Run, Forest, Run!!

What is it with old guys and running? Seriously. Because it seems that now that the weather is nice, I keep seeing these old guys trudging down the road, faces beet red, not actually jogging at a speed any faster than a summer's day stroll. It just further backs up my notion that men are idiots... and apparently it doesn't get better with age.

You know, out-of-shape or older women decide on a whim that they want to get in shape, and what do they do? They find a girlfriend to walk with, they join Curves, they buy Sweatin' to the Oldies. They do not assume that they will be able to wake up one day and run 5 miles because they used to run 15 miles to school uphill in the snow when they were twelve. They do not think that coming within inches of a heart attack once in awhile will do the trick.

My dad is almost one of these men, but not quite. You will never catch him running, because he thinks he gets enough exercise to support a healthy lifestyle by walking on the golf course every other weekend. Because, you know, he sweats. Mind you, he sweats because it's hot out, not necessarily because he's really walking fast enough to get his heard rate up. And I'm not making this up either. He came home and weighed himself last weekend.

I just don't get why men don't know how to stay healthy. And I also wish I was a man in that respect. Because the less you know how to be healthy, the more you can enjoy life. Men don't feel guilty every time they eat a pice of chocolate or drink a beer. They don't think to themselves, man I'm going to have to do an extra hour at the gym because of this hot fudge sundae. No, they think, let me eat whatever I want until I go to the doctor and he tells me I have high cholesterol, then I'll just go "running" once or twice, and we'll call it even. If only that were true. But I guess men just have it all figured out: Ignorance is bliss.

The Nanny Diaries

So, as you may have noticed, it's been awhile since I posted. This is because my entire week now consists of waking up at 7, getting ready, leaving the house by 8, babysitting from 8:30 until 5, driving home in bridge traffic, eating dinner, rinse, repeat until Friday. And though I find the kids I am babysitting completely cute and funny, I don't know that it really makes for good blogging on a regular basis... So instead, I will just edit this post by adding more of what I have learned as the weeks go by to the bulleted list. Then, you can just come back and check if you are interested.

Here is what I have learned my first week:

• Cell phone ring tones are worth hours of fun.
• Once you get sick of hearing the Lion King soundtrack over and over again, and replace it with a more pallatable child-friendly pop CD such as Kelly Clarkson, it won't take long before you get sick of hearing that one over and over as well.
• Burger King forgetting the chicken tenders in a Kid's Meal is, indeed, the end of the world. Cutting up the chicken part of your chicken sandwich into strips is not a substitute, and you will have to go back.
• My "boobies are comfy like pillows."
• 5-year-olds think they are smarter than you. For example, they may try to outsmart you by telling you they have indeed wiped, and flushed down the toilet paper already, despite the fact that you can see evidence of the contrary in the toilet. Apparently toilets are pretty smart too, because they know how to distinguish toilet paper from excrement and flush only the toilet paper.
• Mary Poppins wasn't joking when she said "a spoon full of sugar helps the medicine go down." You actually can get children to clean by bribing them with candy.
• Spending an entire day at a theme park, even Sesame Place, will wipe the life out of you.
• Playing board games on the floor when there is a blind dog living in the house? Yeah... not so easy.

Week 2:

• Don't do dishes. When you come back, there will be glitter all over the living room carpet.
• A "Salon Day" can easily have you looking like Bozo the Clown with a brushed out fro and fun house manicure.
• You will never be able to make scrambled eggs in exactly the same way as their mother.
• Though "Movie Theater Day" seems like a good idea when you get to the house and find out that the 5-year-old got sick the night before and needs to keep it low key, both girls will be jumping off the walls by the end of the day. Mom will come home and be annoyed.
• Decorating special 4th of July red, white and blue ice cream cone cupcakes will not take nearly as long as you had anticipated, and there will be more icing on the table, the floor, their hands, their hair, and the dog, than on the actual cupcakes.
• If you bring the girls out to get eggs at WaWa in full beauty pageant makeup, people will stare at you and think you are an unfit mother.

Weeks 3 & 4:

Five Year Olds:

• Cut holes in their pants when you are not looking
• Smash entire jars of turkey gravey on garage floors (by accident)
• Suck on markers when they dry out (and then spit the technicolor reminants of saliva into a wadded up piece of paper)
• Say no to everything you suggest, and then do it anyway, as if it is their own idea

Seven Year Olds:

• Change their clothes 20 times per day, so it always takes you at least 45 minutes to get out of the house (5 year olds, on the other hand, will wear anything- ripped, stained, too small, etc., so that you are kind of embarassed to take them with you)
• Go to their friends' houses without telling you so you enter a mad rush around the neighborhood looking for them, and then they come back as if nothing happened
• Scrape their ankles by falling off a skateboard without shedding a tear, and then run screaming behind the couch (nearly tipping it over, as it's against the wall) when they see you pull out the brown bottle and cotton ball
• Spill blue Slurpee all over the back seat of your car

Stay tuned for updates.

This Posting Under Construction

Big Pimpin'

I forgot to mention that as we were walking from the concert to the train last night, I saw my very first real live pimp! And you might ask how I knew he was a pimp? I was going to draw a picture, but my mouse-drawing skills aren't that great (as you have seen), so just picture this:

Tall black guy, mustache, huge white pimpish hat, white suit, long white trench coat, and white aligator shoes.

Yeah. If that ain't a pimp, I don't know what is.

That is that and this is this...

Okay, so nothing "crazy" happened yesterday, but Christine is bugging me for updates to keep her amused at work, and all in all, I did have a pretty great day.

Wanna talk about it? Here it goes. (Said like the beginning of that En Vogue song "Free Your Mind")

Saturday happened to be my very last day of having to drive to McGuire for classes ever, which was very, very exciting. The next time I go there, it will be for graduation in August, and let me tell you... PHEW!! We popped a couple bottles of champagne to celebrate our last class, and as they went around asking everyone if they wanted sweet or dry, I said, "Eh, just give me one of each," further giving them reason to speculate that I am the alcoholic of the bunch.

So we get out a little early, which was kick ass because that gave me time to get home and primp, since usually I look like complete shit on Saturday classes because I resent having to wake up at 6 o'clock on a day when I have work. I'm getting back at The Man by refusing to shower. Yeah.

So after said primping, guess where I went? The Electric Factory for the Modest Mouse concert with Christine. It was good times! They put on a really good show, even though I only knew like 3 of the songs. And when I say "knew," I mean "knew the chorus", because it takes me a good long time to learn lyrics of songs, and I haven't listened to them enough. And you know who else put on a good show? All the drunk people around us, falling on the floor, and all the drunk guys throwing their arms around each other, giving each other high fives left and right, up and down, and alllllll around. And it was funny to watch them dancing too, because they only move to the hard beat of the song, so they really reminded me of those weird bird things that people put near a glass of water and they dip on an axle thingy. You probably have no idea what I'm talking about, so just picture a bunch of boys bending hardly at the waste to a beat and thinking they are dancing and then thinking about how WELL they are dancing so turning to their buddies to give them all high fives, and then thinking about how happy they are to be there, listening to Modest Mouse, dancing, and giving high fives to their buddies, and so then giving them more high fives... and so on...

And there is some good news: I did not see the "ex" who is actually not an ex but who I call that because it's my longest relationship of a big 3 months, and it's easier than going into the whole, "guy I used to date..." thing... which I just did anyway, so nevermind. I was just nervous I'd see him because he likes that band, and the EF is kind of a small venue. But all was good.

And guess who made a repeat performance in our lives on the train? That's right, the cop who left us with TheDrunkard. We'll have to take that train home more often. He's hot.

So anyway, back in the concert part, I was a little buzzed (surprise!!!) and I had not eaten dinner, and I realize that I am starving, and I turn to Christine and say, "You know, I really want to go to a delicious restaurant." And Christine is all "Bwaahahahaaa!! You mean the diner?" And it was weird, because that is what I meant... Who refers to the diner as "a delicious restaurant"? Apparently I do. So we made plans to go after the concert, but I was way too tired (having gotten up at 6am... Damn The Man!!) and opted out. Home it was, and I had a nice long sleep.

The Bee's Knees

Don't worry... this isn't another post about my persuit of a bee. It is instead, an awesome announcement:

GuesswhatIgotateachingjobfornextyear!!!! That's right! Jess: perpetual student for lack of anything more productive to do will actually be getting a real really real job!

I am so psyched!!

I will be teaching 3rd grade inclusion, which means I will have regular ed and special ed students together in one class, and will be acting as (well, no, not acting as, but actually being!) the special ed teacher, and coteaching with a regular ed teacher.

The awesome part about this is that I will be with someone who knows (hopefully) what she is doing and will be able to give me lots of great advice as a first year teacher. Also, the class is already decorated, so I won't have to spend my non-money on that until (if) I get my own classroom someday. All of the sudden I feel the need to use all sorts of surfer phrases, like

Duuuude... this is so rad!

But that might not be very teachery and mature of a real really real teacher, so I'll refrain.

WOOHOO!!!


An apple for the te... ME!!!!

Buzzed

So I took my first swim of the summer today, and let me tell you the pool was so nice and cooling and relaxing, and I even think I got a little sun, despite the fact that it was 4 in the afternoon.

But there was some drama.

There I am, just floating along, minding my own business, and I look down, and what do I see? Some type to bee, sitting right on my foot!! I'm not sure what kind it was, but that is irrelevant, because the fact of the matter is that it was yellow and black and it had wings and a potentially lethal weapon* sticking out of its ass. And because I was in the float, and I wasn't really laying when I noticed it (I was actually sitting up, with my feet kind of in the hole part toward the bottom), I could not shake it off my foot, and in fact, I couldn't move that much at all because I did not feel like falling off the float and into the water and then coming up and not knowing where Sir Bee was and then feeling like it was on my shoulder every time a drop of water fell from my hair. So, I managed to splash a little (and wiggle around and yell, "Bee! Bee! Bee!") until it fell off and into the pool.

But then I lost it.

So I used the abnormally large pool noodle as a kayaking paddle and steered myself around the pool in hot pursuit of Sir Bee. When I had finally accepted the fact that maybe he managed to pull himself out of the Waters of Death (for a bee, anyway), I decided to relax and lay back on the float.

And then I spotted him.

He was clinging to the noodle chair (a noodle with a little net-chair attachment) for dear life, and I thought, oh no you don't, Sir Bee. You are not a cat. You don't have 9 lives. Just one for you, yesiree. And so I picked up the noodle chair, put it on the side of the pool, flicked the bee off the chair with the end of my kayaking paddle and continued to pummel it until I was sure Sir Bee would not be landing on my foot ever, ever again.

So I'm all satisfied that I had just killed the thing, until I started thinking about the fact that I had just killed the thing. And it's not like I squashed him real quick so he didn't feel it... I pummeled him maliciously and maniacally over and over like Lizzie Borden with an ax. I'm not sure what got into me. I must have had some aggression in me or something, because a lot of times I don't even kill bugs. I might gently persuade them into the pool filter so that they get trapped and eventually decide to end their lives instead of swimming in circles forever and ever, and the other night I saw a spider on my ceiling and had to fall asleep thinking I would wake up in a cocoon of web, but I didn't kill it. I think maybe it was a release or something, because today was my last day with my dreadful seniors and school is almost over and I spent the day in a 200° oven. But in any case, I felt really bad after it happened, so maybe next time I will simply splash it out of the water and into the grass and let it die a nice, unhumiliating death.

Anyway, I'm going to go eat some dead pig now.

* potentially deadly if you are allergic, which I am not

Drunk Postulates?

So last night Christine and I went out, which was really cool because I finally got to meet one of my three blog-readers and his girlfriend, and we got to go to one of my favorite little bars in Philly (Good Dog), and basically I just had a really nice time. However, there are two events (blogpertunities, if you will) (I am determined to use that word enough for it to eventually make it into Webster's.) that struck me as kind of odd...

The first one happened after Good Dog, when we went to Fadό (which I had totally been to before, and didn't even know). (Ha! I'm a poet and didn't know it!) (Again, you probably don't know whether to laugh or be embarassed that you know me.) Christine and I are just standing around, drinking some beers and watching some really drunk boys make fools of themselves dancing. And while we are standing there, one of the drunk dancers' friends walked up to me and flicked my neck! He just looked at me, took like two steps, put his arm out, and... FLICK! Right where my Adam's apple would be, if I also had a penis. And it hurt!! And he kind of smirked, and then continued to ignore me! The whole thing was very strange. So then, Christine and I go up to the bar, because I need another beer, and this guy is there, and he's wasted, and he buys us our drinks (one thing I do like about drunk guys) and introduces himself, and is like, "Come over here I want you to meet my friends." Okay. So we go over, and they happen to be the same group of drunk guys we had been laughing at already, including The Flicker. So he introduces me to The Flicker, and I'm like, "Hey! Your friend flicked me!" And I gave him The Hand (because my fingers are too short for giving the finger to be effective), and decided he was dead to me. Except then The Flicker offered to buy shots for Christine and Me. So we go to the bar, and he is appalled that it takes me 4 gulps to get my shot down (and that I put the glass down while there was actually a gulp still left in it), (Hey! They were big shots!!) (And I have a small mouth, but that's besides the point.) and I yell at him for flicking me, and he claims it was a love tap. So we go back, but ultimately, nothing is really happening, the DJ is finishing up, the bar's about to close, and we decide to go catch the train home.

Which brings me to blogpertunity #2 (hehehe). We get on the train, and we're just chillin' there because it's the last stop, so the train sits for like 15 minutes before it starts going in the other direction. And so this very, very intoxicated guy just staggers down the isle and plops down right in the seats in front of us. And turns around. And begins a conversation. Now, I can't be sure of most of what he said, because his words were so slurred together, but some of the key things I got out of the conversation included: He works at a place called Snyder, He thinks he is a loser, He does something with personal theorems and postulates (at which point I told him the only theorem I know is the Pythagorean Theorem... he seemed kind of impressed...), and something about Star Wars which I never really got the significance of. And meanwhile, Christine is sending me text messages about him, and we are really just amused. Until he reaches out and sticks his hand all on Christine's head, and she's all "There is no need to touch," and he almost starts to cry over the fact that he may have offended her. And then she asks him if he gets this drunk all the time, and he said only about once a month, and she makes a deal that in exactly 1 month from last night at 1:50a.m., they will meet again on that train. It's kind of a shame that he won't remember, because that dude was amusing. We let him know when his stop came up, and we got off at the next one, and Christine drove us back to her house, where my car was, and I thanked her for a lovely evening and tried to put the moves on her, but she wouldn't invite me inside for "coffee." (Just kidding.)