Post Christmas visit in CO

I have a student in class who always answers yes/no questions with "Sometimes yes, but sometimes no." Today they are taking a final exam. All the questions are yes/no. He's having a hard time.

Last night at about 12:30 I decided that I needed to start knitting a starfish. Lucky for me I had a pattern of a starfish on hand. At 2:00 I decided that I had to stop knitting the star fish for what seems like obvious reasons.

Sometimes I worry about my impulses.

The other day I decided I must have scrambled eggs. The problem is that I make terrible scrambled eggs. They are always too dry or too wet or too crumbly or over spiced, not fluffy enough- in the past I would concede to my terrible scrambled egg making skills and just go to Denny's. That day, however, I decided I could not let scrambled eggs bring me down. So I did some research (online of course) and found my new friend, Mr. Breakfast. He told me how to make perfect scrambled eggs.
I tried it- it worked. Now, if only I can remember that simple bit of wisdom the next time I decide I must have scrambled eggs.

perfect scrambled eggs

http://www.youtube.com/user/slackistanthemovie#p/a

In the life of this blog there have been 925 postings. Maybe I should work on hitting 1000 before 2010.

Eeh.

So- I lost my job yeah? Really bad timing in that most schools don't hire until fall. That leaves many moons of nobody hiring. Well, at least nobody in the USA.

I got a call at 6 this morning. (My time, surely some more godly hour at the point of origination, which was Gaziantep, Turkey.)

I'd never heard of Gaziantep before last week when I got an email saying they were looking for a Business English teacher. Seems I'm all out of the world city scene as several other people I mentioned it to said, "oh uh-huh" when I said it. They were probably faking it.

I don't know why exactly, but I have become an 'Business English' teacher. As if I knew anything about business- but it is a niche and here am I to fill it.

I talked to the Dean of the Business school and the Director of the English Language program of Zirve University.

They asked me what questions I had for them- Uh- 6:00 AM- I'm not sure I'd have questions for God at 6:00 AM, but I was trying really hard to think of something and to sound like I had been dead asleep a second ago.

While talking to one co-worker she asked if I asked about class size expectations, and if there were western toilets and copy machines on campus. Well, heck, I knew I should have made a list of things to ask. Although I'm pretty sure the second question would not have appeared on my list . . .


Turkey- Buzz likes the sound of that. I'm not sure yet.

click to see larger map.
Gaziantep is south, not far from the Syrian boarder.

Now if this university were in Batman, Turkey this would not even be an issue. I would already have my ticket in hand.

Our boss called us into a meeting in the middle of the workday Friday to let us know we were all fired, including himself.

Happy Thanksgiving! Have a great vacation! You've so graciously been given 4 weeks notice. Can't tell you why. Ta!

"Though the fig tree does not bud and ther are no grapes on the vines,
though the olive crop fails and the field produce no food,
though there are no sheep in the pen
and no cattle in the stalls,
yet I will rejoice in the LORD, I will be joyful in God my Savior."Habakkuk 3:17-18

Native English-speaking teacher/animal trainer

We are recruiting a native English-speaking teacher/animal trainer to work as part of an EU-funded zoo-preschool project at the Magdeburg Zoo.
You will be part of the world's first zoo with direct connections to a bilingual preschool located directly on zoo premises. Your English-language activities will serve to teach German-speaking preschool children between the ages of 3 and 6 about animal habitats and the care of animals.
Seriously?!

Also considering moving to Siberia.

It was a bad week. It started alright I guess. My co-worker and I bought tickets to take a trip to Philly/DC over our Winter Break. We are off to a nunnery and other places to be sure. On Wednesday I went to a program graduation- chit chatted with the former students and co-workers. I realized at some point on Wednesday that I had forgotten my phone at home.

Over the summer TX DOT opened an exit one exit before my exit. My exit is 161 N. The new exit is 161 S. Sometimes if I'm not really thinking about it, and sometimes even when I am thinking about I take the first exit, which is not my exit. This wouldn't irritate me so much if 161 S. wasn't a toll road. I have to pay 57 cents (or something crazy like that) to get on, and again to get back off. That's one exit, turn around get back on. There's no other way to get back to my place without paying the toll twice. It's not a big deal, just annoying.

Wednesday night after the graduation it was getting kind of cool, in the low 50s. I took the wrong exit. I had taken the wrong exit the day before and payed the toll twice, and I didn't want to do it again, so I decided to go across the median. The median is pretty small, maybe about 10-12 feet across, level. There were tire tracks, looked like lots of people made my same mistake, but maybe they weren't driving Priuses.

I drive a Prius. (What does your car sound like? Mine sounds like . . . mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm When it's stuck in the mud between the highway and the wrong exit is sounds like . . . mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm)

Now, that 25 year old Z sitting in my parking lot would not have been stuck. It sounds like RRRRRRRoooMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM. I wasn't driving the Z.

I looked for my phone to call Pudding. I didn't have it. I could have sworn I put it in my purse that morning. But, no fear. Inexplicably I have two cell phones. I was carrying the one I never use, which I usually leave at home. I picked it up, I called the number, it rang, the phone turned off. The battery was dead. But that's ok, I had the charger with me. Here's where it starts to break down.

The phone won't charge and turn on at the same time. It has to be turned on before you start charging if you want to use it while it is charging. So, I plugged it in to start charging, but the car has to be turned on for the phone to charge. Fine, but I saw on the console that the electric battery was completely depleted. Fine, except that I was also almost out of gas. So, if I turned on the car to charge the phone, it would use the gas engine, so by the time I made the phone call I might also be out of gas.

What it all came down to was pudding stopping to buy a tow rope, the police shutting down the exit and me getting extremely muddy. In the end all was well- except that the inside and outside of my poor little car and my shoes are covered in mud.

When I got home I found the other phone, in the other purse which I had just transfer ed everything else out of before I left that morning.

I finished the white elephant, and her leg warmers, and her beret. Tonight I nearly finished a Christmas stocking. I'm on a finishing kick- next I want to finish a penguin. It's kind of an ugly penguin, but super simple. I'm making it to see if it really is as easy as it looks to be. (Kinda like why I made the elephant.) After the penguin I'm considering finishing a mermaid or a tiny hand towel.

I'm currently wearing a moo-moo (or is it mu-mu?) I just looked it up- seems either 'moo-moo' or 'muu-muu' is acceptable.

As for why I'm wearing a moo-moo. I'll tell you- it was all the rage in my neighborhood in India, additionally I just found it in my closet. It's really really comfortable. Wow. Impressive.

To bad it's so very ugly. It's sort of like a table cloth, folded in half, seemed up the sides (holes left for arms) and another hole for my head. There is a drawstring belt, but the drawstring has been lost . . .

It is dark blue with a white batik design down the front and back center, repeated on each side and around the arm holes.

While it does make me feel like an India house wife, I'm way too lazy to start slapping my laundry on rocks.

On facebook I was tagged to make a list of 15 movies in 15 minutes. 15 movies that made an impression on me. These are the ones I thought of. Most of them are comedies or kids movies . . . what does that say about me?

Amelie
Bubble boy
Children of Heaven
Finding Nemo
Finding Neverland
Lilo and Stitch
My Big Fat Greek Wedding
Napoleon Dynamite
Out of Africa
Princess Bride
Return to Me
Schindler’s List
So I Married an Ax Murder
The Red Violin
Zoolander

It's not really my fault. I saw a dauchshund in a manger in a cartoon and I couldn't unsee it. One thing led to another . . .

Now I'm working on a white elephant. It's a pretty cool pattern- the whole elephant is made in one piece (talking about knitting of course) then folded up to make the elephant shape. I had white yarn- three small balls of the same brand white yarn. Unfortunatly I can clearly see where I began each ball of yarn- strange. Also unfortunate is the fact that this elephant has some crazy long legs. It's like a daddy-long-legs-phant. I figured I'd make her some leg warmers and a beret and tell people she's a dancer.

Psalm 1
BOOK I : Psalms 1-41
1 Blessed is the man
who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked
or stand in the way of sinners
or sit in the seat of mockers.

2 But his delight is in the law of the LORD,
and on his law he meditates day and night.

3 He is like a tree planted by streams of water,
which yields its fruit in season
and whose leaf does not wither.
Whatever he does prospers.

4 Not so the wicked!
They are like chaff
that the wind blows away.

5 Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment,
nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous.

6 For the LORD watches over the way of the righteous,
but the way of the wicked will perish.

When I'm feeling blue I read about Evil Popes. I don't know what the correlation is. I bought a book called A Dark History: The Popes Vice, Murder, and corruption in the Vatican for myself for my birthday. Since that time I've been blue enough to get to page 65. The writting is terrible, but the illustrations are quite nice.

It seems the popes of old were terrible fellows. No wonder Martin Luther protested.

I'm only now to Pope Gregory IX (1231)- who intruduced an inquisition against the Cathars. The Cathars remind me of the Latter Day Saints- kinda Kookie and theologically-off the Christian rocker, but not bad people.

I found out one of my students is an actor on a Mexican Soap Opera. He's a villain. it's hard to imagine- he just kind of goofy/cute guy in class.

hmmm- come to think of it they are all villains.

pooh- i think i have the flu

If I do have the flu at least it's mild (at the moment)
To console myself on my bad luck- I bought one single serving of Ben and Jerry's Cherry Garcia ice cream, and some 'Air Borne' and some Tylenol cold and allergy. I think the ice cream helped the most.

I rarely watch the news, but it came on while I was sitting on the sofa feeling flu-like so I watched it. It seems some 'feral hogs' have been tormenting some home owners in Dallas. I didn't stay long enough to get the whole report. I did stay long enough to see a report on a 'tractor-trailer, a herd of cattle, a high powered rifle and a high (and sometimes slow) speed chase through Wise County' I'd say that has the elements of a fine Country and Western song.

It seems some young guy was on a ranch and high, he thought taking a joy ride in a loaded semi would be fun, so he stole a truck full of cows and drove through 4 or 5 cities between the speeds of 5-80mph. Finally the police got in front of him, waved everyone off the road and shot his tires out. He kept driving for 3 miles . . . he must have been really high.

More on the flu- one of my students said he was very sick over the weekend and now he felt "soft." He asked me what was the word for feeling "soft." The first word that came to my mind was 'flaccid' but that's not the way to describe how you feel when you are getting over being sick, so I told him 'droopy, limp, or lifeless'

Flaccid

Another of my favorite sentences:

Vocabulary : Rundown

"I met a people very cute and beautiful, but after three years she's run down."

The other day I got in my car and pushed my "start" button. It didn't start. I immediatly thought, 'Great- what do you do when a hybrid doesn't start? It's not like you can ask your neighbhor for a jump- we'd all be electricuted.' So-- I pushed the button a few more times and wondered how I would get to work.

Before I remembered that I had AAA, I realized I hadn't put the key in the ignition.

I'm greatly looking forward to 5 days off for Thanksgiving. I'm feeling a little stressed with the sudden change of position. Did I mention I'm the Reading Instructor now?

Five students in a class of 13 told me they had never read a book before. In their lives- even in their own languages. That hurt my soul.

I'm knitting a shawl from some yarn I bought while I was in India. It is called 'sari silk' yarn. It is made from recycling the remnants of sari silk. This is one of the 'cottage industries' which are all over India and other underdeveloped countries. Usually women who have to support their families work at a craft house to supply trinkets, souvenirs and exports which represent their region or country.

There are many kinds of sari silk yarn, and it is, like many cottage industry products, all the rage in the West now. I bought two kinds, the fine spun and the rough spun. If I remember correctly the fine spun is done by machine and the rough spun by hand. The fine spun intertwines colors, the fibers are more uniform and the texture consistent. On the rough spun the colors don't gradually blend- they suddenly jump from chartreuse to orange to white, aqua, red, yellow (interlude forest green) ok orange again. The textures are many and there is really no uniformity in color, fiber, texture or tightness of the ravel.

So, with this second yarn I'm making a shawl. This shawl is in every way representative of India. The colors are blinding-combining in ways that are at the same time unsightly and amazing. It's awful but attractive. It looks old like it was made 100 years ago- at the same time impossibly- magically vibrant. It's made (and looks to be made) of rags, throw a ways, trash- but the feel of it, there is a satisfaction and luxury in the weight and texture of the silk.

These are the puzzles of India. The age, the beauty, the colors, the textures of life where rags and riches aren't separated- they live together-blending to make a whole which is blinding, unsightly, awful, amazing, vibrant, magic, amazing.

I think I need a samosa.

Apparently the new roach bate is delicious- Buzz keeps trying to eat it.

Great- now the dog is eating to roach bate and the roaches are eating the dog food.

Last night I had a funny dream.
I don't know what it was, but it was hilarious. I woke up thinking, "I wonder if I was smiling in my sleep." In my dream I was cracking up!
It was something about Danny Devito and Simon Baker (The guy from the TV show The Mentalist) a moustache and a Slurpee.
I don't know why those things were funny.