omg. thank God the weather is cooler. it allows me to put off getting my air conditioning fixed.

in my advisory class, we've been reading this book "seven habits of highly effective teens" on and off this year. well, more off than on, since as an advisor, i usually rather us play games than do work. but we picked it up again yesterday, and we're on habit 1 (okay, all off, no on) -- be proactive. and we're reading about reactive vs. proactive language, and having my kids recognize how reactive they are. (i can't help it miss chiu -- i had to kick his ass. why did you give me an f miss chiu? it's her fault, miss chiu. the class sucks. you get the gist.) but really, i realized how reactive i am. i love to whine. and i think whiney people suck, so i'm going to try and do it less. hold me to it. i might smack you though.

so instead of posting about how horrible my fifth period class was, i'm trying really hard (dig deep, al) about interesting things that have been going on at school. funny anecdotes. they're pretty few and far between, but i can try ...

i gave blood today. and this senior, amir, was trying to make conversation with me while i had a fat needle in my arm. (this was the kid who was wearing a medallion at the prom. a medallion. a big fat one.) and while he was asking me how i was doing, all i wanted to say was "hey, you're the kid who thought i was a freshmen."

ok. that wasn't funny at ALL.

oh oh! here's one.

while we're playing war games in class, the kids have to show country pride by papering the room with propaganda posters and write anthems for their countries. here are some that i saw:

1. russianize or circumcise!
2. turkey: home of christmas AND thanksgiving.
3. you'll have a concussion if we find out you're not russian!
4. we're not just fast -- we're russian!
5. we crave pork-tugal because we're austria-hungry.

man, all the russian teams i picked are AGGRESSIVE. the scary part about the game is that the kids (minus fifth period) are a little too into it. they are having these massive planning meetings and physically threaten each other. one kid wrote a program to help him plan his moves. totally out of control.

one of my favorite kids, jonathan, is really really creative. he helped pen an anthem called "oh italy, italy" and i was CRYING listening to his group perform it. it goes on and on how italy can't be trusted, and they'll backstab anyone and put them in the ziti ... too too funny. i wish penny could have seen them today. it might change her mind about teaching.

kids are funny creatures. sometimes, the most unexpected things can make you smile. like travis, who can be a complete hellion -- he calls me ms chiudizzle. i don't know why that's funny ... but it is when he does it. i really do feel a little blacker.