Daily Work: Crying and Hair Color

Fortunately in unrelated events.

Holli and Kelli packed up and left around 12:30. They even helped get some garbage out of the basement before they left, even though I told them to forget about it. I hate the leaving part, where I walk down the drive with the car into the front yard sobbing and waving. And even worse, I hate the long walk back into the house, sobbing and alone in the yard and then singularly alone and sobbing in the silence of the house. I actually cried for quite a while; but I managed to pull myself together and do something: I went to the closest drugstore and bought the hair color that Holli decided was closest to the color of my roots. Came home and doused myself with “Coastal Dune,” which is apparently dark neutral blonde. It feel slightly dark, slightly more brown than it should be, but it’s definitely close to the real color and in the right light it seems reddish rather than brown. I probably should have begun packing for CCCC, since I need to leave on Tuesday; but instead, I took my tearful depressed self to bed and slept from 6:30 to 11:30. Just got back up, took my meds, checked e-mail, and now I’m going back to bed.

Daily Work: TV and Chinese

Holli, Kelli, and I spent the day just hanging out at the house. Watched the rest of the Wallace and Grommit movie then watched Elizabethtown. Went out and fetched Sesame Chicken, eggrolls, and crab rangoon for dinner. I also did more blogging on the basketball teams—too many basketball teams.

It’s going to be very sad tomorrow when Holli and Kelli have to leave :(

Daily Work: St. Patrick’s Day Fun

Celebrated St. Pat’s Day by chunking up a big ol’ slab of corned beef and plopping it in the crock pot for the day.

Took Holli and Kelli for a partial tour of the office, since we needed to go pick up some Girl Scout cookies for them to take back to Virginia. I provided an intriguing tour of campus, marked mainly by my lack of knowledge on what any of the buildings were. I did manage to show them the farms. You gotta see the cows if you’re gonna come to town. Then we concluded this fun with a trip to the grocery store. We’re such wild women.

I made cabbage and mashed potatoes with green onions to go with the corned beef (and chicken breasts for Kelli). The potatoes were the big hit. Who knew I was so good at potatoes? All I did was saute the onions on a stick of butter, but somehow the onions spread a sweet carmelized taste through the entire pan. Very yummy. Kelli proclaimed them the best mashed potatoes she’d ever had (and that’s no easy accomplishment).

Then it was movie time. We watched the Spongebob Squarepants Movie, because I enjoy torturing them. Also A Lot Like Love, a movie that Kelli wanted to see. I TiVoed and and made her a DVD to take home. Then we started watching Wallace and Grommit, but Holli got tired so we saved that for tomorrow. Kelli and I were compelled to watch favorite South Parks: Underpants Gnomes and Sexual Harrassment Panda.

In the News: BBC NEWS | UK | Education | Poet seeks English lesson renewal

BBC NEWS | UK | Education | Poet seeks English lesson renewal—the UK poet laureate Andrew Motion calls for more reading of a wider range of texts in UK schools: “We need to ask how we can reflect the diversity of the society we live in with reference to the authors we use.”

Daily Work: Blogging and Conference Call

Even though I’m at home with Kelli and Holli while they’re here, I had to participate in a conference call for ReadWriteThink, on an evaluation of the various partner sites for attention to issues of multicultural, mulitlingual representation. Most of the phone call consisted of the presenter reading over the chunky report that we had been presented with. Unfortunately, she spoke very softly, so I couldn’t hear her on the speaker phone. I ended up having to tie the phone to my head with a bandana, since it wouldn’t take a headphone and I surely couldn’t hold it to my ear that long. Only 3 hours with a phone tied to my head. What I don’t give for NCTE. (and sorry. there are no pictures)

Other that than, I just spent time with Holli and Kelli, watched and blogged about basketball for GIC, cooked, and fiddled about. Kelli and I had a marvelous day.

Daily Work: Vacation with Holli and Kelli!

My sister Holli and my niece arrived this evening for a short visit. My sister has to go to a funeral tomorrow, and my niece will stay with me. They’ll leave on Sunday morning. I’ve spent much of my time today trying to get things a bit cleaner for their arrival this evening. Baked Chicken Lasagna for them, and have plans for many lovely meals during their stay. It’s nice to have them around, especially since they can carry the heavy things that I can’t. Time to get that box of old dishes down in the basement where it belongs.

In the News: Bill calls for study of media impact on youth

Bill calls for study of media impact on youth—what starts out as a possibily useful study on children and their interaction with multimedia ends on a fairly predictable note: “Mooney said she doesn’t need federal legislation to remind her that television is bad for children. ‘I’m not waiting for better television or a new study,’ Mooney said. ‘Just turn off the TV.'”

Inbox: Reading Habits in the Internet Age

This week’s Denver Post article “Technology Rewrites Rules for Reading” explores how students’ reading habits have been influenced by the various online reading that they do. More and more often, teachers, curriculum developers, and school literacy programs must search for strategies that will best meet students’ needs. The Ideas section from this week’s Inbox offers one way to solve the problem—ask students to explore and share their reading habits and their understanding of text in a digital world.

In the News: Microsoft to offer free parental Web monitoring

Microsoft to offer free parental Web monitoring—would it be cool if what this says were what it really means? I’d so love for Microsoft to monitor my parents for me. One less thing for me to do.

Really it’s just more in the how to ensure that kids avoid baddies. After all, reading and writing that kids want to do on their own is so dangerous.

In the News: Cyber bullies haunt young online

BBC NEWS | Technology | Cyber bullies haunt young online—even in the UK, it seems, there is fear of online woes. The article ends with simple and obvious advice rather than any kind of complete exploration of how to empower and prepare students who use online resources.
I’m beginning to think that I’m going to have to write the article I want to read.