Homebound

Being a Homebound teacher was interesting. I think I'll do it again if I ever have the time.

Monday, I got to see my student punch a wall. He told his mom he wouldn't work, so she cancelled the session. I drove by to pick up some work, so that it wouldn't be a total wash. The student left the house when I did and asked if I could drive him to Burger King. 

Can you guess what I didn't do?

The rest of the week went smoother and I was expecting to be done today. There was a meeting scheduled this morning to place the student somewhere in the county. 

Something happened.

I was told the student's mom got angry and hung up the phone before the meeting could really get underway. When they tried calling back, she would not pick up. I wasn't there so I don't really know.

My department chair told me that there would not be another meeting scheduled for TWO WEEKS! Yikes!

I had to email the Homebound Office to tell them I could not continue. 

Carrie starts her new job Monday, and it's going to be my job to pick him up from daycare on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Plus, my SOLs are around the corner. I have had students asking me to stay after for help for the past three weeks. I've had to tell them "I'm sorry, but I can't" many times only to have my Homebound lesson cancelled. It feels wrong to deny help to multiple kids who want it to chase after one kid who makes it very clear he does not. 

Anyway, no one wrote me back, so I don't know where I stand yet. I probably won't find out more until Monday. I really hope my student finds his way into a school/program of some sorts as soon as possible. I don't think any progress or good will come from him being left on his own to run wild for another two weeks.

Hungry Mother

Carrie is out of town for the weekend. She's on her last big hurrah with State Parks. She and Gaston are running an AmeriCorps training at Hungry Mother State Park (if I'm not mistaken).

For the duration of Mommy's absence, Shane will get plenty of Daddy time!

I Should Write....

...but I'm just going to post a picture instead.

Oh Dawn (and Oh Irony)

I realized an error in parenting too late.

Whenever Shane used to do his pre-dawn wake-ups, I would go into his room, point at the closed blinds and say "It's dark. Go to sleep."

Guess what? Shane's been waking up around 5:30 lately.

It's light outside.

Shane has 'blackout' blinds, but you can see a small halo along the edges.

Boo, sunlight!

Interjection!

::BLACK SCREEN, voice over starts to sound::

Today's broadcast of Mike's Blog, is being temporarily interrupted, to give you.....

Carrie's Memories!


::camera fades in, Carrie is standing in the living room of an old manor house, leaning against the fireplace::

"Thank you, you're so kind... I'm so glad to be here tonight! You know.. it's not often when I take over my husband's blog. In fact, I think it's been over a year since I've done so. But when I do, I always try to make my segments funny, memorable and sometimes (though inadvertently) informative!"

::Sits in posh high back arm chair, making herself comfortable while she holds a book in her hands. A cat decides to jump up in Carrie's lap, making herself at home and she snuggles up::

"I have been at my current job for going on four years now. It's been a noteworthy and eventful four years to say the least. But I find myself now starting a new chapter in my professional journey, which means that I must move on. Now that the reality is settling in, I can't help but think back on some of the moments that made my time with Virginia State Parks so memorable."

::Carrie opens the book and thumbs to a specific page. Once she's found her spot, her hand rests on the cat's head giving her an affectionate rub. The cat responds in kind with the sound of approving purrs::

"June, 2010. This time of year was nearing the end of my first preparation for the start of the Youth Conservation Corps. I was given the arduous task of reviewing all the old documents, changing forms, elaborating, changing and creating policies. All very daunting work that required a keen eye and more than my fair share of patience.

"Things seemed to have been going well. I was learning all the ins and outs of the administrative piece of the program. We were a week out from the start of the Supervisor Training that was going to be held at Bear Creek Lake State Park. This meant we were making sure everything that needed to be packed and ready to go was checked and accounted for. The last piece of the equipment boxes that we packed and organized was a simple sheet of card stock paper. The card stock had an equipment check off list on it, for supervisors to check to make sure they received everything they needed, as well as make an inventory of anything extra they may have.

"This piece of card stock had been reproduced in the hundreds... it was the same list that had been used for at least the past 5 years, sitting in a box that had been in the YCC storage shed. Only seeing the light of day once a year when it was time to prepare the boxes.

"I knew what needed to be packed. I knew what the Supervisors needed. Heck, I WAS a Supervisor for more than three programs. This was second nature for me. I had this very same sheet in MY boxes three times already. What could possibly be wrong with it?

::Carrie smiles and looks at a picture on the fireplace mantle. It's an old picture of herself posing with her first crew at Sky Meadows State Park. She gives a slight chuckle and then looks back into the camera::

"I'm honestly not sure, to this day, what propelled me to review this sheet. But I started reading it thoroughly.   Just before I was about to put the first sheet into the first box, lined up and waiting, a typo caught my eye. Now normally I wouldn't care too much if it was missing a period here, or an apostrophe there... but all the punctuation was correct. The error I found was a simple misspelling of one word. Not the end of the world, right?

::Carrie closes the book and places it on the nearby end table. Keeping the cat close she gently stands up, holding the cat in the crook of her arm, then transplanting her back on the chair seat. Carrie then walks over to the mantle and turns to face the camera, smirking::

"List of items to be packed:

Eye Protection
Ear Protection
Gloves
First Aid Kits
Crewmember Journal
Crewmember Manual
Water Bottles
Head Bands
Hats
Back Packs
Forms Binder
Health Forms Binder
Crewmember Shirts "

::Carrie's smirk turned into a full grin and the camera pulls in on her face...::

"The word 'shirts'.....was missing the 'r'. And that, my dears... is the rest of the story..."

::FADE OUT::

She Doesn't Min-imize the Strange

What a weird cat.

Min has always loved shoving her head in boots, socks, shoes, and anything that smells bad, but I think hugging and rubbing her face all over Dan's used underwear is a new one! Ha ha! 

She looks cute, but with what you now now would you pet her? 

Life Lessons

This week, I'm teaching my students about Gregor Mendel, and how heredity works. I love teaching genetics.

To make the lab more real (and because I like showing family pictures) I projected this picture on my board.

From Sensory Play

"What color is my wife's hair?" I asked.

"Dark." (Several girls also said "She's so pretty!")

"What color is my beard?"

"Red."

"Right! The opposite of dark. What color is my son's hair?"

"Dark."

"My son has one gene from his mommy, and one gene from me. He looks like my wife, though, because her gene is dominant."

There were more than a few puzzled looks, so I continued.

"Dark hair is dominant. Light hair is recessive. My son is a hybird; he has one dark hair and one light hair gene, but what color hair do you see?"

"Dark."

"That's because it's dominant!"

My wife, son, and I are perfect examples of this. I went through our eye colors next. Carrie and Shane are brownies, and mine are a "Blue!" "No! Green!" according to my class.

Then something memorable happened.

One of the girls in the front of my class, looked up at me and asked "Does your son have your ADHD?"

I was totally surprised and cracking up on the inside.

"Yeah, he's probably doomed!"

Use Difficult in a Sentence

It is difficult to use tweezers to remove a tiny tick from the where the fatty chin meets the neck on a tired and thrashing two-year old who is screaming bloody murder and doesn't understand you're trying to help.

You an interchange "difficult" with "frustrating" in that sentence. I had to wrap Shane's arms in a blanket and attempt some wrestling/jiu-jitsu wrangling. 

The tick is dead and flushed. 

The toddler went down for his nap.

The father kicked up his feet, wrote a quick blog, and rejoiced. 

Hooray for tick-free naps!

Pop Culture Reference: A New Hope

Is that a jawa I see?

At the Park

Carrie, Shane, and I went down to the park as a family unit last Saturday. Carrie wanted Gaston to see how much Shane had grown! When Carrie and Gaston went to work, Shane and I went out to play. That's what parks are for right?