Snow Day!

Last week was full of anticipation about the cancellation of school. We were set to have a snow storm Monday, but when we woke up Monday morning it had been delayed, so we had school at regular time. However, as it moved toward the area, they decided to let us leave 2 hours early. Then we had only a 2 hour delay Tuesday even though we had about 5 inches of snow, which is usually more than enough to cancel school.

This messed up our schedule completely because this past week was the county-wide midterm testing week. Also, when we modify the schedule, some classes are longer than others and some don't meet at all, so it's a complete headache. However, another storm moved into the area Thursday night that dropped enough snow and ice to cancel school Friday. This conveniently gave me a 3 day weekend!

Saturday night was our staff Christmas party. This was a much hyped ordeal because the lady who plans it decided to have it on a boat in the Chesapeake bay. The reason this was supposed to be extra special is because last night was the "Lights on the Bay" display where people from some yacht club decorate their boats with tons of Christmas lights. Given the price we paid, I had imagined a lavish meal on a nice big yacht... but that isn't what we got. The boat was pretty small, the drinks were expensive, and the food was good but options were limited. Also the boat was rocking pretty badly at times, but after a few drinks I didn't seem to notice as much. We were pretty far away from the lighted boats, but it was still cool to see that. All in all, I think everybody had a good time (mostly because to be a member of the staff at NHS you seem to have to be willing to consume large amounts of alcohol), so it doesn't really matter that it wasn't quite what I had expected. It was fun to do something different, but hopefully next year the party will be in a bigger room that isn't moving. Here are some pictures of me and my friends on the boat:

Happy Holidays

On December 1, I found something out. The chocolates inside a chocolate advent calendar aren't good. This is upsetting to me because for what seemed like my whole childhood, I wished I could have a chocolate advent calendar because it combined two of my favorite things: chocolate and advent calendars. I still have an advent calendar every year, I guess because I have a sense of nostalgia, and I can remember rushing downstairs after waking up to see what was behind that little window. I can even remember a few times when mom bought the cheap ones that allowed you to seperate the back panel from the front and peer down to see all of the pictures (that kind of ruined it). What happens to that insatiable curiousity as you get older? Mine is gone. Obviously I approach my advent calendar with less zeal, but that is to be expected. It seems that everyone is less excstatic I still get pretty excited about the holiday (until yesterday, Billy and I were the only ones to have Christmas lights on our balcony and windows, which led me to believe they were against the rules... they're not). However, that curiousity is gone.

Each time we get paid they put a paystub in our school mailboxes that breaks down the taxes and such. Yesterday was pay day, and as I was sitting in my classroom grading papers after the students had left, the teacher who is in charge of the Giving Tree got on the intercom and said "Teachers, please come select a card from the Giving Tree, you don't have an excuse, we just got paid today!" Then I realized that my pay stub was sitting in my mail box, but that wasn't enough to motivate me to go get it. A few minutes later I realized that I was going to be paid my extra stipend for sponsoring student council either in this paycheck or in the next one, so I might have about $1000 extra in this pay stub. I still just sat there and continued grading papers for about half an hour until I had to go to the bathroom, so I walked over to the office as well to see if I'd been paid extra (I hadn't). This leads me to believe, in retrospect, that my curiosity is ABSOLUTELY gone. If I needed the money, I'm sure I would have rushed down there, but that would have been out of necessity rather than curiosity. If opening a paper to see whether I was $1000 richer didn't make me curious, I would guess nothing will. It makes me pretty sad that the curiousity was outweighed by my desire to finish grading one class period's persuasive essays so I would only have the other class's to grade over the weekend.

In related news, there was a wrapped present behind the cardboard window today. I put the chocolate in my mouth because I decided the chocolate was gross on the 1st, I threw the chocolate away yesterday, and I thought I might have been a bit too harsh on it the first day. I wasn't. It tastes like feet. It shouldn't even be allowed to be called chocolate.

"They seen the same thing you seen when alls yous came down them stairs."

I have been off from school since Tuesday at 2:40. It has been a much needed break and an enjoyable time away from work. Wednesday I slept in, ran on the treadmill, and then Billy and I went shopping for some Christmas gifts. Thursday we had dinner with his family at his aunt's house. Then we spent the night at his parent's because we were all headed to Virginia for Friday and Saturday.

The main goals of our mini-trip were to go to this big Book Fair where a warehouse is full of reduced-price books. We were also planning on driving down "Skyline Drive," a scenic overlook road in the Shenandoah National Park (in the Blue Ridge Mtns). We were also planning to visit the Luray Taverns, which were near both of these attractions.

Friday Billy and I left with his mom, dad, and brother and drove about 3.5 hours and stopped first at the book fair. It was pretty crowded, but we still managed to find quite a few books to bring home with us. It was interesting to me to see which titles had ended up at these liquidated prices, because there were quite few i'd never heard of mixed in with some classics. Then we went to two different Amish markets. We ate lunch and perused around the wares they were selling there. Then we went to the hotel and rested for a while before doing some shopping at the mall and getting dinner.

Today we got up and had breakfast before heading to Luray, VA. It is a rural town, and I'm not sure what its industry is, but I guess there must be jobs somewhere. Everyone in Billy's family had been to the caverns before, but not for some time. I can remember going to some caverns in southern california when i was younger, but these caverns were much larger. Most of the way there was quite a bit of room around us and quite a distance above us. The coolest part of the caverns was this pond that had formed at one point because it reflected the ceiling perfectly. When you took the first glance at it, you thought you were looking at stalagmites coming up from the ground, but then you realized the water was just reflecting the view of the stalactites coming down from above. Our tour guide was full of information, and she did a good job keeping my attention, but mostly because I was listening to which grammar mistake she was going to make next. She had some really good ones, including something similar to the title I've given this post. About halfway through the tour Billy's mom asked me "Which are you enjoying more, the caverns or the assault on the English language?" It seemed to me that young Rachel spends most of her time underground and has not made it out of Luray too many times.

After leaving the caverns, we drove along Skyline drive for about 30 miles. The forests in the Blue Ridge Mtns are all deciduous, so the trees were bare. It would have been cool to see the views of the valleys on both sides while the leaves were changing, but the bare trees also meant we could see through them and down below. It's still a little bit hard for me to adjust to what is considered a "mountain" on the east coast (i think the highest elevation was around 4000 feet), but they were certainly tall enough to see out quite a long distance. It was a nice clear day, so the views were beautiful.

We made it back home mid-afternoon today and Billy and I have been relaxing since we got back to the apartment. I am glad we took the trip out there because I got to see a bunch of things that I hadn't experienced before and had a lot of fun spending time with Billy's family. Plus, it was also nice to have the chance to get away from the norm for a little bit and not worry about any responsibilities. Tomorrow I have to go back to being Ms. Chambers because I don't have my lessons planned for Monday. That's not entirely true- I had them planned before Tuesday, when my county supervisor told me I had to cover a new poem with my juniors before the midterm and my department chair told me I am not allowed to use the poem I was planning to analyze with my sophomores on Monday. After that, though, I am pretty well planned through the midterm and up until Christmas break, so I will hopefully be able to enjoy the holiday season. I already have most of my Christmas shopping done, which is unlike me. I'm looking forward to getting the Christmas lights and decorations up tomorrow and mailing out the cards next week.

I hope Thanksgiving was a fun and restful time for all of you, as well.

Brand New Start

First, I'd like to thank you for your continued interest in me. Over the past six months or so a lot of people have commented that they'd like to see me adding more entries to my old blog. For various reasons, I haven't been updating that recently, and I took down all the old entries. I had only intended to write the blog for my first year of teaching as a way to reflect on what was happening, but it developed into something larger.

This year I haven't felt like I would be able to produce the same types of entries I was producing last year. Teaching isn't new to me anymore, so things that happen don't surprise, frustrate, delight, or anger me the way they did last year. My students as a whole are much better behaved and more respectful of me and one another, so I have fewer interesting stories. Trying to deal with their apathy towards my classes has been a struggle for me all year, and if I had continued to post bi-weekly or so, it would have turned into me complaining a lot, which isn't helpful to me or much fun to read for you.

Anyway, because I appreciate the continued interest in what I've been up to (and because, let's face it, I enjoy writing about myself) I am going to give the blog another shot, but in a different format. Rather than focusing on teaching alone, I plan on writing about the different types of obstacles and experiences I encounter in regular life. I hope you will enjoy these entries as much as you enjoyed the ones about my teaching experiences. On this website I believe you can post comments without joining the service, so I hope to hear back from everyone. Thanks again for your interest.