There are so many people who ask me why I moved to Southern California when
Monday, September 22, 2014
So, if you have been following my blog, you know that last week a cat was found in the office, of which we named Husky.
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I had brought Husky home on Friday night and another teacher was willing to take her. Since I have been trying to "tame" the stray kittens outside the apartment I was willing for her to go to another good home so that my home was free for another stray.
Well it looks like Husky is coming back to me. Things did not work out at the other teacher's house so she will be coming back to me on Monday night. I hate it did not work out for a few reasons but also because this is more time she has to spend in the car going back and forth to and from Riverside. I am not having the luck I thought I would have with the strays at the apartment so this may be what is expected to happen. I just hope Squeak will tolerate her. On the way home from Riverside, she wanted out of the carrier so I tried to open the top and just pet her but she kept crying. Me, being the sucker for cats, put her on my lap and she sat with me petting her the whole way home just purring. She really does just want to be loved.
I let her out right away once we got to the apartment and while Squeak did hiss at her, she did not attack her and hurt her. Squeak has been sulking on the bed all day long, she did come out to eat and sit next to me for dinner only to see Husky and go back to the bedroom. I don't think Husky has ventured past the bathroom with the litter box. It is obvious they have claimed certain areas of the apartment at this point but at least they are getting along - somewhat.
Tuesday, September 23, 2014
Well I took my official first non-duty day while students were at school that did not involve Professional Development. Last year, I took a few non-duty days but only so I could 1) go to conferences, 2) work summer school or 3) they were forced because the school was closed. Today, I spent the day - yes the entire day - working on PhD revisions. So, yes, I did do two loads of laundry, I did run to the dry cleaners and shoe repair shop so I was gone a total of maybe 30 minutes but for the most part I only worked on the PhD revisions from 7:00 am - 8:40 pm today. Wait a second, Ali called and we talked for 20 minutes so that may have been a total of 1 hour that I was not looking at a computer screen or journal articles and boy am I tired!!!! I can say that Chapters 1-3 are thankfully revised and sent to my chairman for review at this point. I will be interested to see what comes back from her. I have another friend reviewing my data for coding to see if she is seeing the same thing as I did. I am hoping to be able to move forward again in a few weeks and I am planning on taking a few more non-duty days in the future along with the three presentations that I have coming up for science or math conferences.
I updated my phone to IOS 8 this past weekend and spent the evening working out the bugs in one of the programs that I use all the time. My mSecure / password protector did not update and has been totally cutting off when I put in my password. I had to delete it and re-add the program. Oh the scariness of that, to think everything was almost gone. Whew!!!! I needed it a few times today and did not have access and it was somewhat freaking me out a little. I think I need to figure out how to open the electronic backup in excel or word…….Might be a good task.
So, I had my phone turned off today so I could concentrate. I would like to say there was 79 emails on there and I was able to quickly delete some of them so there are only 44 that require responses. Looks like I know what I will be doing tomorrow since I did not do anything with work today. I literally took the entire day away from North in order to work on finishing up my graduate program. I feel like I can see light at the end of the tunnel but somehow I am not sure it is truly there!!!
Wednesday, September 24, 2014
Well I am exhausted!!!! My feet hurt, my head hurts and I am not sure I will be able to sleep I am so tired. I did not fall asleep easily on Tuesday night and ended up falling asleep around 12:00 pm but only to toss and turn through the night and wake up at 4:45 am to get ready for work. I got to work by 6:20 am to answer the 48 emails that were waiting on me from the day before. I started on those only to continuously get pulled away. At 9:00 am, we had a report of problems between some groups of students on campus from the day before that was continuing on campus today. With that being said….. that means no office work is getting done because we are going to be out and about on campus.
Well lunch is where it really got ugly and began. We had a student approach another group of students and start "talking S__T" to them. This of course started everyone "Manning Up" on each other and words exchanged. We had to have one of the kids carried away by one of the assistant principals. Now, we knew we might have trouble so we had some extra police officers there but that still did not help the "scuffle." We had some students refuse to obey the police officers and therefore that caused other problems. Needless to say, we had some students who were taken off campus for resisting / defying a police officer today. In the end, after all the statements were read, share, investigated and film watched, we will end up recommending expulsion for several students but a number of them will be going on a 5 day suspension. I have to say that my BFAWs came through for me today. While all this was going on my BFAWs at EOC and Ramona came over to help out at the end of school. Thanks Victor for sending Alfredo and thanks Lanna for coming. We truly appreciate your presence on campus and helping us out today. You guys are awesome and I am so happy that we are here to support one another. Thanks also to Katie Grimble at University Heights Middle School for helping out with campus supervisors coming down to help out. We truly appreciate all your hard work. Thanks for your help today!!!
Needless to say, I was at school until 9:15 pm playing catch up from my day off yesterday. I had to put printers in rooms, clean out another room of the boxes stored there. I also had to get another room ready for group counseling that will start next week. There really is always something going on and something to do at a high school. At least we/I feel ready for tomorrow. However, after walking around all day, exploring the areas for fights after school, Chromebook training, leading a Zumba class and moving technology equipment around, I am literally exhausted!!!!!!!
Thursday, September 25, 2014
Thursday was one of those crazy days were you are working and working and working and before you know it the day has gone completely by and is over. We were all on high alert today after yesterday's events and therefore the day flew by. There were no issues and all the students were great. Of course there are the rumors - the ones that are saying something is going to happen and it will happen at lunch or after school. However if there was nothing that happened after school at Patterson Park then I feel fairly safe nothing is going to happen today at school. We had extra adults on campus and all the teachers came and hung out at lunch with the students as well so that students felt safe. At the end of the day, I thought I was going to get to go home at a decent hour and then low and behold, I remembered there was PTSA!!!! So off to a meeting I go until 6:30 pm and then catch up in the office. I got home at 10:00 pm only to fall into bed to get ready for Friday.
Friday, September 26, 2014
Friday was uneventful other than I got to do some discipline this morning. Since last year when we decided to re-arrange duties and one person was doing the discipline, I have not done much in terms of discipline except for with students who are arguing with one another. It was nice to get to talk to see students that I worked with last year and talk with them about how things are going. Lunch went well and after school we had our homecoming tailgate event where student groups had lots of tables out selling items to raise money for their club / activity. It was a great success and wonderful to see so many students involved. The Homecoming theme this year was based off of The Wizard of Oz and one of the nicest young ladies at school won homecoming. So excited for her. This year is the 50th Anniversary of John W. North High School and one of the sweetest things was finding the former Homecoming Queens and inviting them to the event to be recognized. The pictures I am including here are not ones that I took but were some that were taken at the event. It was a fabulous homecoming and I really like the themes that are done here, which is different from the East coast.
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| North Faculty and Staff that are also Alumni |
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| Fireworks at the end |
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| Homecoming Queen |
Saturday, September 26, 2014
One of the nice things about being in an area with such a large hospital system is that they do appointments on Saturday so I had a follow-up doctors appointment this morning. I was in and out in about 20 minutes with a Flu Shot and vaccine for a Whooping Cough. Not sure that I need both of them but hey, I was there and it was a vaccine fair as well as the fact I work around kids.
My afternoon involved playing Santa to 5 teachers on campus as I dropped off sets of 40 Chromebooks in their classroom for them to find Monday morning when the get to school. Now, I did email them and tell them they were coming but were unsure when. Now I can have my office back since 210 Chromebooks are out of my office and in the hands of teachers and students who will be using them. I also spent the afternoon trying to solve a problem temporarily for a science teacher until they can meet with their department and come up with a more viable solution. This involved coping 72 sets of papers front and back for two different teachers which took a couple of hours to get it all done, stapled and in their boxes.
Ali and I went to dinner at The Yardhouse. This was my first time there and do you know what???? They have a VEGETARIAN MENU section!!! LOL!! It was really good also!!! I had Vegetarian Buffalo Bites and a Pineapple beer, which was very interesting. We also say The Equalizer movie and let me say I love Denzel Washington as an actor so the movie for me was awesome. However, it was in an IMAX theater and the sounds was phenomenal but may have been a bit too much. There was a lot of killing in the movie and in some unusual ways that were loud and therefore it let you hear the bones crunching and blood dripping. That kind of thing does not bother me but it can be too much for some.
Pictures of the new addition and yes, Squeak is tolerating her…..
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