I haven’t forgotten about you kiddies. I am carefully composing my essay on how I spent my summer vacation. But, I stumbled across this and just couldn’t believe it! The guy (well, that’s questionable now) that I just knew I was going to marry turns 50 tomorrow:
That’s right! Michael Jackson is 50 years old! Man!!! I feel ancient! It’s scary to look at him these days, so that is why I am not going to post a picture of him as he looks now. The man in the yellow shirt and bow tie is the one I was so in love with! I remember kissing his poster every night before I went to bed! Yes, I am a ginormous dork, but I’m sure I wasn’t the only one…..
Just a quickie for now. I’ll be back soon to catch y’all up on my M.I.A.-ness. But, as usual, another Florida teacher has been caught messing with the kiddies.
Joel Matthew Cupp, a teacher at Trinity Oaks Elementary School, was chatting with two different undercover investigators with the Citrus County Sheriff’s Office and one with the Attorney General’s CyberCrime Unit, believing he was talking to three young teenage girls.
Cupp also exposed himself multiple times over a web cam to the “children.”
He’s a teacher at an elementary school near my home!! As a matter of fact, we were considering trying to get MM into this school! YIKES!!! I don’t know how long it will be up, but if you’re interested, he’s got a blog. Another sick f*ck in our already pathetic excuse for schools in the grand ole state of Florida.
Someone pointed me in the direction of this article this morning. I don’t even have words…
When Abbie Hawkins felt a strange vibrating sensation in her bra while at work she simply assumed that it was her mobile phone ringing.
The hotel receptionist was therefore rather taken aback to discover that it was actually a bat that had made its home in her underwear – and that it had been there all morning.
Really???? C’mon! How do you not notice this at any point when putting the bra on?!
This evening, I logged on to see how our wonderful schools here in glorious Tampa were faring after their “grades” were released and instead I stumbled across this horrific story. Apparently, some dumb ass decided it would be a cool thing to toss a lit firework into the backseat of a car where a 1-year-old and his 2-year-old were sitting:
Someone in a group of young adults and teens on the sidewalk had tossed what Felix thinks was a lit Roman candle through the open rear window of her Toyota Camry.
It landed in the lap of her 1-year-old son, Juan Coley, who was closest to the open window. His legs were on fire when Felix pulled him from the flaming back seat. His Pampers had exploded from the detonation.
“I could hear my kids screaming. They were burning,” Felix said from their hospital room. “Smoke was coming off my baby’s legs.”
What the hell is wrong with people?!?! This happened in Fort Meyers while the mom was stopped at a stop sign, on her way to the store to buy juice and milk for her kids. Unfortunately, she did not get a look at the person(s) who did it. Now, she has to sit in the hospital with her two young children and find a way to comfort them and try to understand why something like this happened.
Seriously, if there is a hell, the person(s) who did it surely belong there!
A couple of friends have recently relocated. Listening to their kavetching about the whole process reminded of how much of a headache moving can be. I don’t know which was worse - moving from one state to another, or just moving down the street. Either way, I am pretty sure I’m not going to look forward to doing it again. The part I hated the most was the packing all of my stuff up myself. Yeah, I’m lazy. Get over it! But, what I want is a company that at least offers everything that I am interested in when it comes time to move again. One company that was recently brought to my attention is Reliance Relocation.
Looking over their website, it seems they have everything that you could possibly need when relocating. They are based out of Houston, TX, but they operate Nationwide. From reading their website, it looks like they do long distance moves in a similar fashion to the trucking companies that now offer moving services - they allocate you space on a truck that is heading to or through your final destination.
In addition to moving your belongings, whether it be long distance or local, they also have the option of doing the packing for you! I know, this is a colossal waste of money, but sometimes, you just gotta splurge.
Australia. I went on Google Maps to plan out my trip and thought I’d share with you my itinerary. You all should be able to keep track of me fairly easily; however, please note that when I am at step 12 of my trip, I may not get all that great cell phone reception, so you may not hear from me for a while. Take a look at the map to follow my journey.
P.S. Just in case you haven’t learned already, please don’t take me too seriously.
For Christmas, MM got a Nintendo DS and a couple of games. Our concern, when deciding which games to buy her, is the appropriateness of the games for her age. It turns out that she ends up getting the games that involve taking care of a pet of some kind. What I’ve come to realize is that those games are pretty much all the same, except for the animal. There really isn’t much challenge to them and MM doesn’t really seem to stay too interested in them for long.
When I heard about GoPets: Vacation Island, I really liked the concept. There seemed to be a lot more to it than the other pet games. As soon as we got it, MM opened up and stuck it in her DS. We were headed to Girl Scouts and she did not divert her attention away from the game for one second of the ride. It’s almost like the Webkinz because she gets to earn “money” for doing things and, in exchange, she can purchase stuff for her pet. She really likes that she’s able to communicate and find friends for her pet, and it’s all safe because they can only communicate using symbols.
So far, MM has given this game a solid “two thumbs up” and said she enjoys it much better than her other pet games! Keep the good stuff coming Nintendo!
Today was the last day of school for MM and she had many things to show me when I got home today. Based on information that had been given to us previously, we weren’t expecting to get report cards until the middle of the month and we weren’t expecting the rest of her FCAT results until next week.
Before I get to those, I first saw the 3 awards she received this year: Perfect Attendance, Outstanding Achievement in Writing, and Exemplary Service to her school (I’m really not all too sure what that one is about…maybe she saved a teacher’s life? LOL) She also had received her final book report back. It was due last Friday and she reached for the stars on this one. She had started reading Little Women about a month ago and we decided she’d be finished in time to do her book report on it. She really enjoyed the book and got through all ~400 pages in time to report on it. She got it back and had received an A+ with a note about “Great Detail” from her teacher.
Okay, now to the really good stuff. She got straight As in all her subjects as well as Es for behavior and above grade level for her academics in Math and Reading. And for her FCAT, she only missed 3 questions in both her Reading and Math so she’s in the 97th percentile. Best of all, her teachers decided they didn’t want to see her again next year, so she got promoted to the next grade! (Grand Daddy didn’t appreciate that attempt at humor too much!) MM rocked this year! I’m so proud of her!
Don’t mind me, that’s just the sounds of our whole house dealing with allergies this year! Poor MM has it the absolute worst!! She’s suffered from seasonal allergies since she was an infant and has been taking prescription allergy medicine (thank you for Zyrtec going OTC!!) just as long. Some years are worse than others. I remember one morning, when she was a toddler, and she woke up looking like she’d gone a few rounds with Muhammed Ali! Talk about freaking out!!! I rushed her to an urgent care facility and was so relieved to find out it was just allergies.
Lately, the allergies seem to be extending through the family, and I’m sure having 2 cats and a dog who have a strong dislike for keeping their fur to themselves doesn’t help any. When the time of year comes around when most people are starting to open up windows and air out their houses from the stuffy winter, we have to firmly shut our windows to keep out all of the allergens. But, that only does so much since we’re locked in with the pets.
Weekly, and many times daily, vacuuming shows just how much stuff we’re breathing in that’s probably not helping at all. During one of my daily kavetches about all this, someone told me about the AccuClean Whole Home Air Filtration System. This looks like something that we could definitely benefit from! This isn’t just some special air filter you pick up at the store and have to replace all the time. Instead, this is a whole system that filters the air in your home, removing all those pesky allergens like pet dander, pollen, and mold! EP and I have checked it out and it’s definitely something we want to look into further. With MM being borderline asthmatic and haivng a perpetually stuffy nose about 6 months out of the year, I’m willing to give anything a try. If all else fails, we can always resort to a plastic bubble!
(Grand Daddy didn’t appreciate that attempt at humor too much!) MM rocked this year! I’m so proud of her!
