Now Here's a Ticket I Can Get Behind!

Those crazy WTM homies are at it again!

"Second Breakfast for All!"

Web Photo of the Day-Move Over, Bill Dance!

In this undated photo released by the N. C. Wildlife Resources Commission, David Hayes holds his state record-breaking channel catfish while his three-year-old granddaughter Alyssa holds the Barbie rod and reel that Hayes used to reel in the 21-pound, 1 ounce fish in Elkin, N.C. (AP Photo/N. C. Wildlife Resources Commission)
She's a doctor, a surfer, she works at McDonald's...

what can't Barbie do?

So What Should I Be Doing Right Now?

Hmm...I'm kidless tonight. J is at dad's, the dog is searching the house for crumbs, and the cat has poured himself over the arm of the couch. I'm at the computer touring the WTM Webring and listening to Pandora.

I'm also considering changing the dog's name to "No!" or "Doggie Down!" or the ever-popular "Dammit!"

So what should I really be doing right now?

Ordering J's curriculum now that my student loan is finally in? Done!

How about my cut-and-paste collage for my Techniques lab? Nah.

Fold the laundry that seems to have permanently taken up residence on the schoolroom couch? Nah.

How about reading the first chapter of the Techniques book and taking notes? Nah.

What about working on the 5-page paper I was assigned on the first day of Techniques class? Nah.

Go through the Scope and Sequence of J's curriculum and figure out which lessons to include and which to drop? Oy.

Then again, I could work ahead on the second chapter of that excrutiating book for my theories class...try to find definitions of the major psychotherapies and find where my own beliefs lie...print out and read the readings for next week in whatever class I was supposed to do that...

Nah, nah...and nah.

Blog surfing and Championship High-Velocity Butt-Sittin' it is!!

...oh, heck, who am I kidding?

Let's see, does a definition of existentialism really exist?

Photo of the Day

Welcome to campus: Indiana State First Lady Cheri Bradley welcomes Sophomore Ramon Ishman, 19, of Gary to campus Wednesday at her lemonade stand in front of the president's office. Joseph C. Garza / The Tribune-Star

New ISU first lady sets up lemonade stand to greet students, faculty and staff
Effort by ‘neighbors’ impresses Sycamore students

By Sue Loughlin The Tribune-Star

TERRE HAUTE — Dressed in Sycamore blue and white, Cheri Bradley welcomed Indiana State University students, faculty and staff back to campus Wednesday with a lemonade stand set up in front of Condit House.

Bradley is the wife of Dan Bradley, ISU’s new president.

ISU’s outgoing first lady chatted with students, offered them words of encouragement and showed great interest in attending their activities.

“It’s nice to meet you,” she told one group of students who had stopped by. “Don’t be strangers.”She didn’t want anyone to walk away without partaking in the refreshments. “Did you all get some cookies?” she asked. “Please help yourself to some more lemonade.”

She said she came up with the idea of a Charlie Brown-like lemonade stand recently when she woke up in the middle of the night. “I want students to know that I’m here now and Dan and I are your neighbors on campus and we’re a part of who you are,” she said in an interview.

Web Photo of the Day

So, is this traveling by foot or by bicycle? Maybe both.

Web Photo of the Day

Tallan 'T-Man' Latz performs Monday, June 30, 2008, at Summerfest in Milwaukee. A blues guitar prodigy, the 8-year-old has played in bars and clubs, including the House of Blues in Chicago, and even jammed with Les Paul and Jackson Browne. However, the state of Wisconsin says that Tallan cannot play in taverns and nightclubs because of state child labor laws.(AP Photo/Morry Gash)

There's a reason for that, you know...

...guess who else played a lot of nightclubs as a kid.

'Nuff said.

Web Photo of the Day

Beijing Olympic 2008 opening ceremony giant firework footprints 'faked'
Parts of the spectacular Beijing Olympics opening ceremony on Friday were faked because of fears over live filming, it has emerged.

By Richard Spencer in Beijing Last Updated: 6:58PM BST 10 Aug 2008

The visual effects team at the opening ceremonies were so worried that people would be offended by their efforts to ensure the quality of the already questionable air and the safety of the helicopter pilots filming above...and ol' Georgie's playing grabass with the volleyball team in a country where "saving face" is everything. Lordy.

Note to Self: Do Not Attempt Unless Your Chiropractor Makes House Calls.

Today J and I went to a local nature preserve called Dobbs Park. J and I went there when he was about nine, and he and Grandma and I went to the Native American Museum and Nature Center they have there. Things are just the same as they were.

This is J feeding the birds. Who knew they would like tortilla chips?

This allowed him to get a few really up-close-and-personal pictures of his own.

These guys remain on the other side of the pond with their noses (beaks?) in the air--unless food is being served. Then they deign to come over, usually too late because the others have already eaten it all, and proceed to tell us how unfair they think the whole thing is.

They're actually rather pissy about it. You can see one of them mooning us, he's so incensed.

They also have trails to walk. The woods are completely untouched, save for a few planks here and there to cross muddy places or small streams.

J found a walking stick. It also can be used as a machete, a bat, and an "air sword" (think air guitar). We called it Excalibur.

The park looks so small, and the trails are so compact, crossing and winding around each other, that it's hard to stay on the one you started. When we saw signs like this, we said, what the heck? Let's go that way.

Decisions like that ensure you complete the three miles of trails at least twice, because you're lost...THEN you think, "You know, maybe we should go into the Nature Center and see if there's a map of these trails."

Duh.

"Yes, Prime Minister" Clip: School Choice

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLDb2V86Ei0

"It's looking after children that parents aren't qualified for..."


Hats off to SolaMichella for pointing out this gem!

Web Photo of the Day

We all pitch in wherever we can...

use your talent, I say!

How Sad

Spelling "truely atrosious," says academic
By Luke BakerThu Aug 7, 11:29 AM ET


Embaressed by yor spelling? Never you mind.
Fed up with his students' complete inability to spell common English correctly, a British academic has suggested it may be time to accept "variant spellings" as legitimate.

Rather than grammarians getting in a huff about "argument" being spelled "arguement" or "opportunity" as "opertunity," why not accept anything that's phonetically (fonetickly anyone?) correct as long as it can be understood?

"Instead of complaining about the state of the education system as we correct the same mistakes year after year, I've got a better idea," Ken Smith, a criminology lecturer at Bucks New University, wrote in the Times Higher Education Supplement.

"University teachers should simply accept as variant spelling those words our students most commonly misspell."

To kickstart his proposal, Smith suggested 10 common misspellings that should immediately be accepted into the pantheon of variants, including "ignor," "occured," "thier," "truely," "speach" and "twelth" (it should be "twelfth").

Then of course there are words like "misspelt" (often spelled "mispelt"), not to mention "varient," a commonly used variant of "variant."

And that doesn't even begin to delve into all the problems English people have with words that use the letters "i" and "e" together, like weird, seize, leisure, foreign and neighbor.

The rhyme "i before e except after c" may be on the lips of every schoolchild in Britain, but that doesn't mean they remember the rule by the time they get to university.

Of course, such proposals have been made in the past. The advent of text messaging turned many students into spelling neanderthals as phrases such as "wot r u doin 2nite?" became socially, if not academically, acceptable.

Despite Smith's suggestion, language mavens are unconvinced. John Simpson, the chief editor of the Oxford English Dictionary, says rules are rules and they are there for good reason.

"There are enormous advantages in having a coherent system of spelling," he told the Times newspaper.

"It makes it easier to communicate. Maybe during a learning phase there is some scope for error, but I would hope that by the time people get to university they have learnt to spell."

Yet even some of Britain's greatest wordsmiths have acknowledged it's a language with irritating quirkiness.

Playwright George Bernard Shaw was fond of pointing out that the word "ghoti" could just as well be pronounced "fish" if you followed common pronunciation: 'gh' as in "tough," 'o' as in "women" and 'ti' as in "nation."

And he was a playright.

Copyright © 2008 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Reuters content is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters. Reuters shall not be liable for any errors or delays in the content, or for any actions taken in reliance thereon.


While we're at it, why don't we just adopt the 12-letter Hawaiian alphabet? That should keep the poor tykes from getting so confused...

Web Photo of the Day

Women run in a high heel race at Red Square in Moscow, Saturday, July 19, 2008. Participants of the high heel run were challenged to race in stilettos of at least 9 cm (3.54 inches) tall.(AP Photo/Misha Japaridze)

How nice of Russia to throw some work to those down-on-their-luck podiatrists and orthopedists! It would have looked more realistic if there was a one-cent sale going on just past the tape.

Our Schoolroom

Well, the new school year is quickly approaching, and it's time to get things ready!

I just recently noticed that our colorful timeline is a little less colorful...rather, some of the colors are faded now. I just hate not using wall space in the schoolroom, so I went through a history book of J's that had a timeline in it (which had everything already separated into categories!). I was inspired by the Konos timeline that I was never able to put up in the apartment when J was small--but now, we've gone condo, baby, and that wall is ours to destroy...er, decorate as we please!

The afternoon sun has faded some of the blues and purples in the room, making some categories look pink, but it's still a nice colorful addition to our room--and makes you want to read it (and learn something!).

I took the events and put them in a word file with some fairly big, bold font...a different font for each category should the colors fade (what a forward-thinking person I am--or is that "disaster-minded?"). They're printed out in black ink on colored copy paper and stapled to 2-3 foot strips of bulletin board border. Then I just tacked them up to the wall!

How Sad

A combination of two photographs shows a view of the Forbidden City in Beijing taken July 28 (L) and on August 2, 2008 (R). Beijing has vowed the Olympic Games will take place under blue skies, not the murky "sauna" haze that has shrouded the city recently, but even on apparently clear days pollution levels may not be safe for athletes.REUTERS/Claro Cortes IV

Funny how the promise of revenue will make some countries clean up their act--not the health of their own people. If they really wanted clean air, why didn't they do this a long time ago? I want to be mistaken.

Web Photo of the Day

"Now with less Hydrogen for those who wish to

reduce their atomic mass!"

Oy.

No Comprende!

No Comprende, demonstrated here by Fiver and the Tall Bald Guy, is a time-honored weekend ritual that includes lots of growling, nipping, barking, and generally running around like a ninny...sometimes Fiver joins in, too! It's the only way to wear out a puppy around here. Its name is taken from an expression the Tall Bald Guy uses often at work, as in: "I'll teach you no comprende, dangit!!"

Web Photo of the Day

Must be one of those short buses...

"I may not need oil, but I could sure use a few more

science lessons!"

...and people wonder why we homeschool.

Web Photo of the Day

In this photo provided by Disney-ABC Domestic Television, host Regis Philbin pets Powder, a 44-pound stray cat found wandering in southern New Jersey, on the set of 'Live with Regis and Kelly,' Thursday, July 31, 2008 in New York. Powder was originally known as 'Princess Chunk' until the producers brought out a veterinarian to determine it's gender. From left are Deborah Wright of the Camden County Animal Shelter, Philbin and co-host Kelly Rippa.(AP Photo/Disney-ABC Domestic Television)

Hey, something's gotta catch those New York rats!

The Modern-Day Back to School List

1) Turn in student loan papers and make absolutely sure they're filled out correctly and completely (yes, I've learned the hard way).

2) Cook and freeze meals for those loooong days on campus.

3) Take the rest of the toys out of the schoolroom and change out the year 2 history and science posters (especially since we left them up through year 3...)

4) Wait for student loan money to come in to purchase 8th grade curriculum for the boy who's just champing at the bit to get started (sorta).

5) Shell out $450 for books for three classes--yep, only three. Try not to dwell on the fact that the book for Counseling 533 is the same book you used in Psy 384 and sold back last December.

6) Clear the dining room table of all the studies and papers written during the spring semester, lest we get confused and read the wrong thing (at this point, it wouldn't surprise me).

7) Change the bulbs in the dining room overhead light to 60 watts so I don't squint my way through another semester's worth of homework and further encourage these wonderful crow's feet that are stomping across my face.

Whatever happened to crayons, paste, new shoes, and a shiny new lunchbox?