Home from the River

I just got home from a few days spent in Laughlin with my sister, brother-in-law, my boyfriend, and two other couples that my sister knows. We were taking an end of summer trip to enjoy the river before going back to school but also to celebrate Michelle's 30th birthday. So we spent everyday on the water jet skiing around the lake and then came home to shower and then play around the hotel.

Since I'm a public school teacher, I only play penny slots so imagine how annoying it was to me when my dear boyfriend made $400 on penny slots in two days! I had horrible luck but did get to play the Wizard of Oz game and it was a blast! You actually watch little clips from the movie and hear the songs. Honestly, I think I was just playing to watch the game because I knew I wasn't really going to make money at it.

Speaking of making money, besides the $400 that David made playing pennies, we entered a drawing at the hotel and he won $5,000!!! Seriously?!? So needless to say, we had a great trip! I'll post some pictures from the trip later when I upload my camera but it was lots of fun. :)

Crazy Girl in the Mall

I was shopping with my Nana (Naner...for those who have met her) in the mall the other day and we walked into a clothing store. The place wasn't very busy and immediately after walking in a girl came up and asked if we needed any help. I chalked it up to her being bored and politely told her we were "just looking." I started picking up things that I wanted to try on and she rushed over again to see if she could start me a room. I was almost done so I politely declined, finished up, and headed towards the fitting rooms.

Like other stores, this store locks the fitting room doors. I find that extremely annoying so I turned to go find the girl to let me in and there she was standing right behind me. I was glad I didn't have to go wander through the store asking someone to open the door but it surprised me a little to have her behind me. I tried on my clothes and she came back a few times to see if I needed anything. I finally decided on a new pair of pants and when Nana and I went to check out, she ran up to the register and started ringing us up. Then the craziness started...

She kept stuttering and staring at me when she was talking to me and then finally looked me in the eyes and asked if I was the girl from Days of Our Lives.

I smiled and politely told her no. She responded with, "But if you were her, would you tell me? I know lots of starts lie so that they don't get hounded." I told her again that I wasn't her but that didn't stop her line of questions. It took her about 15-20 minutes to ring me up because she kept asking tons of questions because she apparently didn't believe me. Even when she was ringing up my Nana she didn't take her eyes off me. It was actually getting really creepy so I was thrilled when she finally finished ringing us up and we got to leave. Nana and I both booked it out of the store and when we got out, Nana said, "Well, she was strange." That was an understatement!

Olympics

Like most Americans, I have been glued to my television watching the Olympics in Beijing. It's totally awesome to watch these Olympians compete (niiiiice bodies on those swimmers!) but seeing bits and pieces of China has been awesome too. For those of you that don't know, I'm apply to go on an Asian study tour next summer with CSUF and I am really hoping the trip is to China!!

But anyways, I've noticed some random things about the Olympics and since I have a blog...that means I get to comment, right?

Why is gymnastics on so late at night? I know they say they're broadcasting LIVE but if the gymnastics doesn't come on until 10 pm PST...is it on at 1 am EST? I don't understand why they're on so late at night and I honestly don't think it's live...Anyone know how they work this??

Also, Misty May-Treanor and Kerri Walsh are totally awesome. They make beach volleyball look easy but for some reason, NBC commentators are calling them the "Golden Girls." Really, is that a compliment??
I love gymnastics and Shawn Johnson and Nastia Luikin have been fun to watch. But I wish I were Nastia's friend because I love her name. I feel like I could say it "NASTI-a" and snap my fingers with a head bobbing attitude. That would rock!

Pictures from the Bowl!

On the Loser Cruiser (aka shuttle) going from the parking lot to the Hollywood Bowl...we were very excited!

Clare and Katie enjoying some wine in our box!

Jenn and Ali with the Hollywood Bowl stage behind us!!

Les Miserables in Concert!!

I am incredibly blessed to have a great group of friends and last night, I was blessed even more. My friend Katie invited me to attend the Hollywood Bowl's production of Les Miserables in Concert. We had box seats thanks to the raffle she won at work and Katie, her sister Clare, my sister Ali and I attended. Clare made a delicious dinner with appetizer, entree, and amazing desserts from a local bakery. We got there early to eat dinner in our box and enjoy the yummy food, wine, and conversation before the show started. We were so cultured!

The show was awesome and so many of the players had amazing voices. Melora Hardin (from The Office) played Fantine and Jean Valjean and Javert were incredible as well. Ali took pictures so I'll post some as soon I can but it was tons of fun and I'm so glad I wasn't the only one to cry at the end (Thank you to Clare!). It was an awesome show with wonderful people and a box at the Hollywood Bowl!

Accelerated?

I'm taking some online classes right now to finish off my teaching credential. Here's the deal: I have a preliminary teaching credential that expires after 5 years. When you want to renew it for the first time, you have to jump through some hoops for the state. The hoops include having 30 post-bac units, a current first aid certificate, 2 years of BTSA completed, and take a computer, health, and special education classes. I took a computer class during my Master's so that's done but now I'm doing the health and special education classes online before school starts.

Both of the classes are accelerated so I earn 2 credits in two weeks and 3 credits in three weeks. Sounds awesome but there are papers due every other day because they didn't cut down the number of assignments for the accelerated classes...they just smashed them all together in a smaller amount of time. I've been writing 8 papers a week as well as doing online discussion assignments. Thankfully, I am almost done with one class and have only one week left on the other.

Here's what's funny to me though--the classes are accelerated for the students but apparently not the teachers. We have to bust our butts to turn in 4-5 papers a week but the teachers still have 7 days to do the grading. If we're writing papers on a daily basis, I think it's only fair that the teachers keep up. After all, I am left to do the rest of the assignments without any feedback from the teacher. Am I on the right track? Am I following APA standards correctly? It's always nice to see how teacher's grade to write assignments to that meet their quirks. Why don't they have to keep up with us?

Jr. Cheer Camp

So my cheerleaders are running a Jr. Cheer camp as a fundraiser this week. We invited girls from 5-12 to attend 4 days of cheers, games, stunts, jumps, tumbling, and mingling with high school cheerleaders. While I hate waking up at 5:30 in the morning during the summer (I can hear all of you with year-long jobs groaning but suck it up...you should have become a teacher), it's been really entertaining.

The little girls are very cute to watch when they're performing a cheer or dance. Their arms are all over the place and they're concentrating very hard. Actually, some of our little girls are pretty good. We have quite a few that are already doing back handsprings and can stunt in tosses. One girl even did a "pretty girl" at the top of a toss. A "pretty girl" is the picture at the top of this post. Seriously, it's hilarious to see a little girl (about 6 years old) with one hand on her head and one on her hip like that.

One more day of Jr. cheer camp and then the weekend!

Getting Started

So after reading different people's blogs for years (well, mainly just Carmen's) I am inspired to create my own. I am horrible at keeping in touch with friends and with so much going on in life packing everything into individualized emails just isn't happening for me right now. Hence, my blog. This will be my means on communicating the daily activities of my life with the individuals that I don't get to see or talk to as much as I would like. I hope that it doesn't take the place of emails, phone calls, or cards, but I know that I need to be more dedicated to communicating and I see this as a means to do that.

I'm going to give this a trial run and if it works, then I'll continue it. If I find myself bored with typing up my life (goodness knows I can't keep a journal for that reason), then I'll call it quits. But for now, let's see how it goes!

Any suggestions for how to improve my blog or tips on how to stay on top of it would be greatly appreciated!

Jenn