Homeless - To Give Or Not To Give

     One day after work this week, I stopped by CVS.  As I was walking in, I noticed a young couple that had been holding cardboard signs on the corner come in behind me.  I've heard that people begging on street corners are making around $200 a day.
     Now I decided to do a “Homeless Experiment” and spy….I mean observe them to see what kind of purchase they were going to make.  The lady went to the perfume section and sprayed and sprayed the free samples.  The man stepped around a corner and started counting his money (with the cardboard signs under his arm).  I decided I should probably quit my “Homeless Experiment” and move on since I was afraid they might wonder why they kept seeing me (and kill me).
      So I wandered over to the vitamin section to make my purchase.  Well low and behold if they didn't suddenly show up in the same spot.  Now the experiment is back on, and I was so impressed they were obviously health nuts since they were actually going purchase vitamins with the money they had been given.
     Wrong…..they then started discussing these little tiny bottles of energy potions and the wonderful effect (adrenaline crush) of mixing it with alcohol.  I am pretending to read the back of the vitamin bottle at this time (although the print was so tiny I could not read a word of it).
       Woe is me…..all of a sudden they realize they can get it cheaper if they use a CVS card.  The man, I will refer to as “Experiment H”, suddenly turns to me and says, “Excuse me mam, do you have a CVS card we can use?”  Using the sweetest voice possible I said, “No, I’m sorry, I sure don’t!”  Yes, I lied!  Hopefully God was not shaking his head at me in an annoyed way.
        The lady now wanders off and “H” turns to me and says, “Pardon my French, but when she sprays that stuff on, she smells like a *%ore!”  (No, that is not ore….put a wh in front of it).  Of course since I had noticed all the perfume she sprayed on at the front of the store, I knew exactly what he was talking about.  At this point, I want to end the experiment and just go check out, but I knew I would not be able to use my CVS card if I did, so I continued to pretend to read the vitamin bottle.
   

Family Fun Center

Family Fun Center with Nana........Almost 3,000 tickets......For Brady this was the equivalent to me winning the lottery. I am thinking the machine might have been broken.....yellow tickets kept coming and coming. He wanted to cash his tickets in for a real knife, but settled for guns (with orange tips), holsters, a sheriff badge, and handcuffs. When we got home he was running through the house yelling at his brother, "I'm going to shoot you!" I figured I would let mom and dad handle that one! *smile*

Free Verse Poetry

I was very excited about teaching free verse poetry today. To begin the lesson, my students had to brainstorm and jot down their weather memories. Then they chose their favorite memory and completed a sensory chart. In order to help them get their creative juices flowing, I even played a CD during this time of….yep...a rainy day. Now I am sweetly smiling and pleased that they seem to really be into this activity, when a student blurts out, “Ms. Wise, this CD makes me want to go pee!”

Shaving

     I love my job! A student walked into class today and said, "Ms. Wise, Guess what I did over the break?" Now I am thinking he traveled somewhere unique or saw snow for the first time. I said, "What?" To which he responded in a high/low voice, "Shaved for the first time!" I tried to act like that was the best news I had heard since the birth of my last grandchild.

Age and Weight

    Age....Yesterday my three year old grandson asked me how old I am. I told him to guess. He responded, "Four!" I told him to guess higher....to which he responded, "Five!"

    I said, "How did you know?"

    I think I am going to have him guess my weight when I see him again!

Dog Crap in Car

My grandsons love our trips to McDonald's.  I was recently heading to there with two chatty little boys in the back seat.  They love their Happy Meals and aren't even a little concerned about the nutritional detriments.  Their biggest concern is that they don’t get another crummy Happy Meal toy!  After eating we head back to the car as they clutch some plastic creature toy in their little hands…..with chocolate smeared on their faces.  As I buckle up, I suddenly smell poop.  Now they are way beyond the accident stage, so I get out and lean into the back seat to see if can determine the source of the odor.  There it is…..dog crap all over a little scuffed up Nike tennis shoe AND now smeared all over the back of the driver’s seat!  I figure I now have e-coli in my car, but maybe this is a sign from God that I should get a new car.  Since I can’t afford a new car, I quickly ruled that out.  We rode home with the windows down (which they loved….me…not so much).  The smell is gone but there will forever be a brown stain that I could not completely get off the back of the seat!   At this stage in my life, I can smile at the brown dog crap stain, and fondly remember a trip to McDonald’s with my grandsons.   

Skinny Jeans

     My girls told me that my jeans are too baggy, and that I needed to try “skinny jeans”.  Now I have worn everything from bell bottoms, acid wash, boot cut, slightly below the waist, and yes, mom jeans (but not low rise)!  Anyway, I agreed to go shopping yesterday for a pair.  I tried on countless pairs and modestly modeled them for my daughter, Jenny, who either nodded in approval or frowned disapprovingly.  I felt slightly hookerish (spell check does not like that word, but, I do) in some!  I just knew Stacy and Clinton, from “What Not to Wear”, were going to burst into the dressing room scowling and holding a trashcan!

Cooking Cookies and a Lizard

     I am a horrible Nana...I had my three grandsons over the other day, and decided we would bake cookies. I was loving it....baking cookies now means each kid pulls off a hunk of dough and places it on the pan (no kitchen covered in flour).

       All of a sudden, they realized I was also baking a lizard. They were fascinated! It was like a scene right out of Saturday Night Live.  Fortunately, the cookies were to be placed in a cold over, so before it got too hot, I was able to shoo him out of the oven.  

Throwing up in the Classroom UGH

     Classroom Rule Number One - Me: "If you ever feel like you are going to throw up, you do not have to ask to go to the restroom. You have my permission to fly out the door."  I even point out the trashcan by the door just in case they feel they can't make it that far.  

    Oh the joys of teaching......a kid barfed all over the floor in class the other day. I must say the other students handled it in a very mature fashion......they acted like a space ship had landed in the middle of the room and a green eyed alien was taking us all hostage. I am sure many of them went home and scrubbed down with 

     I thought vomiting was more of an elementary school problem.  Praise the Lord for janitors and that white magical powder they carry around with them. Soon things were back to normal; however, I am sort of wanted to go home and scrub down with Purell!

School Field Trip (insert Jaws sound track here)

     We had a school field trip today.  I had a list and I checked it twice.  I counted 25 kids in my classroom, and I counted 25 kids on the bus…taking pride in my organization.  I counted again when we got off the bus.  Now I have heard war stories about teachers losing a kid, but all of a sudden I had 26 kids (I will refer to the extra kid as “A”).   I did not care who was sleeping, but I did care who was bad or good, and I especially cared that I suddenly had one extra kid that I did not recognize….”A”.  At this point I was wishing I was home doing those five loads of laundry.  I am trying to smile sweetly at “A” so he does not freak out, but thinking I would rather be rubbing my eyeballs with sandpaper.  Now, for those of you that don’t know, field trips, are like herding cats!  It took about an hour, but I finally got “A” with the right group.  Whew, I am now home with a fire going, and my feet propped up.