Ahhhh, Nostalgia

I was listening to the songs on the Lumberjack Marching Band's myspace page just a moment ago. I wish I'd known at the time that college marching band was one of the best things I was ever going to do. I guess I'm far enough removed from it that I don't remember the sweltering heat, the mosquito infested leadership camps, and the 8am game day practices. All I remember now is all of the cool people, the fun parties, and the away games. Remember the trip to New Orleans fall of 98? Remember when it rained so bad at that game we ended up not wearing uniforms but wearing ponchos instead? That was one of the best trips. Remember all the fights we'd get in with the drunk spectators every time we went to Louisiana? I remember watching Amanda Dickson punch the Northwestern Demon in the head. So many memories. Just felt really nostalgic for a minute.........can't wait to see the Lumberjack Band again soon!

Back to Work

Back to the ole 9 to 5 today. Except it was more like 8 to 8. Yep, nothing like a 12 hour day to kick off the new year. I'm hoping that these kind of days are kept to a minimum this year. I got to come home for lunch, so that helped to break the day up a little. There was no time for dinner, so I got to eat left overs at Dean's. His left overs are much better than mine ever thought they could be. He wins the left over food contest. I win everything else. I put my bumper crop of tomatoes to use today and made this yummy salad of tomatoes, mozzarella, basil, and olive oil. Delicious and fun to look at:

My scarf is coming along nicely. I hope to have it finished soon.
I think this is going to be a good year. I feel like we have more control over stuff this year. And since I'm sort of a control freak (yes, I'll admit it) I think that will be a better thing for us. This year has to be better. It has to be. I won't make it in public education if this year is not better. We are starting the year with music stands, bassoons, euphoniums, percussion equipment, and metronomes so we are already ahead of last year! Only time will tell......

Solving Problems

Today I had a light bulb moment. I figured out a way to save the nation. I have found the answer to our fiscal problems. I'm going to start The Stupid Police. Not a unit of police that are stupid, but a unit of police that fines people for being stupid. Like yesterday at our region meeting. I could have easily made enough money to send a few kids to a private university for a pair of degrees. Here's how it will work. If you do something stupid, such as put those stupid cow balls on the back of your truck, then I will fine you. Or if I let you check out in front of me at the store because you have a few things and I have a lot and you don't say thank you, then I will fine you. Your first offense is $50. Every subsequent offense after this will double upon each offense. All of the money from my program will go directly into the school system to help students get a good education. It will also be used to give teachers raises so that they are paid what other professionals are paid. So all of these people beep-bopping through life acting like morons in public are going start paying for education. It would be an endless money pit. No one would have to pay for a college education again! It would all be funded by the millions of people walking around with no regard for anyone around them. I don't see how we can lose here!! And if people finally learn that we are trying to live in a society here, then it will just be a better place to live.

Update: I have found my first offender. What self respecting man tries to pick women up on myspace? And what self respecting woman agrees to go out with someone trying to pick her up on myspace? I got this message today:
My name is Tim and I just moved to Haslet, TX from Shreveport, LA. I am a 25 yr old male and I am 6 foot 2 inches 220 lbs brown eyes athletic build very attractive and I am just on here looking for a cool friend to get to know have some fun with and kick it with. I have a pic I can send you if you are interested. I am a real person no spam or robots or whatever those people are and I am looking for a real woman in return that is down to earth, funny, outgoing, good personality and definitely a frreak. So get at me so we can talk and get to know each other better. P.S. I like that picture ver nice!!! I live five minutes from the speedway also

This guy does not understand that he is barking up the wrong tree. Between the run on sentences and spelling freak with two r's - I don't know what turned me on first.

Wasting Time on Saturday

Today was the stupid fall region meeting. It was hands downs the most pointless region 2 meeting I've been to yet. I'm just so unimpressed with the people running the region and I wish we could vote them out, but if we even thought about nominating someone else we would probably have a mutiny on our hands. I feel like we are still in 1962 and clearly we are not! Example: in every other region in Texas, all of the schools draw lotto balls with numbers to figure out what order we will play at concert contest. At last year's fall meeting we were told by the executive director of the region (who incidentally looks like jolly ol St. Nick) that he would be picking the order of the performances. Of course everyone one from Keller was appalled and he told us "big city folk" to just settle down because it wasn't fair for a small school to have to play after a school from a big district like ours. That's fine and all if he thinks that, but this region is a democracy and we didn't vote to give him that "executive privilege" to keeps things "fair". (Does this sound familiar to anyone?) So basically, the rules don't apply to our region since we have some many good ol boy band directors that just want to do things the way the were done 40 years ago. I swear, if we had a state wide contest to see which region had the most morons in it, Region 2 would win every chair in the band - hands down, no contest! At any rate - we threw a big fit about the performance order process and we got to draw this year. Needless to say, I was not excited about spending my last Saturday of the summer listening to a bunch old Santa looking good ol boys tell us how they did it in the sixties. Luckily we had a fun carpoool:

Jennifer was our driver. She did a good job and didn't get us lost. Hang a lucky at the sign!

Delaina sat in the back with me. She looked very cute with her Paris Hilton sunglasses.

Hurricane Dean will be a Category 4 later today and destroying a southern Texas town near you later this week.

This is my dinner that Tara made for me on Friday night. It was so yummy!!!! I need the recipe. Great dinner, Tara!

Here is my bumper crop of tomatoes that I harvested today. There are more tomatoes growing, so it is possible that I will get to harvest more in a few weeks.

My Feelings for Fall

Today when I was out shopping I walked by a display of fall scented candles. It was scents like pumpkin spice, apple pie, and cinnamon. I absolutely love fall. It has always been my favorite season. It seems like every September I buy crazy amounts of these fall scented candles and burn them all the time. I love the smell of fall. It warms my heart. And there's nothing like that first day when there is a nip in the air. That was always the best day of marching band. I was feeling really nostalgic for fall over the past week because of the oppressive heat. Someday I hope to live some place where fall lasts longer than a few weeks.......s0me place where it is actually a season, not just a few weeks in November before it gets hot again. But until that day comes, I will be anxiously awaiting fall and all of the exciting smells it brings with it.

Dinner and Dancing

Tonight I had dinner at the Surface house. Our pre-dinner entertainment was Kennedy doing her tap dance. She brought her dad his "tap shoes" so that he could join in on the fun. So Kennedy and Dean did a tap show on the yoga mat for us. Hilarity!!!!


Dean made a lasagna for dinner and it was the best one I've ever had. Seriously. The Olive Garden better look out. It was dang good. Kudos to the chef!

My Week in a Nutshell

My sister and Abby came to visit me this week. We had a lot of fun hanging out with the Surfaces and the Smiths. I sang Itsy Bitsy Spider about 73 times and learned the theme song to Dora the Explorer. We were out shopping one day and stopped at Michael's to get some stuff for our craft project. While we were paying, Abby just plopped herself into this basket and took off her shoes. It was really cute and one of the few pictures I got of her smiling.

This is her Dora movie star look.
I spent the rest of the week working with Dean on our upcoming band camp and parent information meeting. I like to call this meeting "Band for Dummies". We decided we were going to have to have this meeting for our 6th grade parents after a series of events last year. I can't tell you how many times we heard, "What do you mean my kid has to play in a concert?" Well what do you think we do in band? We play concerts. Hopefully people will know what is going on after we spell it out in big purple crayon for them. The highlight of my week was a surprise visit from my retirement investment financial guy on Friday. He stopped by the office on Friday morning to say hi. No, I'm not that excited about my 403b - it's just that this guy is so dreamy and nice and polite and I blush every time he walks in the door. He's the only single guy I usually see - ever - so it always brightens my day when he pops in.

I started a new scarf today. I found this cute pink yarn at Michael's and thought it would make a great scarf. I had to give up on my blue one because I had jacked it all up. I think that this one is going to be much better. And since I'm thinking about going to Boston over Thanksgiving, this will be a nice addition to my very limited winter wardrobe.

Knitting Thoughts

I am really enjoying my new hobby of knitting. I think that maybe I find the repetitive movements very soothing. At some point during my knitting today, I recalled an episode of Grey's Anatomy in which Meredith decides that she is swearing off men and decides to knit a sweater instead. Hmmm. She's not that much older than me. I can't really become that cynical about dating yet. I'm not that dark and twisty, am I? And if I recall correctly, she ended up getting back together with McDreamy anyway. Of course, unlike Meredith, here in the real world I don't have two ridiculously dashing men chasing after me. (at least I don't think I do). If McDreamy came to me with those eyes and professed his love to me I would give up on knitting that sweater, too. But it is not coming to that with me, right? Besides, I'm not knitting a sweater. I'm knitting a scarf.

Suz, I Can't Believe I'm Knitting!

Suzanne left me a book called, "I Can't Believe I'm Knitting". I thought I would try to teach myself how to cast on. And I did it!! I can't believe I'm knitting! Thanks for the reference book, Suz. It's been a big help. And I figured out why I kept adding stitches. I was doing something weird every time I would start a new row. So now I'm ready to make my scarf.

Tomatoes and Yarn

I'm really confused about my tomato plants. They started growing little green tomatoes that I assume will eventually ripen to red, but suddenly yesterday I noticed that I already have one little red one that wasn't there two days ago. In the first picture, there are three different colors of tomato:
These are the first ones that showed up, and I guess they are starting to ripen a little. I really have no idea how to grow tomatoes, I just like to eat them.
I also got a lesson from Suzanne today on how to knit. I really like, but I need lots more practice. After hours of practicing today, this is what I've got so far:
And this is the result after I unraveled it several times to start over. I keep adding stitches somehow. And when I mess something up, I don't really know how to fix it so I just kinda jerry-rig a stitch until I can get back on track. So, with any luck, this could possibly be a scarf sort of thing for me to wear in the winter of 2009.

This Isn't Natural

I've seen television shows about this couple in Arkansas that have had 16 kids. Well, they just had their 17th and they said that they are not done yet. I am in no position to judge their decision to have a billion kids because I don't like it when people judge my decision to have zero, so read this article and think what you wish:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20097968/?gt1=10252

It just doesn't seem natural.