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2002-03-11 - 7:49 p.m. What am I afraid of? I'm afraid of being alone. But I think even more than that, I'm afraid of being alone and not caring that I am alone. I spend every evening alone, other than the weekend, and the scary thing is I'm starting to not be lonely. I finally had my second post observation with my principal and he seemed fine with everything. We agreed I fired questions at the students too quickly and didn't give them much of a chance of answering. I was the one that brought it up. Other than that he seemed pleased in general. He also paid me a nice compliment by asking if I could get in touch with the teaching program where I went to school to see if they had anyone who is going to graduate that might be interested in the opening in English here. I know it's not just a compliment for me, but it's cool that he wanted to get some more young ones out here. I haven't exercised yet, but I will. If nothing else just to get warm. Yesterday I lied and didn't exercise like I said I was going to. I have to make up for it tonight, but I won't be like that horrible episode of Full House where D.J. went on the crash diet and made popsicles out of water, and then collapsed on the stair stepper at the gym. I will work out a sensible amount. The good news is that I have been eating better and I have been bringing my lunch every day since last week. I only bring healthy stuff such as the new whipped yoplait yogurt. It is really good, I like the texture way better than the old kind. It sort of reminds me of a smoothie. Speaking of which, I absolutely hate that word, "Smoothie." For some reason it has always embarrassed me. I just can't stand saying it. One of my favorite things that Sherman Alexie said in his speech, to paraphrase, is that he had the same sort of childhood as we all did. He further emphasized this point by mentioning that he can quote the same lines from Three's Company as we can. That cracked me up so much because you know how obsessed with that show I am. It made me feel good. Being back at school today was okay. At first the kids were driving me insane, but by third period I felt better. The seniors actually seemed fairly into the assignment I gave them on the book that they hate, so that felt really good. The sophomores were less thrilled. There is something about reading stories out of the Lit. book that they just hate. Some of the stories are pretty good but it is something about that book...they did actually seem happy to see me. I found out this morning that they had the horrible sub that they hate. I specifically ordered one of the subs that they love, who always leaves a good note about them, but I guess he didn't come through. The kids were actually very good for the mean sub and she left a positive note. That was a shock because usually she leaves minute details about how bad they were. She is a bit insane. I am sure I have mentioned the chalk outline story before, but let me tell it again just for anyone who is new to this journal. Last year I had a very tough group of seniors in one class. They were all boys and best friends and there were only thirteen of them. In any case, they apparently told the sub that I would have no problem with them taking my colored chalk and drawing outlines of their bodies on the carpeted floor. She decided that this would be okay and was a valid use of educational time. She let the boys draw outlines of their bodies on my carpet. One of these boys was my aide during seventh period. Well, by seventh period, she apparently decided that it was a bad idea to have chalk outlines on the carpet. She told seventh period that they had to clean up the mess. The boy who was my aide flipped out and she sent him to the office. The rest of the seventh period happily helped her clean up the outlines instead of doing their assignment. What could I do, when I returned, but reward them with laffy taffy for being so tolerant of someone who is clearly insane? In any case, I have mentoring tomorrow and I really don't want to do it. I'm tired, have ten million journals to grade, and want to sleep. Two weeks until Spring Break!
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