Puzzle Pieces
Instead of writing my normal whiny long entry at school today, I kept writing bits and emailing them to myself so that I could post them later. Which I will now do, and when they're all here -- there are four of them -- I'll see if they make any sense.
The Nickname Game
Poolie played the game where you use a nickname you once had and Google-image it and post the first thing that comes up. As I wrote in her comments, I opted out, because the nickname of my young childhood was Bushie. My sister called me that from the time I was born until I was about five. Her only explanation ever was that when I came home from the hospital -- she was four and a half -- my hair stuck up straight on my head and it looked like a bush to her. So, okay.
My father adapted the nickname Sweetie Pie to my name and called me Sanny Pie (that s is a z sound). So I'm not finding pictures of that one, either. Or of my sister's adaptation of that to her nickname for me in my teen years, which was E-Pie.
The nickname of my adult life, which is used by virtually everyone except my sister and her family (and never by my parents either) is Ro, which works for me. Everyone in the ILs family calls me that, and a whole lot of people at work. Funny, I always wanted a decent nickname when I was a kid (instead of the goofy ones I had, although I liked those at home), and I would never .... NEVER answer to Rosie. It makes my skin crawl.
So, no pictures, just a handful of goof.
So, I went to the office to talk to the principal this morning but he wasn't in yet. I asked his secretary if he would be out today but she didn't know. I asked her to call me as soon as he came in. Did you get a call? I didn't get mine.
But I went there a couple of periods later, and he sees no reason my desk cannot be moved, says getting the computer and telephone drops are no big deal, and so on. All I have to do is email him a list of what I need (which I did the second I got back to the library) and he'll try to get it done the first week in January. !!!!!!!!!!
He also said that he only has five applicants for the librarian's job and none of the them look great, so we'll be hiring someone as a long-term sub to fill out this year, and most likely we'll be looking again for the real thing for next September. It's okay with me. What I want, though, is to switch to the early shift, so he'd better get someone who's going to fill in the half hour after school until the late person comes in from 3:00 to 5:00.
In the meantime, I've been cleaning out the shelves behind my desk, which I will miss (the only thing I'll miss about this location), but I'll make do and I'll make something else out of that space. It already looks like I'm moving tomorrow.
I have been picking up all kinds of green habits lately. Not that we haven't been recycling since day one; the Hubs pulls the labels off of cans and recycles them with the paper (before he tosses the cans into the co-mingled) for years and years. I've been good, but not that good. Oh, I stopped running the water while I brush my teeth when I was a teenager, I always check the water level in the washer, and I almost always wash in cold water. I don't know what got me started these last few months, but I'm making an effort.
The first thing I did was get an aluminum water bottle and stop using plastic toss-aways. Then our town started taking all kinds of plastic, not just some kinds, in the recycling, so I'm rinsing out all kind of things and putting them there instead of throwing them away. So I thought I could start recycling plastic forks and spoons, which, I'm ashamed to say, I'm a big user of.
(As an aside, you know, I have a very small kitchen and no dishwasher, so I've been a huge fan of the disposable plates and cutlery for a long time.)
And now I'm recycling the paper plates, too. Of course, it's becoming pretty clear that if I'm going to be washing off paper plates and plastic forks so I can recycle them, it makes much more sense just to use real plates and real forks. So now I'm there, too.
I usually bring a second cup of coffee to work with me in the morning in a small aluminum thermos, but today I wanted to stop and get some Dunkin, and I found myself bringing a travel mug with me so I wouldn't have to throw away a paper cup with a plastic lid. (Oh, I've also started using a real mug for my morning coffee at home instead of a paper cup. I am no longer the best customer in Costco's paper goods aisle.) Turns out I don't want to carry my thermos every day, and I don't want to stop at Dunkin everyday, either. I need to be able to make myself a cup of coffee in the library. (They make one pot of decaf every day in our cafeteria, and when it's gone, it's gone.) So last night I ordered this from Amazon. This is either going to be very cool or very weird. I can buy loose coffee at Dunkin and use that -- yum -- and I have a microwave so I can boil water, which I'll have to bring in a big bottle of. (Still working that part out.)
Storm's a-Comin'
It's beginning to look a lot like snow for tomorrow. There's a winter watch, or whatever they call it, for 6 am tomorrow to midnight, with a possible accumulation of 12 inches. So that would be a good bit of snow. The question is, if the roads are clear at six, will they call off school, knowing that possibly they will have to close school early and that people will have trouble getting home? The FIL, who used to be the one who made these decisions, would always say that closing school early was a problem because it would be dangerous for the little kids to walk home. Well, yeah, but his background is elementary, so I always think that the sooner we get the inexperienced drivers from the high school off the road and home, the better it is. And hardly any kids walk to and from school anymore, and if they do, their parents are walking with them.
Anyway, a snow day would be reeeeeaallly nice, because clearly, I never want to go to work, but I'm being cautious about my sick days at this point. Aside from the new drivers among the students, there are so many teachers who live an hour or more away -- why they do that I do not know -- and in places where the weather is worse, and sometimes they actually don't get the call that school is closed until after they've left home. The bottom line is that if the roads look bad, or you think they'll get bad, you need to stay home, even if you're a first year teacher, because it's smarter than being a last year human being.
The sun is actually out now -- it's about 2 pm -- for maybe the first time this week. How deceptive. I wonder what I'll wake up to tomorrow.
WATCHING FAMILY GUY :: ENTRY #1943
READING: Slam by Nick Hornby
My brother works at a schiil in Edison. They have already called it off for tomorrow.
ReplyDeleteFriday morning: they had already canceled school when I turned on the radio. It's 11:50 now, and all we have is clouds.
ReplyDeleteWhen I brought Husband his morning meds, he asked if U.D. were working. Her boss had already called and canceled. Okay, says Husband, can she take me to the barber?
(She did; he doesn't realize how lucky he is.)