OH!! Before I Forget... A Note About Comments!!

It would seem that some of you were as shaken up by my HR incident as I was. But, I'd like to assure you that it is ok to leave comments here on this website! I have only given it out to select individuals, and you'll note that there is really no reference to myself at all whatsoever! I know you're all fascinated by what I write, so please feel free to tell me just how good it is!! :)

Forget Ernesto, My Life is a Whirlwind!

I did not sleep well Thursday night. I kept waking up, thinking I heard my alarm clock and having to use the bathroom. (So that's a little extra info for you!) By the time Friday morning rolled around, I was ready to hit the road and get to school. We had meetings in the morning, I attended a Reading Focus Group. Then in the afternoon, we watched the cheesiest video ever on Blood Born Pathogens for Schools. By the time I got to my classroom, the day was almost over. In spite of this, my co-worker and I got quite a bit done. She had to leave early, which left me to move boxes and hang posters. Then, my other co-teacher came in. She kept me talking until 6pm, when I finally said, "It's the weekend, I'm going home!" Today, I had to go to Waterbury for a district meeting, then to Meriden for a department specific session. I am still probably not coherent. I've been up since 3:30 this morning. I had to leave my house by 5:30. However, I will say this on the subject. There is soooooo much talk of differentiated instruction, and making content accessible to all students... But, then they take a group of teachers, stick them in a room and try boring them to death for 7 hours! It's just not right! It really is a cruel and unusual form of torture! Tomorrow will be my last chance to get things ready for my students arrival on Wednesday. At the moment, my fingers are crossed and I am hoping and praying it will all get done! For now, I am annoyed with myself. I couldn't fall asleep last night without watching Grey's Anatomy, and now I am suffering the consequences of just over 4.5 hours of sleep. I am going to bed within the next hour.

Slacker!

Tomorrow will be my first day back at school. I went in yesterday and began moving furniture around, but my room is still an absolute disaster. I had planned on going in today, but at the last minute decided I would rather go antiquing with my mom. Fortunately, it looks as though the afternoon has no agenda and staff will be able to get into their classrooms. Also on the fortunate end, working on a co-teaching team will mean that there are 3 of us to get things ready. While I'm not sure how much help one co-teacher will be, I do know that the other will be a huge help. I'm still feeling apprehensive about all of the changes in store for us this year. On Monday night, I discovered a posting for a full time English position at another school in our system. I'm still trying to convince myself that I didn't make the wrong decision in holding off on it. Tonight though, it's all about Grey's Anatomy... and then bedtime. Tomorrow it's Professional Development!!

The Incredible Shrinking Woman

OK, so a couple of months ago my sister, Sarah, and I (Sarah's the normal married one, not the troublesome 20 year old) were shopping and I realized that my apartment had been missing one very important element.... a scale. Now, typically, I am not a great fan of the scale, and I have in the past made it a mission to avoid scales and the evil numbers they report. But, for some reason, that particular evening, my judgment was impaired and I decided to test one out. I was appalled at the number. I quickly and easily convinced myself that the number could not possibly be correct. After all, with the number of people who, like me, had tested the scale in stores, the scale could very easily have been mis-calibrated. This incident, however, left me wary. After we walked around Linen's and Things a little more, my perplexity over the scale episode got the better of me. I went back to buy a scale of my very own. Once back at my apartment, I set the box on the table. I stared it down for what seemed like an eternity. Finally, I worked up the courage to remove it from the box. Once arranged in the bathroom, I held my breath, stepped on and shut my eyes. After the profuse sweating stopped and my heart stopped palpitating, I pried open an eyelid and glanced down at the number. I had been correct at the store; the scale was not calibrated correctly. The number on my now very personal scale was actually higher than the one that had shown up on the one in the store! I was mortified! Once I got over the hysteria and stopped seeing brightly colored spots, I realized something would have to be done! I began watching what I ate; walking with my parents’ dog and a few weeks later I joined Weight Watchers. I’ve been doing WW for 6 weeks now, and I am pleased to announce that I have lost almost 10 pounds. If you count the 5 and ½ I lost before joining WW, I’m down 15!! This of course is very exciting. When I go back to school on Friday, I will be 15lbs lighter than I was when I left. In addition, thanks to a day at the beach today, I’ll also be returning with a tan! I’m going to sign off for tonight! I just wanted to share my triumph and my struggle. After all, I’m 15 lbs down, but I have a long, long journey to go.

We Don't Need No Education......

I go back to school on Friday. I'm not sure what they were thinking, having staff come back on a Friday. It's such a terrible idea. But those of us who have to depend on the paycheck really shouldn't complain. I'm having some mixed emotions about going back. This will be the first time I will actually return for a second year. I'm very excited that they wanted me back. I'm also excited about the new ideas and activities I want to incorporate into the Lab. I'm also excited about teaching 2 regular English classes this year. Which leads me to some of my apprehensive feelings. This will be the first time I've taught a regular English class in 3 years. I feel a little behind on my content. I also thought I was going to be teaching 9th and 11th grade, but just found out(late last week) that, due to a schedule change over the summer, I'm going to be teaching 9th and 10th grade. I also have to complete my state certification portfolio. I will be spending vast amounts of time preparing lessons, writing "self-evaluations" and evaluating student work, in order to turn it in to a review committee that will decide, based on what has been written, if I am a good teacher. I am also nervous about my students. I know the 10th grade, but my class assignments mean that I will have the same students ALL THE TIME!!! Having the 11th grade class would have meant that I wouldn't have any of those students in lab as well. Teaching 9th and 10th means that I will have the same kids in Lab and class. I'm also a little concerned about my 10th graders and their ability to retain the routines and strategies we spent last year building. In the end, the only way to get past it all is to go back and dive right into the swing of things. I will be heading in on Tuesday. Monday is my Mom's last day off and we'll be hitting the beach. So Tuesday, I will head on in to school to start setting up furniture and filing paperwork and planning lessons, etc.

1 in 27 Isn't the Best of Odds

I have come to a shocking conclusion today. In 3 weeks and 3 days I will turn 27. In my pathetic 27 years I have been on ONE, count it 1, lousy date. And I mean that in the most literal possible way. It was a lousy date. I will officially be 13 years away from becoming a real-life 40 year-old-virgin! So, what, you may ask, is the shocking conclusion? Well, let me tell you... I need to go on a date. I need to go on lots of dates. Don't get me wrong... I'm really a "single and loving it" kind of gal. I certainly don't consider myself to be one of those women desperate for marriage, constantly counting down numbers on the biological clock. But there are times when even I question myself. Do I really love being single? Or Do I say I love being single because I have no other options? For years, I have been tormenting my mother with threats of being promiscuous after 30. But the truth of the matter is, I don't really seek out promiscuity... But I'd like to at least have the opportunity to be. So, in case you hadn't already noticed!! I NEED HELP!!!! I need a date! Know anyone??

I'm So Not Ready To Be a Mom

Monday was my parent's 35th wedding anniversary. There is a part of me that is still shocked and amazed that they've made it that long. Don't get me wrong, my parents love each other very much, but they've endured some rocky times during the 27 years I've known them. So for their anniversary, they left town and went to Portsmouth NH for 4 whole days! This means I spent those 4 whole days caring for my youngest brother Joe (who has Cerebral Palsy) and the rest of the kids who still live at home. For 4 whole days I followed the following routine: 6:45am - wake up to Sophie (the Labradoodle) barking - take her outside to go poopy! 7:00am - crawl back to bed praying for at least another hour of precious sleep! 8:30am - drag my tired self out of bed, turn TV on for Joe and prepare his breakfast, take Sophie out one more time, then let her loose in the house. 9:00am - dress Joe (this includes a diaper change, and let's just say, there were more than enough 14 year old boy sized poops! GROSS!) 9:15am - Feed Joe Breakfast 9:30am - get Joe settled in Living room, with TV on, then clean kitchen. 10:00am - have breakfast 10:30am - Laundry (my own downstairs in the basement) 11:00am - Laundry (my parents' on the first floor) 11:30am - prepare Joe's late morning snack 11:45am - Change Joe's Diaper 12:00pm - Feed Joe his snack 12:15pm - Take Sophie out 12:30pm - Laundry (mine again) 12:45pm - Laundry (my parents') 1:00pm - finally a free moment to watch Days of Our Lives (Don't judge me... there's nothing else on) 2:00pm - start thinking about what to make for dinner, pull frozen meat out of freezer. Maybe get a brother to sit with Joe so I can run to the grocery store 2:30pm - take Sophie out 2:45pm - Change Joe's Diaper 3:00pm - Feed Joe "Lunch" and Meds 3:30pm - Laundry (mine) 4:00pm - Laundry (Parents') 4:30pm - Prepare dinner for me, David and Jeremy (usually their girlfriends too) 5:30pm - Family dinner 6:00pm - clean the kitchen 6:30pm - Take Sophie out 7:00pm - Get Joe ready for bed, Change Diaper, and dress in PJ's 7:30pm - Give Joe dinner and nighttime meds 8:00pm - Clean kitchen (other brothers have made snacks and Joe's dishes need to be washed) 8:15pm - Take Sophie out 8:30pm - Put Joe to Bed 8:45pm - Laundry (mine) 9:00pm - Laundry (Parents') 9:15pm - Watch TV while falling asleep in chair waiting for David to get home so doors can be locked and lights turned out. 9:30pm - give up on David, take Sophie out one more time, leave a note for David to take Sophie out when he gets home, and then to lock up and turn out lights. 9:45pm - crawl into bed exhausted, maybe watch alittle TV to fall asleep. 10:00pm - Out cold 11:30pm - Wake up to David coming in. 12:00am - Finally back to sleep. I am so not cracked up to being a stay at home mom! I was so ready to be home last night it wasn't even funny.

Long Day's Journey Into Night

What a week this has been! I must not have realized how much stress the incident at work was causing me. Last night I came home and fell asleep on the couch. I woke up long enough to drag my butt to bed and fell asleep for the rest of the night. For those of you who have been waiting with baited breath... The final outcome of the meeting came in a form of a "Final Written Warning." This basically means that out of 3 levels of steps they could have taken, they chose to take the most severe! I was a little shocked. I figured they wouldn't fire me, but I also didn't think they would act so drastically. I mean come on... it was the first offense and the rest of their investigation showed me as a model employee. The HR Manager said she felt that I had expressed regret and that she felt that I felt really badly about the whole situation, and yet she chose the route she did. I'm a little confused! According to my union rep, if I choose to file a grievance, I can get the final warning knocked down to a written warning. But that will mean at least 3 trips down to the hospital for meetings off the clock. At the moment, I'm not feeling that it's worth the time. I probably won't work there past the end of this school year anyway. As to the rest of my life, there's been other stuff happening, but I can't really think of what to write about right now. Besides, I need to get back to the cleaning of my house. My parents are going to be away for the weekend (it's their 35th wedding anniversary). I'll be staying at their house to care for their dog and my brother (Joe has Cerebral Palsy). Elisabeth will be staying at my house to care for my cats, which works out perfectly since she'll be running VBS this week. So, for tonight, I am signing off...

The Pendulum Still Swings

So tomorrow, there is yet another meeting with the good folks in HR. I am not looking forward to it, but don't have much of a choice. In truth, I am not really concerned. It's more of an inconvenience than anything else. Here's what I've been pondering during the past 24 hours. FIRST! The problem was introduced with the words "this was found on a printer in Mammography..." Which is odd. I believe the assumption behind this was that I had printed it and forgotten it. Someone found it, and was concerned. The funny thing is... I have never once printed my blog. Why would I? I write it. I know what's there! The other problem with this presentation is that on the day it was printed I was working in a different department and you cannot print documents from the department I was working in to Mammography. This means, someone had to have printed it out and then turned it in. Talk about Malicious!! SECOND! When printed out, the first blog was 30 pages long (I am so thrilled that I had written so much, and am missing some of those posts, a few were quite clever.) The portion I was questioned about was one of my early entries. It appeared on page 20. This means, that whoever printed it out had spent a significant amount of time reading through to find that portion before printing it out and turning it in. So, apparently I am not the only one spending "significant amounts of time on the internet at work." THIRD! It's not as if there was anything significantly inappropriate on the site. There was no foul language, no vulgarity of content, not even a hint of maliciousness toward my work or coworkers. I made one exaggerated, sarcastic statement. I can guarantee, if they were to look at pages belonging to some of my other coworkers, they'd certainly find objectionable material! In the entire situation, I have to say I feel as though it's fairly frivolous. A HUGE deal has been made over something so incredibly minor. I don't understand why there has to be an enormous investigation over what seems to me to be sooooo petty. Would the same thing happen if I'd written the same thing in a pen/paper journal that I forgot on the desk? In the grand scheme of things however, I work per diem. I'd be sad to lose the job, but I can always find something else. Although, I doubt termination is in the works at this point. Not much else to say on the subject. I suppose it's time for me to head out. I'll keep you posted, and will update tomorrow.

Relocated!

Welcome to the home of my new Blog!!! I am so disappointed that I had to shut down the other one, but here's to a fresh start!!! So, around 3pm today, I received a call from my supervisor. She said that Human Resources had called and needed to meet with us at 4pm. I spent the next hour wondering what could have happened that I would be called into HR. When I finally sat down in the conference room, I was confronted with a familiar page. Someone had printed out my blog and turned it in to HR. The HR manager had read through it, compared it to my time card and found that I had posted 2 entries while at work. In one of them, I had sarcastically talked about not having anything to do at work. So, in an effort to play the game and get past all of this, I have taken the blog down and relocated here. Hopefully in a few weeks, I'll be able to go merge the 2 accounts. For now, I think it's best to let the previous stuff disappear.