There’s a quietness in my soul that I haven’t felt since December. Many things are coming to an end very soon: the first year MAT cycle, the students’ school year, and my curriculum class. My favorite part of any task has always been when it’s all said and done and I have achieved closure. The best part is how well I sleep when I don’t have a bunch of small things keeping my brain up at night. I do a lot of problem solving in my sleep, but when there are no projects due or papers to write, my brain takes a break.

It’s odd that I don’t mind that the closure of one chapter always brings the opening of another. I mean, in about 3 weeks or so, I’m going to start another leg of this race that is more challenging than the one I just finished. I guess I like the page between chapters. You know, the one that has been left intentionally blank. In that little section, there is nothing to lose and nothing to gain. Sometimes, that’s the best place in the world to be.

I turned in my massive MAT portfolio on Saturday (somewhere in the neighborhood of 380-400 pagses). It represents an entire year’s worth of teaching, reflecting, teaching, and re-teaching…It feels so good to have that out of the way. Now, all I gotta do is survive one more observation and finish my curriculum framework. This time next year, I’ll be fully certified and get a nice raise. The upcoming summer, fall, and spring are going to suck, royally. If I can survive one more year, though, it’ll all be worth it.

I don’t know what’s in the water, but the kids were very cranked up today. I guess Springtime does it.

I now have a wireless Internet connection in my humble rental. Granted, it is a wireless connection to a dial-up connection, but I can go anywhere in the house and surf. I’ve taken advantage of it mostly while lounging in my new recliner or kicking back on the couch (also new!). If only I had a toilet built into the recliner…

Cans of my favorite carbonated beverage, Pepsi now comes in 14 oz. cans. THE WORLD IS COMING TO AN END! Cans of pop have been 12 oz. for a very, very long time. Our standard pop machines won’t be able to dispense these bastardized cans. We must put a stop to this! If we don’t, the evil soda companies will start making us use Canadian money to buy stuff out of their machines…Click here to sign a petition to end the sale of 14 oz. cans of pop.

Courtesy of the friendly neighborhood rubbermouse, comes the Gizoogle.com. It will instantly translate your page into the smoothest dialect ever: Snoop talk! This really ain’t nothin’ but a G thang!

For any of you budding web designers out there, I recommend you visit Web Pages That Suck.com. One of the best ways to learn good web design is to look at the WORST web design. Gotta love it.

Life is going great: I’m doing well at my job and with graduate school. It’s just too bad that I’m so bored with my routine. On the weekends, all I do is grade papers, plan, and do tedious work in search of my Masters degree. Grading papers and planning isn’t that bad, but if I have to write another reflection on educational philosophy, I think I’m going to slip into a permanant narcoleptic state!!! Grrrrr!!!

On a brighter note, I looked at a house for sale today. I really like it. If I can get the loan for it, I think I’ll go for it. It has redwood siding, and two rooms that were added on about 20 years ago are solid redwood. It’s gorgeous. Instead of throwing this rent money out the window, I’d like to build some equity. Somehow I don’t think I’ll get the loan, but who knows. I threw my hat into the ring. The most they can do is say “NO!”

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

I just got back from Mom and Dad’s with a load of my books. I’ve been slowly funneling all my books to this place since I moved in. This tote-full had been MIA until Dad found them yesterday.

Most are computer books, but my stats and quantitative analysis text were in there too. I’m glad I found them. I really like crunching student data: Stats, when taken with a grain of salt, can be a powerful way to see hidden trends. Right now, I’m really interested in the correlations between students performance/attendance and Socioeconomic Status (SES). The correlations have been studied to death, but I want to do some models myself, just to see how “statistically normal” my students are.

I found my Ender’s books too! I forgot how awesome they are. I think I read Ender’s Game and Ender’s Shadow back to back in 2 days.