The Cheese Wins

Spent the past two days at a training session to learn some pretty cool new strategies to help struggling readers. Good stuff.
Lunch was provided for us on both days....yesterday's lunch was a yummy chicken wrap, tortilla chips and salsa, salad, and a cookie all from "On the Border".....mmmmmm good!
Today's lunch was also from "On the Border". Oooookaaaay....not a whole lot of creativity going into the lunch planning, but I wasn't going to complain about a free meal and yesterday's lunch was pretty yummy.
Today's lunch? Cheese enchiladas, nacho chips with melted cheese, refried beans with melted cheese, and a tossed salad with shredded cheese. Ummmm....not so good for me since I'm LACTOSE INTOLERANT!
However, I decided to tempt the fates since this was the only food being provided and I was starving.
Flash forward to about 30 minutes after eating lunch....gurgle, gurgle, gurgle. And guess who spent the majority of the rest of training in the bathroom?
That was money that my district literally flushed down the drain....both for the food and the cost for me to attend the training since I was basically "missing in action" for the afternoon session.

Next time I attend a training, I'll be packing my own lunch thank you very much.

Let's Hear the Collective "Eeeewww!"

Being a second grade teacher, I see a LOT of nasty little habits throughout the day....nosepicking, booger-eating, eating food off of the floor, palm-licking, kids sneezing and having globs of snot streaming down from their nose onto their lips, etc. It may sound like I've got an awful lot of neurotic imps in my room, but seriously? Those kinds of behaviors are VERY typical in a lower elementary classroom...when I see a kid engaging, it barely even registers anymore. (Although I'm very diligent about handing a kleenex to the kid who is digging for gold in his nose, or rushing a snot-streamer over to the sink).

Anyway....I've been teaching 20 years and I figured I'd pretty much seen it all.

Until last week.

I witnessed an act that was soooo disgusting it actually made my gag reflex kick in.

I've managed, over the course of time, to learn how to control my gag reflex. This has been a job necessity because I've had lots of kids throw pukers in my room, and I've been FORCED to choke back my own bile. It's not easy, let me tell you...but I give myself kudos for mastering my gagging.

(Side note: about 10 years ago, my class managed to shut down our school computer lab for a week. How? The kids sit in rows of 5 computers....one little girl puked all over her keyboard, the boy next to her saw it and then he puked, and so on down the line. I had a few sprinkled around the room who also lost their proverbial lunches due to the exteme vomit-y smell that permeated the computer lab in a matter of seconds. They had to send all of those computers out to be cleaned, so the lab had to shut down. YET...I, somehow, through extreme willpower and shit-ass luck, was able to keep my cookies in my stomach even though I was surrounded by stomach chunkage.) So, as you can see...I clearly RULE as far as intestinal fortitude goes in second grade classrooms.

However, as I previously stated, what I saw last week had the gag reflex in full swing.

Imagine, if you will, a male student (we'll call him "Bobby") sitting quietly at his desk during writing time. He's concentrating fiercely on his epic journal entry...writing about going to his grandma's house and getting to play with her dogs. I just finished conferencing with him about using details to describe the dogs and the games he played with them. I move over to work with another student who sits near "Bobby". As I'm talking with "Bobby's" neighbor, I casually look over to see how "Bobby" is doing. And...WHOA doggies! What in the HELL???
As "Bobby" is diligently writing in his journal, his non-writing hand is stuck in the back of his pants, down into the under-grundies, scratching away at his butt. We're talking major SCRATCHING. Then, just as I'm about to quietly whisper in his ear to stop doing that and go wash his hands, little "Bobby" pulls the hand out and PUTS HIS FINGERS IN HIS MOUTH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!

Once I'd swallowed my breakfast (for the second time), I was able to discreetly coerce "Bobby" into going into the bathroom to wash his hands. I made a quick (and quiet) little phone call to our school counselor to ask her advice on how to handle it. You know what she said???? "Oh...is he still doing that? He used to do that in first grade too." HOLY CRAP!!!! So I told her that it was IMPERATIVE that we do something to nip this little behavior and that perhaps she might want to take "Bobby" for little chats now and again to talk about hygiene and healthy habits. Perhaps she might want to talk to "Bobby's" mom and see if he's doing this at home. I don't know...but to be so casual about it? I was dumbfounded!

And yes...to answer the question that's probably going through your mind, I've been watching him like a hawk since I saw it and he is STILL doing it! EWWWWWW!!!!! I'm working my way through a gigantic jug of hand sanitizer. If the counselor doesn't get on this, I'm afraid I'm going to have to call in mom...and that worries me. Mainly because if this kid does this at school (and it's an unconscious thing...I don't think he even realizes that he's doing it), then you KNOW he's doing it at home...and apparently nobody is putting a stop to it...so does mom think it's okay????
I'm not looking forward to this conversation. I mean, when a kid is a nose-picker, or even a booger-eater, I can simply say to the parent, "I'm trying to help Suzy remember to use a tissue. We want to break her of the habit before she begins getting teased by her classmates." And usually the parent nods his head, or rolls her eyes and says, "Oh! We've been trying to get her to stop doing that!" and we share the frustration of breaking nasty habits.
BUT....how in the hell do I approach "Bobby's" mother? "Hi, Mrs. Bobby....I've noticed that your son likes to scratch the hell out of his ass crack and then put his fingers in his mouth. Have you seen him doing this at home?"

SHIT! (no pun intended)

If Only It Were This Easy...

Loved this photo....go see more at More Cool Pictures.

The Big Day!

So yesterday was MY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!!!!! It was a fabulicious day filled with lots of pampering, attention, and, of course, presents!!!!!!!!!

And the fun doesn't end yet...I still have get-togethers with friends planned in order to celebrate MY BIRTHDAY and to get more presents!!!!!!!

Here are a couple of highlights from yesterday....

THE CAKE: made for me by a wonderful friend that works in the school office

THE FLOWERS: delivered to me AT WORK from my sweet Hubby and the babies, Roameo & Touji

THE OBSESSION: further fueled by my adoring fans who gave me even MORE Hello Kitty goodies for MY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!!

I LOVE MY BIRTHDAY!!!!!

And now for a message from our sponsors....

In all of the craziness of my summer...

In all of my haste to hurry and get to September already because THAT'S MY BIRTHDAY MONTH!!!!

In all of the chaos that starting a new school year brings....

I forgot something very important.

We added four feet to our household....furry ones belonging to a little baby girl! She was dumped on the porch at our vet clinic back in May WHILE IN ACTIVE LABOR!!!! Who the hell does that kind of thing????

Anyway....she gave birth (by ceasarian) to four babies who all were placed in loving homes at the end of August. That left the mama kitty with no home and nobody to love. In walked me and Hubby with SUCKER stamped on our foreheads. She acted all sweet and lovey and charmed her way into our hearts. She's only 15 months old and is the cutest little thing.

So we brought her home to see if it would work out with Roameo. He hasn't quite figured her out, but he hasn't made a meal out of her...yet. However, she may be courting disaster and cruising for a serious ass-kicking because she keeps running up behind him and swatting his butt before running away. He appears to be calling on a myriad of saints to give him patience...but we all have our limit.

She's a holy terror and the lovey-dovey stuff was apparently all an act. She bites, kicks, tears up carpet, scratches furniture, constantly pesters for food, and uses our bodies as trampolines (usually at around 3:00 in the morning or when our bladders are fit to burst).

We absolutely adore her!

So without further ado, here she is:

Little Miss Touji (Toe-gee...which is Japanese for "lady", which she most certainly is NOT).