Okay...so since I am completely a lady of leisure now, well anyhow for the next 38 days at least, I shall share my nonproductive, yet relaxing details of my days with you.
1. Woke up initially at 4:30 a.m. Yep, that's right, that wasn't a typo. Easton has inventory on the last Wed. of every month and today was it. Got up to pee, went back to bed. My mom says I have my dad's bladder. He got up several times a night too. I think my mom would interject here and say, "Jen, that was not a 'need to know'". Sorry for the details. I will keep the details succinct on the rest of the day.
2. Really woke up at 10:15. Cuddled with Ramsey for 10 minutes. The adorable thing actually grabbed my hand with both of his paws when I was petting him and held onto my hand and didn't want to let go. He does this to Calliope, too, when he is curled up next to her. Very adorable.
3. Watched the most fabulous movie, "The New Waterford Girl" (1999). It was set in Nova Scotia, coming of age chick flick about a precocious 15 yr. old girl who doesn't fit in with her prying, intensely Catholic family. I loved it. I definitely recommend. Last night I stayed up way too late and watched, "He loves me, He Loves me not" with Audrey Tautou from "Amelie."
4. Made lunch. Took nap. (2 1/2 hour nap, I'm ashamed to admit).
5. Hung out with Easton.
6. Watched a little tv. Read magazine.
7. Hung out with Easton more.
8. Watched bridal show on Style Network.
9. Doodled on computer.
okay, crap. Neighbor guy just scared the living crap out of me. Knocked on back porch door. It's 11:40 p.m. for cripes sake. I guess he saw living room light on and thought we were up. Being the girlie girl that I am, I go wake up Easton. After strange incident with weirdo neighbor guy from across the street (came home from work about 7pmish. As driving into driveway, saw unrecognizable man at front door. As started to get out of car after driving up to house, strange man in my body space, obviously fucked up and jonzin for a cigarette or something (what the hell??), I told him we don't smoke, he still was lingering, went to get Easton, he came out and asked the guy what he wanted, guy puts up hand and says, "no problems, man....I don't want any trouble", nice. great. my teddy bear of a boyfriend intimidated white, scrawny, f--ed up man, fear of the black man, I'll tell ya. ) Apparently, he just wanted to know if we wanted that king size bed from his friend who's moving to Boston or Miami. I'm unclear as to which...big helluva difference between those two cities.

Very productive day all in all. Sickeningly so, even. Must plan day tomorrow. Trying with all my might to avoid going to Ikea. They just opened up a store in Atlanta. Okay. I'm even more excited now, I just mapquested Ikea and found it's only 2.83 miles from my house!!!! I'm so psyched. Cheap, Sweedish furniture that close to my humble abode. The furniture gods are smiling down on me. Today was the grand opening. Payday is tomorrow. Must resist. Easton will kill me, as we made a budget and a deal that we would call each other before purchasing anything, "extra." Must take Calliope to the vet tomorrow. Hairballs have become a problem and she's licked her poor little kitty thighs bald. Poor baby. Hopefully, it won't be too expensive.

Out for now. Tata.

39 more days free of work...

Easton's mouth. Scary, 'eh? I mean the close-up, not his actual mouth. Try taking a picure this close of your own mouth. You'll find it just as scary, I promise. Unless, you have perfect lips and teeth and in that case, please do send it to me. I want to examine it and make that determination for myself. I don't think we were even under the influence while we took this. Easton had the good fortune of having braces when he was younger, unlike me. Ironically, we both have the same lower teeth messed up. Don't comment on the hue. We both need to go to the dentist. My dentist has a swanky, upscale office in Buckhead. He has very modern office furniture. This did not concern me at first until the receptionist kept commenting on my, "fabulous insurance" and then the dear, dear soul that is my new dentist, wanted to do some kind of fancy cleaning that involves, "injections with medicine into my gums." Now, I don't normally like the dentist but the idea of injecting anything into my gums makes a bikini wax sound more appealing and god knows, I'll never have that done ever again in this lifetime. Must choose new dentist. Do not want to have to get gum injections with my "fabulous" insurance to pay for forementioned dentist's office furniture.

back from Birmingham

Easton and I just returned home from a wedding in Birmingham, Alabama. That's right..Sweet Home Alabama. Actually, Birmingham was a lot prettier than I thought. Nice houses. Lots of green. Decent-sized city. We went to our last trio of weddings for the spring/summer. Amen. I think we both actually like attending wedddings, but Easton only gets one weekend off a month and we've used every "off" weekend since April to go to weddings. We definitely have our opinions of what we want in our own wedding after seeing so many. I guess that leads me into our next annoucement which should be no surprise to those of you reading this. Easton and I will be getting married next summer. Yay!!! No, there is no ring, yet. That may seem odd to some of you, but he's working on it. I think we knew we wanted to get married within the first month of dating and we've almost been together for two years in Sept. Hard to believe. We'll let all of you fine people know the date when the ring is on the finger and we've actually chosen one.
Lots of fun in Birmingham. Went to Easton's mom, Linda's best friend's daughter, Kim's wedding. She used to make Easton play barbies with her when they were little. He had to be Ken. Hehe. She wasn't a very outgoing bride. Beautiful, yes. Friendly and courteous, no. It was a dry wedding. Yes, I kid you not. As Easton says, "they're holy rollers." His mom, stepdad, Easton and I had flasks so we had our mixed drinks anyhow. No music except some gospel from a boombox. Very anti-climatic at best. Easton's wonderful step-dad James' only request at our wedding is to have Jack Daniels available for him. No problem. I love hanging out with his parents. They are so fun. New Orleans folks are the best. Laid-back, like to party and always show that good 'ole southern hospitality. I love it. Not to mention that my future mother-in-law is a fashionista. I need to take some tips for her, but God knows, I couldn't pull off what she pulls off. Each day I was with her and Easton, people mistook her for his sister. I want that when I'm in my fifties!!

I think our wedding will be awesome. We just want to be married to each other number one. Number two is to have our families and friends celebrate with us. Third, we are trying to honeymoon in Jamaica and possibly go to Sunsplash - a huge reggae fest.
More later...probably lots more since I'm unemployed for 44 more days!!

last day of summer school

I can only feel relief after three very long weeks at summer school. I now have exactly 46 days off. Woohoo! In those 46 days, I plan on creating good eating habits, exercising, reading lots of books, taking long walks in my neighborhood, playing with my cats, watching lots of movies, and doing a whole lot of NOTHING.
I got gifts from students - two in two days. That's right. Some expensive chocolates from a student that I think was concerned he was going to fail and from two of my newspaper editors. They brought me breakfast and a diet coke from Chick-Fil-A, a beautiful frame with a picture of them and a ginormous coffe mug and some super-sweet cards. My students definitely know of my coffee obsession! Every single time I feel burned out from teaching, something like that happens. It's not the gifts. It's that they know me because I interact with them on a daily basis.
Some observations from this week:

• Doesn't Jennifer Wilbanks (the runaway bride) suck big time? She came across on the interview with Katie Couric as stereotypically southern (and in a really bad way), naive, fake, dumb and a big 'ole liar. Visit this website: suejennifer.com. It's from one of our local djs at Q100 in Atlanta. Jeff wants to make sure that those damn fools can't profit from this whole event. She owes the city of Duluth (where I teach) $60,000 and only paid back $13,000 and this girl has money. After all, they were having 28 bridesmaids/groomsmen in their 600+ wedding. They're not hurting for money.
  
• Started watching "Team America" with Easton last night until we both got really tired. Damn hilarious! Can't wait to watch the rest of it.
• Discovered my cats both have fleas. Ugh. Esp. since I won't be buying Advantage until tomorrow. Ramsey sleeps in bed with us. Must not think about that right now or will start itching profusely.
  
• Made a budget spreadsheet to keep Easton and I on track financially. I love making Excel spreadsheets. Am I a dork or what?
• Getting my IT tech at work to install Dreamweaver on my laptop so that I can begin making my own website for the classroom. Had a cheesy one a few yrs. ago but let it go. Want to be very technologically oriented with students this year. Will be doing lots of Power Points.

That's all for now, folks. Like I said last time, leave a girl some comments, ya hear?

hardest blog to write

I've been avoiding adding to this blog here because of recent events. As everyone reading this is probably aware of by now, my father passed away on May 19, 2005. I can honestly say that day is the worst day of my entire life. I miss my dad so much that no words seem sufficient enough, so I'm not going to try. Thank you to everyone who has been so supportive of my family and me. We so appreciate it. I have felt so loved in the past couple of weeks. People at work, friends, and extended family have been absolutely amazing. Everyday is a struggle. My stomach and mind have not felt the same since this all has happened. It feels surreal and dream-like. Death is so final and comes without warning. I think the hardest thing is realizing that I will never get the pleasure of my dad's company again. I miss his presence, his voice, and his hugs. My mom and dad had 34 wonderful years together, but as my mom said, "it's never long enough." I agree. At least I got my dad for 31 years; some people don't have that.

I have to admit I'm struggling with some spiritual angst right now. I just want a sign that my dad is an eternal being now and will be there waiting for me when it is my turn.

I hate the pain and the sadness. It never truly goes away and from people that I have spoken with that have lost their parent or parents, it never will.

I'm trying to get on track. I'm teaching summer school for six weeks. It begins Monday. I'm in a science lab. Tim wanted to know if I had a gas valve available when I talked to him on the phone earlier. Yes, and an emergency shower, should any student or me should need one. How ideal. I'm teaching 11th grade - American Lit. I think I am going to teach this subject for as long as I live - it always gets assigned to me. Had to do some curriculum planning for summer school with a very annoying, cranky lady that I taught night school with a couple of years ago. Teachers can be the worst students. So damn stubborn. Remind me to quit when I get carmugenly like that. Yikes.

A lot of changes at school. A few people got let go. I've never been at a school where the principal lets so many people go. He got rid of a lot of half-time retired teachers in the drop program. We hired about 4-5 new teachers. Most are doing double-duty as coaches. Great. We have one that was a Seattle Sonic's dancer. I heard she has big boobs. The male students will love that. Apparently, we also hired a 21 yr. old know-it-all with a master's degree. Know-it-alls don't fit in too well with my dept. Thank god. You had to be an egotist to fit in with my last dept. I hate that.

Okay, that's all for now. Leave a girl some comments, ya hear?
:)Jen