Hurricanes.

Today was the final day of our month-long professional development. It has gone by surprisingly fast! I have two weeks off before we all return on the 17th, at which point it will be full-tilt, full throttle for the school year. The kiddies show up Sept. 3.

I'm looking forward to these next couple of weeks. I've been given a lot of new information over the past month (Moodle, Wiki, RTI, snippy, Write Tools, DL Learning Pattern, OWA, scheduling matrix, curriculum foci {pronounced foek-eye, not fuck-eye, which is what I wanted to call it}, etc.) and it will be nice to decompress and sort through the menagerie scrambled in my brain. Because we were off campus - the renovations on our school continue - every paper, book, binder, and folder I've been given has been housed on our dining room table. Looks like a mini-library, or as our new Librarian would refer to it: the Student I (I as in the epicenter of the hurricane, I as in information).

I promise to use these next two weeks wisely. To work diligently at sorting through the frenetic mess in my head and on my dining room table.

I am though going to miss my new friends. We have bonded and it has been great fun. There has been a natural selection process and folks have moved into comfortable groups, but I'm happy to report that even though Darwin has taken over, the groups themselves still mingle with each other. There was a giggle fit that broke out the other day and someone noted that wherever there is laughter, I am in the middle of it. And that made me happy. I'm not entirely sure how they see me - you'd have to ask them - but I think it's somewhere along the lines of: a little quirky, uncensored, creative and fun. And I'm okay with that. I'm fine with that reputation and I will work hard once the school year begins to build a reputation as a knowledgeably and tough English teacher who also knows how to have fun in the classroom. Learning should not be so painful.

I have met some wonderful, wonderful people and I truly hope our friendships continue to grow amidst the chaos and stress that will become the school year. Our principal called us All-Stars, and not to toot my own horn but rather to toot a horn for the whole of us as a group - TOOT-TOOT - he was right. We were all hand-picked specifically for these jobs. There was no mad rush to fill a spot. There was no bureaucratic nonsense. There is no trace (gasp!) of nepotism. The very best people were hired. Period. And I feel damn lucky to be among this group.

This school has the makings to become one of the best in the US. I really believe that.

I'm anxious and excited for the school year. I want to do right by my peers and my students. I want to be able to hold my own as an English teacher in a school that focuses on math and science. I want my students to say, upon graduating, "I had the very best education a public school could offer; I am ready to go to college and beyond and succeed as a brilliant chemist/engineer/mathematician, but I will never forget the English class I had...she was tough, but I had a blast in her class."

That's what I want.

Oh, and I got paid today and was more than $85. Significantly more so. Sweet baby jesus how good it feels to get a real paycheck again!