Promotions

Last night, we had our 7th grade musical: Urinetown! The show was fantastic (in a middle school sense - I've learned to judge things on a middle school scale now), and there were a few line deliveries that had the audience roaring. Urinetown is a very funny show, but the humor is very smart, which makes it that much more impressive that 7th graders could pull it off (or, the 1-hour nice version). There was even one student who blew everyone away with her belting. And it's not easy to impress me with vocals. With my ego, I always think I can out-sing everyone. I don't think I could out-sing her, especially if she got herself some training.

Unfortunately, that was only 30 or so minutes of the afternoon. The rest of the time was corralling anxious and excited 12-year-olds without using any consequences that might result in their shutdown. There was a lot of angry whispering and juggling kids. You sit here. You sit here. (Wait 15 minutes, and they somehow end up in their original seats.) You sit here. You stand there. For about 4 hours.I left there in a less-than-exemplary mood at 7PM.

Fortunately, I had something to celebrate yesterday. I was pulled into the principal's office yesterday afternoon for a surprise check-in, and my IL was waiting there too. Oh goody. Fired already. The principal then went on to explain that in the interest of streamlining the work and level of rigor across North Star schools, especially in light of the Common Core changes, they would be choosing one 7th grade science teacher to write the lesson plans, 2 weeks in advance, coordinate the interim assessments, and keep the curriculum current, for all 3 middle schools. She's explaining this, and my IL is trying hard not to grin, and I'm thinking: Hurry up already and offer me the position! And she did. Plus $3,000, to basically just do a better job on the work I'm already doing. Plus $1,000 for a week in the summer of curriculum planning. So, not only do they like me here, they LOVE me. I'm a rock star.

So, I left school at 7PM, cranky and exhausted, and met the med school crew for a celebratory drink. I've never been out so late on a school night (9PM), and I definitely feel it today, but it was totally worth it. I'm proud.

I took a look at the course map for my 5K on Saturday. It's hilly. I'm getting nervous. It'll be hot and hilly. I don't want to slack off because it looks hard, and be disappointed in my performance, but I also don't want to have unrealistic expectations. I think I'm gonna have to ditch the GPS and expectations, and just run as fast as I can for as long as I can. Dig deep and run. Fast feet, easy arms. Keep on moving.

15 days left.