when football season officially draws to a close. He doesn't experience the post-holiday blues, because he has playoff football to look forward to. And although he doesn't love the Super Bowl, he is willing to bear with all the "band wagon jumpers" and long, overly hyped commercial breaks to extract the last possible droplet of football juice from the season. He is even willing to explain that onside kick to your mother at the Super Bowl party you're having, if it means he can watch the rest of the game munching on her spicy homemade Chex Mix in relative silence.

Then the sadness comes. And it is a deep, long-lasting sadness that commences approximately three seconds after the game ends, and lasts until he receives a decent sunshine-related infusion of Vitamin D. Like, sometime in March. He stays up late the night-of, poring over football stats, analyzing his performance in his Fantasy "Keeper" League, thinking about the upcoming NFL Scouting Combine. And then he wakes up the next day in a fugue state, sighing deeply. Taking long, mournful showers. Thinking about growing his facial hair differently. Occasionally I find him quietly staring at me and he'll blurt out something like "Have you always had brown eyes?" And then the questions begin: "Who am I?" "Is there no end to man's capacity for cruelty?" "What if we lived on a boat?"

Thank God I'm so lovable.

Then of course, smack dab in the middle of the worst month, there's the worst, most made-up commemorative day ever. Valentine's Day. AKA: The-Day-When-People-Who-Don't-Get-Out-of-the-House-Much-Go-Out-for-a-Prix-Fixe-Dinner. Do I sound bitter? Can I even say the words Valentine's Day without a sneer in my voice? Answers: "yes," followed by a "no." Perhaps I have worked in one too many restaurants that offered a prix fixe on that very occasion.

And perhaps I have been burned in the past by my own oversized Valentine Expectations. Oh yes, I used to have those. Before I met and fell in love (sort of) with the man who presented me (breathless!) with a Tiffany ring box (unexpected!) on Valentine's Day one year. My mind raced! He seemed to be moving so fast! Was this what I really wanted? Did I really see us 10 years down the road, still together, thick as thieves, maybe even with kids?! We could think about that later. Just open the box and deal with the larger picture after The Big Moment…

Thank goodness that Moment never arrived. Contained within the box was a check written to me for 50 whole dollars. Of course, at the time, since he didn't actually have a checking account of his own (he was 30 years old), his Mom (who despised me) had to write it out to me. I guess it was her ring box too. I gave it back. The box, I mean. I kept the check, cashed it, paid my phone bill with it, and never thought about Valentine's Day again for the rest of my life. My actual husband and I pledged to each other an eternal rejection of this day. Instead we smugly smirk and gorge on non-heart-shaped chocolates that we bought for ourselves.

To be fair, that's probably what we would have been doing anyway. Because it's February. And there are only so many classic football games a person can bear to watch on NFL Network. And we're stuffed into our jeans like swollen sausages that you put on the grill and forgot to prick with a fork.

So Happy Birthday Pauly Shore, and R.I.P. dead gopher. No more cards or fruit kabob bouquets will be forthcoming from your old pal Sam Bee in 2011! Next year I'm going to be taking a knee on this one. On Jan. 31st, knock me (gently) on the head with a brick and wake me up sometime in March.

Actually, March is a bit of a tease, could you make it April? You know what, let's call it May and we're good. I'm really into Kite Day."

—Samantha Bee is a senior correspondent on "The Daily Show With Jon Stewart." Her first book, "I Know I Am, But What Are You?" (Gallery Books), will be released June 1.

Junior High Love?

What is up with Jr. High students saying they love each other in the hallway?

#1-No you don't. You're 13!

and #2-Even if you do, I don't want to hear it. (Or see it.) That's just sick. You're 13!

And that is the end of my rant for the day. :)