holiday! celebrate!

Starting tomorrow I'm going to vacate. I'm very excited. We're going to Ohio to spend Thanksgiving with Wendy and her fam, and Chris and his gang are going to come as well. So much madness should ensue. Also, my brother-in-law has an Xbox, Xbox Live, Halo 2, and just recently bought a large projection tv (oh, did I mention they're the wealthy ones in the family?). So I'm hoping I'll actually get some work done, but it's looking less and less likely. No! Must...Not...Cave...to...Pressure! At least not ALL the time.

Today I made my kids bring in a copy of their papers with no identifying marks, then I redistributed the papers and said "OK, you don't know who wrote the paper in front of you. You don't know who has your paper. Anonymity can be a wonderful thing! Rip these papers apart. You know the kinds of comments I'll make. Look for those things. Make these papers as good as you could possibly make them. And we're not leaving early, so take your time and do everything you can." Everyone groaned, but I've actually never seen them so focused. I think it was one of our better workshop sessions, and hopefully it will set them on the right track for the holidays and give them a LOT of ideas to work from.

Also, it gave me time to finish grading their papers. I graded 5 papers before 8:30 am this morning. That may not sound like much, but that takes some major effort! I don't think the last few people got as many comments as the first few, but that's all right.

We also went to Altoona this weekend (twice actually) for some church meetings. Highlights: An old guy and his wife talking about serving church missions in Oregon and the fear and loathing they felt "moving to a liberal state." That was pretty hilarious, but they meant it in all seriousness. Also, we went out for Mexican food after. Tasty tasty. There are no mexican restaraunts in this town, unless you count Taco Bell, which I don't. There was a Chi-Chi's but apparently that closed after a bunch of bad green onions gave people hepatitis. I think I speak for everyone when I say, "Ewww."

Other than that, things are moving on as usual. Unlike the Pacers and Pistons, I haven't gotten into any old school street brawls lately, so I've got that going for me.