WNBP: Heebie-Jeebies With A Side Of Angst

Oh, I'm just about done now.  If I've ever complained to you about not knowing what day it is, then I apologize.  I had no idea.  This is Weekday Confusion.  If I had a nickel for every time I screwed up where I was supposed to be today or what I needed to accomplish I could afford a guy to just follow me around and smack me on the head periodically.

I'd probably have to invest a lot of time introducing this guy and explaining why calling the authorities is unnecessary, but I'd still consider it money well spent.

It's going to be an abbreviated Wednesday Night Bullet Post tonight, I fear.  I seem to have left a number of things to the last minute and now find myself in something of a pinch time-wise.  I really do need that head-smackin' guy...

*What was it I was going to mention?  There was something.  Something kind of important going on...

*Oh yeah.  I remember!

*Giant freakin' hurricane!!!

*Now, to be clear:  We here in Maine did not experience Sandy's full fury.  What we got was kind of like a tiny, ladylike burp following her otherwise hearty meal.

*I am not going to even try and compare what happened here to what others further south went through.

*But it was enough to close school early on Monday and keep us home again on Tuesday.

*The power is still out in several areas and one of the towns that make up our district had to keep the kiddies home for an extra day on top of that.

*I, of course, was fully prepared for whatever came my way because that is sort of what I do.

*I fretted over it for days.  I counted batteries.  I tallied canned food.  I located every single candle in the manse and placed them around strategically lest the lights go out and I not be in a position to provide illumination.

*My power never so much as flickered.  I was a tiny pinpoint of light in an otherwise darkened state.

*I was awake all night waiting for the lights to go out.

*Had school not been cancelled, I probably would have had to call in crazy.

*I also needed the day off because it took, like, ten hours to put away all my unneeded disaster supplies.

*I would evacuate if I was told to.  I might be grumpy about it, but I'd go eventually because that is the sensible thing to do.

*But I don't like being places that aren't my own.

*I further don't like being around lots of people because they will probably be touching everything and wanting to talk to me about stuff while I'm busy worrying about them maybe touching my food.

*I would be a lot of fun at the shelter...

*I have to get some training in Autism Spectrum Disorders.

*Mostly because I haven't had any in a while and that is kind of becoming my job now.

*I was told not to worry about that becoming my new job because I would get some updated training, something beyond the basic stuff I've already done.

*What I was not told was that this "training" would involve getting in a car that isn't mine and riding in it for three hours so I could check into a hotel with my roomie.

*Hotels are places where everyone there is "People."  "Other People."  "People Who, By The Very Nature Of Our Forced Cohabitation Will Be In My Space."

*Also not mentioned was the fact that this training would occur not once, not twice, but three times during this school year.

*In addition to the four to five required on-site meetings that will be held by our team of professionals in district.

*There was mention of graduate credit which I don't really need and will probably have to pay for.

*And did I mention the people?  Or the hotel with beds that other people have slept in?

*I have to leave the house at 5:15 tomorrow.  So I can get in the car that isn't my own and travel for three hours ...well, you know how it goes by now.

*I'd rather have the hurricane.  It was rather soothing by comparison.

*I have to pack tonight because I didn't get anything done earlier.

*Which isn't my fault because I was in denial about going and then there was this whole hurricane thing which led to school cancellations and my not knowing what day it is.

*Best Conversation Of The Week:

(Sheepie is getting ready to leave for the day, but stops in the office to speak with Mr. Principal and Mr. Assistant Principal.  She wants to follow up on the two emails and request for a substitute teacher that outlined in excruciating detail her upcoming absence.  Mr. Principal seems on board and ready to offer whatever assistance the classroom might need in Ms. Sheep's stead.  Now it is Mr. Assistant Principal's turn.)

Ms. Sheep:  ...so that should cover it.  If you have any questions, just refer to the emails and sub request and you'll be fine.  You can reach me at the conference, but it probably won't do you much good.  By the time I get back here, you'll have forgotten why you called in the first place.

Mr. Assistant Principal:  Er...what?  Oh, yes.  Thank you, Ms. Sheep.  You've certainly been most thorough.

MS:  And with that, I guess it's good bye.  I have to go get ready to get up at an ungodly hour and get into a car that isn't my own so I can share a room with someone who might not understand why I'm wrapping myself in sheets of plastic.

MAP:  OK.  Good luck with that.

MS:  (walks down the hall towards the door, calling over her shoulder) I'll see you on Monday!

MAP:  Yup, see you...wait.  WHAT???

*No.  I'm not making that up.  You'd think I am, but I'm not.

*I have some reading material for my trip.  I used some up during the dire hours where Sandy didn't really take up as much of my time as I thought she might, but there was some left.

*I finished  Wyrd Sisters.

*And now I'm reading Pyramids (Discworld Book 7).

*Truly, I am as dedicated as a person can be to getting through that Discworld series in some semblance of order.

*But I'm not rereading anything.  That just seems crazy given the number of books I have to get through.  I'm just catching up with the new ones.

*Also picked up a copy of Mister B. Gone, but that isn't a library book so I'm saving it.

*There's some audiobooks I'd like to mention, but I just realized that my short post isn't exactly that.  And I still have to pack stuff.

*Because I didn't do it before and can't seem to get a handle on how little time I have left...


I'm a mess.  But I managed to grab some packages of candy while I was stocking up on cat food and trying to find an automatic dispenser that was within my budget.  I'll be fine.  Just a few more Snickers and I'm sure it will all come together.

I should probably pack some candy, now that I think of it.  I might need them to bribe my roommate into not telling everyone about the plastic wrap...

SA

WNBP: Back To "Normal"

Last week was something of an anomaly.  I had sickness, a classroom break-in, assorted tragedies and an honest-to-God earthquake to report on.  I don't know whether it is a good thing or a bad thing that all is back to some semblance of normalcy now.  I suppose it's good for the nerves.  No.  That's wrong.  I don't "suppose" anything.  It is definitely good for the nerves when all is quiet.

It's maybe not so good for the blog, though.  I'm just going to forge ahead and see how it goes.  Maybe I can take the same old same old and turn it into something kinda-sorta interesting...

*I am pleased to report that I slept lying down last night.

*That is probably not all that interesting to the average person.

*But, to me, it was a little slice of heaven.

*I've been sleeping sitting up for almost two weeks now.

*This requires a plethora of pillows and a true commitment to remaining upright.

*Sitting up in order to sleep is counter intuitive.

*But it is preferable to coughing so hard that it wakes the neighbors and I'm so totally not kidding when I say that.

*The pneumonia and I were at a stalemate for quite a while there, but I think I'm getting the upper hand now.

*I only use the inhaler once a day or so now and I believe I've already mentioned the whole "lying down like a civilized being" thing.

*I'm so giddy about all this that I'm gonna try lying down again tonight!

*It's all I've thought about most of the day!

*And you thought I was kidding when I said that my regular life might not be all that interesting...

*We've had a real problem at school with kids running willy nilly through the double doors with no thought whatsoever towards who might be trying to come the other way.

*So some brilliant individual thought to put green circles over the "in" side and red circles over the "not so much with in" side.

*Keep to the right.  That's what we're shooting for here.

*Kids can do it.  Adults forget.

*The Boy With The Cutest Lithp EVER was shocked by my doorway behavior as I was taking him down to breakfast the other day.

*I waltzed through the "red" door like it was my right to do so as decreed by the superintendent of schools himself.

*He made me go back and do it right.  He chuckled.

*He made me do it again when I forgot at the next door. He chuckled again as I dutifully did as he instructed.

*By the time we hit the third door and I STILL couldn't seem to get the hang of it, he wasn't as amused.

*And I was a little ashamed of myself as I trudged back to repeat the correct procedure yet again.

*After we'd procured his morning meal, we headed back towards the classroom.  And then...

Ms. Sheep:  Wait.  We just went through a door.  I did it wrong again didn't I?  Just say it.  I can take it...

The Boy With The Cutest Lithp EVER: (disgustedly) I don't know.  I thtopped trying after the fourth door.

*I don't remember the fourth door.

*Or why the heck we have so many danged doors in that school to begin with!!!

*But I think I can pinpoint exactly when I had to start working harder to earn the respect of a certain cutie with an adorable speech impediment.

*The Absurdly Gi-normous Kitty isn't handling the need to close off certain rooms now that the cold weather is upon us.

*Or perhaps he is.

*He is almost able to turn a doorknob now.

*Which is about fifty kinds of disturbing when I happen to be in the shower...

*rattle-rattle-rattle!!!

*EEEK!

*It's only a matter of time before I wake up and find my car keys gone and a note saying, "Went out for catnip.  Back in an hour."

*There was a time when only the major publishers could decide what we got to read.  Independent publishing was something only done for vanity's sake and not anything a "real" author would consider.

*But now, thanks to the digital revolution, we have more options.

*When I was asked to read Generation Z: Birth of the Zompire I was happy to do it.

*Not only do I get to read about zombies, but I get to support an indie author and that's all good no matter how you slice it.

*Be forewarned:  These are lighthearted zombies that chat amongst themselves and engage in what can almost be deemed high jinx.

*While they eat your face off...

*They are not the zombies we will face come the apocalypse.  Do not try to engage them in lighthearted banter while they eat your face off.  You'll just feel rejected.

*But I think it is perfectly OK to play with the genre a bit.  We will all need to learn a little flexibility when the dark days dawn and life as we know it comes to an end.

*And pizza delivery costs, like, a billion dollars because only trained ninjas or mercenaries will be able to get anything to you in under thirty minutes or less...

*Oh, and don't try to tell me you never wondered what might happen if an unlucky vampire ever got bitten by a zombie.  You know you have.

*I'm not going to tell you, though.  You can either keep wondering or read the book yourself.

*Now I'm reading Mort because I've never really read the DiscWorld books in any sort of order and lots of the early ones got past me.

*And also because everything else good was already checked out from the library.

*The commute is being pleasantly passed as I listen to Blood Bound (Mercy Thompson Novels).

*I know I keep saying I'm so totally over the vampires and werewolves, but somehow I keep getting sucked back in.

*Sucked back in..heh-heh.

*You know.  It's funny.  Because of the vampires.

*Maybe I'm not quite as far past the effects of the pneumonia as I thought...

*Or perhaps the abundance of "normal" in my life has gotten the better of me.


OK.  So that maybe wasn't the festival of awesome it might have been, but I did my best.  And no matter what anyone says, the part where I sleep lying down now is possibly enough to keep me awake just from the sheer joy of it.

I guess if "normal" is wrong then I don't wanna be right.  At least for a little while.

SA

WNBP: This Time I Have Something To Say!!

Sometimes it's hard to come up with things for the Wednesday Night Bullet Post.  Yes, even with my glamorous, high profile existence it can be a trial to put something together for my weekly nod to The Blog.

This week, however, I honestly don't think I can even find enough space on the web to report out the strange goings on around here!  I'm not even going to waste time blathering as part of some rambling intro.  I'm just gonna charge right ahead because, if I don't, I might just explode from holding it all in.

*When last we left our intrepid Sheepie, she was hacking, coughing, choking and wheezing.

*By Thursday, I'd had enough and called the doc's office in order that I might beg for something to relieve my drippy symptoms.

*Thankfully, she was open to the idea of calling in an antibiotic and some of that sweet, sweet cough syrup with the codeine in it.

*Bless her little heart and that of all her descendants from now until the end of time because I was at the point where, if I didn't get some sleep, I was going to start chatting with the purple monkeys swinging merrily from the ceiling.

*She also suggested that I come in.  Just as a precaution, she said, given how quickly I've succumbed to pneumonia in years past.

*I managed to snag an afternoon appointment, one that would let me stay at school until the last block of the day.

*The kids have gym and whatnot during that block so I wouldn't be missing much.

*Little Einstein's sad story was playing itself out in the worst possible way in spite of my hopes for better outcomes.

*I don't claim to know much about the inner workings of the universe and why bad things happen, but I did know two things at that point.

*First, he was going to come to school.  It's just what he does.

*And second, I was going to be there with him.  Tissues, cough drops and all.

*The doctor was double booked all day, mostly so she could see people who looked and sounded just like me.

*Now is not the time for a Maine vacation.  We are currently under quarantine.  Just daub some lamb's blood on the border, make the sign of the cross and run back to the place from whence you came.

*My visit with the doc went something like this:

Doctor Judy:  Well, let's see what we have going on here...

Sheepish Annie:  Okey-dokey.  Here's my face!

(Sheepie leans forward expectantly, pushing her blotchy, pale visage within inches of Doctor Judy.  To her credit, the doctor does not recoil in horror. )

DJ:  Um...I was thinking maybe I could listen to your chest first.  See?  I have this nice stethoscope and everything.

SA:  No.  You are supposed to do that thing where you tap on my face and watch me wince in agony when you hit that spot where all the snot clots live.  So, let's go.  Here's my face!

DJ:  Sure.  We can do that.  But how about I just get a little listen to the ol' lungs first?  Just to get it out of the way so I can concentrate on the face tapping.

SA:  Well, if it makes you happy...


*We never actually got around to the face tapping.

*We spent more time debating whether or not it made sense to get the chest x-ray or not.

*We finally agreed that it didn't make sense.  The treatment is the same either way and the doctor was leaving Monday morning for a week's worth of conferences.

*In my defense, viral pneumonia is not at all like the bacterial version with which I have such a long and not-so-happy history.

*And the sneezing kind of distracted me from the wheezing.  I somehow missed the pneumonia symptoms.

*I had to promise to use the stupid inhaler she prescribed even though I thought that was a little bit of overkill.

*The sinus problems cleared up within days of taking the antibiotic.

*The wheezing did not.

*And now I have to publicly apologize for all the mean stuff I said about the stupid inhaler because it is right and I am wrong.

*Breathing during the day is really rather nice.

*I still cough a lot at night.

*Which is why I was kind of on the stupid side come Monday morning.  Three hours of sleep will do that to a girl.

*And being stupid is not conducive to realizing that your classroom has been broken into as you are getting ready for your Monday classes.

*Seriously.  Took me almost fifteen minutes before I caught on.

*There was a doorknob ripped off and sitting in the middle of the floor.

*I picked it up and put it on the table in another room.

*Again, in my defense, they are re-keying and replacing a lot of knobs around the school.

*But failing to notice the jagged shards of metal sticking out of it was probably something of an error on my part...

*My students and I had to vacate the classroom for the day while the police processed all the evidence I'd spent fifteen minutes thoroughly contaminating.

*When I arrived at school yesterday morning, I discovered a little frog happily hopping his way up the stairs.

*This cause me to drop my teacher stuff, throw up my hands and cry, "First Little Einstein, next the plague befalls me, then miscreants invade my teaching space...and now it's raining frogs!!!  If I were a less rational person, I'd be pretty darned worried!!"

*Should have kept my stupid, codeine befuddled mouth shut...

*Last night, just as the narcotics kicked in, I heard a rumbling in the distance.

*Then it got closer.

*Then the building began to shake and sway.

*And the neighbors began yelling things like, "Whoa!" and "Holy sh**, dude!!"

*And the cats fled.

*Apparently the last item on the Armageddon Special menu is an earthquake.

*We don't get earthquakes in Maine.  At least not ones that ring in somewhere around a 4 on the magnitude scale.

*We don't handle that well.  We get all excited and start posting on Facebook before the last quiver of the tortured earth.  We make lots of phone calls.

*We talk about it for days.

*It's kind of like a snowstorm in Florida.

*Plus I had that whole Plague/Frog/Other Horrible Stuff going on so I might have been attaching a little more meaning to the event than others.

*Actually, I was kind of loopy when the thing went down and it took me a while to realize that it wasn't just me falling off the couch.

*Everything is fine.  The worst part was trying to figure out what that plastic cap sitting in the middle of the kitchen floor went with.

*Eventually narrowed it down to the pepper grinder that fell from its perch over the stove.

*That took over an hour.  Blame the cough medicine.

*Kitties got extra treats for surviving the horror that was The Kind Of Great Quake Of 2012.

*The library patron who snagged Abarat: Days of Magic, Nights of War ahead of me finally relinquished his/her hold on it and I was able to secure it for myself.

*Since I was already at the virtual library anyway, I figured I might as well download the audio version of  Moon Called (Mercy Thompson) again.

*I never finished it when I had it over the summer and was wondering what was going to happen.

*Only have one day left on the loan, though.  Might not make it this time either.

*But checking it out again is free so I suppose that's not going to be a big issue.

*Reading has been slow since the plague came into my life.  I'm either too miserable to concentrate or too stoned from the medication to focus.

*But I'm persevering.  I'm nothing if not dedicated.

*Besides, I'm thinking the end of the world is nigh and that zombies will soon be strolling the streets so I might as well get in as much of the reading and listening as possible before civilization crumbles utterly...


Yes, it's been busy over here.  And I mean busy in the weirdest possible way as opposed to the kind of busy where you have to go shoe shopping, eat bonbons and juggle simultaneous dates with male supermodels on the same Friday night.

Of course, if simultaneously appearing male supermodels suddenly showed up at my door looking for dates that might also signal the end of the world but I think I could live with that...

SA (who now has the hiccups and is also blaming that on the Armageddon Syndrome)

S'not Me

It has been one week since I reported my burgeoning cold symptoms and I can now safely say that we are in full swing.  It may even be that we have passed from the mere "common cold" stage and into something more dire that will eventually involve calling in some sort of specialist to excavate my sinuses.

Who do you call for that?  A plumber?  A miner?  I don't know.  The local phone listings have been less than helpful.  There isn't a heading for "worst head cold of the century" in there at all...

However, since I've somehow managed to survive to this point, I suppose I should take responsibility for this week's Wednesday Night Bullet Post.  If I have enough energy to whine and wheeze endlessly, I don't suppose I can claim to be too weak.

Here's what's going on in my tissue-filled corner of the world:

*Thank heaven this past weekend was of the three day variety.

*Columbus Day: Twenty four hours dedicated to a man's steadfast refusal to ask for directions.

*I needed the extra day.  Sleep was becoming something of a fond memory by week's end.

*Part of the problem was the antihistamines.  They make me jittery and it is hard to get just the right dosage and timing with those things.

*The other part of the problem was my not taking antihistamines.  Without them, I am a miserable mass of symptoms and that didn't work well for sleep either.

*I managed six hours on Friday night thanks to off-brand NyQuil.

*Of course, I went to bed at 9:00 so six hours meant a very early rising.

*After that it was back to sleeping two hours at a time if I was lucky and, by Sunday, I was bordering on idiocy.

*Went to visit my parents.

*And their new car.

*And some pork chops.  Which were very tasty and just the thing for a girl with a head cold.

*Mommy Sheep took me for a ride in the shiny red Mustang!

*She even offered to let me drive!

*But I couldn't because I was a sleep deprived idiot who would probably end up launching the shiny red Mustang through the display window of the local shopping center and that didn't seem like the right thing to do to the people who raised me and cared for me so very well.

*No sleep Sunday night either.  I was getting desperate.

*Thankfully, I was able to figure out the whole antihistamine to jitter ratio by Monday night and sleep enough to be functional come the workweek.

*Speaking of which...

*There.  Off-brand NyQuil administered.

*You may recall that all this seemed to start when Little Einstein showed up with a ball of his own used tissues and a desire to play catch with the staff.

*My original plan was to shun him or force him to wear a hat made from an empty Kleenex box and which bore the words, "I am a snotty child who shares too much."

*But the day after the snot ball incident, he received Part One of some devastating and life-changing  news.

*And then all I could do was look at him and say, "Oh, sweetie..."

*I'd rather hoped he'd have some time before the inevitable Part Two happened, but his mother called me yesterday afternoon with the bad news and that was that.

*Now he is just breaking my heart into tiny sodden bits and I can no more blame him for my horrible cold than I can kick a puppy.

*The Organized Teaching Assistant has the same cold only worse.

*The New Teaching Assistant doesn't have the cold at all, but she doesn't seem to want to hang around us as much anymore so I think she might have developed some kind of psychological disorder that makes her scared of co-workers or something...

*I had to go to a meeting this morning.  It was at a school waaaaaay out in the boonies and started at 8:00 this morning.

*To get to waaaaaaay out in the boonies, one has to leave at 7:00 in the morning.

*You'd think that would be bad, but I normally leave at just before 6:00 in the morning so it was actually kind awesome.

*Until it was time to find my way back to my own school from waaaaaay out in the boonies and then I got lost and ended up in New Hampshire.

*I don't want to talk about it...

*I was very late to school this morning.

*Sad news:  Alpha Betta, my long lived fish is no more.

*Two years, almost to the day.  That's a pretty good stretch for a fish.

*Especially one that didn't necessarily always enjoy regular bowl cleanings...

*He was a good fish.  I will miss him.

*It was a solemn burial at sea.  I was going to sing an ode or something but I have a horrible cold so I just sort of sniffled and blew my nose mournfully.

*Best I could do...

*My school pictures came today.  I have to get them taken because I have to update my security badge every year.

*And you know what?  I do not hate them.  They actually look kind of good.

*They remind me of those carefree days before I was stricken by the worst cold ever to hit a nose.

*I might get one of them blown up and wear it as a mask or something...

*My commuter novel these days is Deadlocked (Sookie Stackhouse/True Blood, Book 12).

*The series has taken many twists and turns and maybe isn't quite what it used to be but I still enjoy it.

*I would have sworn that I read Abarat at some point.  But then I doubted myself so I checked it out of the library just to be sure.

*I hadn't read it.  Now I am on the waiting list for book 2.

*Any book about a girl named Candy Quackenbush who hails from a town named for poultry is all right by me!

*I also finally picked up Whispers Under Ground, a book I've wanted to read for a while.

*Sadly, my snuffly state has prevented me from really enjoying it as bedtime reading.  I'm either too tired to focus or too busy blowing my nose to hold the iPad.

*From what I can tell, it is really very good, too.  So sad...

*Maybe I'll try it again when I'm less dribbly.



I think that is enough for tonight.  One more reference to my dripping nostrils and I'll probably lose the few readers I have left.  And it is really only a matter of time before I get to describing the wracking, hacking cough that sounds like I'm about to expel a lung or two and that can't help matters at all.

So I'll just go see about some dinner and enjoy the soon-to-be-kicking-in effects of my off-brand NyQuil.  Hopefully I'll be less with the symptoms next week and the conversation will be lighter.

Or I'll still have this stupid cold but then I can talk about how I'm a world record breaker so at least that will be nice...

SA

WNBP: Can't Put A Label On It

I can't quite figure out how to file this week.  Is it bad?  Is it good?  There doesn't seem to be a pattern here, at least not one I can discern.  I suppose I shouldn't question it too much.  Sure, the whole thing could come together and suddenly land in the "good" column and that would be just ducky.

On the other hand, there is at least a fifty percent chance it could all go into the dumper upon closer examination and no one wants to see that happen.  I think I'll just call it what it is:  A week without a label.

Sometimes it's best to just let these things be what they be.  It will certainly add an extra touch of randomness to the generally all-over-the-place Wednesday Night Bullet Post.

*In case you were wondering what it is like to be a Very Complicated Kitty, I can give you a simple road map to follow.

*First, completely of your own volition, get up and walk out of the room.

*Once you are in whatever location you have selected as your destination, begin to howl inconsolably because you are all alone in this world with no one to whom to tell your troubles.

*After ten, twenty or thirty minutes of this, return to the room where you started where you will see the human and Absurdly Gi-normous kitty with whom you live and looked shocked to find them there as if nothing has happened.  Like you didn't just go through the most horrifying experience of your young life.

*Yowl at them for another few minutes to express your indignation regarding their disregard for self-imposed abandonment issues.

*Ignore all dirty looks.

*We at the Learn-a-ma-torium are fully engrossed in mandated achievement testing.  Historically, this has been a time of great stress for both staff and students.

*This year is no exception, but I have to say that the new job has given me a caseload where kids are far less likely to throw their pencils at my head rather than fill in bubbled test forms.

*In fact, they mostly just sit and take the test.  I'm not really sure what to do with that...

*Little Einstein (a returning student from last year, but not really so little anymore) has a cold.

*He is also one who, until certain chemical processes take place in his body each morning, is prone to a marked lack of good judgement.

*Hence, it wasn't really all that surprising yesterday when he showed up carrying a ball he'd crafted from his own used tissues and trying to involve us all in a game of "catch."

*No one wanted to play.  He seemed kind of surprised by that.

*He also dumped out the container we use to hold the glue sticks so he could capture a spider and pretend to dump it on the heads of anyone who passed by.

*On the plus side, when he was finally able to access his inner calm person, the combination of snot ball antics and congestion left him so tired he wasn't really much of a problem for the rest of the day.

*The New Teaching Assistant took care of the spider.  I took care of using bleach wipes on all snot-ball-touched surfaces.

*The Organized Teaching Assistant just sat at her desk and snuffled because she has the same cold and isn't really functioning well at the moment.

*Today we had our regularly scheduled morning staff development meetings bright and early.

*Then we taught stuff all day.

*Then we went to our regularly scheduled faculty meeting once the teaching day was done.

*Long day...but not so long as it was back when we had to do all our meetings after school.

*It was thirty minutes into the meeting when it occurred to me that I was congested.  And that my throat was all itchy.  And that my sinuses were pounding out the drum solo from Wipeout.

*Great.  I was too late with the bleach wipes.  The snot ball got me.

*But at the end of the meeting, I won a fifty dollar teacher gift card from a local department store.

*Which made everything confusing since I honestly didn't know whether I hated this meeting or loved it.

*Right down the middle...just like the rest of this week!

*Since deciding to devote my morning commute to audio books, I've found the whole experience ever so much more pleasant.

*Even last year when I was driving to work to duck flying pencils.

*But today, I found myself pulling into my driveway during a seriously heartbreaking and crucial part of Beautiful Chaos (Beautiful Creatures).

*I try to not listen ahead since I want to make sure I keep up the Happy Commuter Experience instead of ending it too soon.

*But jeez!  This was just torture!!!

*I have thus far maintained my resolve, but prime time television viewing had better be darned good tonight, that's all I have to say.  It won't take much to tip the scales in favor of listening to the rest of it and commute be damned!!!

*I had a hard time finishing Taken (An Alex Verus Novel).

*Not because it wasn't really good but because I was trying to read it in bed and I've been so tired that I  kept falling asleep.

*Finally got to the finish line last night!  Yay!

*And totally worth the struggle to keep my eyes open.  It isn't the best book in the series, but still darned good fun.

*I fall asleep really well these days, but staying in that state has posed a problem.

*For whatever reason, my brain seems to think that the hour between one and two in the morning would be a great time to start thinking about stuff.

*Which is why I was perusing the library website the other night and discovered that The Magician (The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel) was recently returned by a diligent patron and ready for download!

*Truth be told, I perused this one years ago, but I was reading the series out of order.  Without the first book, the second made little sense to me.

*Ever so much better now that I've finished The Alchemyst: The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel.

*It literally picks up right where the first book leaves off which, as you can imagine, might cause some confusion if you don't have that background.

*Guess that insomnia paid off...



And here we are on this most confusing of Wednesdays.  We are fast approaching 7:30 and I've suddenly realized that I forgot to eat dinner.  I guess the cold symptoms kind of overshadowed my usual inclination to begin grazing as early as possible.

Which could be a good thing, I suppose.  Or bad.  I don't know anymore.  It's just that kind of week...

SA