Archive for category The Fluff

Date: April 10th, 2009
Cate: The Fluff, The Stuff
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Good Music, Bad Excuses, Good Article, Bad Networking, Good Ideas

I’m listening to Darshannon, from the Celtic Cross CD Hicksville. It’s incredible psytrance with a mixture of bluegrass and eastern sounds, if you can believe it. It works, which is brilliant.
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I had dinner with my old principal last night. I was explaining to her why I’m not going into the doctorate program right now. The thing is, I like my house and life in general right now, and if I get my doctorate, there won’t be any more work in this town than there was before. And I can’t see moving for a university job that doesn’t pay all that much. As far as high school administration goes, well, yuk. And having a doctorate degree and remaining in my classroom would make me feel like a loser, which wouldn’t be true, but there you have it.

This morning, I read an article in the Independent called The Dark Side of Dubai. It’s worth a (somewhat lengthy) read. It says so much, and reading between the lines, the message isn’t only about Dubai.

I have an artist in my classroom who hates bookwork. I may get some really awesome drawings depicting the Industrial Revolution from different perspectives. I’m trying to be creative.

Date: April 6th, 2009
Cate: The Fluff
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Impromptu Pink Flower Vase

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Every Easter, I give our secretary a little something. Since she’s been on a low-carb diet, the usual cute little basket of candy is out. This took 15 minutes to make. I gradually put some craft glue down one side of the bottle, and just wound the yarn (Cascade 220) around the bottle. Then I grabbed a felted flower that I had laying around and glued it and a bead on the bottle. Easy peasy. I could have gotten the yarn a little straighter, though. I mean, this is first grade stuff! Still, I like how it turned out.

I’m also sure it will show up on my pink flower blog. ;-)

Date: March 30th, 2009
Cate: The Fluff, The Teaching
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I Changed My Mind

“Learning for Dummies” is an amusing domain name (at least to me), but since I don’t write endlessly about standardized testing, it just doesn’t work. It gives the wrong impression. So instead, my teaching blog is now over here at Room 107. I feel better about it now.

If anyone is wondering, Tiki Martin is my “porn star” name. You know, name of first pet and mother’s maiden name. Now you can hack my bank account. Anyway, I’m going with that since that bit about deciding that I LIKE my job. Anyway, pseudonyms are fun.

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Click on the photo to see a larger version. It was taken right after the depression fifteen miles from where I grew up and thirty miles from where I now live. It blows my mind to think that the girl wasn’t even born yet when my house was built. I am loving this house.

I just couldn’t do the suburban thing. Living in history is cool.

Date: March 18th, 2009
Cate: The Fluff
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A Scientific Explaination for the Crazy Cat Lady?

Okay, you’ve got to read this article about how toxoplasmosis is linked to schizophrenia and then wonder if that’s why there seem to be a whole lot of crazy people with a whole lot of cats.

You get toxoplasmosis from emptying litter boxes or otherwise coming into contact with cat poop. Perhaps a kitty door is in order.

Date: March 6th, 2009
Cate: The Fluff
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Random Recipe

Take some baked chicken and chop into bite
size pieces, add a package of frozen mixed vegetables (or whatever leftover veggies are in
the fridge) and a can of cream of mushroom soup.
Put in a baking dish and put on top a biscuit mixture made from one cup of biscuit mix (e.g. Bisquik), one-half cup milk and a beaten egg.
Bake at 400F for 30 minutes.

Found this in some comments over at The Simple Dollar. It’s a totally East Texas kind of dish. I think I’ll buy a rotisserie chicken and make it redneck.

Date: February 28th, 2009
Cate: The Fluff
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So…

I haven’t felt like writing over here lately. Just haven’t. I think I’m going to change things up a bit and start using this blog as a bit of a notebook for some random thoughts, well, perhaps more random than usual! I also apologize for not stopping by much lately. I haven’t felt like being on the Internet as much. As a consequence, my house is MUCH cleaner!

My back is fine now, thank goodness! Thank yall so much for wishing me well. Sage is all better now too. :-D

I keep laying in bed at night thinking of teaching stories. I think I’m going to start a teaching blog. Some of this stuff is too good not to share. I want to put it somewhere more specific than over here, though. Watch this space!

Date: January 1st, 2009
Cate: The Fluff, The Kids, The Stuff
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Happy New Year!

I’ve just been loving the vacation from school lately. Although, subconsciously I know I’m going back soon, since I woke up to a dream of my boss chewing me out and me quitting on the spot.

We had a blast in Houston–here are a few pics!

Here’s the life-sized floor sign indicating the floor we were on at the Hotel Derek. This caused us to ride the elevator to every floor to check out all of the other artwork on the other floors. It was cool. I loved staying there

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This is Sage at the window in the hall. I like how it looks like he is playing cars.

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Sage and Greg went ice skating at the Galleria. I could not get a decent photo–they kept getting past me!

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This is the computer I bought at the Sony store in the Galleria. I’m loving it! I think that pink blog I write must be rubbing off on me!

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We went to “Chinatown”, although it should rightfully be called “Asiantown” because many different nationalities are represented. (I’m not talking about the old Chinatown near downtown.) We ended up eating Pho twice–yum! I got my dad some sake and other goodies from the largest Asian market in Houston.

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Here’s a pic of Sage and me. Is it apparent that Greg bought me a new camera for Christmas? 10 megapixels, 3 optical zoom at a decent price. It’s a huge improvement over the one that was stolen/lost. And it’s kinda pink, too. Like the iPod that Greg also got me. :-D

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So how weird is this? It was at Discovery Green. I have many more cool pics, but I don’t have my photo editing software installed yet–Sky has got to send it to me–and I don’t have the patience for Picnik right now.

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That more or less sums up our trip to Houston. We were going to go and see the Nutcracker, but I waited too long to get tickets and they sold out. We were all happy, regardless. Apparently, I have found the magic amount of Ativan that enables me to NOT CARE that I am in the car in the middle of nowhere, other assorted stupid fears…I’ve stocked up so I can take more trips with this NOT CARING. I’m planning on going to Austin in two weeks. We’ll see! I’m so excited to actually be out doing stuff. The computer helps a lot as well. On the way to Houston, I worked on my app to grad school. It totally occupied my mind. As far as the data plan goes–well, that just didn’t pan out here in the boonies. Still, I have enough writing to do on my computer not to need it.

Sky came and went–I have photos but they are all turned the wrong way. It turns out that Sky is quite the artist. I would post his work here, but I’m worried about someone finding it and ripping it off. It is absolutely incredible art that could sell. I never knew. He never drew much growing up, but this stuff is all abstract, pattern-based stuff. He may have found his niche. He and Sage talked a lot, and when we went to the locally owned chicken fast food place, Sage said, “What a shame the government is putting places like this out of business.” Whaaat? He’s nine! I guess I just breed revolutionaries…

Date: December 4th, 2008
Cate: The Fluff
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A Meme With a Prize!

I don’t know how many times I’ve done the “6 Random Things About Meme,”, and I really don’t care, because after all, isn’t having a blog all about talking about yourself and the things YOU like? Well, it can be, anyway!

I’m doing this one for two reasons: I like Pacian, and I like the little badge you get…for participating? Anyway, I know I’m a Kreative person, so I’ll take it.

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You can have one too, because you are also a creative person, unless you are one of those blog spammers, in which case, boy do I have something for you!

Anyway, here are the 6 Random Things.

    1. I am less tolerant of bullshit than I used to be. I am not getting mellow as I get older.

    2. I LIKE spending lots of time by myself. For a while, I wondered why I didn’t have more friends. I finally realized that it is because I don’t WANT any more, because that would entail doing stuff all the time when I’d rather read, write or do crafty stuff with Sage.

    3. I believe (apparently) that technology is more effective than therapy when it comes to curing agoraphobia, because I just bought a data plan so I can take the Internet with me on road trips. LIVE PANIC BLOGGING, yall!

    4. I really love the color pink and a bunch of “girly” stuff even though I don’t seem like the type in person.

    5. When it’s cold in the morning, I sing old 80′s songs (poorly) and dance around the house. My family is used to it now.

    6. Despite all the good reasons not to wish this, I often wish I had been born a hundred years ago. Or maybe fifty, anyway.

So there’s mine. You too can do this meme. You know you want to. Here are the rules that I did not follow:

The Kreativ Blog award rules are: Link to the person who tagged you. Post the rules on your blog:Write 6 random things about yourself. Tag 6 people and let each of them know they’ve been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog. Go back to the awarder and let them know that your entry is up.

So there you go! Have fun!

Date: October 16th, 2008
Cate: The Fluff
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Grab the Nearest Book…

I’ve done this meme once before, but I love it. Actually, the last time I did it, afterwards, I found myself doing the same thing with several more books. I’m doing it again thanks to Ken over at Teaching and All That Jazz. Thanks Ken!

Here are the rules: Grab the nearest book. Open the book to page 56. Find the fifth sentence. Post the text of the next two to five sentences in your journal/blog along with these instructions. Don’t dig for your favorite book, the cool book, or the intellectual one: pick the CLOSEST. Tag five other people to do the same.

So here ya go:

“His eyes, wen they caught his father’s, turned defiant. As if on its own, his hand shot up and in a single swift motion seized the gun.”

I cheated. The nearest book is the Cub Scout Handbook. The excerpt above is from A Patent Lie, the second nearest book.

Here’s what the Cub Scout Handbook has to say:

“A scout is obedient to the rules of his family, school, and troop. He obeys the laws of his community and country. If he thinks these rules and laws are unfair, he tries to have them changed in an orderly manner rather than disobeying them.”

So I wonder if Sage will ever join NORML.

If you want to do it, go for it!

Date: September 27th, 2008
Cate: The Fluff, The Photos
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Undignified Photos

I believe that Varmint is smiling. She likes it here. We have a lovely fenced backyard that is perfect for her to enjoy. And yes, she has three legs.

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You know how digital cameras (unless you have a good one) take the picture when they darn well feel like it? That’s what happened here.

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Sage thinks that this one looks like she’s saying, “Bring it on!” Who knows?

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