never rock the mic with the pantyhose

There was a little Beastie Boys on the squawkbox just now so that got to be my title.

So what has been going on in my life lately? Well, nothing exciting. Not really. My job is always exciting. Let me share some of the unique names of some of my new students:

Shanequa
Juvenal
La (who goes by Laquish, but she's Asian)
Maritza
Trendell
Nestor (one of my all-time favorite Mexican names - next to Nacho)
Diovanni
Yanet (which is funny to me since that is how a Spanish-speaker would pronounce Janet if they were trying to speak English)
Cayetano
Talina
Eder
various names ending in -berto (Rigoberto, Gilberto, Humberto, Adalberto, Eriberto)

I'm not making fun of them in any way, but it is interesting to me since I came from a school where I had 4 students named Chris in one class and a countless number of Michelles and Debbies, etc. Now I always have around 10 Jose's, 19 Juan's, and a million students with last names like Martinez, and Gonzalez.

Other fun school stories. I had a former student bring me a postcard that she tried to send me from her vacation in Mexico, but realized she didn't have the school's address. Its always nice getting former students saying hi, but this was one of my favorites and it made me feel like I did good last year.

Also, a student that is in my class for another year shared how much their lives sucked last year after they were bad for a sub. So, its also nice to be feared a bit. This is good because I have to be in an all-day meeting during school tomorrow to help design a Smaller Learning Community. (Basically, SLCs are a school-within-a-school where every kid in the SLC have their classes together) I am working on the 9th Grade "Creativity House" although I am switching to the "Technology House" next semester and will hopefully not be teaching 9th graders next year at all. In any case, I hate being out of class unless its for something useful like soccer games or recovering from Oktoberfest at the Crown, which I guess won't be an issue this year.

What else? Oh, I dodged having to participate in a school fundraiser for Katrina tonight. You may think I'm a dick for doing it, but wait. The fundraiser was a staff vs. celebrities basketball game hosted by Power 106 (where hip-hop lives). So I thought that the idea of playing "celebrities" (aka Power 106 DJs) in basketball, which I haven't played in years, in front of my students, would suck. I guess I'll never find out. Oh well. Don't get me wrong, if Snoop was going to be there, I'm lacing up and heading out, but not for the midnight-4am backup DJ.

One last thing. I am going into soccer overload this next few weeks. I have Galaxy games Sunday, Wednesday, and again Saturday. I haven't been for maybe 5 weeks, so I am getting withdrawal from not having $7.75 Bud Lights. I can just taste it now.

One more last thing. I got a new toy in my classroom. Its a device that senses what I write on the white dry erase board in my class and sends it to my computer. I love it. My kids used it today in their lesson about Plato and Aristotle. They love it too. I guess it cost $4000. So I guess I better not lose it or break it or use it to scratch my butt.

Now that is really it.