Summer Dreams

I'm sitting in school right now supervising final exams. It's pretty boring because I can't grade papers until the kids are done with the exam, I have nothing to prepare for next week since it will be summer, and I'm super clean and organized all year so I have nothing to clean now. So, I'm going to post about what I want to do this summer...

1. Visit Germany (since we already bought plane tickets and have a place to stay I'm pretty sure this one will happen)

2. Read 10 books

3. Sleep until at least 8 everyday

4. Go for a walk almost everyday (if it's nice out)

5. Bust out the sewing maching I got for Christmas and re-teach myself how to sew. I want to make blankets and clothes.

6. Go to the Farmer's Market on a regular basis

7. Try at least one new recipe every week

8. Become friends with someone who has a pool, the summer off, and lives near me

9. Take a lot of naps

10. Go to lunch with Matt several times

School Lunch

Today I enjoyed school lunch for the first time since I started teaching 4 years ago. I never ate the school lunch or even ventured into the cafeteria when I taught in Champaign and I've never bought lunch for myself in the 3 years I've taught at Mahomet. I have spent way too many hours in the cafeteria though since I had lunch duty last year, but I don't want to talk about that painful memory. But today the stars alligned and I bought myself a school lunch. Several conditions had to be just right and they all were. I had cash, I had no food at home, I was too lazy to drive to Arby's, and a friend and co-worker who frequents the lunch line agreed to help me get through this ordeal. So, at 10:55am I ventured to the lunch line quickly picked up an iceburg lettuce salad with ranch and a soft pretzel with cheese (maybe) and paid the cashier $3.40 for the fine cuisine. This combination of items was not the "school lunch" but that looked very weird. The lunch at my school is not very good and many kids brown bag it. Although, it's good to know I have options even if they aren't too tasty.

In other news regarding previous posts...

1. Matt snores.

2. I'm still having some issues getting recertified because I tried to do it online. I figure we live in the 2000's so I should have no problem doing it online. But to make a long story short the certification specialist emailed me and said she was confused. So that makes me a little nervous. I have until June 30th though so I'm not sweating yet.

In The Middle Of The Night

Last night, Anne and I went to dinner with a few friends to a local restaurant called Seven Saints. The signature items at Seven Saints are mini-burgers/sandwiches called Sliders (similar to White Castle, but better). They have various types of Sliders, from salmon to bratwurst to buffalo chicken. Anyway, we enjoyed our dinner and our time there.

Skip ahead a few hours.....at 3:15 a.m., I was woken up by Anne and the following conversation ensued:

Anne: "Matt, I can't sleep. I'm going crazy. I keep thinking that I have to figure out the perfect combination of Sliders before I can go to sleep."
Matt: "Anne, just go to sleep."
Anne: "OK."

It is events such as this which remind me of why it was a great decision for me to marry Anne.

Reading Pen

I just learned about something cool today called a reading pen. Basically if you are having trouble reading a word or don't know the definition of a word you are reading you can use this pen to scroll over the word and get the pronunciation or definition. It looks pretty cool. I learned about it in a meeting with a student who is very bright but sometimes has trouble with words so that causes problems with his reading comprehension. The pen pictured above seems to be one of the top of the line pens and is about $250 (there seem to be cheaper ones that just read and don't give the definitions for about $70)