I heart the Olympics

Adam, Joshua and I watched all four-and-a-half hours of the Olympics Opening Ceremonies last night. Sure, some of it got a little tired after that much time, but it was pretty damn cool.

From an outside observer's point of view, the only hitch came at the end during the torch ceremony when the fourth of the pillars didn't come up. Okay, it still looked good.

This morning, on Roger Ebert post this: @ebertchicago: U.S. tweeters being snarky about Canadian Olympics ceremony. Canuck reply: If you're so smart, why don't you have health care? I get the joke, but unfortunately, I think Americans would be snarky about ANYONE's opening ceremony. It's not just because of our history of thumbing our noses at the neighbors to the north.

I don't think I posted anything too snarky last night. Here's mine:

The cauldron kind of looks like it came from Superman's home planet.

Jeez, they could have at least given The Great One a rain coat or something to cover his head in the rain.

This has been keeping me busy during the opening ceremonies. Started a new sock. Excuse the bad photo. http://yfrog.com/3i6t0tj

Swedes have the best hats!

Wait! What? Thanks, NBC. Your commercial break totally screwed the athletes of my motherland. We're still rooting for you, Croatia.

Granted, I was knitting during the telecast, so I had something keeping me from becoming bored, but all in all, I thought it was a good show. Loved the Tom Sawyer-like prairie segment.

I would like to know, though, if NBC would have shown the footage of the luger if he would have been an American athlete. As we watched the news intro to the ceremonies, they showed him flying off the track, and I asked Adam and Joshua if they thought an American would be showed like that. The man died. Cover the story, but we don't need to see the footage over and over again.

We're talking about ethics in J1 this week. I think we can use that scenario as an example for the students to discuss in class. What would they do if they were the TV news producers?

Snow is falling again

When I woke up this morning, small flakes were flying. I headed out to the chiropractor, and then the large, wet flakes began. Right now, there's about six inches of fluffy snow on everything. The city hasn't been by to plow the road yet.

I'm heading out to the gym. Normally, weather like this would keep me from getting out on the road just to go to the treadmill. But, since it was conference week this week, and I haven't gotten to run AT ALL since Sunday, I've got to get out and do something before my nine miler this Sunday.

The chiropractor said I needed to wait until about 3 p.m., so that I wouldn't undue my adjustments or cause more trauma to my back. Unfortunately, during all of that waiting time, it's been snowing heavily.

If I see any other great photos, I'll post them later. These two were shot from my covered front porch when I got back from the chiropractor.

Safe travels, everybody!

Yikes. Things aren't looking good.

Anybody who hasn't been under a rock for the last year or so knows that the money is tight in a lot of places. The economy is "slowly recovering" according to some, but companies are laying people off, state budgets are looking awful, things are being cut, cut, cut.

Monday after school we had a meeting to talk about the district's budget forecast. It sounds awful. We've already cut $11 million between cuts made last year and cuts made during this year, and there are more to come.

Layoffs are on the table. Salary freezes are on the table. Program cuts are on the table. It's hard to know who's safe and what our jobs will look like next year. Some teachers might be teaching different classes, larger classes. I'm nervous. I pretty sure I won't LOSE my job, but if there aren't enough students signing up for yearbook, newspaper and journalism classes, suddenly I become an expensive proposition for the school and the district. I'm not certified to teach any other area, so I'm sort of stuck.

I spent last Thursday at the state capitol with four of my students. They competed in a contest sponsored by KSPA. Students interviewed our legislators to find out what they were thinking on the state's budget and so the school district's budget. Those we spoke to are not in favor of any sort of tax raises (not even on cigarettes). Their solution is to continue cuts. We're pretty much all the way through any fat there was, and we're getting into the muscle and bone.

Why not increase taxes on something that is NON-essential for life? Whatsa matter? Smokes getting to expensive for you? Well, QUIT. Or, help me educate the doctor who might save your black lungs someday.

I realize tax increases aren't a popular proposition, but when you are talking about schools, it's tough to to stomach cuts to programs. I saw that in my former district, they're talking about removing art classes from elementary schools. For some students, the chance to participate in art classes is a lifeline.

The scariest thing I heard on Monday during our staff meeting was that the district has already had to dip into our "reserve" fund to cover payroll three times this year. That means three times the state's payments didn't make it to the district in time to pay our salaries. That reserve fund sounds pretty important to me, but one of the possible "solutions" the state is proposing is districts returning those reserve funds.

If this keeps up, I might have to really get you clicking on the Google ads...we could be looking for some supplemental income.