Swim Meet Humor

There is a girl on the swim team that has a hard time picking up on social cues. She says things that most people think, but don't say. At one of our swim meets last week she walked up to one of the boys on the team and said, " You are poking out." He looked at her with a strange look on his face and said, "What." Again she said, " You are poking out." He quickly glanced down and then replied, "No, I'm not." She repeated again, "You are poking out." Another quick glance down, and again he said he wasn't. She then said, "Well, you don't have an erection or anything, you just are poking out. I can see the outline of everything. I bet if I leaned over I could see the hair." At this point, she started leaning over and I said, "Name, why don't you come talk to me for awhile." The poor kid had flushed bright red and quickly moved away. She then proceeded to walk over to another boy and say, " You are poking out."

As you may imagine, the conversation mirrored the previous conversation. I finally said, "Name, why don't you go talk to Jeremy (the assistant coach)." I about died laughing. Everyone may think it, but no one says it out loud.

Sick Again

Students are the breeding ground of germs. Teachers work in such conditions. I am daily exposed to every disease and sickness that everyone has. So, yes, I am sick again. This time I have a really bad case of Streph Throat and a mild case of Swine Flu. Lucky me. I thought that maybe my tale of woe had a few hints of humor. Maybe not, but I am sharing anyway.

I got a sore throat on Monday night and thought "No big deal." Then at 1:00 a.m. as I spent my life throwing up, I thought "Great, I have stomach flu again" (Consult three weeks ago post). I realized I wasn't going to school so cancelled swim practice, called a sub, emailed lesson plans that made no sense to three different people, and made a doctor's appointment for later that day. My mom, being the best mom in the world, came down and took me to the doctor. It was wonderful of her to do so because there is no way I could have done it. I was feeling really bad. I was still throwing up on about 5 min. intervals. Great fun. Well, the nurse took my temperature (101.9) without having gloves on. She was so care free. I could only moan in her direction. Then they left me there for 40 min.

Do you know what happens to a really sick person that hasn't been able to sit up for 24 hours that is left sitting up in a doctors room for 40 min? The results weren't good. I kept moaning "Help, Help" which was as effective as a drowning person feels at any local pool. Nobody is going to do anything. I proceed to throw up in the sink and sweat through my shirt for about 20 min. I tried to crawl to the door and ended up passing out. I was laying on the floor in a total confused daze when they finally discovered me. Apparently someone had heard me throwing up.

The next time they entered the room, I was still on the floor. This did remind me of my stomach flu three weeks previous. Apparently, high school students and medical personal all tend to ignore sick English teachers on the floor. Anyway, this time when they entered they were decked out in full gear. Full body scrubs, gloves, masks, hair covered etc. You would have thought I had the Plague. Nope, just a really bad case of Streph.

Yeah!

Student voices

I am still grading essays and probably will be for the next forty years of my life. The joys of teaching English and teaching English my way, with an emphasis on writing. As I read these student essays, my heart aches for what they have seen in their short lives. The assignment was to write about a time in their life that changed their perspective. I don't have their permission to include their exact words, so I will summarize what they have written.

Boy, Senior
I grew up in a trailer park with a dad that told my mom every day what a worthless bag of flesh she was and that even slave traders wouldn't want her. I was beaten everyday and so was my mom. It got so bad that we decided to escape; we even had the truck packed and ready to go when he came home early. He was trying to kill my mom so I grabbed the gun out of the closet and pointed it at him. I told him that if he tried anything I was going to kill him. I then shot all the tires on his car and on the motorcycle and we got in the truck and took off to Texas.

Girl, Senior
My dad was the best guy in the world. One day he came home and told my mom she needed to hide him. The cops came soon after and asked where he was. My mom asked them why they were there and they told her that he had stabbed and killed my uncle. My mom didn't tell the cops the truth. My grandma told the cops where he was. He went to prison and my world fell apart. He isn't the same man he used to be.

Boy, Senior
I grew up in a dark bad place. My step father hated women and abused my mother and my sisters. He didn't abuse me in the same way. He would tell me about why he needed to abuse my mom and sisters and why I should the same thing he did. He told me how all women need to be punished and that they all deserve it. My sister ran away and I never saw her again. I can see why she left. That is why I also left. I moved to Utah to get away from that dark place.

There is power in these voices.

Bright Head lights

For the three of you who actually read my blog, you may be able to tell that it is the weekend, hence I am going to post something.

I have never driven with my brights on before. Well, not on purpose. The first day of swim practice, Travis suggested I drive with brights on. I didn't even know how to turn them on and ended up having to hold them on the entire drive. (I know, I sometimes amaze myself with how stupid I am). Travis then told me how to turn them on and I have been driving most days at 4:30 a.m. with my brights on. They really have saved my life. I see deer almost every morning and the other morning I saw a racoon. It is amazing how much better I see when I have them.

Yay, bright head lights.

Premature Gray

Well, let me out myself. I am going gray at the old age of 28. Actually, I have been going gray for a few years now. It all started (at least from what I can remember) in the MTC due to crushing, defeating stress. On my mission, the gray continued to spread. There was a member in Taidong (my first area) that would sit next to me in church and pull out every gray hair that she saw. I used to pull them out too and tape them to my letters home so that I could prove to my family that I was actually going gray. This said, I am not going completely gray, just gray at the temples. But, enough so that I have changed the way I wear my hair so that it doesn't show too much.

It really bothers me. I don't care as much about my appearance as Jacob does for instance, but I would at least like to hit 30 before I go gray. Finally, someone that cut my hair suggested I go to a Sally Hansen store and buy some coverage. Yeah, I did and then I went to my parents and enlisted their help.

I was only going to enlist my mom's help, but since my dad has been using the same stuff for the last few years, he had quite a few opinions about it. I have NEVER dyed my hair. Never. I like being brown and the chlorine gives me nice highlights, but I digress. Anyway, my mom and I both learned a lot about dye today and we will try again in three weeks.

The end result? It looks much better than it did. One side turned out better than the other. Maybe when I get old, like 30, then I won't care anymore. :)

3 Amigos

Last week, I cam down with the lovely 24 hour stomach flu that makes you feel as if you want to die and then can't believe that you somehow survived. Anyway, my brother was in town and he came and saw me on Sunday. My mom came too. I got really sad when they left and had a long long talk with Travis.

Life will never be the same again. My mom, Jacob, and myself used to do everything together. We were the three amigos. We spent weekends together and talked constantly. I always had at least one of them and usually both of them to go to movies with and do fun things. Now, I'm married and Jacob lives in TN. Life changes and it makes me sad.

People of Walmart. com

I think Sundays are when I confess my guilty pleasures like reading Postsecret every Sunday or seeing the updates with the peopleofwalmart.com site. Now that I am living and working on the west side, I have easy access to quite a few Walmarts. Living on the East side meant no Walmarts for me. Fortunately, the Walmart that is really close to my house is a nice one. However, there are some pretty interesting characters that hang out in Walmarts and this website chronicles their clothing choices.

For instance, the above individual. I haven't seen those colors since my childhood in the 80's.

It is also kinda sad that the very first picture that I put on this website is of an unknow lady from Idaho. Hmm. I may need to add a few more photos.