Oh that's right. I started a blog.

Just wrote a super long update, and then I hit that magical combination of keystrokes that deletes epic pieces of written work from my computer every once in a while and it's gone now. Yes, I've looked for a way to stop the shortcut. No, I haven't been successful. So the moral of this story is that this will be a brief update, rather than a long one. You want the long version, call me sometime. Or come visit me.

Life's real. Just doing my teaching thing and coming home exhausted. And sick, apparently? I've been feeling fairly sick all week but I think it's mostly exhaustion. And not eating well/enough. Oops. I went to bed last night at 9...and I'm thinking that it will be earlier if possible tonight. Hopefully that will help?

I planned a really cool SMART board review game for today, and it worked perfectly when I got to school and set it up. Then school started and the kids had silent reading time and a journal entry and the SMART board wasn't working. Just...not responding. Or on. And it wouldn't turn back on. So that was awesome. I was observed today for the first time, too, and had been pretty stoked about how technologically savvy my lesson was going to be. But oh well. I got to have a woman from the county's Language Arts department observe me read aloud for 35 minutes instead (as well as some cool activities I was still able to do). It worked out fine, and she liked my lesson and was very encouraging. The real kicker is that as soon as the kids all left for the day, the SMART board worked perfectly fine. Heyyy 21st Century technology. Fingers crossed for tomorrow?

Insight into my life: (student) Edward asked me today if I like Beyonce. I said yes. Then he asked me if I like Eminem and I said no. Then he asked me if I like Lil Wayne and I said no. Then he asked me if I like Chris Brown and I said it depends on the song. Then he asked me if I like Rhianna and I said no not so much. Then he asked me if I like Nicki Minaj and (student) Jonte yelled "It's not 20 questions with Miss Melchione, you stalker!" ...and then I started class.

Helpful Hints

Here's a tip: if you've planned to stay extremely late setting up your classroom (and have even gone so far as to prepare with dinner and movies to play on your laptop) to try to avoid coming in all weekend, make sure you know when the janitors will kick you out for the night. This plan becomes much less effective when this happens at 6 pm. Fingers crossed tomorrow gives me some awesome productivity. And let's be serious...Monday too.

Another tip: if you maintain more than one blog, make sure you're posting in the blog you think you're posting. Oops. I should perhaps get that bug worked out before I start experimenting with student posts. I'll just have to add that to the list...

Let's Actually Start This Thing...

I was reminded by a good friend the other day that I promised to start a blog about my life and then never actually started it. I promised to start it that night. It's like three or four nights later but now I'm finally following through. But seriously, it's been a hectic week.

I moved into my new apartment in the Woodbridge area a couple Sundays ago, on August 21st. I was only able to bring up whatever would fit in my small car because my parents were on vacation at the beach that weekend...which was a situation made much worse when I threw my 23-year-old back totally out trying to pack up my stuff. It was honestly one of the worst experiences with pain I have every had. So bizarre: I was moving all kinds of really heavy boxes all over the place all week long and then I go to move one little paper bag of toilettries across the room the day before I move and as I was putting it down I felt a sharp pain that I can only describe as being struck by lightening across my lower back. I fell to the floor and was stuck in that position for...basically an entire day. My dad, the incredible PT/MS/DPT/OCS provided me with the best of therapy programs all weekend long and had me go into his office for some help from his staff, and I was so much better by Sunday when I moved (had to delay it a day). So...that was interesting. My parents came up the next Saturday (Aug 27th) with the rest of everything I owned and got me all set up. Ikea is my new favorite store, and I am madly in love with my new reading nook complete with Ikea bookcases and a Poang chair/ottoman. Anyone who knows me knows how much I love my books, and I've never been able to display them all in one place because I have so many (sidenote: after I pulled all the books for my classroom I found out I have much less books to display in said bookcases, but now I'm just ready for Santa to come). This whole week has been staff meetings and professional development galore, and it's been a long, long week to say the least. Really good at moments, really not at others, but overall I think I survived it. Tomorrow's it for staff development and then I'm going to be in my classroom for approximately 15 hours setting up the rest of my classroom, but I'm excited to have it done and ready to go for Tuesday.

SO. CRAZY. that school is starting and I'm going to be a real teacher with real students and real responsibility for real SOL scores...ugh. Again, I'm really excited but really...overwhelmed. Very overwhelmed. Regardless of how ready I am, though, life's about to get real.

Photos of my apartment (complete with reading nook) and classroom coming soon (aka: once I have a finished classroom to take pictures of and stuff on my apartment walls so it looks better).