Best Weekend Ever.
Don Quixote and Sancho were waiting with a cake when I got up. My sweetie made them for me. 
So I was kind of anti-social at my Dad's. My big book shipment arrived the nigt before I left and it is a six-hour flight so I packed lots of reading material. I'll go in order:
A Mathematician Reads the Newspaper- I'm already a fan of Paulos, and though this wasn't his best, it was very interesting. I was disappointed at the end. The short segments were intentional, but they felt rushed and repetitive. Still, overall it was worthwhile and increased my skepticism of all mainstream math. It's rather heavy reading at times so have a backup book handy.
Freakonomics- This felt like a companion to the newspaper book. It was a quick and thouroughly enjoyable read. I admeit that I remain skeptical about some of the claims within mostly because I had just finished the mathematician book. Paulos warns us not to trust economists and then the economist expresses a distate for all things math in his book. So while they did feel like companion books, they are certainly not without differences. I would absulutely read a sequel to this and loved that education was brought up several times.
The Impossible Musical- My love for Man of La Mancha deserves its own post, but let's say that since my first viewing at age twelve, nothing has compared to the musical so I was thrilled to get a chance to read about how it came to be. The story was absolutely fascinating. It's one of the few books I've been compelled to share pieces of, telling anyone near me the interesting bits. I fell in love all over again and am glad I was able to read this book before meeting the author (just one of my little fantasies). This was my backup book for when the newspaper book started to hurt my brain. I could barely put it down because it was so interesting and I've fallen even more deeply in love with the mnusical. Really I want to tell you all about it, but you should just read it. The story of Cervantes and Wasserman and the birth of the musical is just incredible.
Night- I know that this is a book I should have read ages ago. One of my favorite people teaches it in her social studies class and I've heard nothing but raves about it's power. I bought the most recent translation at the airport bookstore having devoured the books I brought with me. It was heartbreaking and powerful and if you haven't read it you should.
And on my nightstand:
Edly's Music Theory for Practical People- I've always wanted to learn piano and as someone who sings, I also want to know more about music. Lately I've been spending about a half hour a week singing with the music teacher at my school and it's reawakened my desire to learn more about music. Over the last year, I've started to learn how to read music, but other than that and having a good ear, I know nothing about music. This weekend, my uncle gave me some lessons in keys and scales and got me excited about learning more. I had always figured that I needed to wait until I could take piano to learn about music. I was wrong. I had some time in between events at work tonight so I waited in the music room and decided to find some music to tap out on the piano. While looking I came across this book and right away in the first chapter, it reinforced the lessons from my uncle this weekend. So I started reading and did the first exercise (figuring out a bunch of the major scales). When the music teacher caught me, he told me to take the book home and do the lessons in it. He seemed pretty excited about my interest and started adding to the lessons right away. So, as if I needed another thing to do, I've decided to learn a bit about music.
Next up: all those Christopher Pike books that are crying to be read. We've been doing report cards this week and I'm presenting at a conference in two weeks and going to a conference in Chicago in two weeks and our show opens in three weeks and my birthday is this weekend so I won't allow myself to get into those books until things start to settle down. I know I said January-June was my busy time, but March is my busy, busy, busy time. Still, I've been more motivated to post here because being busy always makes me more productive, plus my Katamari addiction helped me lose my internet addiction so I'm spending less time doing random stuff on my computer.
Lots of long-winded comments later, I bid you goodnight.
A story for you: We have a boy in our school who is notorious for not following the rules. He's quite the leader among his peers and can be quite the class clown. We also have a strict dress code, a part of which is that the kids are required to have their shirts tucked in. Every morning, this boy walks out of his homeroom with his shirt untucked.
This morning, he walked out with his shirt tucked in and one of the teachers complimented him and made a bit of a fuss about how unusual it was.
His reply: "Well, it is Pi Day."
The power of math.
As an aside, I saw a former student after school who called after me, "Hey Miss Statue, what day is it?" I smiled back and replied "Pi Day" and we enjoyed a laugh.
I read lots of books, watched a couple movies, and enjoyed the Arizona Rennaissance Festival. It was a good weekend.
Did you really think I'd make you go without your potato picture?
I'm surprised you're not clamoring to see pictures of him everyday! He is adorable, after all.
From rainy Arizona (I bring weird weather everywhere I go), I bring you a movie recommendation.Last night, we watched the movie adaptation of Rent. I was worried. I loved the stage version so much that after seeing it the first time, I promptly bought tickets for the next night. This gave me the unique opportunity of seeing the production from the fifth row and from the balcony. Each had it's own visual niceties. The music is wonderful, the characters are lovable, and the story is moving.The movie was wonderful. There were a couple parts that I was sad to see were spoken rather than sung, but it was great. A movie version allowed them to show much more of New York, tied up some loose ends that can be hard to follow in the stage version, and allowed for some very moving back-and-forth bits. There were a few changes, but they offered some comic relief. The singing was incredible. My favorite character is Mimi and I was glad to see that Rosario Dawson was wonderful- I actually liked her singing better than the cast album I own. For the most part, I wasn't disappointed. Anyone who loves the musical would be happy to have the DVD at home to be transported as they choose.Enjoy!
Daily Frustration: You mean something other than the other math teacher? Um, drivers. I always have the most interesting ride to work. I keep meaning to post about it, but I'll sum it up by saying that there are lots of people who use tiny stretches of road to become king of the road. They put everyone in danger just so they can sit next to you at the next traffic light.
Continual Oddity: I'll stick with traffic. I park on a short one-way street near my school. As I sit there, at least five cars turn onto the road and then slam on the gas so they can speed for the entire 10 car lengths. Today I watched a little car speed through and then do a scary manuveur between a car turning into a driveway and a truck with the door open into the street. Is the thrill really worth it?
Nice thing: First, I need to let you know that I am a plain Jane. I rarely wear makeup and if I do it's usually just a little mascara or on a big day some eyeliner (I don't bother with lipstick because it requires reapplication.) Today was not a big day. I stepped out of my car after lunch and two random guys were walking by. One of them turned his head to look at me and just said, "beautiful" with his face all in awe. It wasn't a catcall at all and it just felt nice for a plain Jane like me to turn a head on a work day.
Really nice thing: My books came in today!! Yippee! I'm so excited and they all look better than I could have hoped. I don't know how I can possibly decide which ones to bring on the plane.
Website: An addictive game. Avoid the blue squares.
Weekend Plans: Arizona. I leave tomorrow and I won't be back til Monday night. Help yourself to any leftovers, just don't trash the place.
I drink a lot of water. I'd say I drink at least a gallon a day.
I have two water bottles at home that I rotate and one at work. I always drink tap water.
In fact, when the bottled water fountain at work ran out and the employees had to risk tap water, one of them told me that she just kept telling herself that Poor Statue drinks the tap water every day and is fine.
Well anyway, no surprise- bottled water is ruining our environment. Plus, it isn't any healthier than tap water.
Let's see if I can keep this up:
Daily Frustration: Waiting 30 minutes for the Vice Principal to handle a discipline issue. It's been awhile since I was that frustrated.
Continual Oddity: I can't sit down for more than 30 minutes without falling asleep. I was planning to post last night, but fell fast asleep about 15 minutes after eating dinner. I am such a great fall-asleeper.
Nice thing: My future FIL. He's so wonderful. He always makes me smile and he's one of the few people I've met who really lives by "live and let live." Everytime I'm feeling guilty about some stupid thing, he always brings me back to reality.
Website: I'll start with Ziggy, my favorite. I get his one-a-day calendar every year. One year, I made the sad mistake of going without and I missed it every day.
Weekend Plans: Arizona......I can't wait!
Last night I unlocked the million roses level. It was awesome.
Happy Sunday all!
It's been awhile since I did a book order. I try to avoid it because I'm book happy. I can't get just one.
My books fell into three categories:
Christopher Pike books (my favorite author since age 10).
Man of La Mancha stuff (my favorite musical since grade 7).
Math stuff (occupational hazard).
My order is scheduled to arrive on my birthday. Yippee!
My birthday plans? New books and Natalie Portman.
Let's see if I can keep this up:
Daily Frustration: I broke my windshield wipers brushing snow off my car this morning. Then I got stuck behind the school bus and every time we stopped, I had to beg my car to get going again because I was getting stuck on the sheet of icce we called a street.
Continual Oddity: I stop at a convienience store right before getting on the highway a couple nights a week. It's on a busy street so I usually wait patiently until someone is kind enough to let me out of the parking lot. The on ramp for the highway is about a quarter mile up right after a traffic light. Everytime some nice person lets me out in front of them, I make the light and they get stuck on red. I always feel so bad.
Nice thing: I'll make the first one the kids who stay with me on Fridays until 5PM doing math. I always dread it just because it's Friday and I'm tired, but it's always worth it in the end. Working with them makes me realize why teachers covet honors classes. These kids can't get enough of learning.
Weekend Plans: D&D tomorrow. Other than that, relaxation. I'm actually caught up on my correcting and lesson planning so I'm going to enjoy the weekend. Grades close next Friday so we're in for a busy couple of weeks after that.
Of course, I had a big thing birthday and I thought some pictures were long overdue. There are a couple I didn't get pictures of yet, but these should tide you over. 
Thing does sweet motorcycle tricks.
There are some crazy new action figure games so I got those things. One of them comes with a die that has a mystery figure inside. The one on the package was Wolverine- he's a favorite of my fiance's so I was hoping for him. I couldn't get the thing open. My fiance did, looked inside, and said, "Wow, you got a rare one!" He then closed it.
Thing vs. Thing
And the best Thing of all? This sweetie.........
.jpg)
