Love When Weeks Fly!

This week absolutely flew by for me!  I expected it to drag on because this was the first full week of school in November!  We have had so many days off this month with Veteran's Day, election day, conferences, and Thanksgiving.  We now only have three weeks of school left until Christmas break.  It's going to be an extremely busy few weeks for me.  Starting Sunday, I could be working 23 days in a row.  At least four of those days I will work at school and my dads store.  My dad needs all the help he can get at his liquor store during the holidays.  Not only that, I have to get the December issue of the schools newspaper ready, take some newspaper club kids on a field trip so they can make a presentation, promote my books while they are free the same day I'm taking the kids on a field trip, attempt to work more on my next book, read a book I checked out of the library before it's due, work out, and somehow stay sane!  I apologize in advance for any negative blog posts or crankiness you see from me.  Although I am not a fan of Christmas, I cannot wait until that day arrives!

Internet

It's amazing how reliant we are on having the Internet readily available at all times.  Today at school, the Internet went down in the entire district.  It started working again after about half an hour.  My Internet worked fined, but no one else in my school had working Internet.  People in other schools had working Internet.  No one could explain why it didn't work.  Teachers were freaking out because they use the Internet for lessons and videos and all sorts of good stuff.  The problem is that they don't have any backup plans because they expect the Internet to work.  That's understandable.  However, it's technology and technology doesn't always work.  It's great when it works, but horrible when it doesn't.  I have one teacher getting observed tomorrow and she is in a huge panic because her lesson is based on the Internet.  Everyone was asking me to fix it.  Unfortunately, when it doesn't work in the entire district, I can't do anything to fix it.  Even if it is out in my school, I typically can't fix it because it is a network problem.  Someone said they would come today and fix it but did not show up.  I told her that she needs to come first thing tomorrow if/when it doesn't work.  I hope that when I go to work tomorrow everything magically works!

Seven Minute Rule

We have this rule at the grocery store.  That means that we are allowed to start our shift seven minutes before or after our assigned start time.  So if I start at 7:00, I can clock in between 6:53-7:07 and still be paid for starting at 7.  It is the most ridiculous rule in the world.  I can't tell you how many of my fellow associates come in to their shift seven minutes late and leave seven minutes early.  7:00 means 7:00, not 7:07.  I am never late to work.  I do not accept tardiness.  I normally clock in 2-3 minutes early.  If I am running the self-checkouts, I normally clock out late because the person that is supposed to come on for me clocks in late.  When I say late, I mean seven minutes past his or her start time.  He or she is not considered late by our store, though.  I get really annoyed when people try to take advantage of the system.  Show up to work on time.  It won't hurt you!

Always Keep Fighting

In 12th grade, I was able to do an internship where I got to help out in a classroom for a certain amount of hours that semester.  I was placed in a second grade room.  That teacher was absolutely amazing and is one of the reasons I wanted to be a teacher even more after working with her.  In September 2009, she was diagnosed with a rare form of breast cancer.  I believe it was stage 3.  She was only about 46 years old.  Less than a year later, it was cured.  Then in June 2010, she was diagnosed with a brain tumor.  She was given 4 months to live.  Well over two years later, she is still alive.  She has been battling this horrible cancer for over three years!  Unfortunately, she has been in and out of teaching.  Instead of teaching second grade, she now teaches reading.  I don't think she has taught at all this year.  I think last year was a good year for her health-wise and she was able to teach a lot.  I even substitute taught for her a few times in 2010 while she was battling this.  It was an honor to come back and substitute teach for someone that was my first mentor in teaching.  About a week ago, this inspirational fighter found out that the brain tumor has grown into something that was even larger than what it was when they first discovered it in 2010.  She writes in an online journal like I do.  She doesn't write in it everyday though.  She has been too busy fighting, living life to the fullest, and focusing on the positive to write everyday.  Focusing on the positive has been her motto throughout this battle.  After reading her entry today, I fear that she doesn't have a lot of time left.  Although there is absolutely nothing positive about death, there are so many positive things that can be said about this person.  She has had a positive outlook on this every step of the way.  She could have easily given up.  She could have been dead three years ago.  Even before the cancer, she always had a smile on her face.  Cancer didn't change that.  She has fought hard, lived life to the absolute fullest, and has been an inspiration to thousands around the community.  I know that she will continue to fight this horrible disease until the day that it will unfortunately take her life.  Keep fighting Mrs. B.!  We are all praying for a miracle!

I slept like a baby last night

My brother told me that the other day.  I know the phrase means that he slept very well.  However, I don't know why it means that.  When I think of a baby sleeping, I think of that infant waking up very often in the middle of the night crying and needing a diaper change.  Some of the phrases that are out there have different meanings than you would think.  I can't think of any other examples off the top of my head right now.  They are definitely out there, though.  On another note, I planned on continuing to work on my grocery store book again tonight.  That didn't happen.  It's okay because in the book I am reading and just finished about making a ton of money selling kindle books, she included many links of websites that promote free kindle books.  I started submitting my information for my free promotion days.  I'm going to send my information to as many sites as possible in hopes that they list my book on the days I am selling them for free.  If I can get many sites to do that, I could get on some top 100 lists if people take advantage of getting my book for free, which is huge for my books.  That can definitely lead to people noticing the books and hopefully more sales when they go back to $0.99.  I really hope all of this hard work pays off!  Patience and perseverance are key!

Weighing my Options

My two brothers are hopefully moving out within a month.  One of them asked me to move in with them.  I gave it absolutely zero thought and said no.  I've lived with them for over 20 years and have no desire to live another second with them.  However, it has motivated me to be more active in an apartment search.  I have a friend who lives in an apartment alone.  She said I could live in the other room.  I plan on going over this week and taking a look at the apartment and figuring out all the numerous utilities I would have to pay for each month.  Then, I have to sit down and look at how much I make each month and roughly how much an apartment would cost me each month.  Then I'd have to look at how much I want to save for other expenses.  I already have three vacations that I want to plan for next year, in addition to wanting a save a large amount of money for retirement.  If I don't think I'll be able to save for all of that while living in an apartment, then unfortunately I will continue to live at home until I can make more money.  Right now, I'm not too optimistic.  I won't know until I sit down with my friend and find out all of the details.  You never know!  We will see what happens!

If I were Rich

No, I'm not talking about someone named Rich.  If I ever had a ton of extra money (haha, right) I would not throw it all away by buying 5 houses and 7 cars.  I would save some for my retirement (again...haha, right) and for my nonexistent kids.  I would spend my money traveling the world.  There are many places I want to visit.  If I had the money, it would be a lot easier to visit those places.  I don't see the point in having several houses and cars.  Maybe I'd have a summer car and a winter car.  I would definitely have a nice house.  I would probably have several things in that house that I don't need.  However, I don't think I'd go overboard like every athlete and celebrity does.  I've read too many stories about people that have won the lottery and lost their money extremely quickly.  I don't understand how that happens.  Obviously, you get many new friends that want your money.  Don't give it to them.  It sounds pretty simple to me.  I know I will never be rich, therefore, I don't really need to worry about what I'd do with that money.  It's always nice to think about it, though.

Family

It's always fun hanging out with family.  I know a lot of people don't like it.  For the most part, I do.  My aunt, uncle, and two cousins came up today from Pennsylvania.  They were only here for one day.  They came over for dinner (because I didn't eat enough garbage last night) and stayed here for over four hours.  They only come up about four times a year.  It's always good to catch up and hang out.  Unfortunately they are only here for one day.  Luckily, they are coming back up at the end of December for a couple of days.  I'm sure we will see more of them then!

Best...Meal...Ever!

Thanksgiving is by far the best holiday ever because of the food.  I was worried that the turkey wasn't going to be cooked for long enough.  However, as my dad was taking it out of the pan, it was falling apart because it was so tender.  It was so tasty!  The sweet potatoes came out great and so did everything else.  Everyone that came over loved everything (besides my mom that doesn't like any food).  I could not have asked for a better dinner.  The worst part about spending 6 hours cooking is that it's all gone in 30 minutes.  There are plenty of left overs, but it's not the same as it is when it's fresh out of the oven.  My grandmother's desserts were awesome as always.  I wish I had more room in my already ridiculously over-sized stomach for more food.  We ate at about 3:30.  It's seven hours later, and I'm shockingly still full!  The other worst part about Thanksgiving is that now I have to wait 365 days until I make a meal that amazing again.

YOU'RE Cooking?

I love that reaction.  Many teachers have asked me the past few days if my mom is cooking Thanksgiving dinner.  I told them that I was cooking.  Every single one of them looked at me in shock and said, "You're cooking?"  Why is this so shocking?  My mom cannot stand cooking.  I love it.  I cook dinner every single night and love every second of it.  Tomorrow, I'll be cooking the turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, and green bean casserole.  It's not that much more than I normally cook.  I cooked all of that food last Thanksgiving, too.  My grandma is baking the desserts.  I'm doing everything else.  My mom will be in charge of setting the table and cleaning up around the house.  My two brothers will have to clean everything up after dinner while I sit down and watch the Dallas Cowboys hopefully win!  Thanksgiving is by far my favorite holiday because I love the food.  I seriously eat real sweet potatoes one day a year.  I wish it was more, but it takes a lot of time and effort to make.  It's totally worth it, though.  I'll be up in about eight hours to get the feast started!  Enjoy!

Twitter

I joined Twitter in I believe around April of this year.  I was active for a few days, and then did pretty much nothing until a few days ago.  In the book I'm reading about getting my book out there, there's a chapter about how to use Twitter effectively.  Right now, I'm being very active and trying to find my readers.  I joined a website where I can post a tweet that I want people to retweet.  I then have to retweet theirs.  It has the possibility to have my books titles be seen by thousands of people.  So far about 15 people have retweeted my tweets.  Some of them have thousands of followers.  Obviously all of those followers don't read every single tweet.  However, my title is definitely out on the web.  I will continue to make tweets more often and hope that eventually it will spark some sales!  You can follow me at Twitter @pacelli_shane.  I will be selling my two kindle books for free from December 14-16.  Reviews would be greatly appreciated!

Social Secuirty and Retirement...Or Not

The other day, my dad and I were talking about how much money you can get and when you can get it for social security.  This year, President Obama passed a law to lower the percentage taken out of everyone's paycheck for social security so that we would have more money to spend.  Starting in January, it's back to the higher percent before the law was put into place.  That means our paychecks will be slightly less money again.  I believe in about 2042, more money will be going out of the social security fund than will be going on.  This is not good for me!  The age you can start collecting social security is 63.  However, they will not give you 100% of the money per month that you are allotted if you collect at that age.  The age for that is I think my dad said 69.  He told me how much he would get if he were to start collecting at 63, 66, and 69.  It was a huge difference per month.  The higher the age you start collecting, the more per month you will get.  Basically, by the time I'm that age, social security will be either gone, or the age to collect will be about 75.  That's why two years ago, I started saving for retirement.  That fund I started has nothing to do with the retirement system I joined at work.  Unfortunately, I am in tier 5 for teaching instead of tier 4.  I started working while in tier 4.  However, I didn't fill out retirement forms until tier 5 came out.  If I was in tier 4, I would be putting in 3% of my paycheck each week for 10 years, then my employer would match that 3% the rest of my career.  With tier 5, I am putting in 3.5% of my paycheck in until I retire.  That's a huge difference.  As of now, I don't get health insurance out of my paycheck.  When I'm 26, I will have to.  That will significantly lower the money that goes into my pocket.  I know how lucky I am to have already started saving for retirement at my age.  Most people my age only worry about paying off their college loans.  However, I know how unlikely it is for me to have any other source of income when/if I retire when I'm older.  Social security will more than likely not be there.  I am seriously scared for what our country faces in the future in terms of money and resources.  It sure isn't looking good. :(

Grammar, Punctuation, and Spelling

I am very good about reading over my blogs and making sure there are no spelling and grammar errors.  Whenever I walk around my computer lab and watch students type, I am always hounding them about indenting paragraphs, capitalizing, and correct grammar.  However, I noticed that in my blogs, I never indent.  I'm pretty sure that I don't indent because when I hit tab, it doesn't indent in this program.  I'm not exactly sure why it doesn't indent.  I know I can hit the space bar several times to show that it's indented.  I apparently can't be bothered to do that though, haha.  I'm such a hypocrite at times.  At least I edit each post for grammar and punctuation!  Maybe one day I will start indenting my paragraphs in my blogs.  That's another thing, I don't separate paragraphs.  I just babble on and on.  It's okay, you all get the point.  This blog is meant for writing my thoughts.  It's not meant to be a published book!

Book Sales

I was just looking at my book sales for last month and noticed a few things.  I noticed that if someone burrows my book (which they can do if they have Amazon Prime), I make a ton more money per book than I do if someone buys my kindle book.  Interesting.  Whenever I check to see how many people have purchased my book, I only check the US sales.  I forgot that they have a spot to check sales in the UK, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, and Japan.  I have sold 3 book ones and 4 book twos in the UK this month.  Also, when I said I sold 112 free copies of each book, I was wrong.  I sold 31 book ones in the UK and 32 book twos in addition to the 112 in the US.  One book in France was purchased during the free promotion, as well as a book in Germany, and even two in Japan!  I love how my book is literally traveling around the world!  As I said, several people have bought my book from the UK.  The one review I have is from someone in the UK.  Maybe I'll be the next world wide sensation.  Haha!

So Glad it's Friday

No matter where I am on a Friday, I always hear the phrase, "I'm so glad it's Friday."  When I was at the grocery store working more often than I do now, I couldn't stand when customers said that to me.  There was no such thing as a Friday in the grocery store for me because the days I worked in a week were always different.  Someone said that phrase to me at work today and I just agreed with them to make them happy.  I don't know why people always say they are so happy it's Friday.  It makes me feel like they don't like their job.  If you don't like your job, get a different one.  I completely understand that that's nearly impossible to do these days.  However, I was talking to a teacher today and she said that her husband was a chiropractor making a ton of money and hated it.  He wanted to be a teacher.  He left his job, went to school, and became a teacher.  He made more money in one month as a chiropractor than he did in one year as a teacher.  However, he was happier as a teacher.  Good for him!  Back to my point about being happy it's Friday.  I completely understand that in a school, we are always busy and the days are exhausting.  The weekends off are awesome and well needed.  For me, I only get one day off a week because I work at the grocery store on Sunday's.  I do enjoy my Saturdays off, though.  I feel like as humans, it's just a natural thing for us to say that phrase on Fridays to start a conversation with someone.  Our minds are trained to do that.  On Facebook, I always see people put, TGIF (Thank God It's Friday).  Same thing.  I'm just not a big fan of the phrase at all.  We should learn to wake up each day and look forward to whatever the day might bring.  After all, you only live once (YOLO).  Therefore, you want to make each day count!

P. S. I got my first review on my first book today!  It as a 4 star review out of 5 and the person put some great positive comments.  Thank you to that person and I hope to get more soon!

Book Reading

On Tuesday, my schools PTA was sponsoring an event at our local Barnes and Noble.  If someone bought a book from Barnes and Noble and mentioned our schools PTA, a portion of the money from the sale would go to the PTA.  Several of our schools teachers were guest readers for this event.  I signed up to read, too.  Obviously I brought my first book, The Teacher That Didn't Teach to read to everyone.  When I got there, there was only about five kids listening to the previous reader.  I was really hoping there would be more.  I think when I read two chapters of my book, there were only three students and my principal there to listen to me.  I thought that this was going to be a good opportunity for exposure.  It was still fun to read part of my book to some kids.  However, while reading, I was rewording sentences in my book because I thought it would sound better the way I read out loud than it did written.  That's not good.  I edited that book so many times and could still edit it again.  Oh well.  There were no grammatical errors or anything that I picked up on.  It was just some rewording that I thought sounded better.  Since I sell my books at The Little Book House in Stuyvesant Plaza, I could do a book signing there.  My fear with that is buying way too many books for the event and only a handful of people show up to the event.  I would love to promote a book signing to parents in my school and district.  I don't think my principal would like the idea too much.  If the parents knew I was doing a signing, I would have a much better opportunity to sell a large number of books during a signing.  I'll have to see what I can do!

Book Reviews

This is a test to see who actually reads my blogs and who reads my books.  I'm reading a book right now about how this author made $42,000 in one month off of the kindle version of her books.  She talked about promoting it for free and stuff like that.  I've done exactly the same things that she has done.  She also talks about getting people to rate and review your books.  I have 0 reviews on either book.  She said that she promoted her book for free and over 20,000 people bought one book and 20,000 another.  Obviously she must have built a following before hand.  I was thrilled to have over 200 people get my books for free when I promoted them.  She recommended that we keep our books on sale for free for 3 days and then another time for 2.  The program on Amazon allows us to have it on sale for free for 5 days within a 90 day period.  If you have books for sale for 3 days, it allows the book to hopefully climb up the best selling lists.  If it does that, then people will see it much more easily than if it isn't on the list.  I have three days left on each book.  I think I will promote them for free three days in a row.  I haven't decided the dates yet though.  With that said, I would love people to review my book, good or bad.  I know a few people that do read my blog.  I know that they have read at least one of my books.  I also know that the books are meant for kids and not people their age.  They only read them because they are awesome.  However, I would love if they would write a review on Amazon with their honest opinion.  That might spark some sales.  I don't want people to put, "I'm Shane's best friend and this book is awesome."  Although I know my book is awesome, (duh), if you put you are my friend, the review won't be reliable.  It will just be a friend trying to help me promote my book.  People looking for books don't like that.  I've said it before and I'll say it again.  I really do feel like I'm very close to a big breakthrough with my books.  As an author, promotion, time, and patience are three of the most important things to do and have to get anywhere with your books.

Yahoo News Articles

I sometimes have a lot of down time while at work.  Since I am the computer aide, I sit in front of a computer all day when classes aren't in the room.  I normally read a bunch of articles on Yahoo.  I've always used Yahoo to search stuff instead of Google.  Don't ask me why because I have no idea.  I enjoy reading articles because sometimes they are very interesting.  However, almost all of them are depressing.  Today, I read an article about a grandmother and uncle having custody of three kids.  All five of them, two dogs, and a cat were found dead in a car from an apparent murder suicide.  The grandmother was upset because the parents were trying to regain custody of their kids.  Therefore, she killed everyone.  That makes complete sense, right?  Another story I read was about a four year old girl being found naked outside neglected while her father was passed out in the house because of either drugs or alcohol.  Not only that, another toddler in the house was found in a dog cage and a third infant was found.  The mother was at work.  What is wrong with people?  I don't get it at all.  When I'm not reading those stories, I'm reading about what President Obama will do wrong next.  It's so depressing to read all of those stories!  On the bright side, kudos to two very young kids in our district!  Yesterday, they were outside playing when a man driving by stops and tells them to get into the car.  They immediately ran to their house, told their mom, and were able to give a great description of the man and his car.  Unfortunately, they have not found the guy yet.  These kids were only 8 and 5 and knew to tell someone something is wrong.  To the guy trying to pick up those kids, I can't write on here what I think of you because kids might read it.  STAY AWAY! 

Hotels

I didn't write yesterday because I once again went to Turning Stone for an overnight visit.  We stayed at Vernon Downs, which is about 10 minutes from Turning Stone.  We were on the top floor and we had a view of the harness track.  As a horse racing fan, naturally I found that to be awesome!  Unfortunately there were no races going on.  As I was laying in bed this morning, I was thinking.  The bed was very comfortable.  I know they changes the sheets everyday.  Do they change the comforter though?  How many thousands of people have slept in the same bed that I was in?  Their germs are all over the bed and probably the comforter that wasn't changed out.  It's absolutely disgusting to even think about.  However, that's where my mind wandered to this morning while laying there.  Naturally, I immediately jumped out of the bed once those thoughts entered my mind.  I wanted to be as far away from the bed as possible!  Overall, I had a nice mini trip.  Now on to a four-day work week.

Grandparents

You gotta love your grandparents.  I go over to my grandparents house once a month-ish.  They spoil me to death.  They feed me lunch and typically give me money.  Today, I went over to rake.  They fed me lunch, paid me, and then took me out to dinner.  You can't beat that!  I always love listening to their stories.  They tell me the same stories practically every time I go there.  That's okay though because at least I am spending time with them.  They normally tell me a few stories I haven't heard, so it's worth it.  I understand that my time with my grandparents is precious.  I hate to say it, but I never know when it could be my last time with them.  I also understand how lucky I am to have three of my four grandparents still living at my age.  It's very rare.  We have old genes in our family.  I can't wait to see them again on Thanksgiving day!

College Basketball

My favorite sport has started up again.  The Siena Saints started their first game extremely well.  Then after about 10 minutes, they decided to play like garbage.  They lost their first game by 1 point.  I want one sports team to root for that actually has a chance of doing well and winning a championship.  I think the New Jersey Devils could do well this year if they have a hockey season.  Of course I root for my local team.  I also root for the UNC Tar Heels in college basketball.  They always seem to make it to the sweet 16 of the NCAA tournament and then lose.  This year will probably be no different.  It's amazing how much time and emotion I put into my sports teams.  If only I put this much effort into promoting my books more and looking for a teaching job.  Well, I kind of do, but probably not enough.  Patience, patience, patience.

Dentist Office

I have never heard anyone say that they enjoy going to the dentist.  You will not hear me say it either.  I normally don't mind it too much though.  I only go twice a year.  It's not that bad in the grand scheme of things.  What I don't like about the dentist is that they love to ask me questions while my mouth is wide open.  They are not yes or no questions either.  How do you expect me to respond with my mouth wide open and drool coming out of it?  They don't stop talking either.  They tell you their life story.  It's like a therapy session for them or something.  The only difference is that they get paid to talk and I have to pay to listen!  What's up with that?  Not only that, she scrapes my teeth.  That sound is one of the most obnoxious sounds ever, too.  When she does that, she always catches my gums and takes chunks out of them.  She cleans off the tool she uses like it's nothing.  Um, excuse me lady, that used to be a part of me!  I wish you wouldn't scrape it out, thanks!  Then when she brushes my teeth, same thing.  She catches the gums and it tickles and I can't move because then something much worse could potentially happen.  My mouth is still hanging open and my jaw hurts the entire time.  I see why people don't like going to the dentist.  At least I won't have to go back until May!

Newspaper Club

We had another meeting today of the newspaper club to work on November's edition.  I talked for a few minutes and then gave some suggestions for articles.  After that, they wrote the rest of the time.  Many of the students took my suggestions and are writing dessert recipes and articles about Thanksgiving.  As I was walking around the computer lab, it was incredible to see 20+ fifth and sixth graders quietly typing away their articles.  I didn't read any of them yet.  However, they were all working tremendously hard and got a lot written in a little under an hour.  It's so satisfying to see so many students interested in writing.  When I started the newspaper club, I had no idea how many kids would be interested.  I definitely didn't think I'd get 25 dedicated students.  Seeing how hard they worked today just gets me even more excited about what they will write in the newspaper as the year goes on.  It also gets me excited about their future.  You never know, we may have 25 more authors on our hands!

My First Author Visit!

A friend from high school invited me to come to her school and talk to the kids there about my books.  I was very happy to do so.  Today, I talked to a group of about 30 1st-4th graders about my books.  I talked about how I came up with the idea for the books, outlining it, writing, and how I edit them.  I talked about how long it took to write and edit the books and how much work really goes into it.  I also talked about finding a subject or genre you really enjoy to read and read a ton of books about that topic.  I read them a chapter from my first book.  They were so quiet and well-behaved the entire time.  They asked a lot of great questions.  I was honored to come to a school and talk about my books and would love to do it again. 

Job you love for a little money, or a job you hate for a lot

Yesterday, I was telling my younger brother about the Andre Agassi book I read.  Agassi was a tennis player that absolutely hated the game.  He was very good and made millions of dollars.  He retired at a very young age, as most athletes do.  He is obviously set for life with all of the money he made.  I asked my brother if he would rather work in a job he loved to do for a little bit of money, or if he would rather be miserable at work making a ton of money.  He said that he would rather work at a job he hated for a ton of money because then he could retire young.  I would much rather work at a job I am happy in rather than a job I hate.  I'm sure that I will be able to live off of my teacher salary with no problems.  Money doesn't buy happiness.  Naturally, my brother argued the point with me and said I was wrong (because obviously every view he has is right).  How many stories have you heard of people winning the lottery and being broke shortly after?  Also, if you win the lottery, everyone will be asking you for money.  Lots of people that have a lot of money are not necessarily happy.  I would much rather be happy with less money than miserable with a lot of money.  I really think that most people would feel the same way as me.  I could be completely wrong, though.

3 Day week for the kids, 5 for the teachers

The kids have election day and Thursday off.  Every year on election day, the teachers have workshops.  This year, we have a morning with workshops and the afternoon with parent teacher conferences.  On Thursday, the teachers have another morning of workshops and another afternoon filled with parent teacher conferences.  I'm not a teacher so I don't have conferences.  However, my contract says that I have to work 4 days this week.  My principal wants me to come in for a half day on election day for the workshops.  I didn't plan on coming in on Thursday.  The workshops that day have nothing to do with me so I'm not going to them.  Now I have to come in.  I do get paid extra for coming in on Tuesday though.  That's good!  Unfortunately, as of now, I have nothing to do on Thursday.  Hopefully my boss will find me something to do!  Otherwise I will sit in my room and twiddle my thumbs for 8 hours!

The Biggest Races Are Over

One thing is for sure... I didn't do as bad as last year.  I broke exactly even.  I lost all of my bets today but it was all the money I won yesterday that I lost.  It could have been worse.  Naturally, in two races today, I didn't bet my favorite horses.  I typically bet my favorite horses even if I don't think they can win.  This time, I bet different horses because I didn't think my favorite horses could win.  However, in two races, they won!  Not only did they win, they paid very large prices to win!  Ugh.  Oh well.  Like I said, I did not lose any money this weekend.  That's a good thing.  The next exciting horse race isn't until next year.  At least I have Thanksgiving to look forward to!

Beetles

I know, such a random topic.  No, I am not talking about the band The Beatles.  I am talking about the disgusting bug.  In my school, we call them the (school name) beetles.  They are black with orange spots all over them.  They show up anywhere and everywhere anytime of the year.  Obviously the warmer it is, the more often they show up.  I cannot tell you how many of them I have killed this year.  They show up all over my windows, on my computer screens, and they make kids scream.  When I kill them, green guts come out.  It's quite attractive.  When I walk the halls, I see dozens of them clinging to the windows.  I wish we could spray some sort of pesticide to kill them all.  I think we get them because we are so close to the woods.  Who knows?  They need to go!

Recap of yesterdays blog post: my high school football team won the section tournament!  They play in the state semi finals in 2 weeks!  I won $90 on the races today!  I hope to add to that tomorrow!

Big Day Tomorrow

My alma matter high school football is playing in their sections super bowl for the first time ever!  I'll be watching that and rooting hard for them.  If they win, they move on to the state tournament!  Over the next two days, there are 15 of the best horse races of the year.  As always, I've spent hours handicapping so that I can win a penny or two.  We will see what happens.  I hope I do better on this years Breeder's Cup races than I did on last years!  Note: do not try this at home!  Gambling is bad!