Stupid Car Racing

Memorial weekend: Racing weekend

So the Chief LOVES to watch this stuff.  Me?  I use this time wisely by taking a nap.  Before I headed off for the nap, I caught a little excitement on the screen.  The only reason to watch Nascar or any car racing is for the accidents.  It is the train wreck that you just can’t turn away from.  This didn’t start off that way.  

I am watching the screen and watch driver Mike Conway come into the pits.  Then I see something horrific.  He crashes into his crew!  Knocks one guy so hard that he flies over the hood and lands on the front wing of the car.  This was the Indy 500, so those cars are a little different from the Nascar cars.  These cars have wings on the front of them.  

Indy Car:

NASCAR Car:

Something about the way the air rolls over...or under...or through, whatever, there is a good reason for the way they build these things.  Back to the pit stop.  He comes zooming into the pit stop and takes out half his crew (okay, TWO of them...but when we are talking like seven guys total, TWO is almost half!).  I turn to the Chief and say, “Does he get fined for that?”  He informs me, calmly as if is no big deal, no, he just has to take a slow lap.  There is actually certain lingo for this, but I can’t remember what it is.  Basically, it means he has to take a lap in the slow lane (which means his punishment doesn’t fit the damn crime).  Shocked, I asked if that was seriously the only repercussion for running into his crew.  

Are you hearing this?  The guy HITS crew members, and he only gets a pee-pee slap?  He could have KILLED them!  He doesn’t get fined, he doesn’t get taken out of the race, he only has to take a slow lap so he loses a couple spots in the lineup!  

Can you see that in real life?  You hit a pedestrian with your car and the cop says, “Hey dude, just take a lap around the block slowly...it’s all good.”  Are you freaking kidding me?  

Hours later (seven to be exact), I was sitting on the couch with the Chief.  

I turn to him, “I have been thinking.”

“Oh no.”

“I’m being serious.  I have been thinking about that guy that hit his crew with the car.  That is TOTALLY wrong that he doesn’t get in big trouble for that!”

“Why?  It was an accident, it happens, that is why they wear helmets.”

“Helmets don’t protect their legs!  He could have paralyzed that guy, and he doesn’t even get in trouble!!  He didn’t even lean out the window and say, ‘Sorry, Dude!‘  That poor guy didn’t do anything wrong, he only came to work!”

“He didn’t do anything wrong?  Because he couldn’t stay away from the buffet line, his fat ass ending up breaking the front left wing off the car which cost the driver the race!”

Yes, Yes...you read that correctly.  

When the driver hit the guy, he flew over the hood and landed on the wing, which broke it.  After the quick pit stop, the driver headed back out and had an immediate accident.

So guess what?  The car people might not have given a punishment that fit the crime, but guess who did?  The one who controls all.  

The Jack Wagon, already over the fact he almost killed someone, immediately went back out on the track and had an accident that knocked him out of the race.  Serves him right.  THAT punishment fit the crime.  

****Now, I am FUMING mad!!  I go to post the video on this blog of him running into his crew and it is no longer viewable for the audience!  They took the video down!  They have videos of the accident that followed it, but no more videos of him practically killing his crew!  GRRRRR!!  I guess that is there way of showing the only important part of the day is that he lost, not that he almost killed half his pit crew!****

Stupid car racing.  Stupid dangerous sport.  Stupid Mike Conway.  

            

Spring Break Part 1

So this is a bit old, but I will write about it anyway.  Over spring break, the little man and I attacked some much needed chores around the house that I have been itching to do.  

One of the reasons the Chief loved this house so much is because of the garage space it has.  We have a large three car garage, and a good sized shed.  I don’t care either way about how much space we have for our vehicles, or the lawn mower, but whatever...sometimes it’s better to let the guy be the guy.  So back to the shed.  It’s a convenient place to store all the lawn crap, golf clubs, and anything else we feel like throwing in there.  I only had one problem with it.  The color.  We move into this pretty house that is brown with white trimming, it looks so elegant.  Then the shed.  Is ugly red.  It doesn’t match the house, it doesn’t match anything.  It just sits there and sticks out like a sore thumb.  Over the year, I have mentioned to the Chief how I would like to paint it.  Over and over again I would get the same, “No, it’s fine” response.  Secretly, I think he was afraid if I went near it, I would somehow damage it.  How you damage an ugly, red shed, I will never understand...what could I do?  Make it uglier?  As we were approaching spring break, I mentioned it again (because what better way to get my way then to bug him to death?).  “I sure would love to paint that shed so it matches the house.”  

“If it shuts you up, then paint it.”  

At first his words didn’t sink in, because I was so used to the same rejection comment.  Once it registered, I didn’t say anything else about it.  I didn’t want him to change his mind.  I had the approval, and that was all I needed to FINALLY do what I wanted to do.  

First day of spring break, the Chief drives off to work, and without delay, I grab the Little Man and take off for Home Depot.  I bought the paint, and headed back.  It was 10AM when we started our project.  I knew it needed to be done before the Chief got home.  So we got to work.  Let me stop and say how grateful I am to have a child that can actually help with things like this.  We worked from 10AM until 6:30PM.  You know how many coats it took to cover up that nasty red?  About two too many.  After all that time and hard work, I couldn’t wait for the Chief to see it.  We waited outside knowing he would come up the long driveway and it would be the first thing he would see (it’s at the top of our driveway).  I see his truck coming down the street and hold my breath.  He slowly comes up the driveway and turns into the garage.  I open his door and realize he isn’t going to make this easy for me.  The Chief isn’t an easy guy to read at times.  He opens his back door to get out his laptop bag...still no reaction.  Exasperated, I finally say, “WELL?”

“Well, what?”  

“Seriously?”

Then I see the quick look that every woman has seen before, only with the Chief it is very brief.  The look I am talking about is the one where they know there is something they were supposed to notice but didn’t.  His eyes flicker to my hair, then down my body trying desperately to find out what “new” thing he is supposed to notice.  

“THE SHED, YOU JACK WAGON!”

As relief fills his face, he swings around and says, “Hugh!  Looks good, Babe.”  

That’s it.  That’s all I get.  I’ll take it.  In the meantime, I will be more proud of the fact the Little Man and I did something very productive on the first day of our spring break vacation.    

Before:

After:

Okay Okay.  Enough harassment.  I have been really busy.  Really.  

It all started with a phone call on April 18th.  The temp agency called me to tell me I have been requested for a long term sub job for the rest of the year.  I of course accepted, excited for the wonderful opportunity and much needed stability.  Then she told me the story behind my position.  The teacher had a heart attack and died.  In.  The.  Classroom.  Despite what local news reports said, the students are the ones who found him.  This teacher dropped them off at Art, then went back to the class.  When he never went back to pick them up, the art teacher sent them back to the classroom.  They walked in and their teacher was dead on the floor.  Imagine my shock.  Now image the shock of 23 nine year olds.  I am not walking into a happy situation.  I am walking into a classroom with 23 traumatized children.  

I put on my big girl panties and headed into the classroom.  The principal introduces me and tells the kids I will be taking over for the rest of the year.  The whole day, there are teachers, counselors, and parents hovering outside of the door waiting on a breakdown from students.  None happened.  I was blown away at their resilience.  The teacher had died the day before, and these kids were more interested in me then grieving over the loss of their teacher that had been with them for the previous seven months.

All that aside, I have walked into a disaster.  As brilliant as the man was, he was an unorganized disaster.  There wasn’t a single file on any of the 23 students.  He had stacks of papers in drawers.  There were no files set up.  There were no lesson plans.  There was nothing to tell me where he left off or what he already covered.  Understandable though, it isn’t like he knew he wasn’t going to be finishing the school year.  Regardless, you would think I would have support of the other teachers.  Nope.  None of them co-plan, therefore no one knows what the other is doing.  Excellent.  Within two weeks, I had my label maker (courtesy of the Brunette BFF) and my files, and I had organized the hell out of that classroom.  Other teachers have been shocked at how fast and how awesome the class looks.  Not to mention, I feel like I can breath again.  Oh wait.  Just kidding.

Those of you that really know me, know there is a bit of Type A/OCDness to me (minus my warranty drawer).  I like order, ESPECIALLY in a place of work.  I need order, I need a plan, I need cleanliness.  I de-germed my classroom with my bottle of bleach (hidden from the school since “go-green” has forbidden any good cleaning products).  I scrubbed the desks, chairs, and any other surface I could get my little hands on.  The kids were shocked at how white their desks could get.  Okay aside from this end of the classroom we have the other, more terrifying end.  

Lesson planning.

All of my training, observation, and student teaching was for Middle School English/Language Arts.  I am certified 4-8th grade.  These are 4th graders.  Now I am thrown into a position that I teach: English, Reading, Math, Science, Social Studies, Geography, and any other subject you choose to throw in there.  Let me remind you, the reason I passed my college math with flying colors is because the Chief was sitting next to me when I did all the work.  Let me also remind you that I found out two years ago that Alaska wasn’t an island.  Now. You. Want. Me. To. Teach. Math. AND. Geography.  Excellent.  Maybe, I am not ready for this.  Believe it or not, I love it.  I love it so much.  I have never been so excited to get up and go to work every day.

One of the reasons my focus was on Middle School, is because that is what I wanted to teach.  I didn’t want to be with 4th and 5th graders.  I thought they were too needy.  I knew they were still touchy-feely and I had no desire to be a babysitter.  I went to school to teach, and in my mind I could only do that with pre-teens.  Or so I thought.  I LOVE my kids.  I love greeting their happy little faces every morning.  I love it when they run up to me and wrap their little arms around me.  As I hug them back I remind myself that it may be the only hug they get all day.  I am in a poverty stricken area.  100% (not an exaggeration) of the students are on FREE lunch plans.  Seventy percent of my students are African American and the other 29 percent are Hispanic.  I have one Caucasian student in my class.  These kids have my hearts in their hands.  They have so much love to give.  What was I thinking when I said forth grade would just be babysitting?  In no way am I babysitting!  These kids have to be taught!  And when they don’t get it, they come in before and after school.  I am teaching.  I am FINALLY doing what I worked so hard to be able to do.  And I love it.  I freaking love it.  I love everything about it.  I love spending a week teaching them to add and subtract fractions with unlike denominators.  Then I LOVE seeing that all but two of them passed the test with flying colors.  I love seeing their little faces when they see that I have taped their tests to the board for the whole class to see.  They are proud of themselves and they are so happy to see how proud I am.  I had 6-8 students in my class every morning before school, doing tutoring.  These kids wanted to understand.  They have never had their work taped to the board.  They have never had that silly little sticker attached to their “A”.  One student told me that the last teacher never let them come in before and after school for help.  She also told me they never got stickers.  

I love my job.  I love my kids.  I love each and every one of their precious little faces.  I couldn’t be happier.  Or busier.  

Forgive me, I have finally started to breath again and get a hold of this teaching thing.  I will try to blog more, in the meantime know that my time is going to something more important.   :)  

Little Man

Some people think that life starts when you are born, or even before that, when a heart starts beating in the womb.  For me, my life started when I got pregnant with my Little Man.  

This is the Brunette BFF with my newborn Little Man

Little Man turned thirteen this past month.  When I stop and think about it, it is so hard for me to grasp this concept.  I have had this person in my life for 13 years.  My child.  My baby.  My only baby.  When I hear this song, I think of him.    

"Brighter Than The Sun"

Stop me on the corner

I swear you hit me like a vision

I, I, I wasn't expecting

But who am I to tell fate where it's supposed to go with it

Don't you blink you might miss it

See we got a right to just love it or leave it

You find it and keep it

Cause it ain't every day you get the chance to say

Oh, this is how it starts, lightning strikes the heart

It goes off like a gun, brighter than the sun

Oh, we could be the stars, falling from the sky

Shining how we want, brighter than the sun

I've never seen it, I found this love, I'm gonna feed it

You better believe, I'm gonna treat it better than anything I've ever had

Cause you're so damn beautiful

Read it, it's signed and delivered let's seal it

Boy we go together like peanuts and paydays and Marley and reggae

And everybody needs to get a chance to say

Oh, this is how it starts, lightning strikes the heart

It goes off like a gun, brighter than the sun

Oh, we could be the stars, falling from the sky

Shining how we want, brighter than the sun

Everything is like a white out, cause we shika-shika a shine down

Even when the, when the light's out but I can see you glow

Got my head up in the rafters, got me happy ever after

Never felt this way before, ain't felt this way before

I swear you hit me like a vision

I, I, I wasn't expecting

But who am I to tell fate where it's supposed to go?

Oh, this is how it starts, lightning strikes the heart

It goes off like a gun, brighter than the sun

Oh, we could be the stars, falling from the sky

Shining how we want, brighter than the sun, yeah

Oho, yeah, oho

Oh, this is how it starts, lightning strikes the heart

It goes off like a gun, brighter than the sun

Oh, we could be the stars, falling from the sky

Shining how we want, brighter than the sun, yeah

Brighter than the sun.

Brighter than the sun.

Brighter than the sun.

Oho, yeah, oho

Oh, this is how it starts, lightning strikes the heart

It goes off like a gun, brighter than the sun

Oh, this is how it starts, lightning strikes the heart

It goes off like a gun, brighter than the sun

Oh, this is how it starts, lightning strikes the heart

It goes off like a gun, brighter than the sun

Oh, this is how it starts, lightning strikes the heart

It goes off like a gun, brighter than the sun

This song hits so close to my heart in so many ways.  He hit me like a vision.  I wasn’t expecting him.  But who am I to tell fate where its supposed to go?  I was 18 years old when I got pregnant.  It is safe to say he wasn’t planned.  I was young and I was scared.  When I gave birth to him, I looked at his little face and knew at that moment he was my world.  I knew my life was different.  My life had meant nothing until that point.  After 48 hours of unforgiving labor, I held that tiny little man in my arms and knew I would do anything for him.  He WAS so damn beautiful.  He was mine and I was his.  He became my everything.  This is how it started.  Lightning striked my heart that very moment.  I wanted nothing more than to keep him close to me and safe.  I never felt ownership over anything before.  I was still a child myself.  Until he came along...

His one-year picture

This is the Blond BFF with the Little Man and his personality.

Beautiful Face

All Mine

Love this picture.  It is like he has a secret.

When he was less than a week old, friends of his biological father came over.  A woman, that brought her two young children.  I nervously handed over my life to her outstretched hands.  I sat and watched her ohhhh and awwww over my treasure.  I also watched her small children peer over his little face reaching their dirty little hands out and touching him.  I couldn’t take it.  I went back to my bedroom, went into my closet, sat down on the floor and cried.  My mother (who happened to also be visiting at the same time), came in and asked what was wrong.  I frantically told her that they had their dirty little hands all over my baby.  I wanted nothing more than to put a bubble around him and keep him safe from every germ and every stranger.  My mom, the strong woman she is, marched out into the living room, told the woman it was time to go, and starting putting her children’s shoes on their feet.  THAT is a woman that protects her child, in turn she taught me to protect mine.  

I haven’t made the best decisions with him.  I am the first to say I have made MANY mistakes.  I think every parent has.  Maybe I have made more, maybe I have made less.  

One of the biggest mistakes I made was doubting my ability to be a good mother.  I thought I was doing a terrible job, and decided to give his birth father a chance at raising him.  This was three months of his life that I didn’t have him.  I had him every other weekend, but that was it.  The tables had turned.  Until I got a phone call early one morning.  A phone call that no mother wants to receive.  My life quickly came tumbling down.  Now I KNEW I had failed.  I had made a potentially deathly decision on behalf of my child, my life.  The Chief and I, made a three hour drive in 2.5 hours.  I picked up my Little Man, I gathered everything he owned and grabbed him to my chest.  I could have lost my child.  I was lucky.  God had his hands around my Little Man that day, protecting him.  At that moment I knew I would NEVER let him go again.  My selfish decision could have costed me my sanity.  I have still made mistakes, none thankfully, as dangerous as letting him out of my life temporarily.  

This Little Man is such an amazing kid.  He is no longer my tiny baby.  He is a teenager.  He is witty, he picks that up from the Chief.  He is smart, he gets that from me.  But most of all, he has this beauty that radiates from his face.  He is such a delightful kid, inside and out.  I am so lucky that on that day, 13 years ago, he hit me like a vision. Brighter than the sun.  I can’t wait to see what an amazing man he turns out to be.  I love you, Little Man.