Pantyhose: My Nemesis

MAJOR wardrobe malfunction today. MAJOR.
And...probably one of the most awkward moments of my life.
I was trying to be creative and mix and match some things in my closet to get a super cute chic look for my meeting today at the district office. I wanted to wear my gray pencil skirt, my white blouse, and a lime green/gray/black cardigan. It was too cold for a skirt this morning, so I decided I would give my black pantyhose a whirl. I put them on and was really confused as to why all of these little fibers rubbed off on my hips when I pulled them up. Brushed off all of the black fibers, did a static reducer routine, and jetted off to work. It was during my 1st period lecture that I noticed a gigantic line showing through my tight skirt-about at mid thigh. I walked over (I was also in heels) to my desk with my legs restricted so I am slightly waddling now. I tell the kids I have to go make a quick copy (the copy room is next to my room) and the kids work on their quiz. In the copy room, I reach both hands DOWN my skirt (PRAY that no one walks by the wide open door to the copy room) and yank up my hose, which obviously FELL down mid calf.
***Jump to period 2. I am now in front of the class at the chalkboard and my pantyhose start to creep DOWN my leg. They are almost to my knees again and I am oddly trying to walk (hard to do discreetly with hose around your knees) back and forth the length of the board to lecture. At this point, I imagine they will be showing past my skirt at any given moment. I realize now that they HAVE. NO. ELASTIC. It is gone. Shot. So, I decide that before my meeting I MUST go home and put a new pair on. I have travel time (about 15 minutes) to switch from the Middle School to the High School. I run into my old co-op, that I student taught for, Earl. Earl asks me if he had a zit coming out on his forehead and if it was tragic looking. I tell him I have pantyhose problems. I then second guess myself for telling a 40 year old male in the hall that I am having pantyhose problems. I walk all the way down the hall. HOSE ARE MAJORLY SLIPPING! I walk out into the parking lot, where the construction workers are staring at me, as I have now no choice but to grab them to keep them up since they were semi-up, I had to grab just below my butt. I waddle into the car. I run home and change before my super important meeting. I now have no time to prepare for said meeting. I called my mother and laughed for 10 minutes straight. The fibers in the morning that I saw were indeed my pantyhose falling apart.

I will think long and hard before I EVER put on hose again.

Homework Club: FAIL!

I realize this is lengthy, but I would like to share the phone conversation I had with Corey on the phone last night right before bed. This is pretty much EXACTLY how it went:

B: I am so exhausted. I need to sleep. I have to go in early to work for a meeting and stay late because tomorrow is the first day of Homework Club.
C: Wait-did you start Homework Club? like create the club?
B: Yes.
C: Oh wow-I bet that will be a real popular hit in High School. I bet tons of people will show up. [note sarcasm that = Corey]
B: It is for my ESL kids to stay after school on Wednesdays so I can help them with science, math, social studies, English...not just for like any kid to stop in so I can do their chemistry with them.
C: Oh. You have to stay after school? You don't have like an "activity period?" (side note: we had this in our school 3 times a week)
B: No.
C: Remember how cool activity period was? I chose like dodgeball and kickball.....and..
B: I loved activity period! I did Arts & Crafts club and Crossword Puzzle Club ...oh and Origami Club.
***************** SILENCE ON THE PHONE***********************
B: Wait...do you still love me? Please don't judge me! It was fun! In craft club we made turkeys out of wooden pots and delivered them to nursing homes!
*****************SILENCE ON THE PHONE***********************
B: One day you will appreciate that I am so creative and enjoy doing crafts.
C: Yes, I am sure turkey pots and nursing home deliveries will be useful to my future. Couldn't you have at least picked board game club? That would have been a little bit better.....




Oi. I am so lame.

Busted!

It is always such an awkward situation when you are watching someone do something ridiculous/silly when they think that there is no one around.

Tonight my neighbor (not the one I share a house/porch with, but on the other side) was walking down his back stairs and "waltzing" out to his car. This was the son-he is probably like 17 or 18. He had a long umbrella in his hand and was singing Disney showtunes...I think Mary Poppins. I was headed out to the rec center for fitness class so I quick stalled on my back stairs on my porch. I tried to delay, but I was running late. Our cars were both in the same back lot-next to each other, of course. Eventually, I was busted, and he looked back at me on the stairs and gave me a sheepish grin.
Awkward moment, and then we both drove away. I really think he is totally humiliated and will try to avoid me for as long as we are neighbors.

Sorry, Corey

I have such a big, fat crush on Jim from The Office ::dreamy sigh::

I find myself wishing I were Pam when he picks her up and does that little spin-around thing. So stinkin' cute!!

Please Contain Your Excitement

So everyone always seems to care if I go to my parents for the weekends (I started doing that more towards the end of last year because I had an event every weekend up near my parents)...and people always get annoyed if I don't stay in the fabulous town of Lititz. Well, tonight, I stayed. I am going to tell you what I did.

* watched 3 half hour TV on DVD shows
* made a 75 question exam for TUESDAY'S class (not even Monday's-planning ahead!)
* put away alll my clean laundry from like the last 4 weeks
* dusted and vacuumed
* ate 4 salt water taffy treats
* did the dishes and scrubbed counters and washed the windows/mirrors
* scrubbed the shower and toilet while blaring Michael Jackson and pissing off my neighbor, that I didn't even realize was home again.
* went on Facebook and played 5 games of Bejeweled Blitz

And I will state that I made a somewhat valiant effort to make plans- I contacted 4 people. 2 were occupied with relatively good excuses, 1 cancelled, and the other is at Temple Law being a hermit and preparing for this oral argument he has to do with some hot chick named Samantha tomorrow. So, it's cool....I had a productive night anyway. I did consider for about 2 minutes walking down the alley to the High School football game, but decided I needed a break from students and it wouldn't be cool to go sit on the bleachers alone.

I GET TO SLEEP IN TOMORROW!

Back to School

I have started back at school. There is no doubt in my mind that this is the "job" God has for me. I see it as so much more than a "job." It is definitely my calling in life, and personal mission to advocate for and educate English Language Learners. However, it is exhausting. First of all, my numbers went from 8 to 18. Of course, I still have people that think 18 is nothing, because they teach 125 kids. What they fail to realize is that my kids are from all different countries, are on different language levels, and I must support content teachers spanning 7 grade levels with no teachers aide. I have about 50 minutes to give support AND teach my curriculum to kids who just came to America and kids who have been here 7 years. I am expected to give history tests, welding tests, earth science tests, and provide homework help for about 35 different courses with different teachers. I travel between 2 buildings. ALWAYS forget something at one school. In the middle school, I have ONE table and a room with curtains for walls. And while it sounds like I hate this job, I wouldn't quit for anything because I would do ANYTHING for these students of mine. I feel like I am on my own missions field in small town, PA. Here is my issue: the lack of support I get from co-workers. I really don't want recognition that I play superhero all day- I am far from perfect. I really don't want to blog about my co workers either. I just need to "vent" about why the last 5 days I was made to feel like my job was meaningless.

Day 1: A teacher says that his class has become a "dumping ground" for "those [my] kids."
Day 2: I overhear a teacher say that this year will be the best because they don't have any ESL kids. Do I take this personally? Of course. Should I? I don't know.
Day 3: A teacher asks if there are any 8th grade ELLs. I say "only 1" and she says "Thank GOD!"
Day 4: I meet with a teacher who says "I want to send all of my work down to your class. It is a studyhall, right?"

I have had to run across the school 4 out of the first 5 days to meet with teachers who are freaking out because they have a kid who can't speak English. I would LIKE to remind them that when I offered an ESL inservice in September, NO one from the high school showed up. Now, I come home late from school everyday because I am educating them on my time.

Also, there is the whole humanitarian issue. I make home visits (tonight I spent more than an hour rocking a baby at one of my student's houses while helping him and his mother with homework for social studies). I fill out free lunch applications, forms, help with bills, mail, etc.

But, I am made to feel useless. This never was meant to be a complaining blog. I really do love my job. But it feels SO good now that I wrote about it, and this could explain why I have been averaging 4/5 hrs. of sleep per night and cried the last 3 nights before bed. UGH. Talk about STRESSSSSSSS!

Shady Ghetto Fabulous

Corey has already completed 2 weeks of his second year at Temple Law. I had the joy of moving him in with my parents help, to this beautiful blue row home in North Philadelphia. He lives in a tiny bedroom on the second floor and has 4 other guys in undergrad at Temple sharing the house with him. While we were moving him in, there was a crazy college party going on. They asked my parents to pay admission and get drunk with them, and Corey's bath/shower had 2 huge kegs in it. My mom scooped some ice out of the bathtub to use for our warm water that we were going to drink out of our red party cups. I informed her that that was absolutely disgusting. Oh brother, pray for safety and Corey's sanity...it is going to be a looooong year. PS- If you were looking for a nice house number, you won't find it because it is squiggled in black spray paint on one of the steps.