Showing posts with label Randomly Random. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Randomly Random. Show all posts
Do you ever wonder what some people are thinking?
0 comments Posted by Lilies of the Field at 9:11 PMEspecially when they paint their car with polka dots. I know what you're thinking. And no, it's not a car that is advertising Dip 'n Dots. There was no advertisement to account for such silliness. At all. This person just thought it necessary paint their Nissan Versa in such a way that someone like me would drive around and take a picture of just how ridiculous it is.
As previously mentioned, I spend a lot of time telling kids that every sentence contains a verb. And that every prepositional phrase must start with a preposition. And that every sentence ends with some form of punctuation. And on and on and on (say that like the teacher on Charlie Brown). Now, I don't claim to have every rule and every tid bit of grammar down, but I like it. Yes, I like grammar. I like that it makes a person sound educated when they understand it even if they're not. I like that you can find hidden mistakes, like looking for Waldo, in published works. I like that I like it even though it's a logistical kind of "thing", and I'm terrible at anything to do with logistics. I like that I can tell my kids that I knew a guy that wasn't getting a promotion in a major corporation because his grammar was so poor. I just like it. It makes me happy.
As stated, I have a long ways to go. I constantly question my own grammar abilities because it's kind of my career. But then I ask myself, self I say, "Does a truck driver ever question the route he took? Does a carpenter ever cut the 2x4 too short? Does a mechanic ever order the wrong part? Does an engineer ... well, I don't know anything about them, so never mind. Does a doctor ... let's not go there. Does a photographer ever capture a picture with terrible lighting? Does a student ever fail a test?" Then myself tells me that the answer is Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Then I ask myself, "Do they then give up because of these mistakes?" No! No! No! No! And this is why I will write, and when I have it down to perfection, I will let you know. (Don't stand around waiting; your legs will surely get tired.)
In the mean time, when books like Grammar Girl: Quick and Dirty Tips come in the mail, I get happy. I even like Grammar Girl herself. It's nerdy, I know. But there are two reasons why I don't care about nerdiness. The first is that I spent junior high and high school working so hard not to be nerdy, and the other side is highly overrated and way too much work. The second is that it gives my husband funny jokes for his messages to students when he tells them that I like to read and that I even read grammar books. The students laugh and gasp and point. Do I care? No. Why? See reason number one!
Oh and by the way, I'm working to get my English department to order shirts that say "Good Grammar is Hot." Laugh. Joke. Point. Remember, your doing all of that at your computer. Who's the nerd now?
When you mix a two year old, a Mac, and an aunt and uncle looking for entertainment...
2 comments Posted by Lilies of the Field at 1:22 PMThe best part is that the sweet baby was so entertained by seeing himself on "video" that he just allowed these mean people to take pictures and laugh at his expense. I'm not sure who these mean people are, but when I find them, they'll be sorry!
Now for the really funny stuff. The sweet kid has a great vocabulary and is exceptionally easy to understand for a two year old except when it comes to the word fork. Watch. See. Laugh. We love this kid. A lot.
Word Mishap #1:
Word Mishap #2:
Someday we'll have our own entertainment, but for now, he's accomplishing that task. Doesn't he do it well?
when you move into an apartment complex where the left side forces kids to go to the district in which you are employed, and the right side forces them to go to the next town over. In your naivete, you choose the left side. Why? Well, you're attracted to the idea of being close to the clubhouse, which probably means less of a building view and more of a "homey" view.
See the clear, crystal-blue water calling our name right from our very own balcony.
[Insert Stupid Side Note #1: Why, when you are living in an apartment, do you make a desperate attempt to make it less than what it is? Whether you can trick your mind or not, you are still living in a building with people every where around you, and though you don't intend to be judgemental, the people are not always the classiest of folk. You know what I mean???]
Anyway, so you choose the left side for the impeccable view and well, you're cheap (hence the apartment-living in general) and the idea of free Internet via the clubhouse is really, really appealing. However, no one tells you until a month or so into your humble (which also happens to be the name of your district employer--so pun definitely intended) abode arrangement that you are likely to be surrounded by your students. Yes, your eighth-grade, hormone-ridden, strange-acting, teacher-hating students. This can be a good or bad thing because you might actually like ONE of the four or five that live within touching/seeing-on-a-regular-basis distance of you and enjoy seeing her, but then there's the part where the rest of them are boys that you frequently discipline which is likely to cause you to have to pray frequently that they never, never ever figure out which car you drive or which door is actually yours amongst the plethora of doors. (Even though in the middle of your lesson on adjective clauses, you are asked what your apartment number is and whether or not you and your husband would be willing to hang out with them on the weekend by throwing around a ball. Really? I would rather __________. [Please fill in the blank with anything miserable in your life.]
But then, this is what really annoys you the most about this arrangement: You are so excited about keeping your sweet, amazing little nephew. You rush home from this job of yours, call the hubs on the way to see if he would be willing to take the little tike swimming. You walk up to your door (which is another great thing about apartment life--living on the second floor, but I'll save that vent for another time), change the little guy, put on your newly purchased swimming attire, wait for the hubs to put on his attire, walk down to the pool (which as mentioned before is very, very close and you think you like this).
Look at this sweet, innocent, wanting-to-go-swimming face.
As you're approaching this "resort-like" pool, you peek through the trees that give this less of an apartment feel, and you see him. Him. Yes, him. The boy from your class in his swim trunks. The boy that is a decent kid and you like sometimes, but you never ever ever really want to see him in any less apparel. More than that, you never ever ever ever ever want him to see you in less apparel. The very last thing you want is to be teaching punctuation or "Flowers for Algernon" and for him to be thinking of you in your swimsuit, which is basically just a form of a bra and underwear made from some less lingerie-like material.
[Insert Valid Side Note #2: Said student may or may not have been in alternative school the first semester of school for threatening to kill another student. And he may or may not have moved from the 'hood of inner-city Houston. But whatever. You're not scared.]
Once this is realized, you have two choices: 1. To allow just the hubs and nephew to swim, and you "enjoy" the view from the side in the 200 degree weather that is really like 300 degrees thanks to the sweltering humidity. This alternative is not good for the above mentioned HEAT, and it would still allow him to know that underneath your cute little Target swim cover-up you are wearing a swimsuit. Then, heaven forbid that you actually have to have a conversation with the guy outside of school. or 2. You walk back up the stairs with a disappointed husband and nephew hoping that they (students in pool) never saw you and never bring this up in the middle of the lesson. However, you're not so lucky. As you've chosen choice number 2, you hear the dreaded words ricocheting off the trees, "Hi Mrs. Whitley." You'll be preparing the rest of the weekend for how you will lie about why you didn't swim even though you had towels in hand and swimsuits on. My nephew was fussy. My nephew had a dirty diaper. My husband suddenly came down with the Swine Flu, and we had to evacuate the area. IMMEDIATELY.
This is the exact reason why you should either A: Do your research before moving into an apartment complex if you're a teacher. B: Never move into an apartment complex. C: Never be a teacher.
[Insert Justification Side Note #3: I really love my students. I just don't want to see them outside the confines of a school building. Ever. That's all. Really, I do. I love them. I promise. They're great. I think.]
When you move to a town that's motto is "The Livable Forest" and are suddenly surrounded by what you see above, your head decides that it doesn't like it and revolts. Then, your nose and your throat quickly follow. It's not fun, and you won't like it because you become desperate and desperate leads to dumb. Just dumb.
I have all this congestion (yes, it's my fourth time to have this junk this school year.), and last night I decided to take some medicine to hopefully eliminate the exploding of my head and faucet-like nostrils that had occurred yesterday morning. Our medicine is below the sink in the guest bathroom, so when I went in there to pull out my plethora of cold medicine, I saw the box that was labeled Tylenol Cold. Appropriate, right? I pulled out the little sheet of tablets and took two.
When Cameron came to bed, he woke me up and asked if I had taken medicine because I was breathing really hard. I told him that I had. I'm kind of stubborn about taking medicine which may or may not thoroughly frustrate him, so he probed me to figure out which kind. Being a sweet husband, he went to the counter where I had left the pills, and using the Internet, he looked up the scientific/medical name that was on the foil. The next thing I remember was him coming to inform that I hadn't taken cold medicine, but instead, I had injected myself with medicine to stop DIARRHEA. So yes, I won't be having diarrhea today (or anything of that nature) or possibly for a couple of days, but I will still have congestion, an exploding forehead, and snot.
Lesson: When you clean out your medicine cabinet and downsize by putting lose pills into one box to save space, don't feel so proud of yourself for being organized because it might eliminate problems later that you never really had. Like diarrhea.
The end.
P.S. After this discovery, my sweet husband then brought me Benadryl (or Wal-dryl because we're cheap like that) to aide the original ailment. He's the best nurse!
Lesson: When you clean out your medicine cabinet and downsize by putting lose pills into one box to save space, don't feel so proud of yourself for being organized because it might eliminate problems later that you never really had. Like diarrhea.
The end.
P.S. After this discovery, my sweet husband then brought me Benadryl (or Wal-dryl because we're cheap like that) to aide the original ailment. He's the best nurse!
What do you say when you are starting a blog for no obvious reason? We're not having a kid. We don't have a huge prayer need. We don't have a photography business or any business for that matter. It's a blog just about random life events. That's all. When you google why people start blogs, you can find an article about why your blog is crummy. Here are a few of them and my thoughts:
- Poor hosting. What the heck does this even mean?
- Using a really bad theme. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder or the person (aka: me) that randomly chooses a theme from some free blogger site. Whatever!
- Not emphasizing your best content. Really? It's for fun and not for a publishing company.
- Blogging about blogging. [Clearing of Throat]
- Weak titles. Who knows what the future holds?
- Ignoring grammar and spelling. I may or MAY NOT have this ONE down thanks to this oh-so-wonderful career of mine, and the fact that I tell 8th graders all day what a verb is, even though they argue that every sentence doesn't have to have one. (It's sad and true!)
- Not getting the proper training. My favorite! Um, could someone please tell me where this training is given? It took me about 30 tries and three days to even get the template changed. I really do want to be more knowledgeable, but all of this unexplainable language in the computer world doesn't quite make any sense (XML, HTML, <>, Widgets). Geek squad to the rescue!
All that to say that I'll do this for fun. I'll post for randomness. Then, someday when we have a real reason to have a blog, I'll be a pro!
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