Today after my history class I headed down to the café with my friend, Kristina, she is the roller derby chick I told you about. We always have a good time talking, and for being total opposites we find we have many things in common. While we were sitting outside enjoying a soda, a boy from my creative writing class zoomed by in his electric wheelchair. He sits next to me in class and supposedly writes poems about suicide. He is pretty funny, loud and opinionated. He stopped by and hung out with Kristina and myself. We were talking about general topics and basically all of us were having a good time. Kristina was complaining how she had to work later, and I mentioned how my vacuum cleaner was broken. I told them how my son Tommy calls these ‘first world problems’, Beau then threw out the “well you should feel sorry for me, my legs don’t work and I am in a wheelchair”…………..omg, did he just say that out loud? Kristina and I looked at each other and then at him. I replied with “Oh, so we get to make politically incorrect jokes to you”? His reply was “Bring it on”.
I am going to like this kid. We then joked with him about his being in a chair and he now calls me mom because of my age. When it was time for us to go to class he told me to stick with him, that we would take the elevator…what there are elevators here??? After class we were leaving the classroom and we were going in opposite directions, he pushed on his electric wheelchair joystick and sped up going very quickly towards the glass door, ( he was just getting there fast) I yelled, “Hey kid, what do you think you are doing, trying to ram the glass door down”. Everyone stopped and looked at me and I could hear him laughing from the opposite side of the building.
The study of poetry sucks, there I said it. I am studying poetry in not one but two classes right now. My English teacher is not a huge fan of poetry so she had us do a fun assignment today. She explained the meaning of a few poems today and then had us break up into groups; we had to name a song with the same theme as the poem. We came up with “Tears in Heaven” by Eric Clapton to go with a poem about a man who lost his first born son on his 7th birthday (the sons 7th birthday, not the dads). We matched “I’m like a bird” with some poem about wandering clouds. I will say this; I did enjoy poetry for a teensy weensy bit today.
I dropped my humanities class and have avoided the nasty walk across campus. The thought behind the drop was that it was too much work for me to accomplish and still put ample effort into my other classes. I also still get to wear cute shoes to class everyday and not be forced to wear good walking shoes. BONUS
Hurricane Hanna is coming this way towards the end of the week. It looks like it will hit the east coast on Friday. Hmmm, ugg, yuck. I hope Simon’s band performance isn’t cancelled, or worse, school will be cancelled again. I’d like my three kids to spend some time together over Thanksgiving, and not Tommy watching them go to school each day that week while he stays home alone. Hurricane season needs to end quickly; I am tired of it already! I thought when we moved to Florida we were going to worry about gators, I never gave the storms a thought.
The Salisburys are coming over today for burgers and pool volleyball, yea! Now that Tommy is gone they are up one family member, but we have HEIGHT! I made potato salad late last night and Teresa is bringing her famous 7 layer dip, are you jealous yet Tommy??? Olivia made her special bar cookies and I made some awesome cookies yesterday for a work function and I think there are a few left. I still need to run to the store for an onion, tomato, lettuce, catsup and cheese. I always forget the small things. I will post some pictures later, we haven’t been very good at taking them lately and I promise to do better. Tomorrow we all start school again and I am ready to be back on schedule.
Prayers go out to all of those dealing with Gustav.
Tonight was Simon’s first football band performance, we all loved watching him play his sax. For some reason they didn’t march and go into formation, but they are planning that for the next game. He had a huge smile on this face the entire time. Tommy is taking a bus to St. Louis tomorrow for the big Mizzou v Illinois football game. He is so excited for this fun new experience. Olivia has 3 cheer friends over for a sleepover tonight, gonna be a long night.
Sarah Palin…..hmmmmm. All I can say is that we will either have the first African American president or the first woman V.P. I know what I am hoping for.
School is good, that’s about all I have to say about it. If I really think about how many research papers or “response” papers I have to write this term my stomach starts churning and I throw up a little bit in my mouth.
Okay, I will talk about it a little bit, but not scholastic issues. Issues more important than that, me being forced to walk across campus in the hot and humid weather.
On Monday and Wed. I have all three classes in one building on the same floor, so I only have to make the hot as hell dash from the car inside the school once. My classes are all back to back with my first and second class in the same classroom, neat. My fifteen minutes in between classes are spent walking downstairs with my new BFF Kristina and getting a Diet Dr. Pepper from the coffee shop. We chat for a bit and then I head back upstairs. My humanities teacher has complained both days about how far she has to walk from her first to her second classroom, so she is now changing where my classroom is. Remember, this is the woman who said my paper would have been an A except for some MLA issues, so we are on thin ice anyway. She tells us today that starting next Wed. our class will now be held in the D building. A loud eruption is heard in the classroom; apparently building D is farther away than BFE. So now I go from building L run to building D, then head back to L all without being late. Apparently this college marks you absent after your third tardy…rude. One other thing to mention, our campus is under construction and all walkways from building L to D are routed around the ENTIRE CAMPUS!!! Plus, most of the parking around D is being used for construction vehicles, so there goes that idea of driving around the detour that takes you off campus and then back on to get to that lot. Did I mention that it’s blasted hot here and still like 70% humid?????
On the bright side, I am learning a ton and meeting new people.
I had a great time at school today and am looking forward to this semester. My women’s history class is going to be great and I made a new friend. Kristina with a K is a 25 year old-lip pierced-roller derby playing chick. We hit it off instantly and she accompanied me to the bookstore to purchase my textbook. Humanities is being taught by the same teacher that gave me a B in English, so I have something to prove to her. We will be doing soap sculptures and a play in class. Creative writing isn’t going to be a “cake walk” as Tom predicted. We will be writing short stories, works of fiction and poems. I am not a poet so this should be interesting. We will be participating in writing workshops and I am looking forward to this new experience. There are some crazy characters popping up in my classes, but I need to give it one more class time before I deem them “worthy” of mentioning.
Tommy started school today and called me after his classes. He seems to be enjoying his classes and his professors. He mentioned that his philosophy professor is a young man in his late twenties with sleeves of tattoos on his arms. Should be an enlightening class for him and I know he is excited. He picked up his season football tickets today and can’t wait for the first game. The college treats the kids to many fun activities around campus. Friday night they had the band Augustana perform, Saturday morning the freshmen whitewashed the M and Sunday night they participated in “tiger walk”, which is where the incoming freshmen walk through the historic columns, symbolizing their commitment to the school. Very cool stuff.
Tom started teaching a new cohort of programmers today. We had them over yesterday for the annual day before party. Fiea always attracks smart, nice kids.
In other news, a new storm is brewing to the South of us.
I start school again tomorrow, and am once again apprehensive and nervous. I know what to expect this time, but I am taking a full load (12 hours). Tom warned me that summer semester was easier than fall and spring are, so this makes me nervous too. I have my folders full of filler paper, my pencil bag full of pens, pencils, highlighters and a stapler. My book bag is by the front door ready for tomorrow.
Monday Classes:
US women’s history
Humanities, Greek/Roman history
Creative Writing
Faye won’t go away! The kids will miss their third day of school tomorrow, crap. Apparently today was the day they should have missed, but went to school. The pool is getting close to overflowing and the roads are covered with twigs, leaves and brancehs. Simon’s english class was flooded today and they had to move to another classroom. We came across a major tree/powerline down and took some pictures. Our power has gone out twice in the last hour. I am glad to be home with the family but I really miss the nice warm non humid days of Columbia, Missouri.
