I'd marry any man who dances like this...

Truth is, I've had a huge crush on Hugh Grant since "The Englishman That Went up the Hill and Came Down the Mountain."

Maybe it's his one droopy eye, his quirky sense of humor...who knows. What I DO know is that I want to marry a guy who isn't afraid of making a fool out of himself and who makes me laugh like crazy. Here's to dancing like nobody's watching!

My Typical Day

You gotta love teens and pre-teens. Being a former English teacher, I'd say we need to bring back mandatory debate into the Master Schedule. What happened to their persuasive skills? Sheesh!

Tough Lessons for an Administrator

Yesterday was one for the books. I got to the office by 6:45, trying to beat the early birds. (We don't start until 8:55.) Working quickly, my data analysis reports underway, at 8:15, I get a call on the radio...."Admin needed in girl's bathroom....a fight!" I respond to find two of my alpha females at each other's necks -- literally. It took myself, our In-House staff and the principal to clear all the girls out, and the rest of my a.m. to clear up the mess.

Two suspensions and parent meetings later, I return to my office to find my campus security guard with three 6th graders. I begin my investigation and search of belongings. It was much like pulling the loose thread... I begin to find more and more. Three bags of weed later, I'm finding out we have a little drug ring at our school.

I'll admit it's one of the saddest things in the world to see a 6th grader be hand-cuffed by a school cop, cited, and then yelled at /threatened by their less-than-stable parents. I've even heard parents tell kids they wish they'd never given birth to them. And we wonder why they might turn to drugs? It nearly breaks my heart in two to have to then suspend them and arrange an expulsion hearing. Though, marijuana is still illegal and there are laws we must follow. I do try to present the picture of the "whole child" in the panel hearing so that the best decision will be made regarding these kids.




While in my teacher preparation program at BYU, a very wise professor once told me, "Kristie, even the good Lord couldn't save them all." I feel that only now, sixteen years later, I'm beginning to understand the meaning of that statement. A study done last summer by the CA Dept. of Education, states that 1 in 4 students will drop out of school before graduating. Similarly shocking data comes from the ACE Study done by Kaiser Permanente and the Center for Disease Control...perhaps the largest scientific research study of its kind that analyzes the relationship between multiple categories of childhood trauma (ACEs), and health and behavioral outcomes later in life. (Take the Study)

Maybe my professor was right. Perhaps we can't save them all, but we certainly can wear ourselves out trying. Identifying warning signs very early on and never, ever giving up on them. Even when it seems that everyone else has.

Feed the Birds?

Pigeons or seagulls...which are more disgusting? I can't decide. I find them both annoying, ugly, scavenger-like and not extremely useful. (I know, I know. As a good Mormon girl, and a Utah native, I should be remembering the time the early UT Saints crops were saved from the crickets by the seagulls...thus leaving their mark in history and obtaining the state bird status.) Still...they attack the students in my quad daily during lunch. Just today I saw quite the adacious fellow swoop down out of the sky and rip a sandwhich right out of the hand of a screaming 7th grade girl. I had to admit I laughed afterwards, it was pretty random! (I had to pretend I was outraged at the moment.)

Some California coastal cities have municipal codes prohibiting the feeding of seagulls or pigeons. So, my question for the day is this: What is their main purpose? Most folk don't eat them -- they are trash birds after all. Haven't we all had a run-in with one of these overly-friendly birds? I know I had a pack of gulls dive-bomb me in San Marcos Square in Venice. And, Mary Poppins and Bird Lady notwithstanding, feeding the birds isn't all that it's cracked up to be. Actually, it can wind up creating a bad situation, as I learned myself at the steps of St. Paul's Cathedral. For example, you'd never want to attract birds near to an airport as it can cause "bird strikes", such as the one that downed the US Airways flight into the Hudson River today. Yes, it's true. Just one of these little "feathered bullets" can down an Airbus 320 within minutes. I must admit, I didn't know this until today's news, but it just added to my reasons for disliking these creatures.

Here's a commentary from my friend Kristina and I on these "Flying Rats" as we sat on a park bench in Prague.