7 Days of Veggies

Well it's been a week of solid vegetarianism and I have to say it ain't that hard! There was one slip where I went to a friends house and he'd made a pasta sauce with (unbeknownst to me prior to tasting it) pancetta in it but I ate it anyway. I figure a little sprinkling of meat in one pasta sauce isn't going to destroy the planet.

I think one of the things that made me figure I could do this was discovering there's a lot more to eat than just salad. In fact, I've eaten very little salad. My diet hasn't changed all that drastically other than the omission of meat from my meals.

Also, I've started to save plastic bags that I get from the grocery store and bring them back to reuse them. I always saved them and reused them but only once. I always put my lunch in a plastic bag but then I throw it away. I figure, if it's not torn or soiled, I'll just bring it home and reuse it. I did this 3 times last week and therefore saved 3 bags. I haven't been using them for lunches in general anyway since I'm not going into school and they're starting to pile up. So, I figured I'd bring them back to Sainsbury's and just reuse them there. First time I've ever done this was today. Two bags saved! Less oil and pollution! Go Environment!

There's a store here called ethical superstore which I just discovered. I think it's fairly new. I'm not sure. I'll be checking it out when buying stuff. Not sure what the prices are like. I checked those energy efficient light bulbs and they seem way more expensive than I could get them elsewhere but I haven't really looked that much into other products.

It's based in the UK but here's the website for anyone who's interested: www.ethicalsuperstore.com

The UK is just so far ahead of Canada in Environmental initiatives that it just ain't funny.

I saw solar charger for phones, ipods, cameras etc on there and I thought that's a great idea! I wonder how much energy comes off the grid to recharge all those items? I wonder how much of your energy bill consists of energy used to charge stuff. You could save money! See, every time these sustainable and green technologies are used it benefits the environment and the consumer.

I'm actually excited and encouraged by the green initiatives that are taking place. I read an article in the financial section of the paper the other day that said that Green Technology is expanding at 20% per year - which would get any investor excited. They're talking about a possible boom such as happened in communications in the 90's. This would probably be followed by the requisite "bust" but the internet and communications technology stayed and revolutionized our lives.

Green developments are being built everywhere. Even in Victoria BC! There's a great condo initiative there. In fact it's one of the best in Canada. I went to the show room when I was in Victoria and was really impressed. Valerie is thinking she might buy one. (Go Valerie!) You can read about it and watch a video about here: http://www.windmilldevelopments.com/resources_news.html

In London they created a "Congestion Zone" a few year back that charged you 8 pounds to if you travelled by car down town. This money went to fund more busses down there and it's cleaned up congestion, air quality and improved transit. Now they're proposing that high efficiency that get great gas mileage (smart cars for example) would pay nothing, typical cars would still pay 8 pounds, and inefficient cars like SUV's and sports cars would pay 25 pounds. Great idea I say. Reward the good cars and charge the bad. It'll lead to a shift in consumer spending which will make efficient technology cheaper.

I could go on and on but I'll have to leave some for another day.

Boston Legal and the Mysteries of the Human Soul

Boston Legal.

Can I recommend this show to everyone? James Spader and Willam Shatner (of all people!) are brilliant! The writing is fantastic. It's quirky, funny, surprising, unpredictable, deep, takes on issues, and is full of sex and conflict to boot! Crazy demented characters who are more than meets the eye.... it's fantastic!

I recommend watching it on DVD so you can go episode by episode. It's not necessary to understand the show but it sure makes it more fun.

I love shows and movies that explore the inherent weirdness of people. We're all supposed to fit in these neat little boxes and be certain things but of course none of us do. Human's are all inherently weird in one way or another I think. We all have our secrets don't we?

With that in mind here are my favourite shows and movies and books involving weird fascinating and real people: (in no particular order)

1. Boston Legal (obviously)
2. Six Feet Under (the 1st season is perfect. slowly goes down hill after that)
3. American Beauty
4. Secretary (film with James Spader and Magie Gyllenhall)
5. Books by Dave Eggers
6. Books by David Sedaris
7. Notes on a Scandal
8. This is England (movie about how british skin head movement went from relatively harmless group of working class kids and was co-opted by white supremacists. Brilliant!)
9. Fight Club

Can't think of anything else off the top of my head but if anyone else can feel free to post.

Busy But Laid Back

Busy But Laid Back. Like this lady in the picture. Busy but in a calm yogic place.

Babagenouche says she's discovered why there are so many great academics in this country. It's because it's cold and rainy all the time so everyone just sits inside and reads and writes.

I concur!

Bab went out today to scout buildings for her character in her upcoming project. They'll be using the pictures of houses around London to show where their characters live. They also took pictures of coffee shops and stuff that their characters would hang out in. Pretty cool actually. Good way of getting into the character as well. Just what sort of building would your character want to live in?

I had a chilled out but productive day. Did a lot of reading of "Yellow Brick Roads." Which is a book about teaching. We got it in University but I didn't have time to really process it. This is one of my big complaints about education. In fact I think it's everyone's complaint about education. The "Brain Dump." Like here's 1000 pages of text you have to read this week and then we'll talk about it. Then we'll do 1000 more next week! We were taught repeatedly not to do this in teacher's college...while they continued to do this to us anyway.

Why is it I read all the books I was supposed to read in University AFTER I finished University? I got curious about all those books sitting on my shelf. Schools have a real skill at taking the pleasure OUT of reading. I loved Harry Potter as do many other people I know. Now think if I told you that you had to read 4 chapters a day no matter what. How fun would that be?

How do I avoid this as a teacher?

I have no idea.

But I digress.

I'm really stoked about the upcoming school year. No matter what happens at least I'LL be interested in what I'm teaching. I have all this energy. I got all kinds of stuff done today, found resources for History and Geography. I'll be posting any good links on this blog to share with any teacher's out there who might be interested. Got mailing done, made notes and plans for English, went shopping. Very productive day!

And now to bed.

Return of the Killer Blog

I'm back! I know you've all been checking this daily since April 15th and now you will be rewarded. I admire your perseverance!

I'm back after 4 weeks off and feeling good.

I just went into my school today to get thing settled and I'm feeling really good about it. The school looks great. The head of English (who is also assistant head of the school) is really helpful and enthusiastic. I have good English teachers there to bounce ideas off and help me with ideas, resources look good, kids are supposedly fairly well behaved. Looks like it could be fun! I'm really looking forward to tackling the English and Drama stuff. History and Geography make me nervous but we will see.

The school looks to have a strong arts bent to it even though they're very geared towards formal comprehension for written exams. The kids at this school are gearing up to write entrance exams at elite schools at the end of year 8 so it's very important they can write those exams well. Hopefully I can keep up with them!

I feel way more relaxed and grounded this year even though I'm going to be entering a new school. First of all there was the 4 week visit back to Canada. Man that helped! It was great to see everyone. Sorry to those I didn't (Len, Cathy, Cara, Casey, Gord, Kerry, Warren, Cody, Jake, Jessie, Cori and everyone else!) Sure was sad to miss the FamDamily Camping Trip.

First of all it was so good just to get back to Canada and see open space and nature! Toronto is a oasis of calm compared to London so it was good to not feel so hectically rushed. It was great to see family and friends again and just hang out and relax.

Biggest highlights:
1. Brother's wedding and the speech that almost killed Mike. (I won't say why but I don't think anyone noticed he started over from the beginning halfway through)
2. Boat ride on West Lake in The County
3. Tofino!
4. Great times all around with friends and family. Absolutely wicked time!

Coming back is to England is a much different experience. I was hoping it would feel more like coming home than coming back to returning to a foreign land and it does. It feels normal to return here as opposed to the disoriented culture shock I went through last time. It's great to see friends here again and it feels good to be able to navigate the landscape, stores, and even dial a phone!

As I said the school looks great so I'm looking forward to that.

Big changes are up coming for Babagenouche and I but I think we'll settle for a bit after that.

1. Babagenouche will be done her showcase, school, and master's thesis in about 6 weeks! Then it's time to take over the BBC!
2. We'll be moving to West London somehow.
3. We may or may not have a room mate when we do that.
4. I'll be starting at the new school which is 2 hours away at the moment. Hoping to find temporary accommodation during the week somehow.
5. Our new place will hopefully be permanent for the next 2 - 3 years.
6. We're both trying to diet right and exercise to shed that holiday weight...well in my case that last 3 years worth of weight.

and to that end...

I'm officially a vegetarian.

Why?

It's all about the environment baby!

Why not eat meat? Well the reasons are numerous assuming you believe that Global Warming is an environmental crisis. If you don't, watch An Inconvenient Truth.

It's not about the animals for me it's about the humans and the planet.

Here are some off the top of my head:
1. Deforestation:
Forests are cleared for animals. Trees eat C02. Deforestation leads to global warming, harm to ecosystems - the usual stuff.

2. Food wastage:
There's only so much farmable land on earth. Much of it is used to grow food to feed animals that we eat. If we used that land to grown food to feed people we could feed more people.

3. Cow farts:
Major source of methane - bad for atmosphere. Seriously.

4. Water contamination:
Tons of animal "effluent" (shit and piss) from massive amounts of animals goes into water table and contaminates water supplies.

5. Health concerns:
Hormones, Drugs, Mad Cow, genetically modified animals, disease spreading in factory farms.

Etc. Etc. Etc.

I did a quick search on Google and here's a link with some info: (I'm not going Vegan tho)
http://www.veganoutreach.org/whyvegan/environment.html

Fairly random source but it's a start for those interested!

Right now I'm just not eating meat. I eat eggs and I'm trying to cut down on cheese. As for cutting out all products that have any animal product in them ( like lard in muffins or something)....not sure how I'll handle that. It'll be an adventure.

And finally...I'll be making this site accessible only to people I authorize shortly. This just means you'll have to create a user name and password.

Greece. Not a bad place at all.

Well we're back from Greece. It was a lovely place to be I must say. The weather was outstanding the whole time we were there. It was bright and sunny with not a cloud in the sky.

Our hotel was great. It was convereted from some old building that was there in there at some point in the 1990's and it was really unique and charming. It was amazing to lie in bed and stare at these stone walls and think: "Someone was livng here 1000 years ago."

We stayed in the the old town of Rhodes which, I didn't quite realize going in, is actually a 100% old medevil town. I was a bit disconcerted at first as it's full of crumbling buildings and parts of it are bascially old ruins. It began to grow on me as the days went by though and by the time I left it I was in love with it. It's got it's tourist trappy type of places but they're a million percent better than the New Town which is just outside the city walls. The New Town is over run with Versace, Dolce and Gabbana, Hugo Boss, endless crappy restaurants, Subway (!), and hotels. Basically it's a name brand shopping mall where as in the Old Town there are shops that sell that stuff but it's all small businesses. The Old Town is full of charming places to discover too. It's not very big and maps of the place seem to have been made up by a blind man who has never been there so I thought it was bigger than it was the first few days as I wandered randomly through it.

We found some AMAZING food there. The first night we we went to a restaurant that was good but was, as we found out later, way over priced. We had a conversation with a retired Scottish couple who, it turned out, were staying at our hotel. We were into our appetizer at another restaurant and I saw them out front looking at the menu. I went out to get them just as they were walking away and told them this place was great so they came in and sat by us. We had a great time eating and talking to them for about 3 hours after that. Fantastic time. We ended up hooking up with them on the final day and sitting at another cafe for about 3 hours whilst sipping wine. They were really great people.

The best stuff we saw in terms of sites were all in the Castle of the Knights of St. John. The Castle was HUGE. It was extremely well maintained as well. There was also an archeological museum that was a lot bigger and more impressive than I had expected. It was housed in part of the castle that hadn't been fixed up which added to the "old historical" feel of the place.

I tried to see if there was any scuba diving but apparently that doesn't start for a month or so. Ah well, I'll have to fullfill that dream another day.

Babagenouche and I had a great time poking around, eating great food, getting sun and relaxing.
Babagenouche's Aunt and Uncle were super kind and picked us up at the airport late Saturday. We finished off my vacation (Babagen has another week damn her!) with a lovely breakfast and a wonderful Sunday lunch with the family.

A great 5 days.

I've posted pics on my flickr account.

Greece is the word.

Well tomorrow Babagenouche and will be off to Greece! I've checked the weather forecast and it's calling for 4 days of temperatures between 14 and 20 degrees Celcius.

We'll be staying in the old town of Rhodes. It's a Unesco heritage site...so...why you can actually stay in hotel there is beyond me but apparently it hasn't changed much in a few thousand years. It looks something like this:

I'm really hoping to get some of this in:

I've never really gone diving before but there's a place you can go diving for 30 Euro's for the day! Whoo hoo!

Anyway, I'm not bringing any school work with me so maybe I can stop worrying about it for 10 seconds.

It should be a great time. We'll be there until Saturday. I'm looking foward to much relaxing, good food, warm weather, a bit of adventure and maybe a night out of dancing! Who knows? Could happen!

I'll post pictures and a report on Sunday.

It's Been Yonks

Well I know I haven't posted much lately but I swear I tried to post on Friday and my browser crashed after I spent hours working on a lengthy and gut bustingly funny post. Alas it has vanished into the digital abyss.

Well, I'm on vacation for the next two weeks for Easter break. I've just been paid - they only pay you once a month here which is causing me great consternation - and I've spent the last few days trying to get a good drink of England. I've had a wonderful time. I spent Friday in an alcohol induced haze as I hit our The Plume of Feathers - my favourite local pub. Saturday I went for breakfast at a lovely cafe we've discovered in Debden then went to see a play called Tom Fool. The play was massively well reviewed and highly disappointing. This is the third such play I've seen that fits this description and I'm starting to wonder what the hell is wrong with English theatre critics. Anyhoo... Sunday Babagenouche and I went to Brick Lane which is much like a larger better version of Kennsington Market. We stopped off at a place called Leytonstone which is the first place I found I really actually liked in the East End of London. Something about it just feels neighbourhoody in a good way. I went to a place called Primark which sells the cheapest clothes in Britain. I managed to buy a pair of jeans and a sweater for 17 pounds.

This all lead to today's trip to Oxford. Now this was awesome! It was Babagenouche's idea and, as usual, it was a great one.

We went down to get the bus at Victoria station and I was immediately impressed. I'd been into central London before but I really dug this area. (Have I mentioned I live in nowhere land in the east end?) Anyway we got a seat on the front window at the top of a double decker coach and enjoyed a lovely ride to Oxford. I was absolutely amazed at how amazing and beautiful Oxford is! It's incredible! I've uploaded pictures to my Flickr account so check them out.

We toured around the colleges of Oxford itself and they're absolutely incredible. HUGE! You walk into these gates or door ways off the main street and next thing you know there are big parks and masses of buildings that are somehow hidden within the city itself. Here's me in Magdelene College.

The architecture is incredible and the city is a-hoppin with all kinds of people and energy. We were lucky to have great weather to boot. Mabye this country ain't so bad after all.

Debden Diary

Well I'm through most of the term. This up coming week is all activities which will be tiring and frantic but at least I don't have to plan anything or do much after school.

Interesting thing happened on Tuesday. It all began a few weeks back when my Principal and I had a bet at golf. Our school goes out on some sort of outing every Friday and I made the foolish mistake of betting the loser would have to do "the worm" in assembly at the end of the day. Well, he got 60 points on the driving range and I got well...um...6. So I did a little mock break dance followed by the worm.

The next time we went out it the activity had changed to skating. He actually started the betting process despite the fact that he can't skate. He's a good sport. I won a race so I made him wear his clothes on backwards during assembly and then the week after that I made him wear a dress. Going in last week I figured I'd have to figure out a way to lose to even things out but I was a little apprehensive as to what I'd have to do. The principal rigged it so some kid came in and interfered with me during the race and the forfeit was mine. The kids decided I had to dress up like a gangsta and do a rap in the next assembly.

This turned out to be Tuesday. I hid out until I was announced and walked in the room with full hip hop attire. I hit play on the sound system and launched into the second half of "Parents Just Don't Understand" by DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince.

I was shitting my pants as I started but then people really got into it. Staff and students were looking somewhat bewildered and amazed 'cause I'm a low key quiet guy at school. I had yet to launch my performing arts skills at their maximum power. Anyway, it went over well and now the kids won't leave me alone to do it again. I rapped the damn song over and over on two more bus trips but they can't seem to get enough. I'll be doing a repeat performance at the term end assembly. I'm trying to think of how to jazz it up a little bit...maybe more bling...maybe a little dance...maybe I'll blend "Bust a Move" in there somehow.

I'll keep you posted

But you wouldn't want to live there

I would say I have more experience and knowledge of England and it's culture than some north Americans.
My dad was born in London, all of my mother's family come from England, and I've watched more episodes of Are You being Served? and Jeeves and Wooster than your average country vicar.

However: none of my previous field research into the goodness of Marks and Spencer's prepared foods and the delights of Rybena and dry sherry has prepared me for the sheer assault on the senses that is: life in Debden.

It's a yob night-mare. It's a tiny, ugly, battered concrete high-street, which someone optimistically (presumably while drunk) named the Broadway. A testament to all that is wrong with post-war building, it contains shops so depressed and shabby that you get the feeling the owners would be all too grateful if you shoplifted them into an early retirement. When I moved in, my aunt from Chislehurst said that it was like a time capsule to the high-streets of remembered from her youth in the sixties and seventies. There are two betting shops, three hair-dressers and (here's the kicker) two discount carpet shops. Now I know we all love a good piece of discount carpet, but come on. Two shops?? Are you seriously asking me to believe that the crushing demand for cheap rugs has swollen to the point that one such establishment can no longer keep up?

Then there's the population of Debden: old people and youwf. The eldery are lovely - my only issue with them is that they are always in front of me at Sainsbury's, buying twenty packets of cream crackers, rooting around for the correct change, and having prolonged discussions about the council's decision to relocate the bus stop twenty yards down the road.

The youwf (i.e. local pronounciation of "youth") are all ten to twelve years old, wear baggy track pants, hang around the local gas station (or 'garage'), bum smokes and beer off of anyone they can, litter, spit, shriek, rev the engines of their cars, beat each other up, shoplift, and generally get underfoot when you're fighting your way towards a pint of milk at ten o'clock at night.

And the frustrating thing is that Debden actually has the potential to be a charming little village. It is surrounded by some of the greenest, loveliest, most breathtaking countryside you could hope for. The local Epping Forest is renown as a place of calm and beauty and tranquility (as well as being a convinient place to dispose of corpses, but never mind.) When the sun comes out, there's not a more picturesque place to behold. Too bad you have to squint past the clouds of underage smoke and people fighting over the latest carpet sale to see it.

Dispatches from the front

I'm officially in training for the title of Worst and Most Infrequent Blogger Ever.
To me, blogging is like communism: I love the idea in theory, but it ain't working so well for me in practise.
Also: I am frantic right now. It's March! End of term approacheth! Busy, busy, busy bees are we! Here's a run-down on what's keeping me busy right now:

a) training for a Stage Combat Exam (involving rapier and bare-knuckle fighting...don't worry, no serious injuries to report yet....knock on wood!)
b) big night of duets coming up this Wednesday...I'm singing this song from a musical called "Chess", which was a big deal back in the 80's and is written by one of the guys from ABBA. (Truly, there is no end to their talents. Truly.) My partner is a lovely Welsh boy called Dan, who turns into a Restoration dandy or "wit picker" when he's had a few drinks, and proceeds to be exceedingly cutting and foppish to the amusement of all assembled.
c) involved in creating a new theatre piece with two other actresses and one of the directors from the directing MA program, which involves weekly meetings where we've so far determined that the main things we have in common are love of wine, avocados, and weekend newspapers. It's a start.
d)heading down to Ravensbourne tv and film school to shoot our specially-commissioned-for-our-class tv scripts. I get to play a morally ambiguous psychiatrist (is she evil? isn't she? how much does she know? is she in on it?) named Dr. Krane...boy the writers really stretched themselves to come up with that name, didn't they? I'm working with a great group of fellow actors, so I feel really lucky and priviledged and hope the shooting next week will be fun. Ravensbourne is in Chislehurst, just round the corner from where my aunt lives, so that will be fun to tromp round my old haunts and possibly pop in to eat my family's cupboards bare along the way.
e) private coachings thrice-weekly for the Carleton Hobbs auditions in 2 weeks. Not sure who knows about this and who doesn't, so, in a nut-shell: auditions at the BBC for the chance to win a 6 month paid radio contract with them. Highly coveted and desirable prize. Difficult to even get selected to audition. Fabulous opportunity. That's March 19th, so cross your fingers for me please. I'm up against approximately 80 others, competing for potentially 8 places. One in 10 odds? Child's play. I spend my professional life gambling on such odds. I'll win it if I can.

So sorry if I don't blog much. It doesn't mean I don't care. It just means I'm deaf, dumb, and mad from exhaustion. But it's a full life. I'm very lucky.

Friday Night is MY NIGHT!

The end of another week. There's no better time than Friday night. I hit the end of the day and no fucking way am I doing any work, worrying about it, thinking about it, or picking up a pen or paper for any purpose other than to write down a take out food order or a phone number to call for pizza, or a grocery list for dinner. From 5:00pm on is my only stress free time of the week. I suck it in like a drowning man coming up for air. Eat it up like a starving man at a buffet. Live it like it's my last day on earth. It's feel good time baby!

Another two weeks since I last blogged. I'd like to blog more but I've gone through this phase where I'm slacking off because it seems like more work and I'm pretty over worked. Teaching is stressful. Especially where I am. Have I mentioned this before?

I had a science specialist who I've been working with come into class today and I think he was pretty shocked at the kids behaviour. Every one tells me I should relax and not worry about my teaching but I know there are things I should be doing...like evaluating, having the proper work ready, having extra work ready for kids, focusing on their tests, organizing so I can get experiments done for them... all of which I'm struggling with mightily. One day I'll look back and I'll laugh and laugh and laugh at all this but it's the tough at the moment.

Having said that I seem to have the undying support of the administration and many of my colleagues which is what really keeps me going. Apparently I care about the kids and this is important. Good to know. Just wish I could teach properly. But there you have it. The caring of the kids is important. It's amazing how much work I can put into a 45 minute lesson. Like an hour minimum. Maybe an hour and a half. People keep telling me to stop doing this but I'm not quite sure how. I can't seem to stop planning and replanning or quite figure out a simple logical sequence for a lesson.

But it's Friday! Enough of that!

Babagenouche and I are going to central London tomorrow to check out a show called I like Mine with a Kiss which is getting absolutely fantastic reviews. That should be fun. Incidentally has anyone heard about Daniel Radcliffe playing in Equus? Daniel Radcliffe is better known as Hary Potter and Equus is better known as "full frontal nudity play about an insane psychologically damaged young man who blinds horses." It's getting absolutely amazing reviews! Radcliffe is apparently amazing. Who knew Harry Potter would go so far?

Babagenouche and I are also planning on going to Valencia Spain over our Easter Break in 4 weeks. Should be awesome sunning and relaxing time.

Good things on the agenda in the near future! Hooray!

Downtime

I've been on half term break since last week and I've been chillin out mightily. I've gone in to school and gotten some work done during the break but not nearly as much as I should have. I'll live to regret this but at least I've done something.

As I sit here I'm eating what must be my 15th pizza of the week (store bought though) and drinking a fine fine pint of Young's bitter. The Red Hot Chili Peppers are blasting in the background and I'm trying to forget that I only have 2 days left in my break.

I went through another term...that's 2 down for the year. It was harder in some ways and easier in others. It was tougher in some ways because I began to expect more of myself but I'm still a rookie so I keep falling short of where I want to be. I also started liking a lot of the kids which made it more difficult to deal with them in some ways. It's harder to be really hard on kids if you like them. You'd think it would be harder for them to be mean to you if some of them like you too but I'm not sure that's so much the case. It must be for some kids. I guess they're the ones I'm not having the toughest time with.

On another note I got cast in a play of sorts at East 15! There's a director there who's doing a play called "The Investigation" by Peter Weiss. It's verbatim scripts from trials after WWII. It's not the Nuremberg trials - it's some other trial that's similar. It's 4 hours long so they're going to do readings every week for the next few weeks. I've been cast as the judge for the first section. Should be fun. I think they're aiming to do a full stage production but I'm not a hundred percent sure how that'll work since they have different people reading in all these different readings. Anyway it'll be fun to dust off the acting tool kit again.

Tonight I'm going to see a play my room mate is in about these women who camped in a park somewhere in England next to this nuclear silo for like, 30 years, to protest nuclear warfare. Should be good. The play has taken that situation and blended it with Antigone (ancient Greek play where the women go on a sex strike to stop a war). They've been doing tons of research for it including camping in the actual park itself.

Babagenouche is doing well. She's got this audition for the BBC coming up which is great but also a lot of work and stress. She'll so great though I'm sure!

That's it for now.

Snow Day

News from BBC.com

Thousands of schools are shut and motorists are being urged to travel only if necessary. Some households are also without power.

Up to 10cm (4in) of snow fell in some areas.

4 inches! Bwahahahaha!

Well today was another good one. Likely because I didn't actually end up having to teach. The entire city ground to a halt as 4 inches of snow fell on the city. Apparently it doesn't actually snow in London most years. This was a legitimate snow fall and it created all kinds of problems.

It took me 2 hours and 15 minutes to take the usual 45 minute train ride to work. Apparently the snow was interfering with the current. I'm not surprised because trains here are constantly sending out huge sparks as they travel along. Then again...shouldn't they be built a little safer?

I got off at one station and crossed over to the other side of the platform there was a constant blue arc shooting out of one wheel. It looked like a welders torch. It quickly began to burn through the metal of the track. Then flames started appearing as well as smoke. There was a worker with a walkie talkie saying things like "Move the train off the platform before it welds itself to the rail!" Apparently it couldn't move... or wouldn't. Eventually the arc stopped. I think it burnt a whole in the rail.

Once I got to work it became apparent this would be a relaxing day. There were only 8 kids in at first so we made up a short schedule.

<--- not my kids but you get the picture.

Then break time hit and the snowball war started. It was awesome! here we had about 14 kids who have major social and emotional problems having a huge snowball fight for about 40 minutes. I was out there on my own for about 10 minutes and had a great time chucking snow around. The kids got to whip snowballs at the teacher and, more importantly, I got to throw snowballs at them.

The only point I got really nervous was when this one year 11 student who is REALLY muscular came after me. He kept coming for me and trying to push snow in my face and eventually we ended up grappling. I thought I might be dead. Eventually he took me down - hard. So I got up again and took him down - hard. Really glad I managed to. I think I earned some respect. :) Amazing experience because none of this would be tolerated at a "mainstream" school.

Then we went inside and had hot chocolate.

It was a fun day.

One day left and I'm off for a week.

Thank God.

1 Near Perfect Day

Hot Damn it's been a long time since I posted!

Apologies to any who have been checking in regularly - I've probably lost every reader out there. Post a reply if you're still reading!

I don't know what happened today with my kids but I went through my toughest day in terms of scheduling with almost nary an incident to report.

Tuesdays are usually brutal. I have 4 straight classes in the morning and then an hour and a half straight of Drama. That would normally be ok but I'm usually exhausted and Drama is damn near impossible with these kids. They really don't want to do it it seems. I think we could do a much better job though. We need to start with just playing games...anyway! Enough about that.

Four straight classes of engaged students. Unbelievable. I had points where I was standing there watching them work - completely unsure of what to do with myself. Usually I'm arguing with them. Or they're arguing with me. Is this what teaching in a normal school is like? I actually have energy left over. Usually I'm so tired I can't stand up by the end of the day. It's also amazing how my disorganization and inability to get any tasks done outside of lessons faded away. It's stress I tell you! I've been so overwhelmed I can't think straight.

So here's to one good day!

I'm sure it'll be WWIII tomorrow. :)

Culture Vulture

In between waiting for my cakes to cool and my chestnuts to roast (see previous food porn post), I have taken in some pretty incredible art this holiday season.

Last week I saw the Holbein exhibit at the Tate Britain. Braving the long hike out to Pimlico, and the even longer queue for tickets with a bunch of snow-haired, well-dressed, personal-space-ignoring old folks, I managed to score a ticket to see the portraits of this most remarkable artist.

In case you're not a rabid slobbering fan of sixteenth century England (but how could you not be? religious upheavals and persecution! sumptuous silks and brocades! live birds baked into pastry! and plague, plague, PLAGUE!), the crash course on Holbein is this: famous portrait painter, became attached to the court of Henry VIII, and is responsible for that great tyrant's most famous portrait. You know the one: legs open, hands on his hips, codpiece prominent and thrust forward, mean little eyes in a pudding face. He also painted several of Henry's wives (heads still on, naturally), as well as other prominent courtiers and officials of the day.

Yawn, you're all thinking. But the remarkable thing about Holbein is that makes all these people so alive - he's particularly good at eyes and mouths. It's a sense you don't truly get until you see these paintings up close and personal. For example, I've seen Jane Seymour's royal portrait before - with its tightly pursued mouth and bland expression, like milk jelly, I didn't think much of her. But when I got up close, her eyes are actually incredibly gentle and thoughtful, especially in the early sketches, where they are surprisingly beautiful.

And this little painting was one of my favourites....isn't he a little sausage? That's Henry's little son by Jane Seymour, the great hope for England. Sadly the little cutie died in his teens, paving the way for his half-sisters Mary and Elizabeth. Little precious.

One of my other favourites: Christina of Denmark, a prospective bride for Henry, sixteen years old, all in black because she's already been once widowed. Her face, robbed of its hair, framed by a weird black hat, is beautiful, cautious, a little nervous, with an incredibly direct and straitforward gaze, but quirks of humour and kindness in her mouth. You feel you know exactly who this girl is, looking out into her future with confidence it will be extraordinary.

I can't reproduce these images here with any justice, but google Holbein and download some for yourself. They're glorious.

I also visited the Dennis Severs' house this week (damn you, Christmas essay!) near Spitalfields market. I'd stumbled across the website and was intrigued by the description of the house:
"a time capsule...the artist lived in the house in much the same way as its original occupants might have done in the early 18th century...to enter its door is to pass through a frame into a painting: one with a time and a life of its own." Giddyup!

So I went along, rang the old-fashioned bell, and after being briefed on the ground-rules (no talking, no touching, no photography), I was turned loose on the house to begin my "experience."

The website describes "the game" as being "you interrupt a family of Hugenot silk weavers called Jervis who though they can still sometimes be heard seem always to be just out of sight. As you journey off in silent search throughout the ten rooms, each lit by fire or candlelight, you receive a number of stimulations to your senses..."

Well, it was probably one of the most captivating and evocative things I've ever encountered. Each room over the four floors is exactly as it would have been in the 1700's - crammed, cluttered, dark corners to be explored, tiny clues as to the family who live here. It felt a bit like an afternoon on the Marie Celeste: you saw overturned chairs, baking griddle cakes abandoned, half drunk glasses of sherry, crumpets still stuck on toasting forks, broken teacups, still-smoking pipes! Wigs, silk dresses, and frock coats were slung over the backs of chairs - tiny baby shoes lay dropped under a high-chair in the kitchen, with a half-eaten gingerbread man in a bowl, and the sink high with dirty plates.

The smells were intriguing: a heady honey scent in a woman's bedroom, something lemony, fresh, and verbena-like in her daughter's room, tobacco and old smoke around an interrupted card game and whisky bottles. And always, very faintly, sounds: a man's voice, a tolling bell, a creak on the floor above you, a carriage going by - always tantalizingly out of reach.

It was very poignant, and haunting. "Still life drama", as the artist described it. How different the world looks though candle and fire light. The darkness is somehow colder, an enemy. But when there is light and warmth, how appealing and sensual things are: a mountain of sugared fruits, a half-eaten loaf of bread, a pile of books, cosmetics on a dressing table. Tiny curls of paper, lists of calls the ladies have made, little notes from family members to each other, even clues from the artist to the sharp-eyed, such as this gem "The late 20th century is an intriguing place to visit...but who would want to live there?"

I loved it - the whole thing was magical. I staggered into the street stunned and battered by the sudden assault of the modern world, and trudged back into this careless and rushed place we call the 21st century.

The Dreaded Lurgy

I managed to get through the Christmas holidays without getting any serious sickness. This seemed quite miraculous at the time as most of London was felled by one flu or another.

Unfortunately that all came to an end yesterday morning.

I awoke feeling fine but by the time I was halfway through brushing my teeth I realized there was an ever tightening knot in my stomach and that my head was beginning to pound. I realized that I was quite likely to throw up at any moment.

Throwing up, hurling, visiting the porcelain telephone and speaking to Ralph... all these things are about the worst thing I can imagine. I hate being sick more than anything else. I fight it to the bitter end.

Which is exactly what I did.

I spent the next hour and a half arranging my lesson plans so I could email them in. Luckily I got sick on the day that is, without a doubt, the most organized day I've ever had as a teacher. I had EVERYTHING set up for the day. I was actually looking forward to going to work so I could enjoy the fruits of my labour. Someone else did, but at least it made me look good.

I woke up this morning and still had a pounding headache and a high fever so, alas, here I am at home again.

I'm feeling better though so I'll probably be at work tomorrow.

There ya go. Not the most interesting post but a post nonetheless.

Leafs 10 - Bruins 2

Alex Steen: 3 Goals 2 assists = 5 points
Matt Stajan: 2 Goals 2 Assits = 4 points
Boyd Devereux: 3 Assists
Bates Battaglia: 2 goals

Highlights can be found at: http://www.nhl.com/nhl/app?service=page&page=Video

	G	A	+/-	SH	PIM	TOI
SUNDIN	0	1	2	3	0	16:17
MCCABE	0	0	5	2	0	21:39
GILL	0	1	2	1	0	19:36
O'NEILL	0	1	1	4	0	14:53
BELAK	0	0	0	0	12	1:44
BATTAGLIA	2	0	3	4	0	23:08
KILGER	1	0	1	2	0	17:25
DEVEREAUX	0	3	3	0	2	18:02
KABERLE	0	2	1	0	0	21:55
KUBINA	0	1	0	0	2	18:26
POHL	1	2	2	5	0	16:55
ONDRUS	0	0	0	1	0	4:34
COLAIACOVO	0	0	1	1	0	12:22
BELL	0	0	1	0	5	5:58
STAJAN	2	2	4	4	0	19:12
NEWBURY	1	1	3	5	6	13:16
STEEN	3	2	4	6	4	17:04
WHITE	0	2	6	1	2	19:59

Musings on the Importance and Random Occurance of Support.

I'm really amazed at what some kind words can do --> even if they're from unexpected sources. Maybe especially when they're from unexpected sources.

I just started back for the New Year. I've been feeling lower than I've felt in a long time. I'm terrified of all the planning, marking, assessment, collection of student work, databases of student marks and long term planning that are just lacking from my teaching life. I'm struggling to get 4 lessons planned for tomorrow and just can't get the big picture in place. Plus I'm massively disorgainzed.

Babagenouche has been amazing to me the last few days including a wonderful dinner tonight. Then I read a comment by a Sledgehammer (who I've never met) on my New Year's posting and I feel much better. Thanks Sledge! And thanks Julie. And thanks everybody who's written and said nice things to me!

Edukator

Here beginneth the food porn

While my beloved Edukator has been delving deep into his soul these past few days, taking a good hard look at himself, and generally preparing for the new year in an awe-inspiring spirit of quiet maturity and sober reflection...

I've been baking things. And searching out shops that bake things. And reading about other people baking things. Hmmm. Two different sets of priorities are beginning to emerge here. To illustrate my point: on our recent New year's junket to Tours (all hail cheapie Euro-flights!), a ridiculously lovely medeival village in south-west France,

this was the kind of thing Edukator
wanted to take photos of:

...and this is what I
wanted to take photos of:








Good thing Edukator likes eating baked things, or we'd have absolutely nothing in common :)

Now in case all this food-porn sounds decidedly frivolous and decadent, here are some of the culinary challenges I've taken on and tackled this festive season (lest anyone suspects I've actually been enjoying my time off):

1) I roasted my own chestnuts. Given the sort of rampant foodie I've become, it was bound to happen one of these days.
2) I invented a graham-cracker substitute, in order to form the crust of my mother-in-law's world-famous Xmas "fiesta bars". I got a package of ginger snaps (the closest biscuit I could find to ye olde grahams taste-wise), wrapped them in two layers of plastic bags, and reduced them to crumbs by beating them with an empty wine-bottle. Which took a VERY long time. But my bicepts look incredible as a result.
3) since it's impossible to buy chocolate chips in anything larger than a 25g package, I hand-chopped two large 500g slabs...again for the fiesta bars. Advancing my carpal tunnel symptoms along nicely.
4) I baked gingerbread, poked holes in them, and strung them around the flat as cheap, festive decorations. Thank you, Nigella, Domestic Goddess indeed.
5) I don't have any of the right culinary equipment to bake. Which led to great creativity: the empty wine-bottle was my rolling pin, I tempered chocolate in the microwave, I used wine glasses as my cookie cutters. Liquids were measured using cleaned-out honey and jam pots. And all creaming and mixing was done by hand, which works up a sweat! No wonder people were thinner back in the day!

All of this, really, because I have tons of Christmas term homework I ought to be doing. Avoidance is a wonderful spur to my culinary creativity. There's nothing like a looming essay on the theatre of the oppressed to give me the urge to make marshmallows from scratch or bottle my own quince jam :)

January 1 2007

Well this is it. A New Year. Usually I look forward to the New Year with great anticipation. I am looking forward to a big year but I'm also very stressed because I have to back and teach again. Oh no!

The upcoming year will certainly have some big events in it. The winds of change that started to blow when I decided to go back to get my Bachelor's of Education in 2005 will to howl and blow. Babagenouche and I did a recap of our accomplishments this year and I can't figure out why I think my life is boring all the time.

Here are my accomplishments in no particular order except mostly chronological.
- Completed second teacher placement.
- Completed mountain of work - much of it inane - for Teacher Training.
- Completed Bachelor of Education
- Met wonderful friends at Teacher's College (you know who you are!)
- Taught Drama to Mentally Challenged Adults
- Packed up apartment, life, moved to Britain
- Survived some of the toughest emotional times in my life:
The denial of my Visa, Getting Stuck in Canada, Getting a job in Canada in the meantime,Getting to the Airport to find I'd missed my plane, Finally getting to Britain, Adjusting to Britain, Teaching for the first time, Teaching in a different system/culture/difficult students. (There I said it. Difficult! Not challenging. Difficult. Let's be honest they're difficult to handle. )
- Began to learn a new language: British.
- Found a school with one of the best staffs one could imagine.
- Started to get more organized.
- Worked harder than I've ever worked to try and get things going in my first term of teaching.
- Set up new life in Britain.
- Started this blog!


Babagenouche was going to contribute but she's fallen asleep on the couch so I'll have to toot her horn for here a bit.

- Had the courage to cross an ocean and audition for Masters Acting programs in order to follow her dream.
- Was Accepted from hundreds of applicants for a very specialized and select program.
- Packed up life and moved to Britain to continue her dream
- Worked intensely and with great commitment through very difficult program.
- Promoted from 12/hr job to $40,000 per year job in one year. Quit. :)
- Organized, planned, and initiated most things needed to get life moved to Britain. Dragged husband moaning and wailing the whole way.
- Received excellent praise and feedback at end of first term.
- Found apartment and room mate when all looked lost.
- Survived the Visa denial fiasco.
- Endless source of love and support.
- Inspiration

Resolutions:

Endeavour to Persevere
Stay Positive
Believe in Possibility
Get in better shape.

And now I leave you with some thoughts and images I hope will carry you and me through the New Year.

"Perseverance and Honesty are more important that Brilliance"

PATIENCE



PRACTICE



PERSEVERANCE