obi wan chaco ate a bit of the super continent

well, we're finally at the end of the school year. it has been a long road getting here, but here we are.

 tonight i made salsa, and i should've taken note when i felt the skin peel off my upper lip, upon merely moving my hand 10 inches in front of my face...every fine invisible hair singed off. at that point i washed my hands (with the scrubby brush thing and soap, even). that was over an hour ago, yet when i went to itch my eyeball, i'm pretty sure my fingers were radioactive...i'll be permanently blinded.

and since i am on the topic of food, i will just say that yesterday i made pancakes...they started out a little runny, but i was able to turn that into a lesson for the boys. i explained plate tectonics and the speculation of pangaea and continental drift. they were not amused, but when i offered them a piece of pancake, they promised to hear me out.

i had a very strange dream the other night. in it i was much more assertive than i see myself. it happened twice in one dream. once i was in the middle of a group, and someone kept trying to cut me off until i finally looked at her and said, "STOP it." looong pause....and i finished what i had to say. then just a bit later, there were some kids being mean-almost to the point of bullying, and i intervened and did some serious stare downs...i'm pretty tough in my dreams.

last week was also acp week....this is how i felt.

and unfortunately the gallant warrior who was supposed to save me from this ridiculosity was...'held up' by a prepubescent giant, and therefore unable to rescue me. it's ok, i was only tied up for a couple hours every day.

in other news today, our school had an awesome career day, thanks to amazing organization by sandra, our amazing counselor, and olivia! the guests were engaging and the outdoor events were awesome!

love love love that it was air conditioned!

we were up in my room when over the intercom, i hear: MS ROBINSON, THE DART BUS IS HERE.  i looked at the students and asked what she said and they said the dart bus was here. (D.A.R.T. not to be confused with invisible aboriginal darts...although that would be an interesting and somewhat adventurous bus to ride...) i wasn't expecting the bus to arrive. in fact, we were under the impression that the bus would NOT be able to come out...so i was pleasantly surprised, and since our 2nd presenter did not arrive, we went down for the tour! as the students climbed onto the bus, several said, "i've never been on a dart bus before!"  as we were on the dart bus out front, the helicopter flew overhead, preparing to land in the soccer field behind the school.

these guys kinda stole the show

 i informed my students that they would be seeing the SWAT team and the motorcycle police unit; we didn't have time to see everything, so that was our schedule. well, when we got outside, there was an opening at the helicopter, so we got to ask several questions, then we were off to the motorcycles and we got the low down on that...i wish i were a motorcycle police or in the k9 unit! i may or may not have been eyeing someone's sidearm while he was talking (please do not be confused, i was not observing the side of his arm, i was checking out his gun) and i asked him what they customarily used. he said he still used his revolver, but he was warming up to the 9 mm.

on our way back upstairs, one of my students who had said he wanted to be a veterinarian told me that he had changed his mind. no, instead he now wants to be on the SWAT team. hmm. i mean...veterinarian, SWAT team the two are SO similar, i can understand the fickle-ness.

 another student said she wants to be a comedian...which almost made me laugh/snort...but i disguised it with a cough/sneeze. chaco's funnier than her when he starts doing his star wars impressions...even if you've never seen star wars!

obi wan chaco

may the force be with you,
julie

can you peel a tuna? absolutely...and you can have mango on a stick

today was another day in avid paradise...(joke. ing.) it did go smoothly though. i sometimes tend to be cautiously skeptical about new ideas, unless they seem practical to me and i feel that i can implement them without too high a degree of difficulty. today certain pieces of the puzzle began to come together and make a lot of sense. in fact, i wish i'd learned a lot of this stuff that we're learning to teach before i got to high school. basically learning how to take notes and be organized-

we went out for lunch and had delicious hamburgers at...hunkys? anyhoo-it was really good and i am still full! then we stopped at a little fruit store where i got to finally see and try a tuna-not the kind of tuna you might be thinking either. it's a fruit from a cactus. one of my students once wrote a story about going hiking with her family in mexico and seeing a red tuna on a cactus and eating it...i was incredibly confused and i had to get clarification from her and even after she told me what it was, i still thought she must be mistaken about the name. i should've gotten a picture of them, but instead, i got this pic of the carved mango.

eventually we finished our segment and left for the afternoon-dart rail, here i come again! almost uneventful ride home..until we got to love field. then there were stops at almost every light. the lady conductor came on the intercom and let us know that the inconvenience  was due to the storm last night...something about something getting struck by lightning (?) she had a thick accent, so we weren't sure what she was talking about, but she felt the need to come on at almost every stop to thank us for understanding (but we really didn't understand). and about that time, a young man began to make his way toward the front and had a goofy grin on his face. i'm pretty sure from his actions and demeanor that he had some sort of learning disability. but after he made his way up front to look out and see what was going on, he sat diagonally behind me next to a gal 1 seat back, so i was privy to the entire conversation. it was really cute. the guy had no inhibitions. first he asked the girl if the seat was taken (she was the typical rider who was enjoying a little space now that the train was thinning out and she was engrossed in her book). after taking the seat, he proceeded to ask what she was reading, she answered and continued reading,and he didn't pick up on some of the nonverbal cues, so he then told her his name was eric and asked her name. he let her know that he was 21, and then he told her she was beautiful. how precious is that? unfortunately this is where i had to get off for my stop because i would've enjoyed hearing more.

when i got to my car, i was reminded of an old depeche mode song-see if you can guess which one:

hint-that's the window of my car, and that is a fly-type insect

if you guessed 'flies on the windscreen,' YOU ARE CORRECT! pat yourself on the back, but don't throw out your shoulder! you cannot see it from this view, but about an inch to the right, there was another tiny gnat-like insect dead by the fly..hot day. so i just pretended they were resting and once my car got up to speed, the 'flew' away of their own accord.

and when i finally got home, chaco was so ready to play, so i let him out of his kennel and threw his squeaky toy, which got caught in the kennel after a few throws, and he was a little distressed about the whole situation.

can't you just hear the gears working in his head as he tries to figure out how to remedy this situation?

chaco is currently in the other room just squeaking his toy. over...and over...and over. strategic extraction may be in order.

blessings,
julie

DART...be relaxing and on time, please

today was the first day of a week of training. i was planning on taking the DART public rail. my phone needed to be recharged, so i plugged it into my computer last night (as i cannot find my recharger-besides the one in the car). well, i put the computer in sleep mode, and learned a valuable lesson: the phone will only recharge when the computer is actually on. so it was dead dead dead this morning. boo. i needed my phone b/c a group of us were meeting. so i ended up driving so that i could get the phone recharged on the way to the meetings.

this was during the keynote speech, and the girl in front of us with the green shirt got a tattoo to match her shirt

tomorrow we're taking lunch and i think i'll catch the dart (otherwise i'll go broke because lunch was ridiculous plus parking-ew!). and i will not be wearing a skirt tomorrow-we weren't sure what everyone else was going to be wearing, so we dressed up and everyone else was fairly casual. on the way up the hill the wind grabbed my skirt, and i was afraid it was going to fly me away like mary poppins with her silly umbrella (only people might be seeing things they don't need to be seeing!).

i had to stop and put air in my tire today on the way home because it was gauging low. so when i stopped, i saw a nail in the tire. boo on all construction workers everywhere who leave nails and screws in the roads and parking lots! but i didn't take it out because i was afraid that the nail was the only thing keeping the air in...hopefully when i wake up in the morning, there will be enough air in it to get me to the dart station! (or to the gas station to fill with more air). i'm a little worried! poor little car!

when we got home, i let chaco out on the balcony because he was begging to go hang out. well, as soon as i shut the glass door, bruno grabbed a toy and said, "watch this!" then he trotted up to the door and dropped it right in front of chaco who couldn't really do anything from the other side but look at it. bruno just sat on the side chuckling.

chaco was trying to act like he didn't care, but i knew he did as he just stood in front of the door staring, i let him know that it was pretty obvious how he was feeling- he betrays his feelings-wears them on his sleeve.

well, i probably ought to check on the dart rail times in a minute and go down to see if the tire has lost air.

when i say your nails look great, i'm not talking about the ones you left in the middle of the road! rude.
julie