Wal-Mart Celebrity Event

Let me just say that being really productive is not as easy as it sounds, because you have to count in the "I feel tired and want to nap" factor. That said, let me tell you about my Wal-Mart shopping experience.

Today I had to go grocery shopping for the Boys and Girls Club because I am teaching a cooking camp. While cruising the frozen food aisle, I felt like a celebrity among the paparazzi. This is because all of the food cases are dark, but when you walk up to them their lights switch on. I walked down an entire row, light after light flashing on. It was like sauntering on the red carpet and getting my picture taken, only with a metal cart and frozen blueberries. I had never seen this before, and I thought it was a pretty good invention.

Besides feeling like a celeb, I think I saw one while I was there. A model, anyway. I got in line behind this blond mom, blond son, and tanned, brunette daughter. Really the only reason I noticed them was because they were in front of me for about a half an hour since they had so many groceries. I think they were stocking up for a month long camping trip or something. Also, because the girl had funny spots on her arm like she tanned too much and then peeled so she had like white/pink splotches where the tan peeled off. Anyway, when I got home I visited http://www.nordstrom.com/ because I wanted to see if they had any cute teacher clothes. Imagine my surprise when I see this girl modeling the clothes.
I swear it is the exact same person I saw shopping with her mom at Wal-Mart. Like, they are unbelievably identical. I am willing to bet money that it's her.

So, you know, the next time you go to Wal-Mart, wear big sunglasses in case you go down the frozen food section, and be prepared with a pen and paper to collect autographs from teen models shopping with their parents.

Really Fake Fictional Stories

Another Good Detective Story
I go all No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency on you. And it's totally worth it. 

A Miniscule Mystery
Detective Rossen returns to solve another case.

The Kiojah Tree
A tree living in the forest suffers to find beauty. 

Kevin's Grief
A sad story.

A Contemporary Christmas Story 
Mary and Joseph, revised.


He's Not Gay After All
Misjudgments about a friend are revealed.

Sleeping In

So ever since I started that job teaching in April, I haven't been able to sleep in past 8:30 A.M. Which is really sad, considering it is now summer. Every single freaking day (Saturdays included) for the past 84 days, I wake up by 8:30, many times sooner. This is not to say I get out of bed by 8:30. Since I am not a morning person, I try to stay in bed and sleep till at least 10:00 A.M. (if it's not a weekday and I don't have to go to work). It's a struggle. Sure, I may fall asleep for another 20 minutes, but then I just wake up again.

You might say "Joelle, why fight it? Just get out of bed and do something with your life." Absolutely not. I need to sleep. About twice on Saturdays I did get out of bed by 8:30 A.M. and the whole day was basically wasted. This is because I did everything that I needed to do for the weekend by 12:42 P.M (which could still be an acceptable waking up time on a Saturday) and ended up watching HGTV for the rest of the day. Plus, folding my underwear out of boredom.

Today I got out of bed at 8:30 A.M., after lying there for an hour and a half awake. I decided to get a drink of water. In effort to not accomplish too much in little time, I have not done everything that I needed to do this weekend yet. I only did lesson planning and new school year planning for 2 hours (because I am really excited for my job next year). Next I ate a bowl of Lucky Charms and started reading a new book (I finished I conquer Britain). Then I took a 20 minute nap.

I still need to:
change out of pajamas
take a shower
clean my room
eat lunch

See what I mean? There's not much for me to do during the summertime.
So after I do the aforementioned items, I will probably end up doing my planning for my new classroom and fold my underwear. I guess I will watch HGTV aftewards, because we are cutting our cable after this month and I need to fry my eyes on design shows as much as possible before July 1st.

Cantaloupe Head

So I went grocery shopping this afternoon and on my way out something caught my eye. It was an old, wrinkly man wearing flannel and cruising on a motorized scooter. Not like an old person scooter, but like a motorized Razor scooter. The sound of the scoot scooting wasn't the only thing that caught my attention. Atop the head of this old man was a bright orange helmet. The helmet was quite round, and for some reason the very first thing that popped into my head was "cantaloupe head." Then I put my groceries in my trunk and drove home.

Right now I am reading I conquer Britain by Dyan Sheldon. It's kind of a sequel to Sophie Pitt-Turnbull Discovers America. It's mostly a young adult (read teen girl) book, but it side-splitting funny because of how sarcastically it is written. So you know, don't judge me for not reading Jane Austen instead or something. Oh, how I aspire to write like Dyan Sheldon. She seriously cracks me up.

BTW

By the way, The Bachelorette was on last night, and I wanted to let you know that Jason is still in. I know you were getting worried there. But DeAnna gave him a rose, so don't fret.

Totally Legit

I am now a totally legit adult because I have an official real-life job for this fall. I received a call on Monday offering me a job as a 4th grade teacher. It will be very exciting. Something that I like about the 4th grade is that you get to teach the Oregon Trail. No doubt I will use the Oregon Trail computer game as a fun little add on. I am so so so so so excited, and even though school just ended last week and my brain was totally checked out of anything related to teaching, I am already starting to plan for my classroom. My mother doesn't know it yet, but I will force her to come and volunteer in my classroom. Of course she will like it.

Props to my roommate, Natalie, for returning a five dollar bill to a small child in Wal-Mart this afternoon. Natalie found the money on the floor and decided to look for an owner rather than to keep it. What an honest, upstanding citizen! I like her a lot. She's also totally legit.

Telepathic Messages

I have decided to start sending telepathic messages to people. Telepathy is something I am not sure that I believe in, but I think the mind can do crazy things sometimes. Like, for example, you have this feeling in your gut that something is really wrong. You call your best friend the next day and find out she’s in trouble. Or like, you have a dream that something happens and it comes true that same week. Once my mother told me about an experience in high school where she and her friend tried telepathy. They set a specific time to send and receive the message, and the story had very interesting results. I’m not going to explain it here, but you can call my mom if you want to know.

So here’s the deal. I will choose a person each day to send a telepathic message to. These might be people I’m scared to talk to, or they might be a really good friend, or whatever. So you know, if you get an internal message, or if I pop up in your dream at night and tell you something, let me know. Maybe I sent you a message.

I nearly died under a bookshelf

When I was driving home today I had this bizarro craving for onion rings. Sick. Usually I am not a huge fan of onion rings, but I really wanted them at 4:36 P.M. Today I had to do grades for my students. It took like four hours at my desk being bored out of my mind. I took some CDs and listened through seven of them. I still have 8 hours to go tomorrow, which means I better find more music so I don't go insane.

I have to finish cleaning tomorrow. I know you're thinking "Ugh. No fun." But I try to think of it like I'm on an HGTV special. Mission: Organize the Classroom. I have no problem throwing stuff out because none of its mine. Haha.

There are these two life endangering bookshelves in the classroom. It almost fell on my twice while I was organizing books. Then Mr. M, the teacher across the hall, tried to save me. Only while he was trying to steady the one bookshelf, the other one tipped over and landed on me. Nothing but my head and the tips of my fingers were visible. Mr. M had to get a crane to take the shelf off of me. Now I don't have to get a job for next year because I am severely injured and the school district is paying me 2 million dollars. Okay, okay, but the shelf really was wobbly.

WAAAH-HOOOOO!

SCHOOL IS OOOOUUUUT!!!! No more students to deal with! Now I just have to do grades tomorrow. The teachers went out for drinks after the kids left, and it was hilarious. We did the wave. I never would have expected it from this group. I'm sure people are still there now. I left at 6:15.

P.S. Jason received a rose on The Bachelorette. If I was four years older I might want to marry him.

Dumb TV

Not that I watch One Tree Hill, but I rolled my eyes at the description for tonight's episode. I was skimming over the tv guide channel on-line, and it said that Kevin Federline is going to guest star. K-Fed. Really. OMG is all I have to say.

Confession: I am watching The Bachelorette this season. Stupid, I know. And I was all "Oh, I'll watch only if I have time." But after watching previews for this week episode, I have to tune in. This is because DeAnna (the bachelorette) yells at the guys for not putting their whole heart into the competition. And I have to see what jerk move they pulled to make her feel this way. Stupid reality television. This guy is my favorite. His name is Jason, he's from Washington, and I hope he wins.

I Am a Liar

Today I lied to a small child. Lied to her face. Our neighbor girl rang our doorbell and asked if Liz was home (only she didn't know Liz's name. Instead she referred to her as "the one with the black hair"). I lied and said she wasn't home, knowing that Liz wouldn't want to talk to her. The little girl was like "I think she is home." I asked her why she thought so, then assured her Liz wasn't, and could I take a message? You gotta give her credit, she's persistent. Must've been pissed that Liz is no longer on MySpace so she can't stalk her anymore. Finally I closed the door on her, went upstairs, and felt like a mean person. But really, she's annoying. You can have her.

Snippets of Life

My car wouldn't start yesterday after work/school, so I had to get the guy sitting across the street to help me. He was on his porch (which is surrounded by his overgrown lawn) smoking. But he was very helpful in a time of crisis. And the guy at the Les Schwab in Salem was a little bit cute.

I worked for 13 hours straight today with children. Makes you wonder where my sanity went.

The kittens are bigger and their eyes are open!

Four days of teaching left before summer break.

Which could I make the most money off of, a gallon of gas, or a gallon of my own blood sucked from my veins?

Love you. Seriously.

MySpace Friend Gone Missing

This is just an FYI to everyone who had my roommate Liz as their MySpace friend. She has deleted her account without telling hardly anybody, namely me. This is upsetting because now I do not have all of my favorite people as my top friends. I said to her, "Liz, how can I leave you funny messages if you don't have a MySpace?" She told me she still has Facebook, which is quite true. So it's not like she dropped off the face of the on-line planet. Basically, if you were stalking Liz, it's going to be a lot harder to do now that she does not have a MySpace account. Which is probably what she wanted. But I am still one friend down, so now I have to go search for someone else I know and like, or I will feel like a friend just ditched me. Love you Liz! I'm proud of you for quitting! Better not see you on Facebook twice as much now!