I'm a cactus. I'm in a desert.

Essay prompt: Your friend claims that a virus is alive. Use what you know about the characteristics of living things to convince him that he is wrong.

Response from SStA: Get a lot of books and show him that viruses is not real. If he don't belive me am just gone have't go around the world a find a real scientist and he will tell him that viruses are not real. And he gone belive.

Response from DF: Just give me two points off

Essay prompt: Why do plants have adaptations?

Response from VB: Because I don't want to die. Ex: if I'm in a desert and I'm a cactus and there is not a lot of water in the desert, obviously there is not a lot of water so I will do anything to get a lot of water where I can.

Sometimes I <3 <3 these kids.

I have ESPN.

Last night, I dreamed that was riding my bike (Bartolo Antonio the Beach Cruiser, named after a character from the opera Il Barbiere di Siviglia [The Barber of Seville] and the classic Italian film Ladri di Biciclette [Bicycle Thieves]) and the chain fell off.

This morning, I put on a new swimsuit and a yellow sundress and rode my bike in perfect sunny 80something degree weather past the little shops of northside Miami Beach to an Argentine bakery, where I got an empanada jamon y queso and an empanada caprese, then to the beach to meet a few of my TforA friends. On the way to the bakery, the chain fell off my bike while I was switching gears. No problem, I had just fixed this situation probably 8 hours earlier in my dream. Weird?

(This has also been a subtle advertisement to attract more visitors to visit me and my new hometown.)

My social change project

Listen. I'm pursuing a Master of Science in Education and Social Change. I really like grad school, more especially now that we are starting courses on politics in the education system. (In case you haven't heard, studying politics is delicious to me.) For our next class, I get to read the Constitution and two Supreme Court cases, one of them being Brown v. Board.

As part of the social change component of the degree, we have to implement a social change project. I have been dreading choosing my project because I can foresee it being either a very meaningful experience or a disappointment that doesn't ignite me. My senior political science paper, which interested but did not captivate me, qualified as a bit of a disappointment. It was on whether religion overcomes socioeconomic status in forming voter preference.

I had a moment of literal magic today: all of my ideas and interests for this social change project coalesced in an instant, literally like a lightening strike brought them together. I had turned in a preliminary proposal that I didn't really believe in and was on my way to discuss it with a group. I suddenly realized that I want to create a safe girls-only after-school zone where we can discuss self worth and adolescence issues, get girls interested in careers in math and science, learn art/music/writing/dance/whatever they want, learn about the status of women all around the world, and raise money for schools in Afghanistan and Pakistan. This may not seem original but things like this are often left out of the urban education story. This burst of revelation was full of recharging, energizing excitement for a future accomplishment. 


The underlying factors influencing my decision:

• A few weeks ago, a few of my girl students said they had had thoughts of suicide and that those thoughts were common among their friends.
• Most urban enrichment programs focus on boys.
• These same girl students said one of their shared big fears are that their boyfriends will hit them. 
• One of my friends teaches a Saturday girls-only engineering class and loves it. 
• I have the most problems with connecting with female students; the weird competitive tense dynamic that sometimes happens between female friends apparently extends to the middle school female student-female teacher relationship. 
• I have been looking for a way to do Pennies for Peace and think it will work much better if the girls are invested in it and represent the program rather than having me do all of the promoting. Even more relevant is that we would be raising money to help elevate and educate girls in Pakistan. 

I think I need to do a lot of research to figure out how to make this incredibly meaningful and transformational, not a feel-good hour to fill the time. I want a logo and an awesome group name. Please let me know of ideas for experts, books, or if you have any suggestions!

(I am also excited because I can see how this project can lead to future opportunities...)

All my troubles, you cain't follow me into July

Someone make that into a Gospel and Blues song.

Modest is Hottest

This is seriously on the Target swimwear home page right now.

Photofintesis!!

My seventh graders were adorable today. That's because the good, funny ones (mostly boys) came to class and the obnoxious drama-causing girls skipped. And because my co-teacher came. She helps a lot to calm them down.

Ms. N: What response is this plant showing?
MB: Photofintesis!!
(Correct answer: phototropism)

TC, after coming back from the bathroom: "I went to the bathroom. I didn't wash my hands. [Sticks his hands in a bucket of sand behind my desk.] In my country, we wash our hands with sand." (This kid is home-grown Miami.)

KG: "If we pour enough water on the sun, and put it out, will it kill all the plants?"

I am a person too

Anyone need a mail order bride? I need to get out of this vat of soul poison.




Weirdest post ever? Perhaps? I might delete it in a few hours.

Thank you Beethoven, thank you Rossini

These songs allay my stress:

1. Für Elise
2. Largo al factotum (I am serious! I have reasons. Weird video though.)

Whining. Sorry.

Sunday night thoughts that are more connected than they appear to be:

1. I feel as though my life since June 2009 has been a study in human fallibility.
2. I tire of making mistakes.
3. I think LDS YSA need to become more proficient in and comfortable with taking social risks. And when I say social, I mostly mean dating.
4. If I am ever to work with small people again, I want them to be my own.
5. The clothes I design in my head are way better looking than anything I can buy.
6. I need to go on a spending moratorium.
7. Someone told me tonight it is very unlike me to be unhappy with my life. This person was right.
8. I believe place is far more important to happiness than most people think it is.
9. Maybe I am not as strong/creative/resilient/productive as I always believed I was.
10. One of the saddest things to me about singlehooddom is that I feel like some of my awesomeness is converted to some sort of deadweight loss, like if no one is there to appreciate it, it goes wasted.
11. Statements 9 and 10 contradict one another.
12. It is about to get reeeeeally hot in Miami. Like nuclear holocaust hot.

Concluding thought: There is a GBH quote on my mirror that says something like "I have come to realize that if we complain about life, it is because we are thinking only of ourselves." I mostly agree, but only mostly.  I don't want to talk about "you can choose to be happy in whatever situation you are in" because I am of the "if you don't like the situation you are in, change it" philosophy, not the "just be happy where you are" philosophy. I believe that my level of satisfaction of life influences many people, so if I complain about life as it is right now, it is partly because I don't have time to be there for people or to spontaneously serve people. I don't like that how full and exhausting my work and grad school schedule is inhibits me from living generously. I can't support people by attending their activities or commit to giving people rides or cleaning the chapel or taking a friend out for a treat if they had a bad day. I don't think that is entirely selfish to lament these things. I am not myself. I never want to be this busy or this emotionally/physically/spiritually leached ever again! My commitment to TforA is serious but really does it have crowd out everything else? 

I feel frustrated.

There, Sav. Does putting it on the Internet make you feel better???

Help me pick out my bridesmaid dress.

Urgent!!!!!!!!!!!!! :)

I need to pick out a bridesmaid dress. Which one should I buy? (Which one would look best on me?) The dress will be the Kunzite (pink) fabric. I am excited about getting something I wouldn't normally buy. (Sorry, not going to steal their images, so you'll have to go to the link.) I will wear chunky turquoise jewelry/accessories.

My first preference, but I don't like that it's something I would wear anyway:

http://www.shabbyapple.com/p-587-julie-and-romeo.aspx

Second preference, but I think it might be unflattering:

http://www.shabbyapple.com/p-592-anne-and-andy.aspx

Third preference, but I think it may not completely cover toward the bottom corners of the neckline. And I'm not sure it would look good on me.

http://www.shabbyapple.com/p-586-jack-and-jill.aspx

Really like this one too:

http://www.shabbyapple.com/p-589-cleo-and-antony.aspx

fragments of No. 2 pencil: a metaphor?

This day is hilarious. There are about 6 weeks of school left in M-D County, which of course means that this is the effectual end of the year. I have zero pencils left for school supply-barren students and reeeeeeeeeeally don't want to buy more because the pencils I buy are nomadic by nature. Or perhaps they are wood-and-graphite magicians skilled in the art of disappearing.

A few students don't have pencils for the test my advanced classes are taking in order to qualify for the honors earth-space course next year. A search of my desk produced a black two-headed pencil (someone had sharpened both ends) and just the eraser part of another one, still nestled in its metal cradle. The two students I gave them to--one needing a pencil; the other, and eraser--found receiving these items just as hilarious as I did giving them out. What? It doesn't sound funny? I promise, it was, especially against the seriousness of the test.