My friend phoned me at around 7 last night (after I had consumed about 50 pounds of pizza and garlic fingers– I swear the PizzaBaby was growing by the second) and said “GET OVER HERE MY PARTY IS ABOUT TO START!” and I remembered that she’d invited Rob and I to her husband’s birthday party so I put pants on (the PizzaBaby doesn’t tolerate pants, generally) and headed out. Rob stayed home because he was feeling shy (he’s met C, but not her husband or any of the other people there) and this wasn’t exactly the place to get to know new people. Because it was not only a birthday party, but a Fantasia party.

So it was fun. One person who was there still lives with her parents, who are ultra-conservative and she is afraid now that they are going to kick her out of the house for having attended (I say lady! You’re almost 31. Be free! It’s not like it was an orgy or anything). It was fun seeing her turn bright red when the lady pulled out the giant rubber thingies that had flashing disco lights on.

The best part? I won a door prize! Yeah, I never win anything, and just my luck. I’m not telling you if or what I purchased. It was a hilarious party, though. My friends were trying to convince me to have one for my bridal shower. Not sure how my mom would react to that. Yeah, here I am telling others to be free! Hypocritical? Me? Naaah.

Oh. My. Gord. First, let me explain:

I’m showing the series Band of Brothers to one of my grade 11 classes. It’s an excellent series, and the class is very interested in it. It can be a bit gory at times (well, it was World War 2, people getting run over by tanks, shot, legs blown off, etc) but not gratuitous violence or anything. It’s a war movie. Stuff happened.

Yesterday during my 10th grade class, I only had about 6 students. The rest were gone to a presentation that they had missed that morning because they were writing a test in another class. I wasn’t going to be teaching anything new with only six of my class there, so after silent reading and going over the review we’d done the day before, I told them they could have a study period. They were pretty happy with that. When there were about 10 minutes left of class, one of them asked me if he could put in one of the Band of Brothers tapes. I said “Sure, but it’s pretty gory; can you handle that?” Oh sure, they said.

So one of my students grabs a tape off my desk (yes, VHS. It’s what the school has). Puts it in. Oh, it’s and episode I hadn’t seen before. Big deal though, they’ve all been pretty similar. Guys shooting other guys. Oh, look, that guy’s leg is blown off. Dialogue dialogue. Hiding in the woods. Running around shooting. Germans. Frenchmen. Americans (why no Canadians? Ah well, not surprising). OH HOLY SHIT IT’S A SEX SCENE WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON HERE THERE’S A LADY ON TOP OF A MAN BOUNCING AROUND TITS AKIMBO SCREECHING LIKE A STUCK PIG!

The six guys who were in the classroom were like “WOOOOHOOOOO!” and I said “Oh! I don’t think I should be showing you THIS!” and went up to the VCR to stop it. But I pushed the wrong button, and it just started fast-forwarding, so the bouncing and the akimbo were still there, only faster. Of course one of the guys yells “She’s rewinding it!” so now there’s going to be a legend in the school of me showing boobs to my class, and then rewinding it so they could see them again.

Oh lordy bagordy.

There is nothing better than free dirt, folks.

See, where I live, we do this Waste Watch thing. It’s nothing new, really, it’s been in effect here since the early 90s, but basically it comes down to this: We separate our trash. Some things go into the waste bin, some things go into the recyclables bin, some things go into the compost bin, yadda yadda yadda. Pretty common nowadays I think, although you wouldn’t believe how many tourists come here and are stupefied by it. “You mean I have to… rinse…a can… HUH?”

Yesterday was Compost Appreciation Day– free compost while supplies lasted. So I woke Rob up (early, and no, he wasn’t overjoyed) and we made our way out to the WW site. Came home with six huge bags of compost made on the premises. Hey, I figure we’ve contributed at least sixty huge bags worth of compost-makings since January (thanks to Judd Nelson and his amazing wonderpoops). Good stuff, too. We dug out one flowerbed (I have no upper body strength. Rob had to rescue me after like, five shovelfuls) and mixed that stuff in and now I’m all excited that soon! There will be flowers growing! Of course we’re not beyond the last frost of the season yet (I’d say that will be in June sometime) so I can’t actually plant anything outside but you should see the plants I’ve got started up in this house. Flowers as well as vegetables.

What, overzealous? Me?

First I’d like to wish a happy Mother’s Day to all the mammas out there, whether or not you have your children with you.

This week has been anything but exciting. I know that when I don’t write, you’re all out there imagining me on whirlwind tours of the earth, saving the lepers and such… yeah ain’t happening. Just busy. One of the thing about highschool teaching is that you have to give tests. The thing about tests is that they need to be corrected. One silly thing about me is that I usually give an essay question along with the short-answer stuff. That means hours and hours of correcting time at home. I gave three tests this week.
Compute. Compute!

Thanks to Heidi, I’m now stuck here taking these insane tests that are making me crazy. Here are my results:

Your data suggest a slight automatic preference for Recent Presidents compared to George W. Bush.

Your data suggest little to no automatic preference between Young and Old.

Your data suggest little to no automatic preference between Fat People and Thin People.

I’m not going to go on but if you do the fat people test? Holy cow are the faces creepy!

I spent the day today in a theatre full of teachers. We passed motions, heard about changes to our contracts, and learned that we shouldn’t have sex with 14 year olds, even if we aren’t teaching them.

There go my plans for the summer.

OH I AM SO KIDDING.

Also– the thing? Basically I pretty much emailed everyone back who emailed me about it. I think. If you dropped me a line and I didn’t get back to you, well, kick me or something. Okay wait, DON’T kick me, I don’t like being kicked or otherwise abused. It’s not that big a deal anyway.

This evening? I spent starting seeds in this mini-greenhouse-thing which will later be planted outdoors (IN MY YARD! HOLY CRAP WE HAVE A YARD!) and watching a 2-part thingie about Elizabeth I. It was awesome. Even the bits where you saw the insides of peoples’ bodies.

Note to self: never commit treason.

Today went a little differently than other days; I woke up at 4:30 with such a migraine that Rob though I would need to go to the hospital. Instead I just called in sick and slept all day. I’m starting to feel better now but I got a phone call which freaked me out a little and now I’m running around the house (not really– more like staying inside my mind) freaking out.

Also there are going to be some changes sometime around here. You can email me (louise.mATgmail) if you wanna know, I’ll tell you no problem.

That is all for now! have a good rest of the day!