Okay, so we were lazy yesterday and decided to run to Jimmy John’s for lunch rather than scrounge around the house for something to eat. We gathered up the orders and hopped in the car leaving the kids behind.

“Oh, you’re going to this Jimmy John’s. I thought you would want to go to the other one.”

“I still might if I can’t find a parking space downtown.”

And then it materialized. A space about a block and a half away from our destination. I pulled in rather than backing into the space to parallel park the correct way but there was plenty of room when I backed up.

“Look at that! A space and there’s even time left on the meter.” She reached into her purse.

“Don’t worry about it. We can make it in ten minutes, no problem.”

“Oookaay,” she responded with disbelief.

The air was brisk and she reminded me that we would have to walk uphill to get back to the car. The I saw her, dressed in official blue, carrying her handheld device for printing tickets and walking back toward our car.

“Uh-oh. I hope I’m right.”

“Look! Two more empty spaces right in front of Jimmy John’s.”

“Yeah, but they don’t have money on the meter. Plus we got some exercise.”

“Wouldn’t that be funny if you ended up having to pay for a ticket because you didn’t want to put more money in the meter.”

“Yeah,” I said with no cheer in my voice.

We placed our orders and I shifted from one foot to the other as they made our order.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

“Yeah.”

“Are you sure?”

“I guess my competitive spirit woke up. I want to beat her back to the car.”

I grabbed the sandwiches under my arm with a quick “thank you”and rushed out the door. I saw the light change at the corner and realized we’d at least have to wait for traffic to clear. I hoped it wouldn’t take too long. As we approached a couple of cars went through, but we hit the crosswalk in stride, breathing a little heavier in the crisp air.

And there she was. She had turned on the side street and was just finishing with a ticket for another car.

“We’re safe now,” I announced.

“Why?”

“She’s behind us, on the other street,” I answered as I looked back over my shoulder to see her following.

“And with two minutes to spare on the meter. I told you so.”

“We are so out of shape,” she panted.

“Yeah, but what a rush!”

…and the living is easy or so they say.

I don’t know how I did it before I had summers off or maybe I really didn’t do it.

The end of the school year had an extra day tacked on for teachers to make up for too many snow days. Our data retreat was the next day and then a half day summer school meeting on Friday led right into the beginning of five weeks of summer school on Monday. By the time it was over I was burnt out!

And now the first full week of my summer vacation has come and gone and I feel even further behind. One side of the house has two new coats of paint and a second side is 95% scraped and primed. Two more weeks worth of work in my online grad course are finished but I’m less than halfway through.

Time to take a deep breath, relax and realize it won’t all get done tomorrow, but it will eventualy get done.

Thanksgiving is not my favorite holiday.

It’s not that I’m against Thanksgiving Day. I’m just afraid that we are not as thankful as we need to be on a daily basis. Setting aside a single day to say “thank you” for this and “thank you” for that doesn’t quite do it for me.

I tried to teach my second graders a little bit about thankfulness today. Today was the end of our week and we did what we normally do at the end of the week, write letters home. Instead of writing about our week though, the kids wrote thank you letters to their parents. In order to truly say “thank you” I told them we need to also tell why we are thankful. I am thankful for my house because it protects me and my family from the elements and because it is the symbol of the love that resides there. I compared only saying “thank you” to saying “I’m sorry” without saying what you are sorry for and without trying to make amends. Not all of them got it but hopefully a seed was planted.

I also hate what happens at church on Thanksgiving. I suffered through another Thanksgiving “service” tonight. Parts from here and there were thrown together to produce a celebration of a Creator so generic that anybody from any faith could basically say the same. Except for how we show our thankfulness. For that the pastor was much more specific. We show our thankfulness to this God of all religions by giving more money to the church. Then he’ll know we’re thankful, especially if we have enough money to let him really know how we feel. Service to our neighbor just doesn’t cut it. Aarrgh!

So please excuse me if I’m not the most reflective, thankful person for the rest of today or tomorrow. You’ll just need to track me down next week if you want to talk to me about it more.

Vacation begins tomorrow!

That probably sounds a little funny from a teacher who has been out of school since mid-June but I need a vacation. Correction, we need a vacation. Amy and I are looking forward to a full week together with no work. If it’s anything like the week we spent together at Christmas we won’t ever want to go back to work.

I had no idea that my first summer off as a teacher would be so busy. Last summer I got my first teaching job but had to work until school began. In fact, I worked two jobs running from summer school to my customer service job. I thought with all my extra time I would be able to do some of the things I wanted to do including working more on this blog. Now it’s two weeks until teachers report (okay, a little less than three weeks) and I’m wondering where the summer went.

I taught summer school again in the morning for the first five weeks. The afternoons were spent running errands for the most part including going to the chiropractor for the first time. Over the July 4 weekend we deconstructed and reconstructed the half bath on our main floor. You’ll find the story of that tiling adventure on Amy’s blog–I’ve teased her that I get to do the work and she gets to blog about it.

Once summer school ended I went to work on our basement project–I think she’s going to blog about that too. Now instead of running errands in the afternoon, I’m running them in the morning. The afternoons have been dedicated to making our mjbasement room into a more comfortable living space. The grid for the ceiling tiles went up today but the tiles are waiting for Uncle Jon to get the new lighting in. Carpeting (or carpet squares) and some trim will finish the project. The project has been a lot of work but Amy keeps telling me how great the space will be when we’re done.

But for now, I need a vacation and even though we won’t be away for all of it, we will both take time away from our work and enjoy the days surrounding our 21st anniversary.

Hopefully we’ll see more of you again when we get back.

A few excuses why I have not blogged lately

• We had a teacher from Thailand stay with us for two and a half weeks
• I’ve begun coaching my daughter’s soccer team
• I just finished my research methods grad class, aka grad class from hell
• I’m still a first year teacher
• I’ve been distracted by team teaching decisions for next year
• I haven’t been getting enough sleep
• I’m busy trying to please my wife

Maybe I’ll get to blog about some of these things later…