Janae Says...

Still bitter and confused. Praying for release from the bondage of anger.

Sometimes, I’m kind of a moron. I mean, pretty frequently, actually. I’m about to disclose an experience that I had on Saturday when I arrived at the post office to mail my school pictures to my madre. Don’t leave a comment telling me I’m stupid. I already know. Here it goes. I pulled into the stall next to the handicapped spot. I got out and started walking in with my stuff to mail. In the handi spot, an old man in a Buick was sitting in his passenger seat with the window down. It looked like he was maybe waiting for his wife who was inside the post office (strategery #1). He was really old, as in like 80 years old (strategery #2). He stopped me. He seemed harmless and sweet enough, and my mom taught me to be nice and respectful, so I was. I stopped and talked to him. He started with, “I bet your husband’s handsome!” (strategery #3) I responded, “I don’t have a husband.” He looked at me in shock. He then asked how old I am. I told him I am twenty-two. He said, “Well maybe you’ll find...

On Saturday, I had a mission. I would purchase a fish so that I could have something alive in my room once more. Without my rabbit, my room feels dead and boring. So I set out on my journey to PetSmart with my friend Rob. It took me forever to decide what kind of goldfish I wanted. I finally decided on a black moor goldfish. Doesn't that seem like a redundant name to you? Black... Moor... Anyway. Rob pointed out that since they were black, they're like ninjas. I went full-force Mortal Kombat style and named my fish Rayden. It was a toss-up between Liu Kang and Rayden, but I figured that the googly eyes made him have killer vision like Rayden. Plus he's kind of nerdy so his middle name is Stanley. I'm happy to have something alive in my room. Yay! Here's Rayden saying hello (by the way, you have no idea how hard it is to photograph a stupid goldfish, seriously): What up? He kept on running into the back of his tank trying to get out. So I backed it with some blue con...

I had my students write a journal entry the other day which was related to our reading. I asked them to recall a time when something bad happened, and they blamed themselves for it. I had a lot of really touching, serious entries. Some students blamed themselves for their parents leaving, or dying, or for their siblings getting hurt, or their animals dying. But my favorite, I think, was from a quiet girl in the back of one of my classes. She said, "The time I remember was in here. Miss Balibrea [yes, she used my name like this in a journal entry that I get to read] called on me and asked a question, but I couldn't answer. I was only sort of half way paying attention, and so I couldn't answer. That was my fault." haha. I'm not sure what the "bad happening" was, but I'm glad she felt silly for not paying attention. Pretty much killed me. ---- I also graded some papers recently where I asked the students to predict some things in the novel. One question...

My new boyfriend is so great. We spend most of our time together on Wednesday nights after watching So You Think You Can Dance. It's nice to have that routine. He is hilarious, and witty, and musical. We get along fine. I love laughing and enjoying his artistic side. And I greatly enjoy his serious side also. He has lots of sides. And if you know me, you know I love complex individuals. We also don't feel like we need to be right next to each other all the time. In fact, we spend our time together about 6 feet from each other. That's right folks, my new boyfriend is Fox's new show, "Glee." It is the love of my life.

Well, here is my school picture. I feel like a junior high student again. It's kind of fun getting free pictures. It's not so much that I like having pictures of myself (I'm sending them to my mom), but I like that they were free. Besides, it's cool to commemorate my first year of teaching. Oh, darling. You can even see the bags under my eyes. So attractive. I'd like to send a public thank you to Cody for telling me I look like a sultry minx in this picture. Woo woo. Don't we all like to know there is a sultry minx hidden within us? Oh yes. So, I yelled at a student the other day. I don't so much feel like going into details. He made me angry by interrupting me in front of the class. Then he made me angry by telling me that he didn't have an EXTREMELY IMPORTANT handout which I had given out two weeks ago , which we've been working on every day. He was present to receive that handout and has been present every day since then when the rest of the class...

Oh, isn't this precious? Does this make anyone else laugh?

I don't know how many of you take my movie suggestions into consideration, but I most enjoyed Away We Go , which I watched tonight shortly after I got home. There are a few reasons I loved it. But the only one I really want to address is this movie's totally raw and realistic approach to parenthood. I adored the characters and their desire to provide a good home and family for the baby they were bringing into the world. It was incredibly entertaining, with totally out there, hilarious characters. But my favorite characters were Verona and Burt's college friends Tom and Munch Garnett. I am so obsessed with words that I will sit down and pause and play and pause and play a movie part to type out everything in a scene that I like. So I wanted to share with you what I thought was one of the most touching moments in the movie. Tom explains how to keep a family together: Tom: What you need to be happy and sane is this! *holds up syrup* Watch this, OK? Here’s you two guys. OK, her...

Remember a long time ago when I was trying to find my Christmas presents for my dad, and I checked and re-checked a place I had already looked before? Then I prayed and I found it ? Well, it happened again tonight. I should preface this by saying that my little red Emtec 4 GB jump drive has my whole teaching life on it. I've been having the thought repeatedly that I needed to back up my little drive before it crashed or before I lost it. So earlier today I was working on a lesson plan before going to my grandma's house. Then I shut my computer and put it to sleep. I threw it on top of my clothes in my laundry basket to take it down to my car. On my way out the door I noticed a large amount of trash on our doorstep that needed to be taken to the dumpster. So I did a spectacular balancing act holding my blue flimsy laundry basket full of clothes, a bottle of liquid Tide, dryer sheets, and my huge laptop, extended battery, and plug all in my left arm while trying to grab a large b...

So, in my blatant honesty and openness I think everyone's gotten the impression that I'm not perfect. This would be an extremely accurate perception. I'm an even worse person than I seem to be on my blog because, let's face it, I can go back and edit this. Plus my blog doesn't follow me around, documenting my every word and deed. And thank heaven for that. While I'm thanking heaven that my blog doesn't document every one of my faults, I also have to note that heaven is where the record is kept. In light of my new calling and my ever-growing desire to improve, I've been praying for a LOT of help. I have so many shortcomings that make me feel like I'm hardly in a position to stand as a leader or be an example or even a friend to the women in my Relief Society. I've prayed fervently recently regarding some of these things. I noticed today that a lot of my consistent shortcomings have gotten better. I'm so grateful for the Lord's help when I ...

This morning I had to be at school at 7 AM for a literacy meeting. I am therefore extremely sleepy. But we got free bagels. Yay-uh! I planned a lesson today to have the students connect with a character in Walk Two Moons --Phoebe. After I read chapters 9 and 10 aloud to them, helping them with characterization throughout, I had them write down their favorite quote or saying on a little strip of paper. They each drew out someone else's message and answered a little worksheet about it the quote and about the message which Phoebe received ("Don't judge a man until you've walked two moons in his moccasins"). The kids loved it. Every period was extremely well-behaved. Sixth period was especially good because I made a deal with them. It also didn't hurt that the assistant principal sat in for half the period. After reading the same two chapters six times and giving instruction all day, my voice is hurting bad. I stayed at school until around 4:30 taking care of rand...

I'm making my first attempt at banana bread. It is in the oven right now. I can smell it as I type. And it smells oh so delicious. Let's hope I'm successful. In other news, I've decided I need to make it a priority to record my funny, frustrating, and saddening stories from my first year of teaching. I'll start with the first couple. I have several already, but some of them aren't funny without names, and if I changed the names, I don't think they'd be as funny. Anyway, stories one and two, both having to do with the same student whom we'll falsely call Aiden. I have a very noisy student. I think he's great, and hilarious, which is tricky for disciplining. How can I discipline if I laugh? Anyway, he likes to make noise in whatever way he can. One day while I was going over the syllabus, he finally stopped talking. But while I was talking, he was picking up his pen and dropping it on his desk repeatedly. Every three seconds or so, one could hear a...