I thought I'd never catch my breath

Today, I almost cried.

Thrice.

For some reason, many people think teachers have it so easy.

Summers off are a blessing for teachers, right?  That there are no curriculum revisions, workshops in other cities, setting up classrooms, learning how to teach new classes, lesson planning, learning how to use the new technology given to us, etc.  Many think that we get paid regularly throughout the summer to just do nothing.

Today, I had to budget my last check of the school year (yes, it is a bit larger than my usual bi-monthly check, but far from magnificent in its amount).  In order to live responsibly throughout my non-teaching months, I try to pay forward all my bills so that I don't have to pay any again until my first check of the school year in mid-August.  (Just writing that I won't see any income for twelve weeks is really frightening.  Each summer it brings me dread.)

I have the money deposited in my bank and decided it would be best to send money orders or direct transfer from my account rather than checks or using a credit card.

The withdrawal to pay for my rent, my cell phone, my internet/cable, my electric, my gas, my bi-yearly car insurance (Why does insurance cost so much?? And why haven't I moved to a place where I don't need a car?), my AAA, my credit card balance, and my car payments for three months was so large that I almost cried when I wrote out the withdrawal amount on the slip in the bank.

I felt like I had these sort of stacks
for a brief moment.

I almost cried and had a panic attack when I went to the teller and told her in which denominations I wanted the money back.

I shoved the money into my front pocket so I could see and feel the large bulging money that barely fit into my tiny pocket.  So I could know that for that brief moment between the bank and the post office I felt like a really rich person who just carries stacks on stacks on stacks (man I hate that Soulja Boy song!) of money daily.

I thought I was going to be fine at the post office when I had the money orders made.  The lady was really nice.  We talked about my hair and how she wants to see what it looks like in certain styles I described to her.

It was friendly banter even as I was telling her the dollar amounts for each of the money orders I needed.

It was friendly banter even as she started printing the first money order.

Then she read the total amount of money I owed.  And then I passed her the massive stack from my bulging pocket.

What she gave me back in change was not even enough to buy a fast food value meal.

At that point I took a deep breath and let it out.  She said that she always feels really bad giving people change after they pay for large money orders.

At that point I almost cried.

This is all I have left on my dresser.
I wish I could turn the smile on
my eraser upside down for effect.

To hold the tears and feelings of angst in, I explained to her my situation.  She explained to me that she thought all teachers get paid throughout the summer - she has a friend who has it that way for his teaching job.  We talked about the differences in school districts.  We talked about what I teach and why I like it.  As she continued to print off my money orders, I continued to answer her questions so that I would not cry.

When we finished, like Lauryn said, "I compared myself to Tony Braxton, thought I'd never catch my breath."

I walked over to the post office table in the middle and started filling in money orders and addressing envelopes to be sent to businesses so that I can live the rest of the summer in peace.  Well, at least not worrying about whether I have money to pay my bills.

I do have money left that is not being moved over to my do-not-touch-savings.  I will, hopefully, not starve.  I just have to budget the rest of the summer and make sure that whatever I do with my money is worthwhile.

I guess I won't be going to any celebrations where I have to make it rain.  Unless they want it to hail when I throw up coins instead of dollars.

What what, in my what?

Yesterday I went to return the rental car I have been in for two and a half weeks.  I had kind of estimated a cost of the car over the course of the time I have had it in my possession, but I was not at all prepared for what the actual total cost was.

The lady had the nerve to tell me that I owed Enterprise $897 and some change.

As soon as she said that I wanted to start yelling out the words to Samwell's hit song, though he is more positive about this sort of experience.  I felt violated - and not in a good way.

I split up the money on the credit and debit cards and then walked over to the dealership.

It felt really nice to purchase a car that I have liked since it came out.

It also felt nice that my monthly payments on the car will be over four times less than I paid for 2 1/2 weeks of a rental.

I am a Mini owner.  This is my actual car in the picture.

Included with the owner's manual is an invitation to join the USA Mini Owners club as well as a catalog of a ton of merchandise, including dog food/water bowls designed from Mini.

Not sure if I will go that far with it, but I will enjoy my car.

Counting, driving, and the po-po

A lot of times I go through the motions in life; not really aware of what I am doing, and just kind of going with the flow.  Sometimes when I am walking I start counting my steps without even realizing it until I have gotten into the 20s -- weird, I know.  I can even be talking with someone and counting my steps.  Not sure why I do it.  Maybe it is some sort of meditation device to keep me calm in various scenarios.  Not sure.

When I am driving, I sometimes zone out and get half way to a destination before questioning myself as to how I got there safely if I was not completely conscious during the drive.  I know it is a problem.  When it happens I try to make sure to stay focused on the road.

I think that people in the US tend to allow driving to be a distraction rather than an act.  I know in Germany, it is a big deal that they are going to start putting drink containers in the VW because they believe you should only focus on driving and not on drinking, eating, or texting while you drive.  I agree.  I just cannot seem to stop the thinking part of the driving distractions.  I am a good driver, though.  Comes with years of driving, years of video games, and years of watching Formula One racing.

I used to be able to say that I had never had a moving violation ticket from the police.

Until yesterday.

I was driving through a neighborhood to a friend's house on the way to the post office.  I was looking at the sign underneath the stop sign that says, "You roll it, we'll write it." I was also looking at the man raking his leaves in the yard on the corner.  In these distractions, I somehow rolled the stop sign.

I did not see the cop sitting just beyond the man raking the leaves, but he saw me.  I almost want to blame the guy raking the leaves.  I'm sure the cop was not really paying attention, but he said that the guy raking pointed out that I had rolled the sign.

Ok.  I deserved it.

I guess I am due.

As he came toward me, and I was thinking of how much money I was going to have to come out of, I was counting how many steps it took him to get to my car.  Eight coming to the car, 6 going back to his computer to make sure I was not a felon.

The soundtrack in my head is struggling to survive this

Somehow the time of the year for the Key Club to raise money came earlier this year than last year. But again, they are doing the annoying song before school, between classes, and after school each day until they raise $800. Unlike last year when they played some Hanson Brothers' song, this year it is Myle Cyrus or Hannah Montanah or whichever name the teen goes by.

Hoedown Throwdown.

The song is super annoying. Some kind of mixture between country music, rap, and a combo of all those electric slide/chacha slide/cupid shuffle types of songs.

So far not too many people are disturbed by it, but I am beginning to lose my ability to smile between classes. Rather than my usual greeting at the door of the students entering my room and hellos to the students passing by on their way to class, I have almost a grimace pasted to my face.

I probably look like I am in pain because it is really difficult for me to focus on another song in my mind that is more pleasant as that one is blasting through every speaker in the school building.

I don't know which is worse, the song, kids walking by singing along, or the students who stop in the hallway and start to do the Hoedown Throwdown dance.

Actually, I do know. The worst thing is that even as I type this, the song is emanating through my brain to the point where after I write each sentence and take a break for any moment of time, little lyrics are being rehashed.

Fortunately I only know the chorus so I can't sing the whole song.

Unfortunately, I only know the chorus so I can only keep repeating "do the hoe-down throw-down, do the hoe-down, throw-down," something about popping and locking it and polka-dotting it, and that being how we roll over and over and over and over each time there is a moment of not much thought in my brain.

I must keep thinking.

And I must make sure that the soundtrack in my head defeats the speakers in the school.

Can diversity occur in school functions run by African Americans?

Yesterday I mentioned the Girls’ Night Out event at my school. It was a good turnout and the kids got out of it some new perspectives and some of them some new friends. The only thing disturbing about the event was the make up of the students.

There were about 70+ girls there, but only about 10 of them were non-African American.

I can only speculate the reasons for that.

The main woman who thought up the idea and the woman who students were to see to turn in their permission slips is an African American woman. The students who were really excited about attending were African American. About 5 of the 12 sponsors were African American.

But that should not deter white and other ethnic students from attending.

Last year the turn out was predominantly African American as well, so we specifically got some non-white girls to help with the planning and to try to spread the word to the other students that it was open for everyone.

I know that people talk about a post-racial society. That sounds great – let’s just all be a part of the human race. But honestly, the social construct of race is something that is not going to go away. Especially when we have people still doing blackface (and not understanding why it is wrong), still talking about the need to stop “race mixing” (saying they are looking out for the children), still not providing enough economic support to schools that are predominantly made up of minority students (don't really understand the reason for this other than to keep these people perpetually in a state of inequality).

Can’t we all just get along?

I hope that as the message of how fun and meaningful the GNO spreads to more girls that we will have more of a complete mix of students as we have our follow up activities throughout the rest of the school year.

I hope that these students and their lack of desire to fully integrate is not going to be representative of what the future of our nation holds.

Yo homeboy, I said yo homeboy

The past few days have been filled with the good, the bad, and the ugly.

The Good:

• My post on the All-Star Game was chosen as the "Local Blog o' the Week" for the local newspaper the Riverfront Times. I guess I'm almost-semi-locally-acknowledged. If you haven't read it and wish to know my views on baseball, check out my point of view on the All-Star Game here. I guess I am one of a very few bunch of people who can be called "baseball-hating". I don't apologize. Thanks to whoever nominated me as well as to the RFT people for picking me.
  
• Weather has been nice, which means I am saving money by not running the AC.
• This year of work, I have been able to limit my spending and save a significant amount more money than I have ever saved before.
  

The Bad:

• The basement floor leaks. I should not really be too surprised since leakages seem to follow me the past few places I have lived, click to see the stories of water past.
• Even though I have saved money on AC, I am having to shove out ridiculous amounts on fixing the basement leak. This house is basically a brand new rehab, but I guess the contractor and constructors of the place were relapsing when they built it because the basement is shit. Concrete is so thin, that when the waterproofers started to demo to put their system in, they reached dirt in less than an inch. That explains the leakage.
• Dishwasher is also broken and leaking onto the floor during the wash cycle. So I have to get a new one of those. Didn't ever use it when I first got here; I have only used it about 5 times in the past year (really 3 months).
  

The Ugly:

• Not only is the basement leaking and I have to pay for that, but the home builders did not have a footer on this house so I have to pay extra for the waterproofing system people to use a different technique than they normally would.
• Then today as the waterproofers took a break from listening to and singing along with Hart, Lisa Loeb, and Mötley Crüe, the foreman came up and informed me that the sump pump is not functional. Explains why the water was not draining.
• The money I was able to save is going to be almost completely gone after this.
  
• I don't get paid again until the end of August. Good luck to me.
  

I am reminded of In Living Color and the fabulous Homeboy seminars the two guys used to present.

Only in my case, it seems as though everyone else is trying to figure out how to get mo' money, mo' money, mo' money from me.

The Amero, a North American government, and the VChip

I'm not trying to make everyone paranoid, but this is some real shit that is happening that I'm sure many do not know about. I'd heard of some of these things before, and Sean gave me the link to the video. I just started really re-thinking about a lot of this stuff again.

If you are not interested in hearing about the following, please skip to another of my entries. I just really feel like letting this serious stuff all out right now.

• North American Union
• The Amero currency system
• VChips embedded in people
  
• A World Government

Check out the video.


The whole idea of the North American nations forming an entity similar to the European Union is not a joke or a conspiracy theory. The White House formed a group in 2005 called the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America, SPP. One goal of this group is "to increase security and enhance prosperity among the United States, Canada and Mexico through greater cooperation and information sharing." This organization falls under the power of the US State department and the Department of Commerce -- without the consent or oversight of the US Congress.

Some have said that the plan for a more directly united North America Union (similar to the EU) is something that the US has been pushing without letting the Canadians and Mexicans really even fully know about the concept. Many Canadians who do know about it are against the idea as well as the current NAFTA setup.

Judi McLeod of the Canadian Free Press said that "One of the signs that the NAU is on its way is the collapse of the American greenback dollar paving the way for the debut of the 'amero'... In the US, experts are now predicting that the collapse of the dollar is imminent. "People in the U.S. are going to be hit hard," says Bob Chapman publisher of The International Forecaster newsletter. "In the severe recession we are entering now, Bush will argue that we have to form a North American Union to compete with the Euro. Creating the amero," Chapman explained, "will be presented to the American public as the administration's solution for dollar recovery. In the process of creating the amero, the Bush administration just abandons the dollar.""

Part of increasing prosperity is to increase trade. The Bush Administration has already started working on a North American super highway. Read up on what this could mean for the economy and on how the United States will be able to gain easier access to Eastern goods.

Another thing we can already see evidence of is the VChip. The VChip has already begun being implanted into some babies as tests, as well as some adults. They have also been a staple in pets for years to help veterinarians identify the pets easily and retrieve information on them in the paper form or to identify them when they are lost and then found by someone besides the owner.

Some of these ideas could work out well. The uniting of the nations could benefit us the same way it has benefited the EU nations. Or it could hurt the economy. But the economy isn't exactly doing too well right now, anyway. Immigration might increase, but with the idea of the super highway the government must not be too concerned about that. Kind of strange since there are so many places in this nation that are trying to limit immigrants through many means (punishing landlords for renting to them, punishing business owners for hiring them, making English the official language of different cities, building walls on the nation's borders, putting vigilantes on the boarders to shoot and kill people trying to come in, sending boat loads of people back to their nations even when they are being persecuted or are not living well in their nation).

The idea of a united North America could possibly mean that I could move to Canada easier since that is where I would love to live. (But perhaps if we are all united, Canada will become more like this nation and may no longer be as attractive.)

But the idea of technological chips implanted in the people of the country is scary. It's like Big Brother watching everything. As if the new possibility of the airport x-rays that can see through your clothes are not enough. Now I might have the government following everywhere I go and knowing exactly what I purchase.

Lots of links in here. Check them out. I have really been thinking about this stuff, especially with a new administration about to come into office. Who knows what they will do, and who knows what G-Dubb will try to rush into being before he finally leaves (01.20.09)

Sorry for babbling on.

On a completely unrelated note... I accidentally flipped to BET for a moment. What the hell is this Baldwin Hills show? The black people's OC/The Hills? No wonder I feel so strongly about BET and no wonder there are so many messed up views of brown folks - among themselves and from other races. Seriously. Reconsider your self-images.

Golf, family time, and idols

I'm sure I will offend many people when I say that golf sucks. I think it is stupid. I think it is a waste of a lot of hours in the day. I think it is a waste of good land space/usage.

But I was delighted this morning on NPR when I heard them talk about the decline in the number of people playing golf. Hopefully the people who used to take up so much of their day avoiding their families, or just drinking to oblivion in the heat will find better use of their time. Perhaps actually spend some with their significant others or their children. And perhaps find better use of their money. Maybe use it to put toward the super large house they are living in which they cannot afford, or the car that they are leasing. Or maybe even use it to buy things necessary for their household.

Not sure what they can do with all those clubs, though.

In other exciting news (please note my sarcasm) there are going to be stamps to highlight American Idol winners.

I am not kidding. This is for real.

The first will be Kelly Clarkson, but more will follow. I guess the good thing is that the proceeds go to the Idol Gives Back Foundation. And since so many people watch that horrendous show, I'm sure a lot of money will go toward a good cause.