Not Bad...

An all around OK day. The kids were pretty good, and there were no major traumas. I finally am getting to the point where it feels like fun to go to work. I am not perfect, and not everything always goes according to plan, but it feels better. I feel as if I am beginning to have a slightly more intuitive feel for this group of students to the point that I can make some changes as the situation dictates. That was not often the case last year, and it has taken some time to get there, or closer to there, this year. More to come on this subject as the year progresses...

My mentor is here for two nights this time around. She will be helping our new rookie as well, so she will have two subjects with whom she can visit from now on.

There was snow in the air today, and there is some suggestion that there may be accumulation over night. Excitement is in the air, because as soon as there is snow, someone will get out a snowmachine. Once the river freezes, we will again be able to access the world of Bethel and $30 fajita dinners. Unfortunately, one of our favorite Bethel locations will be no longer, as I understand it. Shogun has been sold to new owners and its fate will remain unknown, at least for the time being. Bummer. If I had known, I would have made it a point to go there the last time that I was in town. I actually have to go back in three weeks. Maybe the Greek place will still be open...

Substitute NYO Coach...

And boy, am I underqualified! Mostly, I just kept asking them if they weren't supposed to be practicing something. Their real coach was busy filling out paperwork for the Rose Urban-Rural exchange program. She and her husband have acted as host families in the past, and apparently are going to do it again this year. The reps from the program were out here to visit, and we will be exchanging this year again with Ben Eielson High School in Fairbanks. We had an entertaining group here last year, and there will be more visitors in November.

My wife is off steaming with the girls, which leaves me here with the dogs. Fortunately, they are behaving well-sleeping, mostly. Not much else is going on. It is pretty much another week during the school year. No special events that I can think of. We will be a day short this week because of, you guessed it, yet another inservice. Nothing like sitting in day-long meetings for two weeks in a row. We get to do it again in another two weeks from Friday. I would say, "enough, already," but the district is not likely to listen to me all that closely. Funny how that works.

It was a pretty good day, and I hope that tomorrow is another. Not much better that you can ask for.

It's Monday and I'm Tired...

Time to get some sleep-it's been a busy day. I was up at 5:30, a mistake that I do not intend to repeat tonight. The day went ok-no children were killed, and I am not in custody. Just kidding...well, it is technically true. All is well, and snow is in the forecast for Wednesday, and the rest of the week, for that matter. After all, the first of October is nearly upon us, and winter is on the way.

Now for a good night's sleep...

And An Evening At Church To Top It Off...

We hadn't been to church since we got back, so off we went this evening...we wandered into a long Sunday night service. I actually enjoyed it-we are both thinking that we want to go more often. I kept having this thought that these are the people among whom I have chosen to live, and I want to be a part of the community in a deeper way. Father Vasily invited us to come up and do veneration of the icons, which we have hung back from doing, mostly out of a sense of shyness of some kind. We talked about it afterward, and had to laugh at the warm feeling that we both get when we go to church. I am not sure where it all goes from here, but it will be interesting.

To top it all off, we had one of those amazing harvest moons tonight. I caught it a little late, but it is the best that I could do...

Too Much Funky Stuff Lately...

Time for some joy. Too much mention of funk and gloom around here lately. We took an invigorating (cold) stroll to the airport this morning, along with the dogs, who like to frolic and run about all over the place. They get really antsy if they haven't had a walk in a while, and it had been a few days.

I got my lesson plans finished at last this afternoon, so that was a relief. The weather is still chilly, but there is abundant sunshine, with nary a cloud in sight. We booked our flights back to the midwest for Christmas, and we even got a discount on our hotel stay in Anchorage on the way back because we are frequent stayers at the hotel in question.

We have a short week because of inservices, and there will only be roughly eleven weeks before the holidays at the end of it. Good news all around, and I didn't even mention the discounted PFD fares and the frequent flier miles that I used to make the more expensive flight home a free one!!

I am hoping for a good week to come.

One Long-Ass Day...

We apparently slept through the alarm clock this morning, which had apparently been moved to the living room sometime during the night. The upshot of that was that we ended up (ok, I did) going into the second part of our inservice in our pajamas. It was perfect. We were confined to quarters yet again for a silly repetetive exercise, and then practiced some important skills. After that, we proceeded to hang around for another seven hours, doing lesson plans and giving a little counsel. There is a definite malaise in the local atmosphere, and I find myself wondering where it will lead. The amount of workload out here increases steadily, and like so many others in this economy, we find ourselves forced to work an increasing number of uncompensated hours to get our jobs done. Mandate follows mandate, and there does not seem to be any realistic consideration of the idea that people might have a life outside of the work place. I am not sure that there is even a concern about that part of employees' life at all. Maybe the philosophy is diffferent at the district level, but I am not reassured closer to home.

On the plus side, I am enjoying my kids more every week, as we all get to know each other better. This is a fun bunch, even when they are not angelic. Much better than the mix last year. Much. They like to stay after school to use their computers, and I usually don't mind staying around for them. So that part of it is good. It makes the other stuff more tolerable. Not great-tolerable.

In other news, the weather continues to be brisk and cool. There was a one-year feast for Ralph, the VPO that drowned a year ago. I had salmonberry pie and some delicious strips-some of the best that I have had this year. Some of my students were there and I chatted with them for a little bit. We got the mail and walked dogs. Big doin's in PKA...and now my sweetie is using her salad shooter to fix dinner. Man, I am lucky!

Not That Crazy About This Pattern...

Up again at 2 am...not anxious or stressed, just awake. It didn't seem to cause me any harm last night, but it is kinda weird...I'm not sure that it is a great thing in the long run...it gives me the chance to catch up with the news stations back home-go Spartans and Wolverines! After all these years and wandering, I am still a Michigan boy at heart.

The long part of our Friday-Saturday daily double is done-most of what we will be doing is recertifying for our crisis intervention certification. I am going to try to get some lesson plans written this morning so I can get it out of the way and enjoy some of the weekend-we will be out at noon. We started prep for after school program last night-I may have to balance that commitment with others this year, like the region director job that I have accepted with our union-the site rep position for Napaskiak is also open and no one seems that anxious to jump on it. October is shaping up as busy-I wouldn't want to get bored!

The wind is still blowing briskly here, and a definite chill is in the air. I am not sure about the weather for the weekend, but I think that the big dogs will still need a run out at the airport-they are pretty wound up these days. The question is what there is to do for a change of pace-those can be hard to come by around here, but I think that one would be nice. I think that we are getting into a bit of a rut these days. A trip to Bethel might be nice, but I don't see that in the cards outside of the work arena for a while. There is an avocado-we could always have guacamole night...

It is about time to get back to bed, and get a few hours of sleep while I still have the chance...