National Novel Month

I just looked at the certificate I printed for completing National Novel Writing Month in November 2013. That was two months before I moved. I didn't even consider participating in it last November. I would have had to write 50,000 words in a month. I didn't have any ideas for a new book. I also didn't have any time to write. With the amount of work I have for teaching, my writing career is on hiatus for awhile. My book sales are still doing very well and that's all that matters for now!

Tax Time

It's that time of year again! For the past 27 years, my mom has done my taxes for me. Thanks mom! All I have had to do was read the numbers to her while she plugged them in. I don't have mom here to help me this time. I don't have a clue how to do it. Luckily, my bank will do it for me. I heard someone say it was free for them to do this. I asked them yesterday and they said it depended on how much money I make. We will see. I am still waiting on some forms from places. My taxes will be a little challenging for whoever because I lived in New York for a few weeks and have a few W2 forms from there as well as my North Carolina forms. I hope I make some money back!

Error Given to Students

I was showing my kids a StudyJams video from Scholastic about classifying triangles today. They have a little test at the end of it. One of the questions was what type of triangle has three equal sides and three equal angles? The kids knew the answer to be equilateral triangle. I clicked that and the website said it was wrong. They said the correct answer was a scalene triangle. That is absolutely incorrect. I told the kids that. I also emailed Scholastic to tell them of the error and they immediately emailed me back apologizing. It surprises me that no one else has emailed them about the error. Hopefully they will fix this so other students don't get confused!

S'mores

Is there anything better than s'mores? A lot of things, but s'mores are delicious! I just hosted Wednesday night dinner. For dessert, I started a fire in my fireplace (without burning my place down) and we ate s'mores. It was a great night to cap a horrible day.

Syracuse at UNC

I went to the Syracuse UNC game last night. UNC didn't look good at all the first half. They were down 5 at half. They had 19 turnovers in the game. They really picked it up second half and ended up winning by 10. I fully realize that my friend and I have problems because we go to so many games. That was game 2 in three days. Now we have a long stretch until we go to our next game one week from yesterday. I'm just trying to enjoy everything I can while I can!

I Did It

I had my kids start their journals today. I showed them this blog and told them I write everyday. I explained to them that my goal with this is for them to improve their writing and so theey can look back at this years from now and have memories. Like I said last night, they didn't like the idea. Then when they started creating their journals they got somewhat excited. Then when it came time to write, they said they didn't know what to write. It'll take some time but this will be good for them...I hope!

Maybe Tomorrow

I was just thinking about what I said in one of my first blog posts here. It was the blog post where I said I was going to start writing every single day. That post was on May 24, 2012. In that post, I said that when I got my own classroom, I was going to have my students write a few sentences each day in a journal. Unfortunately I did not do that this year. I didn't even think to do it. I was so busy and nervous at the beginning of the year that it slipped my mind. I guess I could start it now. I'm not sure. I think it would be a good idea. I know for a fact that my students wouldn't like it. I also know that if it turned out the way I hope it does, my students' writing will benefit from it. I'm going to talk to the other 4th grade teachers tomorrow and see what they think about the idea.

Game 1 of 3 in 10 days

I went to South Carolina today to see the number 1 ranked team Kentucky play at South Carolina. They looked vulnerable today. Their defense is unstoppable. They only let up 43 points. However, they looked sloppy at times. They missed a lot of free throws. They could have easily won by more than 15. There were times they looked brilliant though. South Carolina didn't want to shoot the ball today. They seemed scared every time they went down the court. They also missed a ton of shots. It was a great atmosphere since it was a sell out crowd of 18,000. I loved how it only cost $5 to park right near the arena. It's going to cost $10 to park at UNC Monday and we will have to walk quite a ways. I wish today's game was more competitive. It was for the first 16 minutes of the first half then Kentucky took over. I'm excited for Monday's game of Syracuse at UNC!

Flue

I learned a valuable lesson yesterday. I have to open the flue in order for the smoke to go up the chimney instead of all over my apartment! Like I said yesterday, I have never used a fireplace before so I had no idea what I was doing. If I had opened the flue, I would have been fine. I'm extremely lucky that I didn't burn the place down. My coat smelled so bad that when the kids walked into the room today they wondered what the smell was. I didn't answer them. I spent this afternoon after work fabreezing everything. Lesson learned!

Fireplace

This is my second apartment I have lived in and my second fireplace. I didn't touch the fireplace in my old apartment. My friends want me to start a fire when they come over next week for dinner. I was told I had to use a chimney cleaning log first. I bought that today and am currently burning it. I hope this isn't a preview of what's to come next week with a real starter log. It has been burning for about an hour and a half and the smoke is pouring all over the apartment. I have the windows open and the fans on. It hasn't done anything. My eyes are watering because they are burning! On the bright side, the fire alarm hasn't gone off. I hope this doesn't put a permanent stench into my furniture and clothes. I've never used a fireplace before but I'm not very happy with the start! We will see how next Wednesday goes.

Treadmill

I went to the gym for the first time in a LONG time yesterday and today. By gym, I mean the gym like place they have in my apartment complex. They have 2 treadmills and a few weight machines. I almost fell flat on my face while running the treadmill last night. It's not as wide as the ones I used at my previous gym. I went to the gym last night around 9. How I motivated myself to cook dinner, wash dishes, make lesson plans, then walk to the gym is beyond me. I sometimes get in those motivated moods. I'm proud of myself. Let's see how long this motivation will last.

Trying to Get Points

I bought a new credit card a few weeks ago. It's a Southwest credit card. I have to pay $69 a year for it. The things you buy earn points towards a free Southwest flight. The promotion they are running is if I spend $2,000 in three months, they will give me 50,000 points. That's pretty much enough for a free flight. I was told by the apartment manager that I could set up auto pay for my rent with my credit card. I tried and I can't. They only allow echeck to be auto pay. If I paid credit card individually by month, I'd have to pay $21 extra each time. No thanks! The lady suggested I paid with my credit card for a money order since that is only 70 cents. I'm trying to avoid extra fees. However, 70 cents isn't bad and I really want to spend $2,000 so I can get my 50,000 points. There's no way I'm spending $2,000 in 3 months on my credit card if I don't use it for rent. I gotta get those savings!

History

Charleston, South Carolina has so much history on every corner you turn. Yesterday, we added our own bit of history. My friend proposed to his girlfriend of seven years. I played a huge role in that. I had to hide puzzle pieces for a scavenger hunt. I nearly messed up the final puzzle piece. I was supposed to place it under a statue at a park. I couldn't find the statue because there were several around. Moments before his now fiance came to that clue, I found where it needed to go and ran away as quickly as possible. It worked out perfectly. Besides that excitement, the city was amazing. It was very old-fashioned. We took a tour of the jailhouse which is said to be haunted. The history of that jail was incredible to hear, but I don't believe in ghosts and spirits or stuff like that so the tour wasn't as scary for me as it was for some people. We did a lot of walking around and the weekend could not have had better weather. It was between 55-65 each day in January. I loved it! We might go back again during spring break.

Charleston, South Carolina

Since Martin Luther King Jr. Day is Monday, I have a 3 day weekend. My friends and I are going to Charleston, South Carolina. I'm really excited. It's something different for us. I'm so used to going to the beach or basketball games. Now we are going to an older city and checking out downtown. We have a lot of fun stuff planned (well, we don't really have anything planned, but I know it will be fun). We are leaving tomorrow morning and coming back sometime Monday. The bad part about that is that I had to spend tonight working on grades since they are due Wednesday. On the bright side, if I finish them tonight I won't have to worry about them when I get back from Charleston. I'll let you know how the trip went on Monday!

Life of a Teacher

When we work from 7AM-4PM and then come home and grade papers and make lesson plans, it's exhausting. When we work all day then come back to work to present to parents from 6-7:30 like I did today, it's even more draining. Of course we don't get paid overtime for this. I know many people will yell at me and say I have summers off. Fine. You can use that argument. Why don't you try teaching the future day in and day out when they give you attitude, don't listen to you, do whatever they feel like doing, sit there and do nothing, when you don't get parent support, when the kids come in with more baggage than you have ever dealt with in your life, when you are distracted by phone calls, parent walks ins while trying to teach, assemblies, paper work, etc. Then tell me about my summers off. Don't get me wrong, I love teaching. But man is it tiring!

Trivia Crack

A few weeks ago, my friend told me about the game Trivia Crack on iPhone. It's exactly what it sounds like. It's a trivia game that you play with your friends. It's addicting, hence why it's called crack. I've played so much and it's very surprising that I've only seen about a dozen repeat questions. I'm like my kids when I answer the question though. I forget the answer right after I answer it. That's not learning! The game is still very fun and distracts me from the work I should be doing.

9/11 Pictures

On 9/11 this past year, I taught my kids about it. That afternoon a parent called and said, "I wish you would have told me you were teaching that." I thought, great, my first parent complaint. It was the opposite. Her stepfather was a first responder at the scene of the crash in Pennsylvania. We were able to talk to him over the phone the next day. It was amazing! This students mother gave me a CD with pictures he took. I tried to load them on my Mac and it wouldn't work. I can load them on my Windows computer, but not my Mac. That's surprising because it's normally Windows computers that are awful. I hope I can load them on to the Windows, email them and open them in my Mac, since my Windows computer is the schools and not mine.

Address Again

Remember when I said my apartment gave me the wrong address. Unfortunately, I was wrong! I was convinced that my road was Northsouth Rd. and not North South Dr. However, after I turn on Northsouth Rd., I have to then take a right on my road, which is North South Dr. It's unbelievably frustrating because I had already changed all addresses, including my drivers license, which cost $10, to Northsouth Rd. I'm in the process of changing them all back, besides my license. I will keep that the same because I don't feel like spending another $10 on it! Maybe I should have listened to property management in the first place!

Not a Good Day for the Lamps

I officially moved into my new place yesterday. It went much more smoothly than I expected. I got the U-Haul at about 9AM and got right to work with loading the truck. On only the second trip downstairs, we carried the mattress. All of a sudden, we heard a crash. We hit a lamp cover with the mattress and it shattered. Oops! It was on the outside of my old place. Oh well. Then we had to break apart he lamp I had. When I put it back together, it wouldn't turn on. I checked the cord and it ripped. It wasn't a good day for lamps! Other than that, the only other minor issues were a few small scratches on furniture. It went really well. My arms are killing me and I'm exhausted but I have amazing friends. Everything is pretty much put away except a few minor things. I will be doing that throughout the next couple of days.

Cleaning

Does anyone want to clean my apartment for me? I'm still busy doing laundry and packing for my move tomorrow. After everything is cleared out, I'm going to clean the entire house so I can get all of my security deposit back. I cannot tell you how upset I'd be if they dinged me a few bucks because there was a piece of dust on something. That would be my luck though. I just can't wait until this move is over and I'm settled in. Soon enough!

Delays

It was cold all over the nation today. Several districts in the area had two hour delays. The district I worked for last year had a 2 hour delay due to the cold. Normally the district I work for now and the district I worked for last year do the same thing in terms of delays and closings. That wasn't the case today. My district was open like a regular day. Their logic actually made sense. They didn't want to delay because the temperature was going to be about the same two hours later than when we arrived anyway. Another reason we didn't delay was because the high schools were testing. Both reasons are logical. My district in New York even had a two hour delay because they were so cold. They called it last night! They rarely call it that early! Oh well, I survived the day and my kids were really well behaved for the most part!

Wall

There are some days at work where I feel like if I talked to a wall, it would respond better than the kids. Today was one of those days. I don't know what it was, but I was not getting through to them today. My key players would not listen to me at all. One boy got upset over something and stopped doing work. I went up to him a few minutes later and said, "What would happen if I stopped teaching whenever I was angry?" I responded for him and said, "I would never teach!" That surprisingly got him to start working. Sometimes I just feel like I'm fighting an uphill battle. I just keep putting in my best effort because I am determined to get my students to learn what they need to learn in 4th grade!

Notre Dame at North Carolina

Two friends and I went to the ND at UNC game last night. On Veterans' Day, I saw a deal on the UNC fan page on Facebook. They had $11 tickets to this game! I knew it was going to be a big game that I couldn't refuse. When we went to the game against Robert Morris, there were only 13,579 people out of a possible 21.750. Last night, there were 20,604! The place was electrifying. ND is the 13th ranked team in the nation with only 1 loss. UNC is the 18th ranked team with 3 losses. UNC did not play very well. ND could not miss shots. UNC was very good at missing shots. They were down by as many as I think 12 points in the second half. They came all the way back to take the lead by one with 1:14 left. That was the last point they scored. ND took the lead and then UNC had a chance with 4.7 seconds left to score, but didn't. Although UNC didn't win, I couldn't have asked for a more exciting game. It was a great atmosphere to be at!

Playoff Win

Wow, that Dallas Cowboys game last night was ugly! They got so lucky to come back and win. They were down 14-0. Then in the 4th quarter, there was a penalty called on Dallas and then the refs decided to cancel the penalty call. Now everyone is saying it's a conspiracy theory. They say the NFL wanted Dallas to play Green Bay instead of Detroit winning. That's a load of garbage if you ask me. The refs pretty much did decide the game though. I don't care. A win is a win. I do know that if Dallas plays that pathetically this week against Green Bay, they don't stand a chance! They have to have a much better start than they did yesterday.

Stuart Scott

The world lost a legend today. Stuart Scott died of cancer at the extremely young age of 49. He was an anchor for SportsCenter. He also used to call Monday Night Football games before he became too sick to do that. He didn't fight cancer once or twice. He fought it three times! No one should have to do that! He fought it with as positive an attitude as he could have. He was an anchor on SportsCenter who pushed the limits. He took risks with the phrases he used to cover sports. I quote him all of the time. He has many catch phrases that many sports fans use on a daily basis. He is single-handedly the reason why SportsCenter is as popular as it is. It's a shame that cancer took his life away this morning. He will be greatly missed!

I suggested This?

When my friends and I went to the Cheesecake Factory a few weeks ago at the mall in Raleigh, we said we wanted to come back soon. I was the one that suggested we come again to the mall so we could walk around and shop. As you know, I despise shopping. The mall in Raleigh is huge though. I needed to get a little bit of clothes for work. Last time we were there, we came on the day after Black Friday and found a parking spot fairly easily. Today, it took me about 15 minutes to find a darn spot! It was ridiculous! We ate dinner at about 4:30 and then shopped for only about two hours. I got a few good things I needed. I feel like I should have gotten more work clothes though and retired some of the clothes I have. We should have gotten to the mall earlier to have more time to shop at the insane amount of stores they have. My favorite purchase was two pairs of shoes for under $50! They are pretty good shoes too. I have no fashion sense, but I like them and they met my friends approval so they must be halfway decent. My credit card has gotten a serious workout the last two days. I do not look forward to paying that bill at the end of the month.

Man on a Mission

I got back to my apartment at about 2:30 today. Since then, I have been surprisingly incredibly productive. I've been tired all day, but got right to work the moment I walked through the door. I have done laundry, paid a few bills, called for a new credit card, got a money order to pay my 1st month rent at my new apartment, shopped for groceries, and changed my address to my new apartment for several places that send me mail. Boom! I was half thinking of getting next weeks' math materials ready today, but I won't. It's 8:25 on a Friday so I have no interest in continuing to be productive. I'm proud of myself for accomplishing so much today in so little time. I'm relaxing the rest of the night. I'll get school stuff ready tomorrow morning before I go to the mall in Raleigh with my friends tomorrow afternoon.

Leaving

I'm leaving New York tomorrow morning to head back to home and reality. The only thing I can think about is all of the work I have to do for school Monday. I have no lesson plans done or anything. Oops! There's a very realistic possibility that I won't have any plans done for Monday when school picks up again. Is it bad that I don't care? Oh well. I had a ton of fun while visiting friends and family and way too much food. Back to North Carolina tomorrow!