Quick Entry

Let's see if I can be brief. I haven't blogged for a few days (not including the posting of slideshows). My original plan was to do a day by day journal entry of my summer of change. Well, those of you who have been reading awhile, know me pretty well by now. That didn't happen.

Monday
My plan was to start on Monday with my liquid diet. My plan was to spend this week getting my body used to the liquid cleansing, and to clean my apartment. That didn't happen.

Having passed on several invitations to meet a new epal (electronic pen pal) due to me cleaning and packing up my classroom for the summer, I finally agreed on a Monday meeting. I resisted the urge to do yet another "I'll start tomorrow" excuse for my diet. I brought a quart of vegetable juice for breakfast, and drank water for most of the day. The meeting? It was nice. We met at 10am in the Bronx. About 7:30pm, my epal had to return his sister's car. I stopped off at the store to buy some more vegetables and fruit (determined to start the diet tomorrow) before returning home.

Much to my surprised, I resisted the urge to "start the diet tomorrow". I settled for an 8oz. bottle of ENSURE (a health shake) and called it a night. The downside was that I managed to aggravate an old injuring. I banged my toenail causing it to bleed a bit. For awhile, that toenail has been growing up instead of out. Now, it is in a very delicate position. Any bang will most likely cause it to come off. There's more.

Also, (probably due to pushing, pulling, and lifting heavy boxes and things in my classroom, I might have sustained a groin injury. I thought if I just rested, it would get better, well it flared up on Monday, but lucky it did get better. Yes, I know I do need to see a doctor. I have already made an appointment for August 5th, but I probably should call to reschedule my appointment as a possible "it can't wait until August 5th" change. I have HIP, so my options can at times be limited. The downside is that the injures (mainly the toenail) has put me in a lazy mood these last couple of days. I haven't been out for the last couple of days (not including my brief walk to play the Lotto. I also haven't eaten anything since Sunday. The problem is that I haven't done any exercising. As a result, I haven't lost any weight (probably because my body is in starvation mode).

Wednesday
Well, today, I finally got around to unpacking the juicing machine. After washing it, I tried it out for the first time. I like it. I hated the carrot juice, but I like the machine. It took about 16 minutes to clean --the strainer basket with the attached shredder took about 5 minutes of those minutes to scrub (yes scrub) clean. I made a carrot and apple juice mix. Yuck!!!


Post Date - Wednesday, July 7, 2010 10:12PM

Quick Entry

Another attempt to clear out my draft folder. However, considering I have report cards to do, I'll have to keep this brief.

Tuesday, August 19th


I met a new epal in Union Square Park. In a matter of seconds I knew we had nothing in common. I arrived at the meeting spot about 10 early. After about 10 minutes of reading my newspaper, I look up to see some guy staring at me. It turns out to be the epal. He is a teacher as well, but I got the impression that he was treating the job as a temporary situation. We had nothing in common and he wasn't interested in talking about school, students, or teaching in general. Epal suggested that we sit on a bench in Union Square Park. I wanted to walk, but I agreed to sit. That was a very long 2 hours. Very long.

After about 2 hours, we went our separate ways. He went shopping at a clothes store in the area, I went to Radio Shack to buy some credits for my Napster account. AFter, I went to the movies to see District 9. I liked the movie. However, I was highly annoyed at the coming attractions. EVERY SINGLE ONE WAS A PREVIEW FOR A HORROR MOVIE!!! I'm not a horror movie fan.

Wednesday, August 20th
I finally got of my lazy *** and went to apply for reenrollment in college. I need to finish up my Master's Degree. Unfortunately, I was too late for Spring 2010.

Post Date - Wednesday, November 4, 2009 7:55PM

Official First Day of My Vacation

Tuesday, July 1st. My official first day of my vacation.

Quick summary of Monday before I go into details about my first day of vacation. Monday, I started to feel the pull of vacation. I was reluctant to get up, and I really wasn't in the mood to go to school to clean. However, I finally managed to get up and out the door. I arrived for more cleaning about 11am. Today I mostly had to relocate the boxes, and stack furniture and objects neatly. Since I wanted to be finished, I did not stop for a lunch break. I finished packing about 4:30pm. I was suppose to drop off my classroom keys, but no one was in the main office. The Principal's door was closed and the lights were out. The main lights in the main office were out as well. I guess everyone was eager to start their vacation. I labeled my classroom keys and left them on one of the secretary's desks. I also found in the mailboxes the official typed (tentative) new class list. I was expecting to have about 20~24 students. However, my new class will have...

Are you ready...

I will have 29 students!!! For those of you readers that are not familiar with classrooms. 29 is a lot of kids. Throw in a couple of hypers or personalities, and it is a powder keg waiting for a match.

Admin decided to make some changes. Ms. Across the Hall will be assigned a 4th grade class leaving myself and Ms. Down the Hall as the only two regular 3rd grade classes. The Talented and Gifted second grade class will be moved up to 3rd as a whole, and a second grade teacher will be assigned to teach that class. I'm assuming that because of budget cuts and a slowing economy, approximately 60 kids will be divided into two classes (giving each teacher about 30 kids) as opposed to dividing the 60 kids into 3 classes (giving each teacher about 20 kids). Very creative. :(

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School's out, I don't want to think about school for the next month and a half. So, onto my 1st day of vacation time.

I agreed to meet another epal. After hearing his voice, I felt it probably wasn't a good idea, but since I agreed to meet, I went. There was a slight drag in the sound of his voice, and there was a noticeable delay with his replies.

My plan was to take the 2:30p.m. MN train, but after a slow start, I missed my train. I took a bus that arrived about 3:02pm. Since I don't think the 2:46p.m. bus arrived, I either took a late bus or a 3 minute early bus.

When I arrived at the Bronx subway station (242nd station -- last or first stop on that train line), the train in the station had a couple of cars that smelled like they were used for a toilet, but that did not stop the train from leaving the station, even though there were about 5 or 6 transit workers (in cleaning attire)milling around on the platform. So what is the significance of the stinky train? As soon as the train left the station, no one, I mean no one wanted to sit in the back cars. About 3 or 4 stations away, the train is pulled out of service "due to unsanitary conditions". Before going into the tunnel, I'd sent a text message saying that I would be about 10 minutes late. However, with the train out of service that estimation was no longer accurate.

I arrived about 30 minutes late (29 minutes if you want me to be exact). I called as soon as I could get a signal on my cell phone. My epal seemed very understanding. Once I saw him, I got the impression that he was lonely and really was looking for company. He seemed nice. I did notice that there was a bit of delay in his speech pattern. And he seemed to moved a bit slow. Originally, my epal wanted to meet at a bar, but I'm not really a bar person, so I changed it to a walk in Central Park. He suggested Prospect Park, but I really did not want to travel out to Brooklyn to go walking in a park. I thought Central Park was a good compromise. At first, the conversation was fairly strained. I felt as if I really had to work to keep the conversation going. For someone like me who is not a social person, that felt like hard work. We walked through Central Park for a while, by the time we reached a placed called Belverdere Castle, the guy seemed to loosen up a bit. After walking for about 30 or 40 minutes, my epal needed to sit for a minute; we ended up sitting for about an hour. I learned the guy had a fairly interesting story.

After sitting, I told the guy that I wanted to buy him dinner as a way of making up for keeping him waiting for 30 minutes. The guy was a vegetarian, so the options were limited. He finally agreed on going to a pizza place. So he would be able to eat vegetarian pizza(pizza with vegetables on it). Since I was very hungry -- I only had a bowl of raisin brain cereal that morning. However, I did not want to pig out in front of the vegetarian. We ordered pizza. Unfortunately, my epal was having some difficulty with his pizza, I went to get him a knife and fork, and that helped a lot. I felt bad for the guy. The guy told me how (since he is a freelance worker) he doesn't get to get out to socialize. He mentioned how he enjoyed our walk and wanted to know if we could do something similar again. The empathy in me took over, I felt the guy was lonely, so I agreed to meet him again on Sunday. Having spent a couple of hours with the guy, I was able to see past...my "first impressions". The guy was actually a very nice guy. And I did enjoy myself. Besides (those regular readers of this blog know that I have nothing going on except eating and sleeping. The guy was suppose to meet a friend at 8:30pm for a drink at a bar downtown. Although he said that walking would be too far to walk to the bar, we did end up walking about another 40 city blocks to the bar. When we arrived at the bar, I got to see yet another side of my epal. He seemed very social in the bar, about 6 or 7 different people came up to say hello to my epal. I felt a bit out of place. I really didn't know what to do in the bar. It was crowded and extremely loud. I have a bad habit of stepping into a room and immediately looking for a corner to cover or a wall to hold up, but that bar was very crowded. Did I mention loud as well? There were wall huggers on every wall, and every corner was covered. There was nothing for me to do but follow my epal around like a lost dog. So what happened to the friend?

The friend thought my epal wasn't going to come so he had left the bar "to get something to eat", but he came back just to say hello, then left again. The friend seemed nice. My epal told me that his friend used to weigh 300lbs, but the guy looked like he had lost about 1/3 of that.

We left and decided to call it a night. I walked my epal to his train station, then I walked to mine. I stopped off at an ice cream place, I ordered a milkshake.

I made it back to the Bronx with a couple of minutes to spare to catch the 10:40pm train. If I had missed the MN train, the next train would have been an hour's wait.

I had a nice time, and learned the saying, "don't judge a book by its cover" is very true.

Next Sunday, we will be doing another walk. I suggested a walk over the Brooklyn Bridge. And next Saturday, I am suppose to be going to the movie with NJ epal.

Below is a slideshow with a few pictures I took during the walk through Central Park.



Completion Date - Wednesday, July 3, 2008 12:10PM
Post Date - Wednesday, July 16, 2008 12:04PM

Monday, May 19th
Another stressful day. I did manage a smile for a good couple of hours before my students with their usual determination, wiped it right off. So, a quick (I hope) summary of my weekend.

On Friday(evening), May 16th, one of my epals sent me an email cancelling our planned walking trip through the Bronx Zoo. All week, the news reports mentioned Saturday being a cold and wet day. I was planning to send an email to suggest a change from zoo to movie, but I got beat to the punch by minutes. I already had my email written with the movie schedule saved for Saturday on my desktop. I started watching movie trailers, and lost track of time. I got the cancellation email minutes before I was about to send mine. Problem? Not really. It seemed a bit strange that he had to go out of town at the last minute, but that could have happened. I was watching the trailer for Kung Fu Panda -- it looks very funny!

Anyway, since I no longer had plans to do anything, I fell into my old weekend hermit habit, I slept Saturday away. I was a bit annoyed that the weather turned out to be very nice. I was also a bit annoyed with myself because I had wasted my chance to get organized, and with nothing exciting, or at the very least interesting to do, I answered an online ad from someone seeking "anyone interested in going to the movie tomorrow to see Prince Caspian. Normally, I don't read ads below the age of 35. I also don't like last minute plans. However, on an impulse, I answered the ad agreeing to go. The ad maker was 32yrs old. Moments after getting a "hello" email, I quickly fell into my old hermit habit. I changed my mind. I even started a "Cold Feet"(I won't be able to attend) email. Since the guy left his phone number, I thought the least I could do was to cancel in person.

Well, within minutes of answering the phone, the guy was already offering to buy the tickets and making arrangements to meet. I froze and agreed to go. The meet up time was 3:15PM. The guy also mentioned that if I got there early, we could "get something to eat". Normally, I would have gotten there early, but I was not comfortable with the idea of being stuck with a face to face meeting with someone I had not met before and may have nothing in common with. My plan was to arrive on time which would have kept the possibility of a long conversation to a minimum.

Sunday morning. Still having done nothing in the way of lesson planning, laundry, or shopping. I was both excited and nervous. The weather returned to cold and damp. I cut and shaved my head, took a bath and was out the door about 1:50pm. My plan was to take the bus because the MN train would have gotten me in NYC too early. The bus only operates 2 per hour on Sunday, so I was not expecting it to be more than 5 or 10 minutes late. The bus was over 15 minutes late! When it arrived at my stop, there was no one the bus, but it was still late. Ten minutes into the ride, the driver informs us (the passengers --all 6 of us) that due to a parade, he would have to make a detour. After about a 10 to 15 minute detour and the driver needing confirmation from the officers blocking the street and his dispatcher, he decides to pull over and wait for the parade to pass. Most of the 6 of us got off the bus. I decided to walk to the Yonkers MN station and take the express train into NYC. I walk about a block and the parade of high schoolers stop at the intersection I want to cross to do a number. I walk a couple of blocks then a guy with a horse of a dog who had his dog aside maybe due to the loud music disturbing the dog starts walking in front of me at a snail of a pace. He also had his young daughter with him. A few more blocks, the parade's path was a right angle into the Yonkers MN station area. I felt like I was in one of those movies or comedies when the main character has one obstacle thrown in front of him.

Anyway, I arrived at 34th street about 3:40PM (movie start time). Since it was raining, and I was only about a block and a half from the theater, I just walked as quickly as possible. The guy was not there. I was annoyed and embarrassed at being late. I bought a ticket knowing that the guy had already paid for my ticket online. Since the guy did not have the cell phone area code of 646, I just assumed that I had his home phone number. I didn't think to call him. I'm not too bright.

Anyway, I got my ticket with the idea that maybe after the movie ended, I might see the ad poster (he attached his photo to his post). I walked into the theater with the idea of sitting as far back as possible (still annoyed, angry, and wet).

Well, it turned out I sat down right next to the ad poster. Amazing!!!

The movie was nice. The special effects were great. After the movie, my epal asked if I was interested in getting a drink. Coffee at Starbucks.

Short story made long...sorry. I need to wrap this up. Long story short, I was amazed at how much we had in common. It was strange meeting someone who shared the same interests that I do. Also amazing was that his conversation almost seemed to be a step or two from what I was thinking. Even about an hour ago from typing this blog. I was thinking about what kinds of city type activities I could suggest. I thought about museums, but I thought that was something he might not be interested in. I was wrong. I wanted to meet my new epal again, but next week (even though it is a three-day weekend), I thought it might be difficult because I was planning to make arrangements with "Macy's Walker" epal. I also signed up for a group meet up next week. Well, my new epal told me that he couldn't do anything next week. Amazing!!!


Completion Date - Tuesday, May 20, 2008 12:08AM
Post Date - Monday, June 16, 2008 7:10PM

Normally, I would be waiting until my draft folder was empty, but I'm in a good mood. I haven't posted for the last few weeks because I was sick of the repetitive boredom of my life, but that might be about to change. Today I met a new epal. I went against my usual rules about age limits and avoidance of last minute plans. I agreed to see a movie on an impulse with a complete stranger. I had a very good time. I arrived about 30 minutes late(due to an almost comical set of events), my epal was already in the theater. Since I came that long way, I decided to go see the movie by myself. Guess where I ended up sitting?

Right next to my epal.

I will write more in another blog, but now my dinner in the microwave is done, and I have prep for tomorrow.

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Friday, April 4, 2008
Waste of time. A real waste of time. That would be the title of this blog entry if it had titled entries.

First, I have not been blogging for a while. As the days turned into weeks, I noticed the incredible similarities (and repetition) between the blogs that I had in my draft folder, and blog entries that were yet to be written. Also, I continue to allow my job to suck the life out of me. Also, my meeting with Drama Queen's (step) mother gave me the idea for the title.

Below are a couple of emails that were sent to DQ's mother recently:

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FIRST EMAIL
Hello Ms. D.,

I hope your weekend was a pleasant one. I'm just writing to let you know about DQ's progress. I think she could be doing much better, but I think she has gotten too comfortable with seeing school and class time as her play time. Today (Monday, March 24th), I finally had enough of the disruptive playing and sent her out of the room. Every few minutes, there was some kind of distraction with DQ. When I asked her to stop, then I would get the "Okaaay"(with a smile on her face), only to have another couple of minutes of her doing the same (or similar) thing. Followed by another "okaaay". A couple of minutes later, DQ is whispering for Cackler across the room. Again, "Okaaay"(smiling). Ten minutes with her hand up, wanting water (I wanted the math assignment finished). Besides, when one asks, then 7 to 10 will do the same. My rule is before the lesson or after but not during. Then I get DQ's "why" questions (smiling) knowing the girl who got water did it when my back was turned without permission. Then it was DQ leaning back relaxed commenting (out loud) how easy the assignment was, and that she was finished. When I checked, she did not complete the lettering which needed a fraction and decimal equivalent. Then it was "oh, I didn't understand that part. Then it was, "Oh, I need help". Then, back to the cross the room conversations and invitations for Cackler to "come" (talk) to her. Then back to the "Okaaay"(smiling). Since DQ seems to respect her second grade teacher more, I sent her to Ms. S's room.

Please speak to DQ about taking her work more seriously. Too often, DQ looks for short-cuts. She rushes through her assignments, at times putting anything thing down. During computer lab, while checking homework, DQ had submitted a very rushed (incomplete assignment). By the time she completed the homework correctly, the 45 minute period was finished. Then, she switched to her "Drama" mode. She got upset that someone was in her chair.

I've attached a progress report. Sorry, it is not as complete as it could be, but hopefully it will give you some idea of DQ's progress.

Again, any questions, or concerns, please don't hesitate to ask.

Regards,

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SECOND EMAIL (A week later)
Hello Ms. D.,

I hope your evening is a pleasant one. I am sorry to be sending another email so soon, but DQ's behavior continues as stated in the previous email.

I hope you don't mind if I write abbreviations (from my annotated notes). I've had a long day, I really don't want to sit at my computer this evening trying to compose a detailed report of DQ's behavior. DQ mentioned to me (smiling) that you read the last email, but did not say anything to her. DQ is getting too comfortable with being rude and disrespectful. Please understand that if she continues, when school trips come up, I won't be able to take her along, nor will she be allow to attend extracurricular activities.

Below is just a few of the annotated notes that I took. Please speak to DQ about respectful behavior towards adults, and the importance of her school work, and the effect of her behavior on others.

March 26th
* DQ (after arriving late) 8:15 began conversations with Cackler and then with Princess Beady. Her response, "okay, okay". When asked to stop with the smiling "okays", "What do you want me to say?". She should have been working, not conversing.

March 27th
* After several "giggling" episodes during the P.E./Health teacher's lesson, DQ's response, "My mom gave me Red Bull so I can't stop laughing".

* Later in the afternoon when I mentioned that you must not have read the email, it was at that time, DQ mentioned (smiling) that you read the email, but didn't say anything.

* Moments later, DQ continued as I was writing down her comments, "My mother's not going to do anything". Then continued talking at her table mentioning that "she (you) are her stepmother". When I mention that I could hear what she was saying. Her comment to me was, "I wasn't talking to you".

I'm sure DQ was not raised to speak to her teacher (or any adult) the way she seems to feel she can. I already sent DQ out of the room when she was being disrespectful. I was trying to not create a pattern this time, but I can't have a student speaking to me like that. As I mentioned above, if DQ can't show a bit more respect for me, I will not take her on (or allow her to participate) in any extra-curricular activities.

Please speak to DQ about her attitude and behavior. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask.

Regards,

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After the last email, it took the stepmother about two days to call "acknowledging the emails"(according to her). On the phone she had said that she could not reply sooner because her computer was broken. During the phone call, the stepmother wanted to meet to discuss DQ. She wanted to meet during the lunch period.

Well, she did show up. Five minutes into the meeting, her cellphone went off. And again about five minutes later the cellphone went off again. She apologized and mentioned that that was the reason for not replying to the emails. She said that she just got the new cell/PDA and was having difficulty learning the features. Originally, my plan was to cite further examples of DQ's rude and disrespectful behavior, but something in my gut told me it would be just a waste of time. If those emails didn't rattle her cage (and it didn't), then there was no point in wasting my time. So according to the stepmother, DQ is an only child who (she admits) "likes to manipulates others". And "since she is an only child is spoiled raised by a single mother". As recently as a couple of weeks ago, DQ received a $1,000 puppy. The meeting ended with the same threats -- including the "one more bad report and you don't go to the Dominican Republic". The same threat used several "bad reports ago". The meeting ended with the stepmother taking DQ home. She did not give a reason, but my gut feeling was that they would be doing some "bonding activity". Since DQ was unusually quiet, I got the impression that she was told to keep her mouth shut and look contrite. The next day, DQ was a bit reserved, but the behavior was basically the same. I told DQ her body language was telling me more than she (or her stepmother) wanted me to know. The giggling, playing and laughing told me that some kind of bribe for good behavior was in play. Usually, when a student has been "in trouble" they don't come in the very next day laughing and socializing after mom taking off from work. However, I could be wrong.

On the way out, I mentioned that the school aid in charge during the lunch period wanted to speak to her, the mother mentioned that she couldn't because she was doubled parked.

Oh, I almost forgot. The "official" school photos arrived. Problem? First, the teachers did not receive the usually complimentary portrait shot. I don't like having my picture taken, so that was not a big deal. However, I was a bit annoyed that teachers did not receive a complimentary class photo. I mean really, how much would it cost to print a copy of the class photo for the teachers. Or, if the cost is too expensive, then the company hired should have offered teachers the option of buying a class photo. I would have paid for the class photo. I guess faith is sending me subtle messages. Last school year, since I did not choose to have a portrait taken, I missed the opportunity to have a class photo. This year, the company hired was too cheap to provide one. Oh and another thing. Ms. Across the Hall had 2 or 3 students who had my class photo in their package. And one of her kid's photo pack was in my class set. So what did the kids get? The only offer was a $25 flat fee for a variety of sizes. Wow.

Completion Date - Sunday, April 6, 2008 4:20AM
Post Date - Sunday, May 18, 2008 9:33PM