cant wait till friday...

mamahat: So I'm home early...Choclahontas has gone off to her class...moodmagicbarbie is pissy, partly because her school went on a trip and she was not allowed to go...why? you ask...who the hell knows...
Personally I think it's because she stands up for herself, and I stand up for her, and they find quiet ways to punish her...

My house is not clean, but choclahontas VOLUNTEERED to give me twenty dollars (ten dollars a day for everyday that I have to trip over her shit), actually I can use it, gas is killing the budget.

I love my house, I love my exposed brick walls, my Terrace, living in a duplex. Our flowers, that we started from seeds, are growing beautifully...looks like they will start blooming in June, giving us a full summer of beauty. I have the back door open along with the windows and the breeze that blows through here is WONDERFUL...I don't even need an air conditioner on the hot days, we just have powerful fans that circulate the air.

moodmagicbarb is going to clean her room for inspection...she gets a dollar for every drawer that's right-clothes folded and no hidden garbage...that's six dollars, and she gets "bonus money" for shoes put away, closet right etc...she can make extra money for sweeping the stairs and putting all the shoes away...one weekend she made fifteen dollars.
I have found with girls, money talks. They like to feel that they accomplished something and have something to show for it...moodmagicbarb usually buys nails, or gets them done at the salon.

My crazy neighbor, who likes me but is the poster child for ADHD so I'll NEVER go out with him, is outside my window fixing his car...he LOVES to converse out the window...he's cool though, and he really looks out for us and the girls...tunner loves to call his name, and will actually whine when it's time to go in...I remind him "that WONT be your grandpa kid, get over it"...one hyper pain in the ass is enough for the family.

professorhat: I graded a paper two weeks ago, the student was not happy with the grade, so the next week, she corrected the paper and begged me to reread it and give her another grade...if your handing in a paper, common sense should tell you to read it over, don't just fix the mistakes and think it's okay...the paper has to be outstanding.
The class had to write a five page research paper on how they would counsel a child or adolescent. They had to include the child's developmental age using Freud, Piaget and Erickson, and describe the presenting issue...I told them that if they got stuck, they could make up a client or use a character out of a book. This bitch chose to use the character from the book "Push" by Sapphire. If you haven't read it, don't.
I don't know what she did, but I saw MORE mistakes in her paper....she also added two more pages, like that's going to get her a better grade...little secret, after five pages if it's not good I don't finish reading it...
So being that I'm reading the paper a second time, I read it and correct it more closely. She ended up only getting three points higher than her first grade. I only did that because she did make some sort of an effort. But she attempted to blow me up in class...getting all loud and shit, accusing me of shouting out her grade...WHY...I very calmly apologized for shouting out her grade though I said "I really must have had a brain fart, because I truly don't remember saying that". But I explained to her that she did not follow the outline and her research paper really sounded like a book report. She went into great detail in describing the most horrific part of the book- when the mother was describing to a social worker her husband abusing the girl while she was still in pampers (like I said, DON'T read this book...sorry Sapphire)...took a WHOLE PARAGRAPH describing this shit...I could feel her excitement jumping off the page as she recounted the story...
In the other class, a women wrote...uh copied...a paper...I gave it back to her and told her "this does not sound like your voice"...she was so lucky I didn't turn her ass in, but this is her last class for her BA, so I'm being nice...
This bitch rewrites the paper, uses only Internet searches that she didn't even cite, and takes pages in listing information that was totally irrelevant to the topic...so she got a very low grade and was PISSED...but this one tried to butter me up earlier in the semester...I'm young, but not dumb...and I remind them often that I too was a student and I DO know the tricks...
Ah, my first semester teaching...I can't wait to see my evaluations...I really don't care if they are good or not, just interested in seeing what they think of me...