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.

Running on the brain, sunburn on the head

Sunday's training schedule was an 8-mile run. I got up and did it fairly early, so I wouldn't mess up our weekly Panera grading date. I knew I wouldn't feel like running after we were finished.

Based on the weather, I probably would have felt like running after Panera. When I left the restaurant, it was almost 50 and sunny out. But, because I motivated early, I ran inside. On the treadmill. For. Eight. Miles. At 8:30, when I left for Gold's it was only 30 out, and I knew I couldn't slog through that temp by myself.

Thankfully, I got one of the TWO good treadmills (seriously, Gold's, it's 2010. Can we upgrade our 1987 model treadmills?). And, even better, the one I got was right in front of the TV, so I got to choose my running accompaniment for the morning. I chose E! Channel, because I knew I could watch The Soup, E! News Weekend and The Daily 10. Perfect fluff for 90 minutes of running.

The run felt pretty good. I wasn't dying at the end, but it did get pretty monotonous on the treadmill. I can't wait until temps get high enough to do all my runs outside.

Anyway, back to the title of this post. I must have had running on the brain after Sunday, because that night I had the strangest dream. It's coming back to me in bits and pieces.

I was in a strange city, running in a marathon. In the middle of the race, there was a "challenge" of some sort. We ran into an open stadium, and I remember that I changed my shoes (quickly, as if I was racing) and a man was shouting instructions to me.

"Run up the stairs, all the way, once. Then, run around the top of the stadium once, then run back down the stairs. Then, continue on your marathon way."

Uh, what?

I barely remember doing it in the dream, but I'm pretty sure I was climbing the stairs walking, then crawling, then pushing through it. Somehow I made it out of the stadium.

The next thing I remember from the dream is that there was a stop in a hotel room. I assume it was my room, because all of my luggage and gear was in the room. (How convenient that my lodging was right on the race route, and that I had remembered my hotel key card...)

Once inside my room, I removed the white visor I was wearing, thinking at that exact moment "Jeez. A visor? That was stupid. My part is going to be so sunburned."

Sure enough, the next scene I remember from the dream is me looking at the top of my head in a mirror to see a giant red and pink patch of blistered skin just above my forehead. Ouch.

I fashioned a covering for that sunburned patch out of something, slathered on a bunch more sunscreen on the rest of my exposed skin and headed out of the room to finish the marathon.

I can't tell you HOW I finished the race, because the last thing I remember as my alarm went off was walking out of the hotel room.

I do remember stumbling through my bedroom door into the bathroom because I wasn't fully awake. I hate being jarred from a deep, dreamful sleep by the darned alarm clock. It makes me off all morning!

A knitting progress report

One of my goals for 2010, as reported at the first of the year:

Keep knitting. And trying new and different patterns. Work through the yarn stash. Knit up what I already have, and then I can get new fun yarn. Maybe I'll start knitting things and randomly sending them to people I know...Who knows.

Since then, I've worked on a handful of projects. I completed a hat for Adam and below, you can see the matching scarf I'm working on. I've made a lot of progress, but it's just ribbing, and requires lots of weaving in ends because of the striping. Because of all that, I've taken small breaks from the scarf for other projects.


I'm participating in a sock KAL (knit along) that my mom told me about. I've knit A sock before, so this helps me meet the goal of trying something different. I've never done a KAL before, and I'm hoping that because I'm doing it with a bunch of other people, I'll actually get a PAIR of socks knit by the end of this project.

It's fun because we get new instructions on Friday afternoons. I get an easily digestible knitting assignment for each weekend.

In other KAL news, I also tried this dishcloth KAL from Rachel's Knitting Corner. She gives a washcloth knit along on the third week of each month, and you knit just a few rows a day. Again, a good excuse to sit down and do just a little bit of knitting each night.

I just finished it tonight. Needs to be blocked, as you can probably see. I used two colors of Sugar and Cream 100 percent cotton yarn. It's my go-to dishcloth yarn. I don't usually use more than one color of yarn, so again I was able to work on my goal of trying new knitting techniques. It was actually pretty easy to carry the two colors along the edge.

I've got a few more rows to do on the sock in the next few days, then I need to get back to work on Adam's scarf. I'd like to finish it within the next week or so.

Maturity Notice

I received a "maturity notice" in the mail the other day. At first, I thought maybe someone was patting me on the back for being a good girl, having a good job, nice house, etc.

It wasn't. It was something even better than that. We paid off our little red Ford Focus! Woo hoo! The montly payments weren't that bad, because it was a 72-month, zero-percent loan, but still. I think that's an accomplishment. And, anyone who worked with me at the Eagle knows that for a while there, I changed cars pretty frequently.

The Focus doesn't have a lot of miles on it, either, so it should last us a while more. We might not have a bunch of fancy stuff, but we have what we need, and now the only debt we have is the payment on my car. That's a nice feeling. I'm glad we don't have to spend our paychecks paying for stuff bought months (and in some cases, years) before.

For those of you with kids, be sure you're teaching them about credit cards and debt, because there isn't a class in the public schools that deals with that. We touch on it a little bit in our advisory classes, but personal finance is definitely something kids should learn before they head off for the easy-credit land of college.

Driving the Dodge Caravan thru the Taco Bell drive thru

I watch a lot of TV. Those of you who know me or read this blog have probably figured that out. Despite that fact, I don't watch a lot of commercials. I'd say 75 percent of my TV watching is on the DVR these days.

I'm either not home, or too busy at the time the show is on, to watch it live. The other 25 percent is mostly treadmill time, when it's on as a distraction.

Lately, though, I've noticed two commercials that really chap my hide.

First, and some of you have already commented on this on Twitter and Facebook, is the Taco Bell Drive Thru Diet. I'm just going to say it: Are you freaking kidding me? Unless that woman ate super fatty menu items at Taco Bell every day of the week earlier in her life, I don't see how eating Taco Bell can help you lose weight.

Sure, the "Fresco" menu items might be healthier choices than say, the Burrito Supreme, but it's not diet food. Give me a break. I'm pretty sure if I were to go on the Drive Thru Diet I would gain weight, since I don't eat fast food more than once or twice a week (a benefit of not being a newspaper photographer anymore, when I used to eat it all the time!).

The other commercial that is driving me crazy is the Dodge Caravan commercial that tells men "Because come on, what's more manly than driving around with your five offspring in the car?" Seriously? That's the measure of a man now? How many children he can father? Is Dodge trying to cash in on the Duggars and John and Kate "phenomenon"? I'm pretty sure the last thing the planet needs is a car company encouraging people to overpopulate the planet even more.

That Dodge commercial is incredibly sexist. It's okay for women to be stuck driving minivans, but if a man does it...He needs to be pounding his chest the entire time.

Are there any other commercials out there right now we can discuss?

What a 180.

I won't go into too much detail about winter break and then winter break 2.0 (the three snow days last week) because I'm sure you're tired of hearing about "all the extra time off" teachers get.

This week has been a complete turnaround from last week's life of leisure.

First of all, we're back to regularly scheduled programming at school.

Second, yearbook is trying to complete a deadline that was due last Friday. We didn't finish because of the snow days. Plus, we had proofs to return on Monday night.

Third, newspaper's deadline is next Monday (which we have off for Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday), so they had worknight this week.

Fourth, my grad class was Tuesday night from 5-9.

Fifth, AFTER newspaper worknight, we had 8th grade round up, where they come in and learn about all of the possible activities they can get involved in. That didn't get over until 8:30.

So, Monday, got home about 6:30.

Tuesday: 9 p.m. (prof let us out a tiny bit early, thankfully).

Wednesday: 9 p.m.

Tonight: 5:40 (left fairly early, just had heavy traffic heading home).

Tomorrow is finally Friday. I think last week's unexpected vacation left me seriously unprepared for a full work week. I had psyched myself up to return on the day after Christmas break, and having the snow days was a real motivation killer!

There's good news and bad news at the end of this tunnel: Since it's MLK day on Monday, newspaper won't have a day at school to work on deadline. So, we're working on Saturday during the day. Good news is, WHEN we get done on Saturday (when, not IF), we won't have to work on Saturday, so I'll still get to have a "weekend" - two days off.

When you think of me this week, visualize a hamster on a wheel, trying in vain to keep up. I'm going to do a quick Biggest Loser Wii workout right now, before 30 Rock, since I have had ZERO time to exercise this week. There's a 7-mile run staring at me this weekend. It won't be pretty.

Can I get a fist pump for GTL?

If you don't know what that stands for, consider yourself among the lucky (and smart) ones.

I've been hearing here and there of a new show on MTV called "Jersey Shore." Bobby Moynihan did a great impression of one of the main characters on Saturday Night Live a few weeks ago. My interest was piqued.

That says a lot, considering I haven't actively turned the channel to MTV in, say, 12 years. Oh, wait, there was that one season when they ran "The Paper" about a high school newspaper staff. I did watch that show each week.

But I digress. I hate MTV these days. Not for the reasons one would assume a 32-year-old would grow to hate it. When I was young (middle and high school) I thought old people wouldn't like MTV because it would be too loud, and they would grow to hate the type of music played on MTV. Little did I know the reason I would grow to hate MTV is because it's not M TV any more. Ridiculous "reality" shows about self-involved 20-somethings just do not hold my interest.

After watching last week's "The Soup" I decided to DVR an episode of "Jersey Shore" so I could see what all the fuss is about. I figured I couldn't deride it til I tried it.

Let the derision begin.

Basically, all you need to know is that GTL stands for "Gym, Tanning, Laundry" which, combined with barhopping, fist pumping and general debauchery, is all the cast members feel they need to do with their lives. I'm hoping that any teens who are watching this stupid show are watching it because they get a good laugh out of it, not because they aspire to be like this and be on MTV.

If you're looking to make a little money in the stock market, look into hair gel, because these gentlemen are ALL ABOUT the hair gel, and god knows it's only a matter of time before it becomes a trend.

I suppose the show is good for a laugh, because Adam, Mitzi, Bets and I got some good laughs out of one we watched last night. Our laughs mostly came from the ridiculous nicknames they've given themselves: Snooki AKA Snookers, Snickers, Mike The Situation, Sammi the Sweetheart, etc.

If you want to find out what your "Jersey Shore" nickname would be, there are a few nickname generators out there. Here's our group nicknames:

Me: The Tight End
Adam: A-Train
Mitzi: The Opportunity
Betsy: Tanny

I need to stop writing about this right now, because I'm afraid that combined with the drop in IQ I experienced from just watching the show, trying to dissect the show might make me a total idiot.

Have any of you watched it?