UPDATED! Monday, Monday... danannanananana

Monday I find out if I made it into the top 50. I am waiting patiently, impatiently, in awe, biting my nails, nonchalantly, with expectations, with hopelessness... My goal was to make it into the top 50, but with over 30,000 people applying my odds are very low.

I am still optimistic because I really do think that I have good qualities for the position, but I am trying to be realistic and not get my hopes up. Time will only tell... and the weekend will be over before I am ready for it to be gone.

That's what I wrote this morning... more news.

I heard from a pal that the site crashed on Monday as everyone was trying to submit their last minute applications. Sucks to be them, sort of like students who want credit for late assignments.

I did some further research. 34,684 applications were received; 11,565 from the US. Apparently a short list of 200 has already been made and applicants have been contacted to take some online psychometric testing. Since I don't have an email from Tourism Queensland does that mean I can assume that I did not even make it into the top 200?

Oh well.

Worms!

Nobody likes me, everybody hates me, guess I'll go eat worms...

Last night I took a Worm Composting class. The class entailed an informative lecture with a knowledgeable extension agent, a copy of the worm composting bible, drilling holes in a brand new worm tub (a storage container to most people) and mixing shredded newspaper, compost, and starbucks coffee grounds together for a fresh worm habitat, dumping a half pound of pink squirmy worms, and leaving. Not exactly what I was expecting, but I;ll be honest getting my hand dirty was a bit therapeutic after the last couple of days I have had. I was the only one not wearing gloves. I was also the only one under forty.

My new worms are adjusting to their new home. I have to leave the light on in the basement to encourage them not to flee their new plastic home. After a few days they should be settled in and ready to eat eat eat. I am not supposed to give them any compost until Sunday. And then afterwards I am only to feed them about once a week and I get to be silly and hide their food to see if they can find it. Well really, you hide the food to reduce any smell, which there shouldnt be, and to reduce the possibility of fruit flies.

I asked the lady about how much organics I can feed them because lets be honest, there will be at least 8 banana peels a week, at least 8 sets of coffee grounds and filters and who knows how much weight in apple cores, carrot tops and other organics. The extension agent shared my concern and suggested that I may have too much compost and that I should weigh it - because I can only put in two pounds a week. How many banana peels is that?

The extension agent assured me that I pretty much couldnt mess this up. I have my doubts.

The good news is, in three months I can split them up (because they will be having worm sex) and make new bins or start feeding them more compost. So Karrie... in case you are wondering, a worm bin will be your house warming gift. :)

If you think worm composting sounds interesting - read the article linked above or some of these provided by Happy D Ranch - where my worms were growing up.

Layla loves Brusters

Layla was supposed to be all alone on Sunday so I thought I would go into town and take her on a nice long walk to Brusters and get ice cream.

Well turns out Dad was back, but I did take her anyway. It turned out not to be that bad of a walk (Dad thinks it may be 1.5 miles - he's going to measure it today) and Layla seemed to enjoy the oppurtunity to sniff everywhere.

I did not allow her to get a Doggie Sundae because of her delicate stomach, but she did get a dogbone while I slurped on my blackberry cobbler ice cream cone.

You should see if they have Bruster's near you, because they have the best ice cream ever and Thursday, banana splits are half price if you bring your own bananas. :)

What teachers do for fun...

We get together with really tasty potluck dishes, drinks, and do a quiz bowl challenge.

I love this! The food is fantastic - this year was a Mardi Gras theme so there was jambalaya and King's cake and then whatever everyone else wanted to bring. I brought chocolate peanutbutter bars that were still warm - they were a hit! Then we all got together in a room with a projector and answered 200 random quiz bowl challenge questions that ranged from current events to biological processes to algebraic equations - whatever. Some of them are difficult. And people were mad when we got one wrong.

We scored 1560-something I think which is excellent considering the amount of education present in that room even with our beverage handicap.

I think this is also why I like playing board games. And maybe why other adults do to. We like feeling smart. :) And being competitive.

adventures with geocaching on the side

Adam and I went geocaching in Louisa this weekend. We had been planning it all week and yet I still forgot that I needed to download the points... until I was already at home on Friday afternoon. I called him to let him know and we decided we would give it a go anyway with some old 'mineral' points that I had downloaded in 2007.

After consulting the map and the GPS we determined they were mostly around the lake which we thought would be no big deal, but in the end is endlessly frustrating. But more on that later.

The first geocache was exciting. Adam determined from cross-referencing the GPS and the map that it must be on a little loop of route 700.. . okay... route 700 is a dirt road. Excitement number one. As we progressed the potholes and mud ruts got bigger and bigger. At one point, Adam and I had to get out of the car to assess the best driving route (or if it was even drivable).

Side note. I would be perfectly at home in a four wheel drive all terrain high clearance vehicle, but I have the junkets mobile (ford focus) and it has to do. I may not be the best highway driver, but I can do a U-turn just about anywhere (as Adam experienced later) and I am pretty good at navigating potholes, tree stumps, big rocks, and creeks. So since it's pretty cold and I knew that underneath the mud was frozen and pretty firm, I decided to cross these perilous mud ruts (twice even bc we had to come back). I had one tire where Adam is standing, and one all the way to the right. So Excitement Two.


We crossed some more dangerous sections and then Excitement Three - a small sign saying "BRIDGE OUT." Excellent. We kept driving. Then at the bottom of the hill I could see a large puddle, or maybe a small lake. Excitement Four. We decided to park (in the road) and trek on foot - we were only 0.08 miles away at this point, and that's negotiable.

We navigated around the small lake and determined that it was probably impassable in the junketsmobile and trekked onward. We found the creek and there was a bridge, but it was obviously homemade because people's names were written in the concrete. We trekked up the next hill and found out we were getting farther away so we headed back down the hill and decided to take the footpath along the creek. The walk was pretty and the creek was nice and burbling. We then noticed an encampment ahead. Several RVs and campers and as we got closer I could see tents. We were deciding whether we actually wanted to walk through this living space. Adam noticed a sign and asked me what it said... it said "Potkids" I think. Excitement Five. Now our better judgement started to kick in and we decided that whatever this was it was not good and we turned around quickly and quietly and headed back to the car. Even though we were 0.4 miles away.

We re-navigated the potholes and mud ruts and everything and decided to see if we could get closer along the other road - turns out that road is longer than it is on my map and we ended up in sub division land. Excitement Six - "End of State Maintenance." We saw many many of these signs as we tried to find the cul de sac that ended close to the cache. Appropriately named "Up a Creek Without a Paddle." We ended up hiking along a peninsula in the back of a subdivision (probably trespassing) along the lake and it was gorgeous. Beautiful. Excitement Seven - It had to be across the lake. Try as we might we could not get closer than 0.01 miles.

We decided to try to drive around and knew we would pass another one. It was titled "Old and New" so I thought it might be at the antique store, but it was actually along the old bridge road on 522 - that Adam didn't even know about it. We walked down to the creek and saw the old supports for the bridge and then determined it was on the other side of the creek - Surprise! We did find it though.

We decided to try to find one more before lunch, but once again we were in a maze of subdivision roads all dead-ending at the lake - and every time we determined that it must be across the lake. That's the frustration with drive-by geocaching... you don't actually know anything about the point you are going after; that is also the excitement. Because I could look up each point on the computer and get the driving directions, but seriously, where is the fun in that?

VOTE NOW

My video finally posted! Time to rock the vote!

Please watch my video and click on the stars to the right to give me lots of stars!

http://www.islandreefjob.com/applicants/watch/r3hAgN89cyI

Send it to everyone you know... THANKS!

The next date is March 2 to see if I make the top 50.

VD is tomorrow... more fun....

Today I had some of my students write valentines using physics vocabulary words. Some of them are AMAZING! And because I told them it was a contest (some kids will do anything for contests) I need some prizes, but the worst of it is I have to pick a winner! Some of them are so good that it is a difficult decision.

Here is the top winner:

You are the centripetal force in my life because my life revolves around you. And like inertia states, an object in motion will keep doung what it is doing; my heart will keep beating for you.

He says he's going to sell it to Hallmark.

Other excellent ones
- You are the torque that makes my world go round (torque is turning power)
- Gravity can't keep me down when I'm with you
- You are the fulcrum that keeps my heart balanced (a fulcrum is in the center of a see saw)
- You must have a lot of gravity, cause I can't stay away from you

Some Anti-VD sentiments
-You are the wedge that splits us apart
-Your weight is so great it makes my heart ache. Your beauty makes vomit come out of my mouth in projectile motion. Your force makes my soul go off course.

All in all a hilarious assignment that PROVES they know some of these words. Plus the point was to make me laugh. This is what I enjoy about VD - cheesy silly things like ridiculous valentines. I gave all my students silly barn animal valentines today - and most of them really appreciated it.

Do you need any ideas for the VD? Nothing says I love you like marine life... check out some e-cards from the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

And apparently you can customize M&Ms with sayings and photos and even imprint the foil of Dove Chocolates with a saying of your choice!. Though these are high dollar purchases.

So however you choose to celebrate... Happy VD and Happy Friday the 13th.

VD is coming

My favorite the Acme heart maker. (Yes Best Job in the World - PICK ME!) I do not like to eat these heart candies, but I am fascinated by them and love to pick through them and read all the sayings. If only they made an updated version on a more taste-appealing candy. Or if I was Alice in Wonderland I could eat heaps of tasty little cakes with more enchanting sayings that "eat me."

And the next best - these anti-valentine sentiments from Meish.org.

However you choose to celebrate... Have a happy or miserable VD.

Dress Up Days

Some club (FCCLA) is sponsoring dress up days and a canned food drive this week. They made an announcement on Friday so there was not a lot of prep time. Not many of the kids are dressing for it, but I find it highly amusing. Many of the teachers are participating, plus canned food = teachers can wear jeans any day this week. A big incentive for some folks, but lets be honest, my classroom is too hot to even wear jeans.

Monday was 70's day. I have several outfits for such an occasion and settled on a flowery dress to also commemorate the unseasonably warm days we have been having (60 degrees in February? It's weird.). Mom coached me on the eyeshadow in the morning (it is hers... blue. She thinks it may actually BE from the 70s...). It was funny to me though because so few people made the connection that it was 70's day and just thought that I had on a nice spring dress. Ha ha.

Tuesday was very exciting because it was twin day. Lauren and I have known since the first week of school that we have a skirt that is the same and as the year has progressed we have realized that we have a few more items in our closets that match. We were planning on being twins on a random day, but this was a perfect opportunity for us.

We matched from head to toe - earrings, glasses (Lauren normally wears contacts and her students thought she was wearing fake glasses), blue tops, lanyards and ids, brown skirts, and brown shoes. Awesome. This may be the best matched I have ever been besides when Kelley and I were young and mom put us in matching outfits.

Today is Career Day. I was really drawing a blank and did not plan well for this one. I actually thought about wearing a dress and a crown and saying my career was being a princess. I decided that I would rather be more comfortable and I am wearing a tshirt that says 'smartypants.' My shirt that says 'smart and beautiful' was a bit too tight for the middle school. Being a smartypants is an admirable profession. And let's face it... it is true.

Tomorrow is green and gold and Friday is red and white for VD. So not to exciting, but a little easier to accommodate... except for red. I don't actually have many red clothes. Heaps of pink. No red.

I have applied for the Best Job - Now I have to wait

Thank you for your application.
Your video file will be reviewed by our staff and you will receive an email within the coming few weeks notifying you if it has been approved.

:( I will let you know as soon as I know it has been approved. Then we can all rock the vote.

:( That's frustrating. I really cannot beleive that some of those other videos I have seen have made it passed the approval of the staff! Oh well. Let's just wait and see.

2nd try video

Alright here is my re-edited video. It is of proper length and include all the stuff I need to. There is still one sound issue, but what I am sayingis not important. Thanks for all your constructive criticism.

try this

This is a smaller file so the quality is not as good, but I thought it would upload faster.

Perfect Dusting

This morning there was a perfect dusting of snow on everything. It was beautiful and very picturesque - and the roads were clear, my favorite kind of snow. And we had a two hour delay because of it. I drove slowly to work (just in case the roads were bad) to take in the beauty of the snow. I was early before it all started to melt (because I had grades I needed to put in, plus I couldnt go back to sleep). I wanted to stop half a dozen times to take photos, but I settled with waiting until I was in the school parking lot. Pretty, but not quite the photos I was hoping to capture.

Happy Groundhog's Day

From Daniel's collection of Groundhogs. I never knew anyone to collect them, but apparently Beanie Babies puts out a new one every year. Here is a good collection of them.
And in case you didnt know- he didnt see it - so we have six more weeks of winter forecasted by a rodent.

Best Job Video

Today during directed study I had a student take photos of my teaching and then I had to explain to all my kids what zooxanthellae were.... And then answer all their questions about why I needed these photos.

Today afterschool I filmed the beginning and ending of my speech. I asked Susan to help me tape the end because I wanted a powerpoint running at the same time. She obliged and did not seems to get too frustrated with me mumbling and jumbling my lines. By the end I had aquired a small audience who knew my lines better than me.

Then I taped the ending by myself over and over and over trying to figure out if it was better to be stationary or pop in and out of the screen. I am going to watch them this evening and then hopefully I can post a sample tomorrow. I am trying my best to have the video done by this weekend.

Fingers crossed. Because there have already been 10,000 applicants. Whoa.