Noooooooooooooooooo! Don't make me go back! Why oh why do we have to start back to school in the middle of the week? If I had more days saved up, I wouldn't start back until next monday. I'd let the other teachers calm the kids down.

Cleaned the house last night, actually, I threw a bunch of stuff away, so that left very little to put away. Had to wait until the family was gone to do it, oh but IT FELT SO GOOD!

Anybody else get a theraputic kick out of throwing stuff away?

Cough, cough, hack, hack, that's what's going on over here. Oh, and obsessing over gardening magazines, again. It's that time of year.

As I get older, the more days I need to recover from Christmas. My kids were the "typhoid marys" at the family dinner yesterday, hacking and coughing all over the buffet table. My house lay in ruins, toys are eveywhere. Dishes and laundry are piled sky high. My hopes of cleaning and baking during my free time are dashed. Recovery will be slow, but I'll get there. Maybe I'll even find time to make something fun over the next few days. I have a recipe for silly putty.

Weird family stories from the holidays! I want to hear them if you have any!

The season of Winter Holiday Programs is a low point in the Music Teacher's year. It's stressful, everybody including the principal has to put their two cents in, and the kids are wound up. Sophanne is a pro, she's been doing these for years. This year was my first.

Parents are a hoot; overheard at Sophanne's concert: They didn't tell me I had to dress him up. [duh!] That would be the parent who would walk out without realizing how much work (blood, sweat, tears (mine) and drink) goes into 50 minutes of kid entertainment.

And then there are the Choir field trips. Oh. My. Gosh. Choir Field Trips are like a children's Birthday Party on steriods. So my principal scheduled 4 stops for us, one of which is another nearby elementary school (Elementary School D). His reasoning for stopping there was so the kids could eat a healthy school lunch, because McDonald's wasn't healthy enough for him. And while we are there, he and the other Principal (henceforth known as Principal of Elementary School D) thought we could sing for the kids there too.

I was stressed.

Bits from Choir Field Trip Day:

My Principal: Did you call a sub?
Me: No, I thought you did.
Principal: That stinks. (Frantic rescheduling)
Coach: Those two are going to kill each other on the trip.
Kindergarten teacher who's missing her extra plan: evil look as she passes me in hall.

At Elementary School D:
Principal of Elementary School D: Maybe we won't take your kids on a tour of the building. They're a bit excited.
Me, justing coming out of bathroom: evil look at choir.

Music Teacher of Elementary School D, from up in bleachers: Do you need any help? [the night before she emailed me to see if her choir and my choir could do a few songs together. I turned her down.]
Me, sitting on gym floor with choir who's being extra well-behaved/scared: No thanks

Principal of Elem School D: passes out chocolate covered pretzels to my choir on their way out the door.
My Principal: does a slow burn because the kids just got juice and cookies from the previous place and he doesn't even let them bring in candy for school Halloween parties


My Principal: Since we're running ahead of schedule, let's stop by the School Board office, they're having a luncheon. We'll sing for them.
Me: Sure kids, eat your chocolate covered pretzels
Me to bus driver: There's going to be some heavy drinking at my house tonight.

So we sang at board office. Assistent Superintendent introduces herself and cryptically tells me, "We've heard so much about you." Does that mean good or bad?

I introduced the Big Boss Superintendent to kids as "the man who calls off their snow days". He told them they could have all next week off. One kid was like, "wait, we already have that off..." I was suprised the board office people laughed at my stupid jokes. The kids were wedged in between the tables of food.

Last we went to the cold stone creamery. Principal kept calling it "stone cold creamery" until store owner corrected him. We sang. They got free icecream. Someone (can't imagine who) called the newpaper reporter, so we had to sing again because he was late.

I went home and opened up a bottle of wine. By the time I recapped it to my husband, everything was a huge joke to me, and then I fell asleep at 6:30.

I feel so much better the next morning.

I'm so glad that's only once a year. I had enough excitement to last for a while.

7 weird things about me

Tag! I'm it. 7 weird things about me...I've weird, but what can I put in print?

1. I'm facinated, maybe slightly obsessed with finding old roads. Not back roads, we have lots of those. I mean the original paved portion of the road made before they began straightening them out by cutting into the hills and stuff. Like old Rt. 51 in PA for example. I look diligently for how the old road went. I'll even go out of my way to drive on it.

2. I love maps. I love to see where roads go and how places are situated in the big scheme of things. I'll study them with a cup of coffee.


3. I am extremely vain about my hair. I have lots of patience for my hair.

4. I have very little patience for many other things, such as decorating the christmas tree. Let kids and hubby do it. Decorating my house, not! Is my piano in tune? Nope hasn't been for years and I play it regularly, ignoring the out of tune sounds. (Maybe that's why it doesn't bother me when the kids at school sing out of tune?) Makeup? Not usually. Do my clothes match? Only if hubby helps me match them. Let's just say I don't go shopping by myself anymore because I have terrible taste.

5. Another reason I shouldn't go shopping by myself is my slightly compulsive tendencies. (I'll blame that on the meds). If one is good than 5 will be better because I'll need to stockpile in case something happens to that one....

6. I read and own most of Tom Clancy's books. Nobody would buy me any of those when I was part of the "secret sisters" at a church a few years ago.

7. From the time I was a kid, I've had a phobia about swings, especially the old playset ones in backyards, because if you swung hard enough, the feet of the swing set would start rocking out of the ground. This really freaked me out. Even if I'm on a real playground swing, by the time I get to the top, I start having panic thoughts: what if the swing lets go? How far will I be hurled into the air? What will I break when I fall? But I like to swing, which is why I get on them, and then I start to panic.

Okay, if you want to play along, no pressure, I'll tag Haley (labor of love) and Gina (you know who you are up in that snowy city).

So What's New, BBQ?

Thanks for asking! I'll tell you:

-After the college football team suffered a humilating defeat Saturday night, our college party town still celebrated by setting things on fire.

-One of the local fraternities decided to get in the christmas spirit by cutting down a pine tree from a city park.

And the biggest news of all:

-Extreme Home Makeover is in our neck of the woods, North Central West Virginia. The big revealing of the house they built will happen today at 2:00. All the kiddies are home from school today, maybe we could all drive up and see...

Polite conversationalists do not discuss...

Faculty lounges have a life all of their own. Things one should not discuss:
1. Politics
2. One's indifference towards the local football team
3. The fact that a certain female music teacher told her 5 year old daughter that there is no Santa Claus, mommy and daddy buy her presents.....Holy smokes, you would have thought I was the devil herself....

They were all discussing the moment in their lives when they realized there was no Santa Claus. I wanted to save my daughter from that traumatic moment in her life. I wanted her to believe that the things I tell her are true, always true....

Should have kept my mouth shut
Should have kept my mouth shut
Should have kept my mouth shut

After patiently listening to my lunchtime experience last night, my husband says to me, "Speaking of santa claus, where is the "night before christmas" book? I wanted to read that to our girls."

After a moment, I sheepishly replied, "It's at school, I was going to read it to my classes...."

still chanting...

The power of bobbly snowman earrings and a snowflake pin (doubly powerful since it was given to me by a student), be with all of you hoping for a snowday!

For those of you who got dumped on and have more snow than a Hallmark Christmas Movie, I'm sorry. I'll stop the chant now and go put my accessories away. The snow clouds merely got lost on their way to my house and dumped their load on you.

chants...

snow day, snow day, snow day, snow day...!

Rain! Wind!

Ooooohhh noooo, power outage;
......lights stay on, lights stay on, lights stay on...

okay, so what have I done so far?

My neighbor called. He wanted to know if I was missing a pool. Well, no not really since it's 30 degrees out and I don't do the polar club thing...oh, it's a plastic blue wading pool? Come to think of it, that empty spot under my porch hasn't been looking so junky lately; yeah I guess I am missing a pool. What? It's been in your yard for a few days? Well, Merry Christmas, why don't you put Santa in his skivvies inside, decorate it with lights and call your christmas decorating "done". Guess I'll take my ugly pool back home. Really I wouldn't have blamed him if he threw it out. When would I have noticed it was gone anyway?

Still no gifts bought, still no money to call my own. I really did a doozy. Should be digging myself out soon. My christmas letter is done, but not copied, printer's out of ink. Need to get that taken care of. House is semi clean, hopefully I can keep it that way. Oh Man! Hubby is taking out the garbage w/o being asked! Really, what more do I need for Christmas? Maybe a clone to come teach my music classes for a few days?