Dear Blog,

I am sorry that I have been neglecting you, but lately it seems like everything I have to write, I have already written. Which is fitting, since I am in the final five weeks of my kiddie-teaching career, but nonetheless, I feel guilty.

We have been going on lots of trips lately, today to the Hall of Science, and yesterday to the YMCA. I have brought the crazies with me on both trips, and it has actually gone fairly well. At the Y we had a morning of playing on the Y playground, swings, slides, I even organized a game of kickball which was pretty great. There was a minor incident where one girl stole another girl's lunchables, but overall, smooth sailing. Adrian gave me such an impressive performance that afternoon that I gave him a trip slip for the Hall of Science, and again he impressed me!

We had a strict bus driver for today's trip and he kept the kids in check, even when they were battling by singing every hip hop song released between now and 2004. I remained positive all day, even when there was a lot of chaos and the kids got a little whacky with racing each other homeroom vs. homeroom while we were eating lunch outside. The ice cream truck man gave me free ice cream for "being a teacher" and then asked if I had a boyfriend and how old I was and "d@mn girl you look too young to be a teacher" and when I explained I was 27 [when the hell did that happen, btw?] he held up his t-shirt with his ice cream man phone number on it and said "girl you should call me." My co-teacher suggested it was not a bad deal--free ice cream! And a man with a car and a job. It does sound like a sweet summer boyfriend, no? I thanked him for the chocolate crunch Mr. Softee cone and went on my way to judge the races.

T-Rex even joined us, and I sat with him on the bus and talked about baseball and how he should play for high school but first he had to get to high school... he seems to understand that, and asked about his progress and I explained what we had left for the year as far as assignments. He will probably get a better grade than a 36, which was his last report card grade, but I can't imagine him passing. It will be very sad and challenging to leave him behind so he will be 14 in 6th grade and even more gigantic. Poor buddy.

When we returned to school, the students who had stayed behind because they had forgotten money or trip slips had gotten themselves into a bit of trouble. Apparently they had ransacked the classroom they were in all day with the sub, and rifled through a teacher's desk and were accused of stealing magazines. They steadfastly denied this and the 2 kids who "told" on them are not the trustworthy type [one is the girl who stole from me all through the fall] so I do feel badly for them but seriously, I have no problem imagining the madness that ensued with the 12 kids left behind from 4 trips in the building, all in one room, with nothing really planned as far as teaching goes. I think they will probably work harder to get their act together for our next trip, no?

In other news, I was hired to teach a grad-level class this summer, for new teachers. While I'm not sure I'll be able to write about it, given that new teachers are web savvy and I don't know how well I can camoflauge it and still keep it interesting, it does mean that I'm not done teaching for good... It also means that I will not be a complete bum this summer, and with that an a job as an "Online T.A." [read=grading papers from home for a professor], I think I'm set for employment with minimal commitment.

MFT and I calculated that there are technically only 15 "teaching days" left this year, when you consider how there are trips and PD days and conferences and the like. That sounds entirely manageable, dontcha think?