File it under “N” for Not Doing This Again Anytime Soon.

There is the distinct sound of internet silence coming up tomorrow as this is the last post for NaBlo… aww, crap. I don’t even want to write it out anymore. The posts have not even just been a “one-a-day” thing because I was trying to make sure I did my Cuppa The Day as well as posting pictures of my shoes. That’s officially three different posts! Even though I didn’t do my Cuppas every day, I did do my shoes. Actually, I started late and I’m sure someone (Chris? Mir? Susan?) will tell me that I owe them a few more days of shoes seeing as there was open lusting after my footwear.

Then, of course, I had to take the dare from a certain someone and title every post beginning with “You Should…”

Aww, crap. I’m even sick of myself at this point. What can be said of daily posting anyway besides the obvious fact that I got to practice my writing? Of course, there is the fact that you now know that I told my mother about my first orgasm and were appalled. Appalled, I tell you! (Not really) Especially amusing to me is that I didn’t describe it here because that story is much better told in person, but that NO ONE ASKED ME TO REPEAT THE STORY. It’s better in person. I do the voices and everything. In any case, should you ever meet me in person I would most definitely tell you the story. Don’t be so prudish. It’s not a pretty color on you. It’s not like you’ve found me in flagrante delicto.

Truly, it is time for some reflection as to what this month has meant to me in terms of writing. Daily writing is quite enjoyable and there are times that call for an in-depth summation of what’s going on. Other times it calls for a tedious litany of events that have no connection whatsoever except for the fact that they are simple observations. [I must interject here to say that I am in the lobby of my hotel using their free wireless that only ranges from the elevators to the bar and an entire Mariachi band just walked by. It's not even 7am] Finally, there are my conversations with friends and family that produce a cackle from me that is now instantly recognized to all who know me as, “Totally bloggable. Must write that down.”

It’s also one of those events that makes you question why you write. For free. It begs the question as to why you put so much effort into it when no one is cutting you a check at the end of the day. This conversation came up when a friend of mine was defending my blog-writing to her husband. She likened it to doing community theatre (Oh, shit. Am I waiting for Guffman?) where people give of their time and energy to put on a perfomance for which they are not paid but get immeasurable pleasure from when it is all said and done. There is applause. There are accolades. There is acknowledgement.

Here, there are comments. There is correspondence. There are connections.

There is also the writing. There is the means of producing psychological relief through an open expression of purgative writing which brings about enormous amouts of emotion and reflection that I’ve only ever done in private journaling. Yet, people comment on it. They have something to say about it. They have their own experiences to share that act as a balm for me. Infinitely more than you may ever know. If not for the connections with readers (whether that’s during this maddening month of frenzied writing or not) then I would surely have been functioning differently. Most likely this would be in equal amounts of bourbon and denial.

So, let me end this month’s writing by saying Thank You for reading. Thank you for commenting and providing tears and laughter. Thank you to those who picked up on something simple I wrote and responded with the sincerest form of flattery: imitation.

You wouldn’t know it by looking at me, but I loved every minute of reading you, too.

And now, I want you to lean in closely and close your eyes and blow me a kiss. I’m taking a much needed break…

I’m making a blend of Sumatra and Kenyan coffee this morning as I have to leave for Texas soon and my coffee has to be TO GO because there’s no way any decent coffee house will be open before my flight. I’ve got my TO GO cuppa filled with dark, robust flavors and nothing else. No cream, no sugar, just coffee.

Not too long ago I wrote about this school-within-a-school that three African American men are trying to implement. I made mention of it here, here, and here. Since then, the program has changed from taking approximately 50 of our AA male students and relocating them to another building where two teachers would be responsible for them to identifying 28 AA males who will remain in our building with the support of these 2 extra teachers. The best part of this stems from the fact that the ball is back in our court and we will be responsible for creating this program with additional staff members.

A liason has been appointed to come to visit our 6th grade teachers during their planning time to disseminate information, take questions, and have a general “sit-down” to make sure everyone understands how this will work as well as be able to offer input. For each meeting, I sit quietly behave like my verbose self with my puke-of-the-mouth disease but I also take notes and gather as many particulars as possible.

Since I am considered “support staff” who researches best teaching practices and offers professional development during team plan and teacher in-service workshops, it’s natural that I be invited to these meetings. Some of the things we’re planning on doing to ready ourselves for this school is read books and articles and visit a KIPP school (on which they’ve based this school). The most difficult part of this is getting information second hand and trying to understand the philosophy behind this as well as trying to appease their original intentions of working with African American males who aren’t performing well.

Some of this time has been spent in “Wait Mode” as we anticipated the state scores of the 5th graders in our district so that we could identify those African American males who didn’t perform well so we could identify them and then invite them and their families to an informational meeting. When looking at the data of the lowest performers after the dust settled, we learned something entirely different.

The common denominator for the low performers was NOT that they were all males. Nor were they African Americans. It was nearly a 50/50 split of Caucasian students who were also about 50% female. Quite the conundrum, wouldn’t you say? Our meeting with the liason prompted not only a discussion of this new piece of information, but questions as to exactly what these students had in common.

I’d love for you to guess exactly what that is. You don’t even need to be in education to figure it out, either.

While you’re coming up with your guess, I’ll let you in on the extraordinarily lamebrained comment that came out of my mouth as our liason was getting his things together to leave and that got me a surprise invitation.

“Well, I could have told you that. But no one ever seems to ask me. No one ever invites ME to these meeting with Those Men who are making decisions about the things we’ll be required to do next year. No one has ever come to see what kind of programs we already have in place to improve achievement for our students.”

The meeting is at 9:00 next Tuesday. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Check Your Pop Tarts Prior To Purchasing

Since we are a family of tall people, with the exception of Mallory, we keep the microwave on top of our refrigerator and we hid food from the children on top of that so that they can’t even see what is up there. The downside to this is that Mason is now taller than me and closing the gap of height on his father with a quickness. In fact, his arms are longer and Kennimus had to ask Mason to help him reach the string on the ladder to pull it down so he could get in the attic recently.

Morgan has simply bypassed the idea of not knowing what lurks up high and he often gets reprimanded for standing on the countertop to peek up there to see what kinds of Pop Tarts are available. Not too long ago someone in the house (see Mr. Mom, Kennimus) bought some Pop Tarts with no frosting.

Sacrilige.

Morgan found them today as the box was simply sitting on top of the fridge collecting dust and he assumed that he’d hit the jackpot with this find. He was quite disappointed.

Dad, these have been up here a really long time. There was no frosting on them. What’s wrong with these Pop Tarts?

You Shouldn’t Call My House, Telemarketer Minions

Since we got on the “no-call” list it’s been sweet, sweet silence because the telemarketer people have better things to do like help Santa with the naughty list, sharpen their retractable claws, and create hellish inventions like the Stairmaster. However, once in a while they get us and last night I let Kennimus answer the phone.

Kennimus: Hello? Umm hmm…. I’m a homosexual and there aren’t any women who live in this house. Thanks anyway.

You Should Avoid Skeletor
One of my colleagues got a promotion this year and is now in charge of several buildings instead of just one. The downside to this is that she now has to work with someone we affectionately call “Skeletor” and I told my former colleague that she should be wary if Skeletor asks her to start doing “social things”. She (known here as FC - make up your own name if you need to) and Jenni and I discussed her newfound position and the perks that come along with it.
FC: It’s not all bad, you know. I got invited to her son’s wife’s baby shower and that was pretty fun.

Jenni: Ooohh. That means you’re in.

FC: I know. [She is smug] I’m in the Inner Circle, so HA.

Kelly: Yeah well, you realize that it’s Dante’s Circle and that you’re headed straight to hell, right?

When I signed up to taste the Folgers “Gourmet Selections” coffee I didn’t realize the Vanilla Biscotti would be so good. I also didn’t realize that Kennimus would make it every day. I have yet to try the other flavors and today is no exception. Not only did he make a pot of it at home but when I got to work there was another sample of it on my desk that I’d left here for work coffee. It says that it makes “9-11 cups of coffee“. Because of it’s Arabica Awesomeness with a creamy flavor, I’m going to test them on that to see if it’s true. When I start talking fast because of it, you’ll know that I got to my eleventh cuppa. Don’tworryaboutmeI’llbefine.