I have this Reading Workshop training to attend next week, and I've been racking my brain about what to do with my classes while I am gone. We are sort of in between units right now in both my 8th and 9th grade classes, so there really isn't any "plan" that I need to follow. My solution? School House Rock: Grammar Rock. Oh, yes. They will be rocking out to "Conjunction Junction," "Verb: It's What's Happening," "Rufus Xavier Sarsparilla" and the rest of the gang. As I have been creating the worksheet and subsequent class activities, I have been delving into my beloved past time of cherishing all--errr....most--of these songs. There are a few that I am less than fond of, such as "Verb: It's What's Happening" and "Lolly, Lolly, Lolly Get Your Adverbs Here," but overall it's great set. It's a classic. Just to show you what a TOTAL nerd I am, when I was in high school I would *literally* rock out in my 1987 Ford Escort Pony to the soundtrack.
One of my VERY FAVORITES is "The Tale of Mr. Morton," which is pretty much the cutest, most romantic, and wittiest grammar songs ever written. I love it! And I would like to share it's awesomeness with you:
My favorite quotes:
Mr. Morton talked to his cat. Mr. Morton talked: "Hello cat, you look good."
Mr. Morton wrote Perl a poem. Mr. Morton wrote.
The cat stretched. The sun beat down. The neighbor chased his kid: "Come here kid! Come on!"
Mr. Morton was a nervous man. When she opened up the door, he ran.
...until Perl showed up with a single rose. Who says women can't propose?!?
Ever since I can remember, music has had amazing power over my emotions. Although I do not keep up with the local music seen, what's new, or much of anything like that, when I hear good music it really speaks to me. Also, I'm a lyric person. Discovering this caused me to realize why my hubby and I have such different musical tastes. He is able to hear instrumental nuances and amazing bass beats that go right over my head; simultaneously, I am broken apart by powerful words, even if the instrumental part is less than exciting. Generally speaking, I like "chill" music. You know the type: acoustic, calm, with a lead singer that potentially hasn't bathed in a week... I also like female artists, who generally do bathe on a regular basis. For some reason, God has recently been laying on my heart the importance of music in my life. I love it. I am energized by it. I am touched by it. I am challenged by it. The timing of this couldn't be better (God kinda works that way) since I got a new car stereo system for Christmas; I can plug my iPod into it and jam to whatever I have on there. Thus, I am also figuring out this whole iTunes site and realizing that whatever kind of music I like is right at my fingertips.
Hope Community Church--where you can find me most Sunday mornings--has an amazing worship band. They often try new things and play songs that I am unfamiliar with. When I hear something that speaks to me, I make a note of it in my cell phone. Over the past year or so, these little notes have been piling up and generally ignored. So, today, I am sifting through them and finding the ones that I really like on iTunes. One that I find absolutely incredible is a song called "Ten Dead Dogs" by Wild Sweet Orange. The lyrics are below the video, since the words are AMAZING.
Lyrics to "Ten Dead Dogs" I saw ten dead dogs on the side of the road driving late last night to your apartment and I thought it was an omen so I headed on back home and walked in circles 'round my room alone.
And Oh my God, is this really what you want? Would you tell us if it's not? And could you rewrite the plot and come and get us? Yeah, come and get us.
Shivering cold, I woke up in water and wrapped myself around the toilet seat. I spoke in tongues and took all my clothes off. The tops of my fingers touched the tops of my toes
And Oh my God, is this really what you want? Would you tell us if it's not? And could you rewrite the plot and come and get us? Cause we can't stop doing what we think we want, even though we know it's not. This place is merely a subplot to come and get us.
I've never felt this way before. Am I running away from what I've always been running towards. Belief, believe in me, cause I don't know if reason's ever gonna see why love would come to die, to leave.
Oh my God, is this really what you want? Would you tell us if it's not? And could you rewrite the plot and come and get us? Cause we can't stop doing what we think we want, even though we know it's not. This place is merely a subplot to come and get us.
I watched the sky turn from blue to black to red and yellow too before the purple dawn was filling up my room. And for a brief moment, I heard the whole earth groaning like there was something that it needed me to do
As we were discussing the upcoming summer break (yes, I know it is 6 months away, but I'M REALLY EXCITED FOR IT!!!), my husband had the following to say about it:
Oh, great. I'm going to come home everyday to find something else has been reorganized!
My hubby and I recently celebrated our 3-year anniversary by going camping. And I know that there are SO MANY women out there that are like, "Really? Camping? Have you been camping before?" I even know of a story where a relationship was almost broken solely because of a camping experience. Well, I love to camp. My hubby loves to camp. So, yes, we camped (and peed and ate and slept and...other things...) in the woods for 4 days and 3 nights. Here are some of my most memorable moments:
The Drive. It was only supposed to take us an hour to get to our original campsite. We were going to really rough it by making our own site at Rum River State Forest. Yeah. It took like 2 1/2 hours to get there in traffic and then the forest was not-so-campable. There were way too many bugs. I expect bugs in the woods. But these bugs practically carried me out of the car. Plus the forest was super dense; chopping down trees was not my idea of "making camp." So, we drove another hour to a state park. We're picky campers and didn't like it. So we drove another half-hour to a different state park. We didn't really like it there either, but it was getting dark. I was tired and hungry and cranky from the drive, so we made do for the evening. The next morning we packed up and found an excellent state campground that was PERFECT.
Hot dogs. Tim bought me Schweigert natural-casing hot dogs for the trip. I LOVE THEM. I hate like 12. Yum. By the way, ALL--and I literally mean ALL--of my pants have ketchup stains on them from my hot dog binges.
Tim. He was HILARIOUS on this trip. At one point, we were driving through a mostly deserted campground in the forest, when Tim looks out the window and says (I'm not kidding), "Dude. This is awesome. I just love this. It's like you look out at the forest and think, FOREST!" At which point I bust out laughing. Really? Really, Tim? So articulate.
Creepers. Our final campsite was a hike-in site, which means that it was off of the road and you had to hike in to get there. It was very private and out of the way. Or so I thought. One afternoon, Tim was napping and I was not, so I decided to grab my book and read. It was warm that day and we had a private, hike-in site; I figured I'd be just fine reading my book in nothing but my underthings and a tank-top. I hadn't seen anyone else around, and who would just walk through someone's campsite? Well, someone did. So, there I sat in my panties and a tank top trying to ward of nosy neighbors. Lovely. And embarrassing.
Hair eating fish. On Friday, we bathed in an area lake. I'm not proud to admit that I had a minor panic attack with the Blue Gills and Sunfish got all horny for my conditioned hair. Everytime I'd rinse it out, I'd find like 6 more fish swimming towards my head. Gross.
