i'm fresh out of titles

probably because not much in my life is truly inspiring right now! but that's ok, uninspiring doesn't mean bad. my students have been hard to deal with because they're just not rising to the challenge. i've cut out the baby stuff and am completely holding them accountable for all the stuff they should have been held accountable for from the beginning, but now i feel justified because i know i have taught everything i'm asking them to do. unfortunately, just because i feel justified doesn't mean the parents think i am. the backlash is already beginning and parents are scheduling conferences... and progress reports don't go home until next week! (if you're a teacher, this all probably makes more sense to you.)

anyway, so the work side of things is a little sub-par, but the rest of life is going pretty well. megan and i are totally kicking ass at the gym, which is really exciting. monday i took a pilates class because i forgot my shoes (i know, idiot), tuesday i ran longer, faster, and better than ever before (yes, i am a super-hero), then megan and i killed ourselves on weights. and then tonight was yoga night (love, LOVE) yoga night. i was so stiff and sore from yesterday that stuff i could do last week, i could not do this week - which made me sad - but i did have one small victory in that i was able to actually do "crow" (or bakasana), a pose i have never been able to do before, for about 3 seconds before almost falling on my head. i was proud anyway!

then, i came home and made a smoothie with my new chocolate protein stuff. it was not too bad, and that is good enough for me when it comes to post-workout protein. and i even got to see the puppy, because as i was going outside, my neighbor was heading out, and there was the adorable little fuzzball. she's already grown and gotten a bit of an attitude, but she's so incredibly smart that she, in less than a week, has learned sit, down, shake, and sort of stay. i'm so proud of her little brain. 

all in all, not a whole lot of excitement, but small victories are keeping me smiling.

for your "moment of zen", as jon stewart says, i leave you with a picture of a much better crow than i have ever done:

Update from Dormia land

So I'm currently sitting at the purple Dormia desk in the Cary store squishing a block of memory foam to occupy my time. It's been a slow day. I've only had one "customer" and she was looking for a pillow that kept her sleeping on her back. Needless to say she didn't buy one. Yesterday was about as slow. The day before(Monday I think, I lose track of the days) I had a good sale. This woman named Roan came in and practically bought the legend without even trying it. Apparently her fiance is in Fallujah and found it online. Being the germaphobe that he is the all latex matress appealed to him. For those who don't know our beds are resistant to bed bugs and mites because they don't like the foam like they like regualr matresses. So that was an easy sale, aside from the fact that she got a flat tire while going back to her office to get some identification and papers she needed.
This was a funny exchange between my boss Pete and me via email. (For those who don't know, Moose is Will's nick name. He's the store manager in Cary.)

Pete,
I still have not received a paycheck for the pay period ending
1/15/08. I am signed up for direct deposit and have contacted Casaundra to
see if there are any problems. I have not heard anything back. Could
youlook into this and let me know what is happening?

Dude,
You want to get paid for working in Dormia land? Isn't just being in the
presence of the Moose enough? The first pay usually gets mailed to the addressgiven in your hire pack and its always later than sooner.I have forwarded you
pay concerns on to Casundra and will let you know if I hear anything.


Pete,
I just figureda little pay to put up with the moose was in
order. He's quite a handful sometimes

(His response) Hey keep your hands off the Moose!

monday gloom

i have had a hard time since giving the puppy away. it's weird, i only had her one night but i just felt like she was mine for real and like she fit in perfectly to our little home. it has really cast a shadow over me. 

i had trouble getting up this morning too, so i got coffee from starbucks (not something i've done much recently) and thought, this will be a good day.

that's pretty much where the good day ends. 

my kids at school decided to give absolutely no effort to their projects that were due today despite the two in-class workdays and extension i gave them last week - half of them didn't complete the assignment, and at least 20 of them didn't even bother to turn anything in. paige had the same kinds of problems with her classes, and we even held a "come to jesus" meeting during 7th period for the whole 6th grade to try and, i don't know, encourage them to do well or something... i don't think it worked. i'm so discouraged with teaching, sometimes i wonder if it wouldn't be better if i just quit for good. stupid teaching fellows loan.

and my wrist keeps hurting from when i punched chicken's beer can the other night.

and i forgot my shoes for the gym, so instead of doing cardio and yoga, i just did pilates and left.

and andrew worked until late... again.

and i tried making tofu stir-fry but it was crazy salty so i didn't eat much of it.

and now it's time to go to bed but i don't know if i'm ready to face tomorrow.

fleeting excitement - puppy for a day

yesterday at school my student, ginger, brought her 6 puppies in because she wanted me to take one of them. i was intrigued but knew andrew probably wouldn't go for it, so i told him if he didn't show up at carpool i was going to take one home. unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately (i'm not sure yet), we took one anyway.

one of my other students, jacori, told ginger's dad that his dad said he could have this puppy, the one i wanted. he said his dad said it was ok. jacori carried her around for an hour and wouldn't let anyone hold her or let any other families look at her. eventually, after he'd taken her inside, ginger's father left, drove off down the road, and then finally when his father came, his father said he could not have her. so we took her.

i was so excited and so was andrew, though we were really apprehensive about staying up for taking care of her and mostly about the financial obligation of another puppy, but she was so good and so cute that we just decided to take care of her but put our feelers out there to see if anyone else wanted her.

this morning, after getting her shots at the vet, i mentioned to my neighbor that "goober" (as i was calling her) was looking for a home... sort of. and my neighbor immediately seemed interested. i felt a sinking in my stomach as i took her inside. she and lillie and i snuggled and hung out and napped all day long. it was one of the best days i've had in a while, until the neighbor showed up and said she wanted her. we had to give her up - it was the right thing to do.

but to make it worse, when the neighbor took her, they brought her back outside to put her in the car... and she ran back to my door and put her face up to the glass and looked in at me like "please let me back home" - it broke my heart into pieces.

yoga and dog...ma?

no not really but i wanted to figure out how to get lillie and yoga in the title together.

so the dog part is that lillie got her annual checkup and a dental cleaning today! woohoo! you would be celebrating too if you had smelled her breath recently. her pearlies are all white again, and her breath is so fresh and so clean clean.

secondly, i have SOOO much work for school that i'm behind on that i almost didn't go to yoga tonight with my favorite instructor. fortunately though, at the last minute, i felt like a lazy blob, got off my couch and rushed over just in time for another packed class. literally there are like 50 attendants in this class, and our mats are about 3-4 inches from one another on all sides. apparently this horde of people became regulars in this particular class the same week megan and i did. fun because it's a great class, but kinda un-fun because you have to kind of kill people to get a spot on the floor. but, it was a fantastic, hard class that had me sweating profusely. i was really proud to be able to do so much more than just last week and to be able try some of the more difficult things. megan and i both left the class feeling strong and accomplished, which is great. as a sidenote, since i have begun drinking profuse amounts of water by direction of the nutritionist, i not only have to pee all the time, but the sweat factor was really out of control. i'm talking rolling down my face - groooosssss!

tomorrow night, pilates! stay tuned for the review.

food diary

but not in the fun sense. the nutritional counselor at peak has asked me to keep a food diary for the next 3 days. now the only thing about this is that i've already been making a concerted effort to have healthier eating habits since i began working out. additionally, i sort of feel like when you have to write down what you eat, you're obviously more conscious of being healthy. now, i can do this for the 3 days i'm supposed to, but how much do you want to bet that on day 4 i get a greasy cheeseburger with nasty french fries! ...i'm just saying, let's be honest.

but yes, let's recap the day shall we? i went in to work today and had a surprise observation YAY (can you feel the sarcasm?). not only did i have 1 surprise observation, but i had two people attempt to observe - at the same time! yes, while ms. lanier, the mentor coordinator, was sitting in the room observing me mrs. baker, my mentor, came in to observe. luckily, she left but unluckily, she plans to come back tomorrow. ugh. however, i left work on the early side and unscathed, so it was ok.

then, i went straight to the gym for my free consultation with the in-house chiropractor, dr. hall. she was incredibly nice, and though i am a huge skeptic, i really liked her attitude, and i find her to be completely competent. she says i am having tension headaches, found some reasons why, x-rayed my neck, got me a free 15-minute massage, and scheduled me for another free session. it was excellent, and i feel like there might be an end in sight for my neck/spine/shoulder issues.

after that, megan had her session and then we worked out. today was some cardio followed by weights. we both bought protein smoothies (which i think tasted like chalk) in order to "make sure our bodies aren't eating away at our lean muscle" ::gross:: and headed home.

tonight, andrew and i are going out to dinner to celebrate his second sale at dormia - go husband! and tomorrow lillie is going in for her annual and her first dental. exciting things going on in the korhonen household!

1 year anniversary...

of the day andrew proposed to me!

i wish i could be hanging out with andrew instead of sitting alone, but at least the dogs have been here to keep me company! i planned to spend the day grading papers, but i don't like grading, so instead i did nothing. yep, i'm a winner. after bumming around cary for a few hours with andrew, he went off to work and i pretty much ate and sat on the couch all day. megan and i were supposed to go to the gym this evening, but i didn't realize that tonight's class wasn't until 7:30, and by this point, she and i are both more into just sitting around than working out. i was toying with the idea of going alone, but i don't think that's going to happen.

on an unrelated note, there is one interesting thing that's been getting to me recently, i keep getting these (tension?) headaches in the afternoon. they start at the base of my neck and shoot to the front of my head. the only thing that helps is to go to bed... i'm wondering if they're some sort of migraine, but i know migraines usually involve feeling nauseous, and i don't. kim mentioned to me that she was getting ocular migraines, which sound somewhat similar in symptoms, but who knows. it used to be that i only got headaches when i was really sick or when i was dehydrated, so now the first thing i do is start drinking water or juice when i get a headache, but even that doesn't help anymore. any ideas?