THUDER SHTORM

I cannot spell on a white board, that is what I wrote on the board. In class today, we began a sample of the assignment my students will finish at home over the next week. We are writing a 300-word descriptive passage in the style of James Fenimore Cooper. Here is what we did in class:

"The clouds enveloped the sky with blackness; the heavy air bore down upon the visage of the hapless youth as he struggled through the curtains of rain. This poor soul quaked with fear as he gazed upon the dark anvil of clouds and envisioned the bleak task at hand."

Everyone else gets to choose their own topics and make it work in the overly-wordy, minute-detail style of Cooper. I think class was fun today, everyone was talking and suggesting things and seemed to understand it and get into it. I think, from the kinds of questions I was being asked, I will get papers about a ninja, a coffee shop, a lake, and maybe the fair.

Shake Well Before Each Use

Hair spray? No.
Redi whip? No.
Spray paint? No.

What could it be with instructions like these? Nail polish? Nope. WD-40? Not even close.

It's orange juice. I don't understand. I only know how to use orange juice once, after that it's gone. Maybe I missed something. I should have gone to public school.

The Russian Award goes to...

The Exxon station across from Rosauers.

They are officially, already, advertising Christmas. It's a small sign selling gift cards with Christmas designs. But they are first.

Spoiler Alert

But you only have to wait til the 27th of Septmeber anyhow... Well, I'll probalby have to wait til the 28th when it's available for download because I don't have cable. But I'm still excited.

The Office goes on Summer Vacation

Shoot...Dang!

I forgot to take a picture at my very first dinner party I threw all by myself.



I had Brendan, Sharon, Joel, Jordan and their kids over for dinner and to meet my new roommates. I made calzones from scratch! (ok, I bought the spagetti sauce... and I didn't make my own pepperonis, but I made the dough and shredded the cheese). I made two batches and timed the yeast in the water, and the dough rising in the bowl and baking and I was/am pleased with myself. It worked. I started at 3:45 with nothing. And by 5:50, there was dinner. When things like this work, it always amazes me. And I was only 20 minutes late from when I said I would serve dinner. ;-) We had a good time and Evelyn got to see the cows I live near. I wish I had remembered sooner, Flannery could have seen them too. Anyhow, Jordan told me that now that they have been over, I'm allowed to have other people over to my house without them.

But the real party started after the guests left. There was cleaning to be done. I like cleaning when I have the time to do it. When you have to eat, clean, and run off to somewhere, or run off to somewhere and then come back to dirty dishes, I don't like it. But I had nothing else to do tonight. I plopped in my Rat Pack CD and started clearing. But then I happily remembered that I had left a third batch of calzone dough rising while we all ate. So I had to make it. Since I was alone, things were already a mess, and I had time -- I experimented.

My new skill tonight is tossing and spinning dough. I had it pretty high sometimes. And I always caught it. Not always flat, but always in my hands. I don't know if it was better or faster than using the counter, but it was WAY more fun -- especially with Dean Martin singing pretty loudly in the background. So I popped the new "left overs" in the oven and kept cleaning and I did a load of laundry. Now I'm waiting for the dishwasher to finish drying so I can fill it up again and go to sleep.

So I took a picture after -- that's what I made. Except they didn't look this nice the first time. It's got to be becuase I threw them...