Courtesy Calls, Popcorn Salesmen, and Magnetic Messages

Yo Howdy!
Usually I kind of tune out the announcements at school, but every once in awhile something catches my ear. Which happened just this week when the announcer (who shall remain anonymous, but who is well-known to anyone who attends, attended, or has a child who attends Orange Grove Middle School) made an announcement aimed at discouraging kids from visiting the office without a pass by saying something like, "Don't just come to the office to say, 'Yo howdy!' without a pass." Why did this catch my ear? you may ask. Well, because I found it to be mildly amusing, so I then dared my first period class to, at some point during the day, go to the office and say, "Yo howdy!" (without a pass). I also stipulated that they had to say, "Yo howdy!" in an enthusiastic and ebullient manner - not just mumble it - for it to count. During the day, I continued to dare students to go to the office and say, "Yo howdy!" (without a pass) and apparently quite a few of them took me up on it. I had instructed them not to tell anyone who dared them, but of course the little rat-finks ratted me out, so the next day, there was an announcement that students were supposed to either, "bow or curtsey whenever entering Mr. Bindschadler's room," and ever since then, I've had quite a number of students bowing and curtseying (7th grade boys especially seem to enjoy the curtseying - I guess it's not surprising since 7th grade boys also seem to enjoy dressing up like girls for Halloween - not sure what the significance of all that might be) to me as they enter the classroom, which actually isn't such a bad thing and I'm doing everything I can to encourage them to continue.

Another mildly amusing school-related anecdote
The other day after school, I was sitting at my desk grading papers, when some kid (I have no idea who he was) knocked on my door, opened it up, poked his head in, and said, "Would you like to buy some popcorn?" I've been a teacher for 22 years, and I can honestly say that this is the first time this has ever happened. And I'm guessing it will never happen again.

Yet another mildly amusing school-related anecdote
I have those little magnetic words on the doors of a metal cabinet in my room (the ones that can be arranged into weird/disturbing/borderline inappropriate sentences and phrases) and every once in awhile, a small group of kids (usually 7th grade boys) gather around them and giggle while arranging them into weird/disturbing/borderline inappropriate sentences and phrases. Here are a couple of the ones I found today:
•"Mom always blows horsefly whips."
•"Caramel is chocolate."
•"Celebrate Christmas pie - ho ho ho."
•"Dad kisses brilliant women's bellies in the morning."
•"My cat likes sweet melon cakes."
As I read these little snippets (and others like them) I'm always reminded of that old tale about the million monkeys typing at a million typewriters for a million years. Eventually, brilliance will emerge.

Speaking of cats…
As you may remember from a previous post, we adopted a cat a few months ago. The reason we adopted the cat was because she was, literally, a scaredy cat. As in, when her previous family added a dog to the household, this cat hid under the bed and never came out. So we took her in, and for the first three weeks, she hid under the bed and never came out. But now she's much better, and she only hides under the bed about 50% of the time, and the rest of the time, she'll actually come out and interact with the family (except when we had the crazy little puppies in our house for about a week this summer, but that's a whole other story). Anyway, we weren't really sure what to call the cat for quite awhile (maybe because we never really even saw her for the first three weeks while she was hiding under the bed) but finally, after much deliberation, she has been officially named, and her name is… Sheshe-Squeakers-Kittyface. Sheshe because that's what her name was when she came to us (don't ask me why, because I have no idea why anyone would ever name anything "Sheshe," though I'm guessing it has something to do with being young and cute - at least that's what I hear from Katie), Squeakers because she's very squeaky and makes this squeaky meowing sound when she tries to meow, and Kittyface because, well, she's a kitty and she has a face. So now whenever I see her, I say things like, "Hello there, Sheshe-Squeakers-Kittyface, how are you today?" which may sound kind of goofy but is actually oddly satisfying. Don't have any idea why.

Which leads us to a gerbil update
Connor seems to have recovered from the tragic loss of his beloved gerbil "Snake Eyes," and after much hand-wringing and agonized pondering, he did finally decide that he wanted to get another gerbil to take the place of the one that passed away, and the new gerbil (who started out as "Snake Eyes, Two," but I think has been renamed but I don't remember what) seems to have bonded with the remaining original gerbil (Stormchaser) so all seems to be good for now.

That's all I've got, so until next time, may your magnets remain uncluttered, may your secrets remain hidden, and may your animals all be memorably named.

A More-Reflective/Less-Mildly-Amusing Posting

Every once in awhile, something happens that makes you look at someone you think you know in a whole different way. They say something, or do something, and you realize that the person you thought you knew isn't really that person at all. For me, it happens with my kids quite often, which I suppose makes sense because they change so much as they grow older. We'll just be going along in life, and suddenly, something will happen that will make it abundantly clear that they're not the same person I'm holding onto in my memory. With Caitlyn, I remember this happening when I went and watched her perform in a play last year at the UA. Seeing her up on stage - the confidence she had and the ability to become her character and perform so convincingly - it was like seeing a whole different side of her. Just the other day, Carrie was telling us that she was going to be on an Odyssey of the Mind team this year, and Katie asked her how she was going to fit that in with everything else she was doing, and Carrie just said, "I'll make it work," with this quiet sense of conviction, and I realized that she has a sense of self that's very strong and a motivation to push herself to do as much as she can. I'd seen glimpses of these things in the girls before, but those moments cemented them in my mind. And then there's Connor.

We've always known there's a lot going on in Connor's head, but we're never quite sure exactly what it is because he's pretty good at locking it in. When he's sad, he'll make jokes and laugh things off, or he'll hide under blankets in his room. But not today. A couple of weeks ago, he decided he wanted to get gerbils for his birthday. He'd taken care of all the various animals (cat, guinea pigs, tortoise) over the summer, and we were impressed by how responsible he'd been about feeding them and paying attention to them, so we figured he could handle his own pets. Katie suggested he should spend some time learning how to take care of gerbils, so he checked out several books from the library, then spent a week or two reading all about them. Then Katie took him to the pet store and he got two gerbils and brought them home. Even though they're girls, he named them after "GI Joe" characters (Snake-eyes and Storm-something) and every day he's been feeding them and putting them in their little hamster ball so they can roll around the house and generally taking really good care of them. Yesterday, he spent his own money to buy them a fancy new habitat with an "Xtreme spiral slide," a "petting zone," and an "Xtreme wheel" that goes in circles when it rotates. So everything was good.

Then this morning, while I'm reading the paper, Connor comes holding a shoebox. His hands are shaking and his eyes are swollen, and I just know what I'm going to see in the box. One of his gerbils is lying very still, and Connor starts to cry. I'm thinking, "This is the kid who laughed when Barney the dog died. This is the kid who took his grandpa out in the backyard and said in a jovial tone, 'The dog's dead. Dad buried him here. Barney died.' This is the kid who hides his sorrow and laughs off his pain, and now I'm holding him in my arms while his body is shaking and his eyes are overflowing," and pretty soon I'm crying too, and I realize that this scrawny little kid I'm holding isn't the same person he was three months ago. Something fundamental has changed. And I guess that's good. But it's also a little sad.