Well, I'm home sick today. I hate calling in the day after a holiday break. People think you're just trying to extend your vacation. Now, honestly if I was going to extend my vacation would it be by laying on the couch with a box of kleenex and a glass of apple juice in and out of sleep between coughing up a lung? Not likely. The couch, apple juice and sleep sounds ok, but the rest is for the birds. I hate mucus! Yuck! How can a body produce that much mucus? Gross. Time to leave this topic.

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving. I did. There's nothing like Thanksgiving, turkey, dressing, all the fixin's, crying nieces and nephews (my kids are past that stage, thank God) sulking teenagers who are just too cool for this family crap, and dogs looking for scraps. It's at this time of year that you realize how small a house really is. Did you know it was possible to cram 15 people eating pie and trying not to spill their coffee and a dog into an area 8 foot square and still have room for a wrestling match to take place with the 4 year old twins and anyone who will tickle them? Well it is and it's kind of fun as long as you don't need to get to the bathroom fast. Give it up, wear a diaper. Can't wait til Christmas!

Speaking of Christmas, it's time to Shop! I love and hate Christmas shopping. I love buying presents, but always get that sick to my stomach feeling when it comes time to pay. That damn cashier stands there with this big dumb smile on thier face, "six hundred seventy eight dollars and twenty eight cents. Would you like to save 10% on your purchase today by applying for yet another credit card?" Hell no!! The last thing I need is more plastic in my purse! I just sold my first born to pay for his Christmas presents. You figure that one out. It's so obvious my husband doesn't do the shopping, he thinks we can still do Christmas for a couple hundred bucks. He lost track about 15 years ago. He always seems so surprised that it costs more than ten dollars for a gift for his sister. Geez how many candles can I by for the poor girl. Maybe I'll get her a Snickers bar this year.

Well, hang in there people it's the holidays and they are joyous, bank breaking, and never going to go away. SO COPE! That's what I do.

MAN or WOMAN! Teachers talk about how much they love to have their summers off. but I'm telling you this makes September seem like a cruel joke! You're going through your happy life sitting in your favorite Adorondac chair, sipping iced tea, getting some sun...when WHAM!!! It's September! All of a sudden it's back to work all day, only to get home and drive the kids to soccer or dance, or scouts or some other thing they just have to do. Summer has lulled you into a false sense of tranquility all the time plotting against you with Sept. Now, I know teachers say they work all summer getting ready for school in the fall, but at the risk of being beaten severly by my colleagues, I must say planning for the fall while laying in your favorite hammock does not equate to a full time job during the summer months. We have it pretty good people.

So, I come running into the house wildly tonight looking for whoever I need to drive wherever, when it hits me,  nobody has to be anywhere! what will I do?!  Monday is a free night! Get somethings done that's what I'll do! I actually returned the movie before the late fee, filled prescriptions AND ate dinner before 9:00!!! I feel like I've had a vacation! Five whole hours to get things done. After dinner, I attacked the mountain of laundry, which has grown over the last week to gargantuan proportions, with great ferver and zeal. I folded and folded and then it happened. I sat down on the couch. OOOOHHHH NOOOO! My body was fooled into believing it was time to relax. Silly, silly body. What was it thinking? What was I thinking? Oh well, at least I made a dent in it before my ass won the fight. I still think September is a cruel joke like a cold bucket of water poured over you while you nap in the sun, but hey at least there's Mondays. What the hell has life come to when you look forward to Mondays? I think I'm turning into my mother.

So, I'm three days into my new teaching position. We won't have students until the 4th so this week has been dedicated to "professional development". Fancy way of saying meetings, meetings, and more meetings. I got to work today thinking I was having a meeting at one building and find out I am supposed to be at another building all the way across town. Not my fault mind you. "We got an e-mail". Yeah, you got an E-mail, I don't have a working password yet!  So, I made a grand enterence into the room, fortunately with a co-worker who had a similar experience, having to walk the full length of the room between the speaker and the teachers. HHHMMMM....I felt a little conspicuous.  It was pretty funny actually.

Starting a new job is crazy stuff people! You know you try to make a good impression but I'm a really active faculty member and I have been teaching for 15 years and welllll, let's just say I'm pretty confident. Now, some people think that's great. They look at me and say, "now, there's a real go getter!" But there's that other group that looks at you like, " who does she think she is?" or the group that has a look on their face which could mean, " she is completely nuts". My least favorite is the blank facers, you know the ones I'm talking about. It's that woman who lacks any expression when you say something witty. She just looks at you.  But then some teacher she's been teaching with for 10 years comes up and she is all like, smiling and laughing. Ok, so there's a brush off  Those are the people I make sure to dog for the remainder of the time I work with them. I foust myself upon them and eventually they can't help themselves they start to like me. I tend to grow on people that way.  

Ok, on almost every faculty there is the nay sayer. They're the guy who sits at the back of the room during every staff meeting with his arms crossed over his chest and resting on the basketball under his shirt.   Now, I think our district is really forward thinking and innovative. He however, thinks change is bad. Really bad. Oh yeah and he doesn't know how to use a computer. The guys counting the minutes to retirement. Can anyone say get to it fella! So, he makes me crazy, every one of them I've ever worked with. This guy I always kill with kindness. Makes him nuts. They think I'm just this really sticky sweet girl, who's so nice it makes them ill. What they don't know is that's the point.

Time to wrap this up. I've got to get dinner on the table and put on a pot of coffee. Last Comic standing is on tonight. I love that show!

Today my husband and I went shopping for cars. When I say cars, I indeed do mean plural. Since I have aquired this new job, I will be driving an hour to work. I currently drive a durango. Durangos and good gas mileage, not so much. My husbands car is really well used...up. At least the door doesn't fall off of it when you try to open it anymore. So, we are both going to get new cars. It's funny how my internal money monitor makes my stomache lurch and all the blood flows from my face when I say that.

Now that my cheeks have regained some of their rosieness, I will tell you picking out a car is not easy. Far worse than picking just the right pair of black boots not to mention the purse. Fuel economy, safety, handling on God aweful Michigan winter roads... can I tow a boat with it? Can I drive it 40 miles on one tank of gas (not likely if you can tow with it)? Egad! I want a big car, but should drive a small one. We need a vehicle to tow the boat or should we keep the old beater Jeep to do that? Oh and by the way how are we going to pay for this? Just imagine being this salesman when we finally make up our minds. So, what kind of deal can you give me if I buy two cars today?  Kaching!

I can't believe I go back to work on Monday. The summer is gone and I'm a teacher again. Don't get me wrong, I love teaching but I REALLY want to be an administrator! I was an interim principal for a semester a year ago and I'm hooked. I loved it! The job market for administrators in Michigan is terrible right now. There are too many experienced administrators in the market for us newbees to get a chance. I've come really close a couple times. I've had interviews, but not yet. I guess I'll have to practice my patience techniques. I think I need a new punching bag.

Well, off to bed for me. Don't forget the first thing you should always do in the morning is laugh, but new alarm clocks are expensive.

I'm a movie quoter. Ugh, you might say. But I simply can't help myself. I find myself in conversation and someone says, "will you hand me a spoon?" and instantly I think,

• "Locksley! I'm gonna cut your heart out with a spoon."
• "Why a spoon cousin? Why not an axe?"
• "Because it's dull, you twit, it'll hurt more."

Now, for people who have seen Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, this may be mildly humurous. In our family, nobody can mention a spoon without someone breaking into this quote. Admittedly it has become slightly modified to meet our family needs but it is the same basic premise. Why? I'm not sure. Some people are movie quoters and some aren't. I have a friend who would do entire Montey Python dialogs with me. Our favorite being the famous, proving the woman is a witch scene in The Search for the Holy Grail.

It's almost like a private joke that's only for you and your close friends, and anyone else who has ever seen the movie. It's a bond and a common ground. Have you ever sat at a party and an uncomfortable lull has crept up on the crowd, like some sneaking cat. (I have to be honest, when I'm around there are very few moments of silence. My husband says I can hold a conversation with a tree stump.) and somebody quotes a movie that almost everyone has seen. Boom! We got conversation people. It's like your sitting there and you realize, I have nothing in common with any of these people, but who hasn't seen E.T.? Well, except that weird, couple who's been making out on the couch all night? "E.T. phone home" anybody.

I don't know, maybe I'm reading to much into it and I just like movie quotes. You can learn a lot about a person by the movie quotes they know. For instance, you are standing in a small group of people making pleasant conversation when someone shouts, MUMBO JUMBO! Mumbo Jumbo!

Everyone in the group laughs but you. "From The Ninth Gate" they say.

Time to find a new group,  I think.

Well, I think you get the gist of my point. Which leads me to my next one which isn't really a point, more of a comment really. I think I'm going to add a movie quote field to my page, so I can share some of my faves with you. I hope you like it. Feel free to share some of your favorites too. Who knows we may have something in common

Wow, where the heck did August go!?! Ok, so we still have a week of it left but what the heck? We just got back yesterday from our annual camping trip which went in the usual way. Mishap after mishap. It didn't used to be this way. When I was a kid my mom and dad said, "get in the car we're going camping." and we went. All the way to the camp ground, set up camp and camped. Ah then alas I met my husband's family. A nicer group of people you'll never meet but do they have some hellatious (sp? I need a spell checker) luck. No matter how you look at it isn't what I'd call lucky. This year was a typical year, not the worst (that would be the Spanish Forest trip on '87, that was a doozy! Maybe I'll tell that story later if anyone shows an interest. As good as National Lampoon's Vacation) but not the best.

We started out having to meet the in-laws to pick up the kids who were already camping with them. But wait! The day before we are supposed to leave we find out that my father-in-laws boat isn't working right AGAIN! Now, we store that large hunk of metal in our back barn on the condition that we can use it once a year to fish. But in the last three years, it hasn't worked right once. Well, I guess my hubby had had it because the next day on our way to go camping we stopped and bought a bass boat. That's right ladies and gentlemen a bass boat on the way to go camping. How's that for a last minute buy?

Now, the trip to where we camp is supposed to be a 5 to 6 hour trip. Seems like a long time doesn't it, until I tell you that it took us 3 DAYS to get there this year. That's right, days. First off, the original plan was for us to meet the kids at about 1 o'clock that day but being as we had to stop and buy a boat we didn't meet up with them until about 6:00. Well, then we had to get dinner with the whole family and buy the time that was done it was getting to be about 7-7:30. At this point we decide not to go the additional 3 hours to camp and just stay in the local state camp ground for the night. Which is a good thing because we discovered that something on the trailor tire for the new boat was amiss. I don't know all the details but I know it took my husband a good portion of the next day to get fixed which meant that we only traveled about another hour and a half toward our final destination.

Really this is so normal for us that it didn't even phase us. We just decided to stay in another camp ground that night and the next day we took the kids canoeing down the AuSable River. Which was a great time once my 12 year old son and I came to an understanding. And surprisingly the two german short hair dogs that we had handled the canoeing fairly well. Except when they wanted to get up and walk around the boat. Not a good idea.  For those of you who don't know, short hairs are sort of big dogs. The weather was great for the trip and it broke up the ride to camp a little. Oh yeah, we didn't capsize once believe it or not.

That night we finally got to our camp site, I can't remember but I think that was also the day we had to get the tire on one of our vehicles plugged because it had a leak, or that might have been the day before. It all runs together.  Anyway we got to our destination and set up camp without incident. Did I tell you the lights on the boat trailor only worked intermitently too? Well, they did. I looked like I was driving down the road with a winking left eye. hehe.

The next day we rise to find the sun shining, the weather beautiful and get ready to put the boat in the water. But wait, the damn boat won't start! Surprise! a boat you've never had in the water on the first day of camping will never start in this family. It is a given. Needless to say though my hubby was less than pleased if not surprised. Turns out the problem was something very simple and once he figured it out (the next day) we were on our way to fishing. We didn't catch anything but hey the boat worked! The kids were having fun, I'm not much of a fisher myself so, I wasn't totally disappointed, and my hubby was relaxed. Sitting around the campfire at night just chatting and being together as a family was great!

That is until, Governor Granholm decided there would be no more campfires for the national forest campgrounds in Michigan because of the drought. No more fires for us. Crosswords by lantern light after that. 

Other than that the only problem was that we had to have another tire on our other vehicle patched because we had picked up a nail. So that sat in camp for a few days up on a jack.

For those of who think this sounds like a kind of crappy vacation you're wrong. We had a lot of fun and have learned to take adversity in stride. We plan on it. No matter what happens I just got to spend seven whole days with my family, the people I love the most, and that's really what our camping trips are about. If you'd like to hear a real camping horror story, which was my first camping trip with my husband's family let me know and I'll tell you about the Spanish forest.

Well, it's time to take a packing break. We leave to go camping in less than a day. The living room is strewn with sleeping bags, duffle bags, hiking shoes, water shoes, and my husband (he's on the couch snoring). I need to get out and clean the car out. I'd better take a couple garbage bags! I'm not sure but there may still be a small child buried in the back underneath all the Burger King bags. I know that there's a Mr. Burns toy from BK because I occasionally hear his eerily, creepy voice, coming from the back seat when I go over a bump, "excellent".  

I can't wait to get up north without TV, radio, phones, etc. I'm taking all my art stuff, except my paints, a Stephen King novel, and a crossword book. I should be all set. I love crosswords. They remind me of how really not smart I am. Isn't it funny how you can sit there and stare a 4 across for about an hour and not get the answer "inept puzzle solver"  five letters starting with "i" and than your hubby walks by and says, only a "idiot" couldn't figure that out.  Hurumph!

Well, I'll bee back after camping. Until then. Take care all!

I was just e-mailing a friend of mine and telling her about the fire we had in our garage last week and I thought I'd share it here too.

Well, I just dropped the kids off at Grandma's house. They will camp for a few days with them and then the hubby and I will meet them up north and camp for eight days. I love camping. It's much more fun now that we have a camper though. For the first 15 years I camped with my husband, we did it in tents. I really don't like tents. I mean in a pinch they work but spending 10 days where the only dry place is a tent isn't my ideal. But wait, I didn't mention we never took a year off of camping in that whole time including when my children were 3 and 5 months old. Now, that adds to the fun of a tent. I'll tell you. There is nothing like a nice rainy weekend in a tent with a baby and a toddler, oh yeah and the dog/s. No, I'm not kidding. It was admittedly a good sized tent, but still,  a camper makes all the difference for me.

Our anniversary is this weekend. I can't tell you how many anniversaries I have spent in a tent. We'll actually be at home for this one, without kids! Funny thing, our anniversary. I think we have forgetten it more than we have remembered it. For years my husband and I would get a card from my grandmother wishing us a happy anniversary and we'd go "oh yeah, it's our annivesary!" It got to the point that my babysitter would remind me it was coming up so that I didn't have to call her at the last minute. This will be the third year in a row I've remembered it admittedly I just realized it today. But I did remember it!

Well, I have to get off my bootie and go get some chores done. Until next time, here's a coffee fact for you: The American and French revolutions were concieved in coffee houses.