Evil Wrapped in a Fangirl Disguise

Subbing at the school makes me feel like such a spazz.

I mean, kids generally like me but interacting with the other teachers? The ones that didn't teach me at some point? Kind of makes me feel like a spazz.

And the kids, too, to a point. I think it's the whole...trying to be authoritative when you have no clue what is going on.

Though I was helpful and clever at the port meeting. Or, well, at least helpful. I'm a librarian. My google-fu is strong.

( Project Runway - 6.08 )


Meanwhile, writing this city council meeting is LIKE PULLING TEETH. Blergh.

Writing up this month's school board meeting makes me angry. Or frustrated. Or both.

I just...feel like the parents who are opposed to the free lunch program are putting forward their arguments in a semi-douchey way. I understand their arguments (some of them, anyway), I just don't like the classism and racism I feel is lurking around the edges.

But maybe that's just me projecting. ::shrug::

It is a touchy subject.

I think I ended up making a disapproving face at the meeting (that is to say, my mouth got really small and off-center). I wonder if the chairwoman (or other board members) noticed...

Meanwhile, I have fic to post later. Exciting, I know. It is the bright spot in all of the writing today.

Since today started out pretty shitty, I'm going to focus on things that are good or amusing.

- brownies sitting in the kitchen

- the coconut-pineapple-chicken-curry thing we had for dinner (yuuuuum)

- puppies with their little wagging tails

- cats being long and lanky and affection and weird

- the 3700+ word fic roll I am on

- the feature I wrote that I think is really good

- the man in Spook who thought "that Leprechauns...were most likely discarnate humans."

- Spook in general. Except the whole ectoplasm thing freaks me out a bit, what with the emanating from mediums' orifices (like their vagina). Disturbing. (The bit about the woman giving birth to rabbits! Holy crap! Because, yes, sticking skinned rabbit bits up there is a good idea, especially in the mid-1700s.)

- texting with Dahlia and Natasha

- Bored to Death's opening credits

I am not doing so well right now. Achy and tired. Using lots of Kleenex.

Probably shouldn't leave the house, but if I do I will get pho and pho sounds really good right now.

This city council meeting is going to be a pain to write in this state.

:( x infinity

Spent the morning doing an interview for a feature with the woman I sell peaches for. It was delightful and we spent most of the time off-topic. She's just such a fun person to talk with. As she's mentioned before, it's funny that there's such a gap in our ages (she's old enough to be my grandmother) and yet we enjoy many of the same things and have similar opinions.

Don't know when the peaches will start this year yet. Won't know until they actually do.

Meanwhile, I get to muddle through the proposed school district budget for '09-'10 for the article on July's school board meeting. The business manager even told me it was the most confusing budget he'd ever done, since a lot of the funding is hypothetical at this point and just because the numbers aren't in one fund, doesn't mean they're not in another. So I'm going to look back through my notes and what my editor would like and what the packet actually says and see if I need to call him and go, "Okay, explain this to me again please..."

But beside that, I've finished a book and a TV series (posting about it later, maybe) and have started A Study in Scarlet. There are popsicles in the freezer and two fantastically cool rooms in the house. My Headache from Hell has not return since Sunday. I am excited about people coming over for the rodeo and people maybe coming over for the Best Peaches in the World, No Seriously and others coming over just to hang out. Things are pretty good.

Interviewed our town parade's grand marshal this morning. With her son.

It went well, I think. Mostly, anyway. I made her cry, people!

::headdesk::

I was warned it would be emotional since she lost her husband in February and it was going fine until I asked how she felt about being grand marshal and that brought up rumors for last year and, yeah, bottom line is she left the room to go get Kleenex. Sniffly, not full-on tears.

Still! :(

I dislike interviewing people. Maybe if I did it more I'd feel less nervous.

So now I'm going to get to work on school board and supplement that with Sims 2.

(Also, re:subject line. I just wanted to use it. Aw, boys. Though I do feel a little loser-ish. Making old ladies cry.)

Home from taking olivelavonne to the bus stop. It was fantastic having her around, especially for more than a couple of days. We went out to dinner with a friend of mine, saw Star Trek (third time for me; not tired of it at all) with sdrohc_ratiug, watched Merlin, and took pictures of cows. Last night she even went with me to the school board meeting, which turned out to be a doozy! But now she's gone. :(

Meanwhile, today is for:

- writing NCIS. Turns out DiNozzo/McGee is my default writing place. They seem to be what I gravitate toward when I'm trying to generate anything. Lately my notebook is filled with those two. Time to try to make something of any of that, I think.

- working on school board. Last night was a marathon meeting. It was crazy. There were a bunch of members of the Hispanic community present to show their support for the bond that didn't pass (AGAIN. I am frustrated). But I felt the board was attacked a little when they started listing their grievances with the school. I was really happy when one woman stood up and said, "We have to take responsibility, too. Who buys our kids' clothes? Who lets them out of the house?" The school isn't responsible for raising your kids, people.

Anyway.

- Supernatural season two. For someone who was originally all, "I don't think we really need to buy the DVDs," my mom sure is going ahead and purchasing them without any prompting from me. Heh. It's a good thing. I had no idea I'd love this show as much as I do. And I really had no idea I'd become so invested in the characters. Or so interested in Dean.

Monday I subbed in the middle/high school life skills/special education class. Love the fifth graders though I do, the experience was the most fun subbing I've had yet. It's a small class and the kids are great. Plus, I didn't end up with a hoarse voice and a wicked headache like I do when I'm in the elementary school.

The paraprofessionals are basically in charge when the teacher's not there, so that makes it easier on me. But I graduated with one of the parapros (and it's her mother's class), so she knew what I could handle.

I'd definitely like to go back if they'll have me.

Tomorrow I'm going in to talk to the school district's business manager about state budget cuts and what that means for the school. Washington is cutting levy equalization by about 15% and I-728 funds by about 68%. The meeting tomorrow is to make sure I've got the expected dollar amounts correct for the paper. If I do, the school district is losing...about $600,000 in funding next year.

I could talk about how frustrating and scary that is, but that would just make me sad and, well, frustrated.

So instead I will say that season one of Supernatural came from Netflix yesterday and I've now seen exactly one whole episode. Exciting! I vaguely remember planning to watch it initially, but then work and school and other TV got in the way. (Thursdays are unlucky sometimes. I lose my TV watching stamina.) And like I need things that negatively encourage my over-active imagination. But now I'm giving it a shot.

And it's fun watching Mom try to remember Padalecki.

So sometimes when I write for the newspaper, I get distracted and end up writing things like this:

Morning classes are in Spanish while afternoon classes are in the afternoon.

Made for quite a laugh. Good thing I had people proofread.