i'll send an SOS to the world

for the past four days, i've been humming the peter, paul & mary song "if i had a hammer" while looking mournfully at the beads to go across one of my three (don't ask) bedroom doors. if YOU have a hammer you'd like to loan me for about 15 minutes, i would trade you a top-secret, honest-to-god recipe for sweet tea. if you have a hammer and would like to come over and be handy, i would actually share my sweet tea (using said recipe) with you.

in other news... nothing like waiting until the very last minute to get school schedules together. the students report in 10 days to school, and we still have no final schedule. rumor has it that i might be teaching compensatory reading this year in addition to english 3 and/or english 4. okay, if that was a possibility, i really should have been told at the beginning of the summer.. OR maybe last year when i asked to go to the adolescent literacy conference, they should have forked out the $250 to send me. as it is, it's likely that i have 10 days to learn how to assess reading skills and teach 15 year olds who read on a 4th grade reading level how to understand what they're reading while building their vocabulary. no worksheets. i don't do worksheets. argh. and this, dear readers, is why i love teaching in the delta.

despite my dread over possibly being ill-prepared to teach a new subject, getting into my classroom felt like going home. and despite the sarcasm above, i really do love this crazy, whacked-out delta teaching gig. ask me in a few months and the answer might have changed, but for now, i'm in that "new year" exhilaration stage.