My day:
Headache from two glasses of wine
No milk in the house, artificial creamer is congealed
Cat pukes three times while I drink black coffee with a headache
Megan shows up with small boy from next door before I get to vacuum the pool
Ants invade my rose planter
My accomplishments:
Ran dishwasher
Changed Litterboxes
Watered shrubs outside of fence
Did some laundry
Got rid of headache
Walked and fed dog
ate lunch
Vacuumed pool
And so it begins.
In other news today, Brian invited a new kid over, and the kid came...within a minute, they were riding their bikes up to the shopping center. Now they are at this kid's house, and nobody is home. This will NOT be the way the whole summer goes. Megan is back, and worrying about her volunteer swim lessons. Yesterday, when she went to do it, the guy asked her and the only other girl to write the names of the kids on certificates (they had to ask the kids for their names) and the other girl ditched the chore and jumped in the pool with the kids. Megan was stuck writing certificates for two hours, and nobody helped her. She's afraid she will be stuck with that again today. Oh, and our neighbor drove by and told Megan to tell me that E is on the agenda for the Wednesday meeting! Seems like it may end up happening after all!!! Stay tuned!
Showing posts with label volunteer hours. Show all posts
Showing posts with label volunteer hours. Show all posts
Friday, June 20, 2008
Thursday, June 19, 2008
School's Out for the Summer!!! o/ o/
The last day! It's here and it's over! And it is beautiful outside. Brian is at a party (not much of one, thank God, I was worried about the guest list but most of the ones I worried about decided it would be too boring and didn't go) and Megan is at the Y teaching the week-long Learn to Swim lessons and then practicing afterwards. It's very quiet in the house, and Puff is even out. She just hopped down from the window, but she is ignoring me, pretending not to hear.
It was a fairly uneventful week aside from one inappropriate comment made by a 5 year old yesterday, I told the counselor about it and the little girl was sent home. Nobody really seemed too affected today, she was back and seemed as happy as could be. I hate when things like that happen on my watch, but I couldn't just ignore it.
This morning we had a brief power reduction (not quite outage) and the carbon monoxide detector was going off in the basement. I unplugged it and went out for a walk. There was a dead mouse in the driveway! I passed a fire truck responding to a call about a neighbors CO detector. I cut my walk to two miles and came home to find the dead mouse was nowhere to be seen, and the lights were back on. I put the CO detector back in the basement, and it's been fine. The only problem is that there is another chipmunk in the pool, as well as a big dark spot by the drain. Gah. I want to go sit out there and read my book, it's so beautiful out, but I don't want to scoop the munk (or munks!), but I don't want to know it's there, either.
The big news is that they have reopened one of the roads that was closed about six weeks ago in town. It was slated for these HUGE improvements, which one would assume were done to improve traffic flow. Well. I just sat in traffic for ten-plus minutes to go through a light that would normally have taken three or four at the most. About five lanes of traffic were all trying to get into one lane to make a left turn for the Parkway. Ridiculous. These people call themselves engineers and planners!?! Maybe their goal was just to make people hate that area so much that they will continue to find alternate routes, thereby cutting down on bothersome traffic in residential areas.
In other news, everything is pretty mellow for now. Megan got her letter from the summer program so we know she will be in a class with autistic kids, probably 2nd and 3rd grade or so. It should be a good class. I spoke to my board neighbor briefly this morning and she told me she is working with Dr. NoCallBack and they are "doing everything they can". I found this odd, as she had also been gung-ho about it when last we spoke.
It's like Dr. NoCallBack has some big concern, that she can't tell me about, but she tells all my supporters and then they become non-committal about the whole thing. All I know is that if they end up rejecting it, after all of the hoops they made us jump through and all their rude inattention to our messages, emails, and calls, I will be furious. Not even so much because we won't be able to host the student, but because this will have taken nearly two months, wasted the time of the two ladies at the agency, wasted my time, gotten my kids' hopes up, and, most of all, wasted the time of poor E, who has done nothing but apply for a year abroad. This is honestly the most blatant display of inefficiency I have experienced so far in this district; and if they reject her, I think I will send my letter straight to the superintendent. If there is something missing, we have not been made aware, if there is a concern, nothing has been said. They just seem content to drag it out forever, which implies that they are processing the information; but something nags at me that there is more to it than that.
It was a fairly uneventful week aside from one inappropriate comment made by a 5 year old yesterday, I told the counselor about it and the little girl was sent home. Nobody really seemed too affected today, she was back and seemed as happy as could be. I hate when things like that happen on my watch, but I couldn't just ignore it.
This morning we had a brief power reduction (not quite outage) and the carbon monoxide detector was going off in the basement. I unplugged it and went out for a walk. There was a dead mouse in the driveway! I passed a fire truck responding to a call about a neighbors CO detector. I cut my walk to two miles and came home to find the dead mouse was nowhere to be seen, and the lights were back on. I put the CO detector back in the basement, and it's been fine. The only problem is that there is another chipmunk in the pool, as well as a big dark spot by the drain. Gah. I want to go sit out there and read my book, it's so beautiful out, but I don't want to scoop the munk (or munks!), but I don't want to know it's there, either.
The big news is that they have reopened one of the roads that was closed about six weeks ago in town. It was slated for these HUGE improvements, which one would assume were done to improve traffic flow. Well. I just sat in traffic for ten-plus minutes to go through a light that would normally have taken three or four at the most. About five lanes of traffic were all trying to get into one lane to make a left turn for the Parkway. Ridiculous. These people call themselves engineers and planners!?! Maybe their goal was just to make people hate that area so much that they will continue to find alternate routes, thereby cutting down on bothersome traffic in residential areas.
In other news, everything is pretty mellow for now. Megan got her letter from the summer program so we know she will be in a class with autistic kids, probably 2nd and 3rd grade or so. It should be a good class. I spoke to my board neighbor briefly this morning and she told me she is working with Dr. NoCallBack and they are "doing everything they can". I found this odd, as she had also been gung-ho about it when last we spoke.
It's like Dr. NoCallBack has some big concern, that she can't tell me about, but she tells all my supporters and then they become non-committal about the whole thing. All I know is that if they end up rejecting it, after all of the hoops they made us jump through and all their rude inattention to our messages, emails, and calls, I will be furious. Not even so much because we won't be able to host the student, but because this will have taken nearly two months, wasted the time of the two ladies at the agency, wasted my time, gotten my kids' hopes up, and, most of all, wasted the time of poor E, who has done nothing but apply for a year abroad. This is honestly the most blatant display of inefficiency I have experienced so far in this district; and if they reject her, I think I will send my letter straight to the superintendent. If there is something missing, we have not been made aware, if there is a concern, nothing has been said. They just seem content to drag it out forever, which implies that they are processing the information; but something nags at me that there is more to it than that.
Monday, June 16, 2008
A Handle on the Pulse
The blood pressure monitor arrived! It is my latest toy. I am no longer afraid I am a high blood pressure candidate although I will continue to monitor, and to try to lose ten pounds. The first reading I got was a little high - 128/75 - but the pulse was 92!!! I was afraid of myself! I took a couple more readings, a few minutes apart, and as the pulse came down, so did the BP. By the final reading, it was under 120/80 and the pulse was 78.
Megan asked me to take hers. Her pulse was low, of course, somewhere in the 50s and she had the BP to match. I had had a glass of chardonnay, which I had read can raise your blood pressure, so I was not sure what to expect. Well. My pulse was 66 and the bp was 117/70-something. Hah. The secret must be that I have to schedule all my doctor's appointments after Happy Hour.
So one mystery is solved: Megan emailed the woman from the special ed program and she is, in fact, accepted. So she will be working in the special ed classes for the summer on MWF from 8:30-12:30. That's really OK. It leaves us the entire afternoon for activities and leaves her with much less idle time. Now we just have to wait to see to which class she has been assigned.
Otherwise, the package from the exchange student agency will go out in the morning, and Dr. NoCallBack will have it on her desk by Wednesday at noon. I'll let my board President neighbor know so she can be on the lookout for it, and she will go and thumb through to try to ensure that it gets on the agenda by the 25th. And so we should have no news before then as far as that goes, but once the 25th rolls around, we will know for absolute certain if we are approved.
In other news, it's the last week of school, I spent the day with my kindergarten friends and we had a lovely time. Tonight I convinced Megan not to go to swim practice, she has her algebra and Spanish finals tomorrow, her worst day, and it's a late night for swimming tonight. Also, we were expecting violent rains. I hear the pool was closed at 7, but the storm had pretty much blown through here by the time that they were supposed to have gotten in the pool. I had Wren at the vet today for her rabies shot and he said she looks good. I was a little concerned she had gotten thin, but she was half a pound heavier than last year, so she must just be thin compared to the rest of the tub-o-lards we have around here. She was not happy with the whole experience. She managed to get herself under the towel I had put for her to sit on, and when the tech came out to call her, the receptionist said, "Wren's not here."
Megan asked me to take hers. Her pulse was low, of course, somewhere in the 50s and she had the BP to match. I had had a glass of chardonnay, which I had read can raise your blood pressure, so I was not sure what to expect. Well. My pulse was 66 and the bp was 117/70-something. Hah. The secret must be that I have to schedule all my doctor's appointments after Happy Hour.
So one mystery is solved: Megan emailed the woman from the special ed program and she is, in fact, accepted. So she will be working in the special ed classes for the summer on MWF from 8:30-12:30. That's really OK. It leaves us the entire afternoon for activities and leaves her with much less idle time. Now we just have to wait to see to which class she has been assigned.
Otherwise, the package from the exchange student agency will go out in the morning, and Dr. NoCallBack will have it on her desk by Wednesday at noon. I'll let my board President neighbor know so she can be on the lookout for it, and she will go and thumb through to try to ensure that it gets on the agenda by the 25th. And so we should have no news before then as far as that goes, but once the 25th rolls around, we will know for absolute certain if we are approved.
In other news, it's the last week of school, I spent the day with my kindergarten friends and we had a lovely time. Tonight I convinced Megan not to go to swim practice, she has her algebra and Spanish finals tomorrow, her worst day, and it's a late night for swimming tonight. Also, we were expecting violent rains. I hear the pool was closed at 7, but the storm had pretty much blown through here by the time that they were supposed to have gotten in the pool. I had Wren at the vet today for her rabies shot and he said she looks good. I was a little concerned she had gotten thin, but she was half a pound heavier than last year, so she must just be thin compared to the rest of the tub-o-lards we have around here. She was not happy with the whole experience. She managed to get herself under the towel I had put for her to sit on, and when the tech came out to call her, the receptionist said, "Wren's not here."
Sunday, June 15, 2008
National Honor What?
OK, so the story goes that in order to be on the National Honor Society (in?) at our high school, you must satisfy a list of requirements. Among them is the community service hour quota. A student must have completed at least 100 volunteer hours by the time that they make their application. Which is not too bad, considering you do have about four years in which to do this, right? Hmm. But what if nobody tells you about the requirement before you're a senior? I don't even know how I found out about it, but I did. The guidance counselors do not tell the freshmen about it. But I have been on Megan to get to work on these hours.
In order to try to knock off a chunk of the hours in one summer, Megan applied to work at the school district's extended school year program. She had to fill in an application, write an essay on why she wanted to do this, and another paragraph summarizing her extracurricular activities. Then she had to get a letter from a teacher or guidance counselor, recommending her. She did all of this, and I dropped it off before the due date. (This was the first time I tried to get in touch with them regarding the exchange student)
The volunteers were supposed to be notified by today. She has heard nothing. Two of her friends received letters with assignments. She has not even recieved a letter turning her down, or thanking her for making the effort to apply. One of the girls who is doing it did it last year. The other, like Megan, was applying for the first time, but her mother is active in the PFA at the middle school, and probably at the high school as well. Anyway, it's demoralizing, as there is no apparent reason for her to have been passed over; not to mention that it's just plain inconsiderate of them not to even contact her with a letter of rejection.
So we're having to scramble to figure out what she should do this summer instead. Honestly, if not for the insult of it, it is not such a bad thing. She was going to have to miss a couple of the five weeks of the school for trips, and then she was going to have to work MWF from 9-1 until the middle of August, including the week when we will have C. If she doesn't have to do this, she can volunteer at the church's vacation bible school, and get 15 hours while having fun. So she will do that as soon as I get the mail tomorrow and confirm she has in fact not been assigned to a class. Then we will be free to entertain C as a whole family for the entire week. It's too bad she can't get some hours for that. I am going to email them and ask if they have opportunities for her to help. There's a picnic for the kids in July and maybe she can help out at that.
We also tallied up her church volunteer hours and found she has already gotten 26 just from her acolyting, then another 25 from the 30 hour famine (she skipped some!) and she will do some community swim lesson volunteering on Friday at the Y. Then add on Vacation Bible School for another 15, and she should be at 75 or so hours by the end of this year, with two years still to go. So we should be able to get the 100 without their help, but it still makes me so mad.
But the one thing that really burned me about this is that, in typical Middletown fashion, the Superintendent's newsletter says that students who missed too much school this year to advance a grade (more than 16 days unexcused) may make this up by volunteering the hours in the extended year program. Beautiful, right? Take the kids who skipped too many days of school and put them in the positions instead of the straight A honors kids, who work their butts off the whole year and DON'T go to the drinking and pot smoking parties. I am quickly beginning to think our new administration may be worse then the ones we have had in the past. It's really not a nice thought that this would be their priority. I'm seriously considering getting Brian out of the system after 8th grade and sending him to one of the Catholic high schools. I wish he would show some interest in the county schools, but he insists he does not. This should be the topic of many blogs-to-come once the new school year begins.
So that is all for now. In other news, we had a nice day at the track despite some violent storms that passed through. After that we had dinner with the Doll for her birthday and Father's Day. It was a nice day. Finals are this week for Megan, and I am working four half days; three of them will be applied towards by sub certificate, which is good for the next five years. After that (if not before) I suspect I will have had enough!
In order to try to knock off a chunk of the hours in one summer, Megan applied to work at the school district's extended school year program. She had to fill in an application, write an essay on why she wanted to do this, and another paragraph summarizing her extracurricular activities. Then she had to get a letter from a teacher or guidance counselor, recommending her. She did all of this, and I dropped it off before the due date. (This was the first time I tried to get in touch with them regarding the exchange student)
The volunteers were supposed to be notified by today. She has heard nothing. Two of her friends received letters with assignments. She has not even recieved a letter turning her down, or thanking her for making the effort to apply. One of the girls who is doing it did it last year. The other, like Megan, was applying for the first time, but her mother is active in the PFA at the middle school, and probably at the high school as well. Anyway, it's demoralizing, as there is no apparent reason for her to have been passed over; not to mention that it's just plain inconsiderate of them not to even contact her with a letter of rejection.
So we're having to scramble to figure out what she should do this summer instead. Honestly, if not for the insult of it, it is not such a bad thing. She was going to have to miss a couple of the five weeks of the school for trips, and then she was going to have to work MWF from 9-1 until the middle of August, including the week when we will have C. If she doesn't have to do this, she can volunteer at the church's vacation bible school, and get 15 hours while having fun. So she will do that as soon as I get the mail tomorrow and confirm she has in fact not been assigned to a class. Then we will be free to entertain C as a whole family for the entire week. It's too bad she can't get some hours for that. I am going to email them and ask if they have opportunities for her to help. There's a picnic for the kids in July and maybe she can help out at that.
We also tallied up her church volunteer hours and found she has already gotten 26 just from her acolyting, then another 25 from the 30 hour famine (she skipped some!) and she will do some community swim lesson volunteering on Friday at the Y. Then add on Vacation Bible School for another 15, and she should be at 75 or so hours by the end of this year, with two years still to go. So we should be able to get the 100 without their help, but it still makes me so mad.
But the one thing that really burned me about this is that, in typical Middletown fashion, the Superintendent's newsletter says that students who missed too much school this year to advance a grade (more than 16 days unexcused) may make this up by volunteering the hours in the extended year program. Beautiful, right? Take the kids who skipped too many days of school and put them in the positions instead of the straight A honors kids, who work their butts off the whole year and DON'T go to the drinking and pot smoking parties. I am quickly beginning to think our new administration may be worse then the ones we have had in the past. It's really not a nice thought that this would be their priority. I'm seriously considering getting Brian out of the system after 8th grade and sending him to one of the Catholic high schools. I wish he would show some interest in the county schools, but he insists he does not. This should be the topic of many blogs-to-come once the new school year begins.
So that is all for now. In other news, we had a nice day at the track despite some violent storms that passed through. After that we had dinner with the Doll for her birthday and Father's Day. It was a nice day. Finals are this week for Megan, and I am working four half days; three of them will be applied towards by sub certificate, which is good for the next five years. After that (if not before) I suspect I will have had enough!
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