rolling on the river

I'm in Vicksburg.  The school sent up me here with a few of my colleagues for a teaching conference.

This past Monday night, I got to listen to Mark McLeod speak.  Today, I heard Gracy Taylor speak.  And now that I'm at this conference, I'll be listening to the legendary Harry Wong.  Apparently after this week, I'll be the greatest teacher ever.

Anyway, I miss Brandi already and I'm ready to go home.  And I need to type up some lesson plans.

Good night.

The Graveyard Book

One of the many wonderful Christmas presents that my wife got me this year included a copy of Neil Gaiman's newest novel, The Graveyard Book.  

Well, not only was it just announced that it won the 2009 Newberry Medal, but apparently they're making it into a movie as well.

I'm very excited!

decade

This past Friday marked mine and Brandi's ten year anniversary as a couple.  Way back in January of 1999, I asked her is she'd be my girlfriend, and luckily of me, she said yes.  We've been together ever since, and I cannot imagine my life without her.

To celebrate this grand occasion we ventured down to the coast for the weekend.  On Friday night, we went to this very high class steak house called Ruth's Chris which is part of the Hard Rock Casino.  Yes.  That food was amazing.  It cost about as much as we would spend on a small grocery bill, but yes, that food was amazing.

Saturday we hung out with Drew and Tabitha.  Apparently, just about every store down on the coast is going out of business.  So of course, we took great advantage of the nation's struggling economy by buying tons of stuff at discounted prices.  We also went back to their new house where I destroyed everyone at Wii bowling.

when one hand doesn't know what the other is doing

John Smoltz is playing for the Red Sox.  Derek Lowe is a Brave.  What is this world coming to?

I went to go work out today.  I'm tired.

If I can make it in time, I have some kind of physical exam on Thursday night.  I guess I'll find out how out of shape I am.

I performed a dog and pony show this morning.  I'm finishing up my Master's degree and a professor came and observed me in the classroom.  Things went well.

I do not have much else to walk about.

mistaken tater tots

The sermon this morning at church was on self-control.  Apparently, I need a lot of work in that area.

Right after church, a group of us ate lunch at a pizza buffet.  I ate a lot of food, despite the fact that I made a goal this year to be more healthy.  I also have a ton of school work to get done, but instead of working on that, I took a long nap.

So yeah... still got a ways to go on the whole self-control thing.

that nobody owns

I've been pretty much worthless all day today.  I did work on some lesson plans earlier, but other than that, I haven't done any of things that I was supposed to do.  Instead, I finished reading The Graveyard Book and it was amazing.

I also added a lot of Jack Kirby stuff to my Amazon wish list.  There's a lot of stuff that he's written/drawn that I haven't read, and that is a crime.

I need to get some more work done.  But I really don't want to.

and I am already having a hard time thinking of interesting blog titles

Not much worth blogging about occurred today.

The MCT 2 and dog feces are easily two of my least favorite things.

a weird combination of friendly and soulless

Tomorrow, I have to give a practice MCT test.  It will not be fun.

I really think that Lamar County Schools should let me be on vacation all the time.  The last two weeks were great.  The last two days... not so much.

The Atlanta Braves off-season doesn't seem to be going so great.  They can't trade for Jake Peavey.  They can't sign A.J. Burnett.  They can't sign Raphael Furcal.  Their best hope for starting pitching is maybe John Smoltz and/or Tom Glavine will be healthy enough to pitch another year.  This does not look good.

I was browsing Warren Ellis's website a while ago.  Apparently, he dumps weird links/articles/pictures/videos/other strange stuff into a blog format.  Then later on, that stuff gets worked into his writing.  

I just wanted to throw that last part in there in case I post some weird stuff on here for no apparent reason one day.

Scrubs is now on ABC.  It is still awesome.  

Hot dog pen!  Count it, honky face! 

This is the first time I've used to random shots format in my new blog.  It will likely be a reoccurring thing.

cutting your own icicles

I went to workout for the first time in over a year today.  I'm very tired.

I'm also disappointed in how out of shape I am.  We were doing really well for a while.  But then we just quit working out, quit eating right.  And it doesn't take long to become fat and out of shape all over again.

Today was also my first day back at school after being off for two weeks.  It was one of those teacher work day things where they tell us all types of things we need to start doing in addition to teaching.  In fact, I've got a pile of tests that I need to "analyze" right now, so instead of ranting further, I'm going to have to cut this short and get to work on that stuff.

more than meets the eye

Back when I was a little boy, the one toy that I always wanted but never got was the original Optimus Prime action figure.  My mom never got me one when I was a kid.  I even remember her telling me one Christmas that Santa called her and told her that he ran out of them.  Dang elves.  

However, 2009 marks the 25th anniversary of The Transformers.  And to celebrate, Hasbro has re-released that original figure, along with DVD of the pilot made-for-TV movie, and the first issue of the original comic bundled together in a fancy new box all for a suggested retail price of $70.  It's a little bit cheaper if you can find it at Wal-Mart or buy it off Amazon, but despite my desire to own one all these years, that is still a bit too expensive for me.

Well, my wife and I went to this little store called Dirt Cheap today, and guess what I found.  

Of course, there's a reason such a high end collectible ended up at Dirt Cheap.  First, the box was torn up.  But hey that's cool, it just gives me an excuse to open it up.  Secondly, its obvious there are some pieces missing, namely his hands and his gun.  The fact that it is missing Optimus's hands is actually a bit of an issue for me, but the price I'm paying for it makes up for that fact.

Like I said, the figure retails for $70.  The sticker on the beat up box of this figure says $39.99.  Plus, it is 60% off.  That brings us down to sixteen bucks.  The DVD is almost that much by itself.  Plus, I figure I can always leave him in vehicle mode when I'm displaying him on my desk.  That way no one will notice the fact that he's an amputee.

a hand in the darkness holding a knife

One of the best things about being a teacher is the fact that I get lots of vacation time spread throughout the year.  I've had the past two weeks off because of Christmas break, and it has been awesome.  The bad side of that is that it does not take long at all to get spoiled by sitting around the house being lazy.  Do that for two weeks straight like I have, and it pretty much makes you worthless.

On top of that, now that it is just about time for me to go back to school/work, I think I'm starting to come down with a sinus infection.  Hooray.

...the start of something new

This is my new blog.  

For years, I posted here.  So if you feel the need to go back in time and read about things that happened to me before I started blogging here, that's the place to be.  

One of the main reasons that I started this new blog is because I had pretty much quit posting in my old one.  I'm hoping that a change of scenery might get me blogging more often.  I suppose we will see what happens.  

In this new blog, and seeing as how this is the first day of a brand new year, I'd like to start things off by setting some goals for myself for 2009.  This time next year, assuming I'm still blogging regularly, I'll come back to this list and see how I did.

Blog on a regular basis.

There's really no point in having created this page if I'm not going to update it.

Lose some weight.  Get healthier.

Yeah, that's probably on everyone's New Year's Resolutions list.  Most won't keep.  I've certainly made that goal before and haven't kept it myself.  But Brandi and I both are tired of being out of shape.  She just started a new job, and one of the perks of that new job is a discounted gym membership.  We've also got a couple of friends from church who say they will work out with us occasionally.  

Get a Master's degree.

If everything goes according to plan, this is one goal I should certainly obtain.  I have one class left to finish, and I take comprehensive exams in March.  If I pass those, I'll have a Master's Degree in the Art of Teaching.

Pay of some debt.

It's time to get serious about paying off some old credit card debt.  Like I mentioned above, I'll be finished with my Master's degree soon.  And while that does mean a pay increase for me, it will also mean that I'm going to have to start paying back some student loans.  So what I need to do is get as much credit card debt paid off as I can before those loan bills start coming in.

See an Atlanta Braves baseball game.

I've been a fan of the Atlanta Braves for getting close to twenty years now.  But I have never in my life been to see an actual game.  So Brandi and I (along with a few of our friends) have decided that this will be my year.  

Create something.

I used to write all the time.  A year or two back, I decided I was going to get back into that.  I dabbled in it, but never got serious.  I'm not promising that this will be the year that I actually do get serious about it either.  But it is something that I have always wanted to do, and I won't get any better at it without actually doing it.

Be a better teacher.

There's a few things that I know I need to do better.  But for the most part, this is just a constant goal that I will probably have every year.  This is just one of those things where every year I need to improve some aspect of my career.  I can certainly say that this year is better than last year.  Hopefully, this time next year, I'll be able to say the same heading into 2010.

Be a better Christian.

Here's another that will probably pop up here every year.  And I suppose that it is a goal that every Christian should have every year.  Do more for the kingdom of God than you did before.  What will that actually entail for me in 2009?  I'm not real sure.  I just guess I'll know at the end of 2009 if I actually pulled it off or not.