a dose of reality (tv)

Should I be more embarrassed that I am so familiar with the formula of The Bachelor that I knew I wasn't going to miss anything by not watching next week because it's the "Women Tell All" episode and not the finale?

a dose of reality

There's nothing like hearing that your replacement has been hired to remind you how soon you are (and that you are, in fact) moving across the country. Again.

thought of the day, 19: it's really the simple things

My day was just made by the fact that they now offer Dill Havarti as a cheese at the sandwich bar in my office cafeteria.

Happy Halloween!

Having already partied the night away for Halloween on the Saturday before (I was an 80s party girl; S was a stewardess), I sort of opted out of any mid-week reveling, anticipating a trip to Boston and not really looking forward to, as I told one friend, "walking around in mobs of people wearing makeup and angel wings poking me in the eye, looking for something to do."

So, the only true taste of Halloween I got happened just now, on my walk home from the 7th Avenue subway station. Park Slope has a pretty large Halloween parade every year, and 7th Avenue is full of shops that dole out candy, so the kids were in full effect as the sun was setting this evening.

I saw several Spidermen, a couple Ninja Turtles, a lovely mermaid and her pirate lady (her dad in drag, no less), a family all decked out in white and neon, including a pregnant mom. I fell in step with a group of girls in football jerseys. Robin Hood sat outside a bar and a little lamb was afraid of him. (I would have been too; he gleefully explained that he was wearing a codpiece that said "Mr. Happy" on it, which was why he was sitting down.) Mind you, none of the kids were quite as cute as these.

And then as I turned down my street, I walked behind the Fantastic Four: Mom was the Invisible Woman, Dad was Thing, and the boys were Mr. Fantastic and Human Torch. Another family walked near them and one of the kids asked who each of them was. His dad explained and then asserted, they weren't all from the same movie; they were all from the same comic book.

particularly for Chuckee D

I think he will find these especially funny.

Music Explorers, vol. IX, the Halloween Edition

Today, I was a stresscase. A combination of feeling unprepared for volunteering (sometimes emails aren't that effective, and that's the only way my co-leader and I plan), having 3 hours of meetings at the end of the day, needing to run errands for the evening beforehand, and anticipating seeing both parents tomorrow, left me anxious for the evening's lesson.

Then, we ended up with 19 kids for 5 volunteers, and those kids love to yammer. Boy, do they ever.

The biggest thing I've learned working on this project is how to stay flexible. My co-leader and I have to always be ready to change our plans because we see different kids every week and also work with different volunteers. We had an initial plan to dress up, make masks, sing and dance this week. We ended up scrapping the arts and crafts part and focused instead on learning the lyrics of and a dance to Michaels Jackson's "Thriller."

But first, we played a rousing game of musical chairs, where the person who misses a chair has to go around and name everyone. If he/she gets them all right, he/she can pick someone else to leave the circle. If he/she gets them wrong, he/she is out. (How PC of me.)

Then, I went over the first 2 verses and chorus of Thriller. We listened first, then read along to a beat, then sang it through a couple times. It was hilarious.

My co-leader masterminded a dance for the chorus, and we threw it all together, complete with an introduction of spooky sounds: witches cackling, doors creaking, zombies groaning, cats meowing, and ghosts booing. They creeped in, making their sounds, then danced the chorus.

It was a spectacle.

Next time, I think we're going to focus on singing--probably Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious. Is that how that's spelled?

thought of the day, 18: damn

Deleting someone's phone number from your phone does not mean you stop thinking about the possibility that he'll call you.