Sunday Chatter

~ The older you get the more interesting football is to watch...maybe I just have a longer attention span now, or maybe it's because I understand more of the rules now.

~ I did something this weekend for the first time...I took a guy home to meet the family. Technically Ethan has already met the family (except for John, who is never home at the same time), but this is the first time I've ever brought him to my home town. It was a great weekend!!!

~ I have a mystery bruise. On my right forearm, no idea where it came from.

~ Tomorrow is an in-service day, as much as those days usually annoy me, I am actually looking forward to it because it means I can relax tonight instead of grade papers and try to have everything planned. I might be singing a different tune after tomorrow though...

~ I am in love with these coco dusted almonds, just enough chocolate plus the crunchy almonds...so good!

~ Apparently people who were born on Halloween are creepy...(This was explained this weekend by my sister before she found out that Ethan's birthday is Halloween...haha!)

~ My brother Joe has finished his training to become some kind of building inspector guy for Power Plants. He will travel around the country working one outage to another. This is all necessary before he can get a permanent position somewhere closer to his family. I am happy for him, but will be sad not to have him around once he gets going.

Goodbye to Tony and the Gang

At the beginning of the summer I started watching The Sopranos. I enjoy mobster type movies so after watching a couple episodes I was hooked. I have a Netflix account so every week I would receive my two DVDs in the mail and enjoy watching season after season without the months of hiatus in between. Tonight I finished the final episode. Like all good TV shows I wish it wasn't the last...I keep waiting to find out what happened next. So, thanks to Tony, Sil, Christopher, Pauly, Carmella, Meadow, AJ, and even Janice (the most annoying character) you made my summer very entertaining!

Prayers for Bird

My friend Bird called this week to tell me that she has postponed her wedding. Unfortunately her grandfather has become seriously ill and it is very possible he could pass within the next week, two weeks, or month. This is the first close family member dying that she, and her family, has had to deal with. She just couldn't chance having a wedding and a funeral in the same week. My heart goes out to her having to make all these decisions in such a short amount of time, plus the stress and pain of dealing with the death of a loved one.

There will still be a wedding, but when it happens it will be a happy affair for everyone involved. I pray for her and her family during this difficult time.

Sunday Chatter

~ I did something today that I said I would never do...I bought expensive jeans. I have always been able to find jeans at a decent price (less than 40) and laughed or scoffed at my sister who would spend 70-80$ a pair. I can justify my purchase though...I had a 20% off card, I spent more than 50$ so I got a 10$ gift card, and my jeans have NO holes in them. (Why pay good money for jeans that already have holes???) PLUS!!! They are a size smaller :) Soooo worth it!

~ It was homecoming week at school...I hate homecoming week. Might as well cancel practice the entire week.

~ Victoria Secret bras really are worth the money...and with coupons you can actually get them at a decent price!

~ Dad and Joe came up this weekend to help my aunt move. We went out to dinner at Old Chicago. The food was great, the beer was cold, and the company couldn't have been better!

~ My C team volleyball girls had a great night Tuesday. They played really well, came out 2-1 and I was so proud to finally see some of the things in practice show up in a match.

~ I am loving the cool fall weather. This last week has been beautiful. I wish it could be like this all the time.

~ I am having golfing withdrawals...I haven't been out in over a month and I miss it. Funny how I have only played for one season and I'm already wishing there was more time to play! Plus I got a new driver and 3 wood I just can't wait to try out :)

Top 10 Reason to Live Alone!

I have lived with a lot of different people over time, and I have not yet had a roommate I didn't like (well...not including my siblings growing up :) ) For the last three years I have been living by myself in a small house. As much as I loved living with my girlfriends, I would not want to have another roommate again (that is until I get married). There are just some things that I've gotten used to living alone...

10. I can keep the temperature of my house whatever I want (as long as I'm willing to pay for it)

9. I can cook whatever I want for dinner and not have to worry about who doesn't like onions or peppers or mushrooms.

8. No one sees when I trip and fall.

7. I get to choose the smell-good candles that I want to light. None of that citrus stuff!

6. If I want to spend a Sunday afternoon curled up on the couch watching movies and taking a nap, I don't have to worry about sharing the couch or TV.

5. The house doesn't have to be clean constantly...although I do like it that way, it just doesn't always happen.

4. I can be as loud as I want in the morning when I wake up and am showering, blow drying my hair, and getting ready for school.

3. I don't have to wait to take a shower.

2. I can listen to whatever music I want to, however loud I want to listen to it.

1. I can walk around in my bra and underwear anytime I want to!!!

Teaching: A Young Profession!

I am convinced that one of the main reasons that I became a teacher is because I don't want to spend all day everyday with adults. Once a month I am pulled from my classroom and required to work on integrating my social studies curriculum with our Communications classes. It usually ends up as a glorified planning day. Today was one of those days. I spent the entire day working on a list of vocabulary for my 7th grade class. I literally mean all day. When I'm in the classroom teaching I know that sometime during the day (at least once) some kid is going to make me laugh. The silly comments they say, or goofy looks they give me when I do or say something unexpected, and all the random conversation before class officially begins. They keep me young, and I hope after I've been teaching for 20 years, these kids still make me feel like I'm 25!

Sunday Chatter

I decided that I like the random bits of chatting I did last Sunday, and thought it would be fun to try and do that each week. (I said try...)

~ Busy season is here. I spent my entire Saturday at a high school C team tournament, and was looking forward to spending my Sunday on the couch and relaxing. Only to be reminding that I promised I would officiate the Homecoming activities "boys volleyball games."

~ I have to go grocery shopping...Thursday night I ate Spaghetti Ohs and a hot dog. I have a real job and make too much money to be eating Spaghetti Ohs.

~ Coaches who have the pleasure of coaching the Freshman teams should get bonus pay...

~ I have a cup of coffee each morning, only one cup. I never really notice a big "pick-me-up" but if for some reason I don't have one, I am dragging.

~ There are movies that I can watch over and over and over again. This is something I get from my grandpa. Movies like, The Rock, Harry Potters, Ocean's 11, Gone in 60 Seconds, National Treasure (which is playing now). I can probably say all the lines along with the actors, and yet I still look forward to popping popcorn and sitting down to my old standbys.

~ I have been netflixing the Sopranos and I am down to the very last season. What will I do when it is over? I need to find a new show.

~ I have a very pretty black dress that I bought a long time ago. It was 1/2 off and just too pretty to pass up. I want a reason to wear it, and it is too fancy for Church. I'm hoping that the rehearsal dinner to Bird's wedding will be the perfect occasion to wear it!

Bird

One of my best friends is getting married in less than a month. Bird. Actually her name is Bridget, but in middle school it was decided that her name sounded like "Bird-Sh*t" and since that was not allowed in school, it was shortened to Bird.

Bird and I went to school together from the fourth grade on. However through middle and high school we were what I like to call "sports friends." We played on the same team, went to the same church, and were polite to each other, but we weren't the "Friday night" friends.

Then college came, and I went to play volleyball at Hutch Juco and she went to KU. While I played volleyball and gained a personality, Bird would occasionally come to Hutch to visit her boyfriend at the time (who played basketball). We would get together every now and then when she was in town at a ball game or go out to lunch and catch up. Eventually she moved on to Emporia State and I was looking to transfer there after Hutch. I needed a place to live, and she had a room open in the house she was living in. As fate would have it I moved in with her in the fall of 2003.

In two short years of living together we went from "sports friends" to "bridal party" friends. Now she is getting married and I get to wear a very pretty Burgundy colored dress while we drink the night away dancing all the cheesy wedding dances. (I better have lots to drink before we get to the hokey poky)

Sunday Chatter

Just some random thoughts tonight...

~ When you cut your legs shaving it will bleed and bleed and bleed. It will of course always happen when you are somewhere else (I was at the Y) and a band-aid is not readily available.

~ When it is March and a warm day of 68 hits unexpectedly people will bust out the shorts, t-shirts, and flip flops. But when it is an unexpected cool 68 in September we are bundled in sweatshirts and jeans. I love Kansas!

~ Middle school kids will be more motivated for a Jolly Rancher than for 5 points extra credit.

~ I want a puppy. A yellow lab to be exact, but I can't have any pets at the house I currently rent, plus it has no fence. Is it wrong that out of all the reasons I should find a new place to live...and there are MANY...the fact that I want to have a puppy is the one that motivates me the most. (I already have a name picked out...Meadow)

~ If you trip and fall in your house alone with no one around to see...did it really happen?

~ I bought a pair of really cute jeans in May. I have worn them three times...last night i could pull them off without unbuttoning them. Now I have to go buy a smaller pair. What a cool problem to have!

~ Gas is going back down...what do you want to bet it's just for the upcoming election and they sky-rocket right back up after the first Tuesday after the first Monday of November! Am I a pessimist or a realist?

~ It amazes me how our concept of time changes as we get older. As a kid a two hour drive might as well have been an entire day spent in the car. I can clean my entire house in less time now than it used to take me to clean just my room when I was younger. The thought of waiting an entire YEAR for Christmas to come again was almost painful and now I can't believe that my little nephew is almost a YEAR! Time really does fly.

Coaching

Coaches...we have the opportunity to change the lives of kids more than we even know. I have had my fair share of different types of coaches. I've had the push-over, the hard-ass, the "paycheck" coach, the first timer, and the life timer. I have had coaches compliment my every move (not as cool as it sounds), coaches who could never find a positive thing to say, coaches who would chew my butt at half time, and some that would literally throw things at me, and coaches who inspired me set high goals and strive to achieve them.

Now that I coach, I try to take things I've learned from ALL my coaches, whether it be things I should do or things I should never do. I love coaching. I love being on the bench during games and seeing improvement throughout the season.

However there is the downside to coaching that isn't mentioned as much. I'm not talking about the parents or administration (that's obvious)...I'm talking about the hours we lay awake thinking about decisions we make, how to improve that one player, and how to teach a kid to be competitive (I have come to realize that competitiveness can't be taught...it's something you have in your gut).

This week I was kept up by a decision I made. I played "Mean Coach" one day this week. There were a couple of girls who were having attitude problems. (This is nothing new to girls athletics, but has to be fixed). Bad attitudes on the court can be like a cancer in a good team. It spreads from girl to girl slowly killing a teams enthusiasm and performance. I was tired of seeing and hearing about these girls...so I took care of it. I was not nice. I might have even said a couple words that are not "school-appropriate." Needless to say it ended in the girls crying...which was not my goal. I never want to make someone cry. So at the end of practice I pulled them aside and calmly explained myself. I was impressed with them. They took my criticism, apologized for their attitudes, and later that night at the football game came up to me and said "Hi" a couple times. This morning at practice, both girls had a great day...their game and attitudes were much better. I still don't know if chewing them out was the right thing to do, but I am impressed with the way these girls were able to bounce back and make an effort to improve.

Bottom line...coaches/teachers/parents will always analyze the choices we make. We, like everyone else, are constantly learning from "trial and error."