Frozen

Sheepishly, I like the Disney film Frozen.  I saw it for the first time in a cabin in the middle-of-nowhere-Mongolia, which gives Disney a different feeling than American living-room-and-popcorn.  Plus, it opens with a bunch of blond Scandinavian dudes working outdoors and singing well, which is epic.

So our all-school field trip happened to be a day-trip to see a performance of Frozen by Disney on Ice, at the Target Center in Minneapolis.  Frozen on ice skates?  That's fitting.

My class and I tried freehand drawings of Elsa.  Here's mine.  (Okay, we used a YouTube tutorial, but it still turned out decent for freehand.)  I wanted to keep it but we ended up using it as a thank-you card to the people from the bank who gave us the field trip.

aging

"Grandma!"  says my student to me this morning.  Well, that's a first.

"You look...dead."  says another student this afternoon, upon seeing a photo of me in a choir concert.

I seem to be aging.

melt

I am extremely happy!  The ice has finally melted!

I did not realize that the ice can pile up on the shore when the wind blows it and it melts.  (It looked more impressive in real life.)

taking it slow

Most mornings I rush through the door.  This morning I was talking to a student, so I must have opened the door in slow motion.  I walked through the doorway.  From the end of the hall I heard a burst of exasperation and heartbreak:  "Are you SERIOUS??!"

There it sat, teetering on the edge -- unfallen.  HA!  My student was crestfallen.  His one chance to douse Mrs. Clare had epically failed.  He had so carefully contrived his plot.  He had even got his dad to take him to school extra early -- they even had to wait for the secretary to come open up.

Sister came into the hall to investigate the commotion and the quickly-gathering crowd.  She did not look amused.  I told her I had it coming to me.

He got the desk though.

I packed it all up in bag.  It was the good kind of toilet paper.  I told him it would be put to good use.  He thinks I'm fooling.

top music hits

I asked my students what music they would like to listen to during math time.  "Creepy organ!  Creepy organ!" they begged.  Meaning, Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D Minor.

Seriously?  Organ is generally not my thing, and specifically not in that 9-minute piece.  (Apologies, Bach.)

But...the public will demand their classical organ.

up-and-coming poets

Once in a while our spelling exercise asks the students to write a poem using some of their spelling words.  The tales they spin to incorporate the required words can end up being quite...fanciful.  And abstract.

The audience clapped for Carrie Underwood.
The announcer's prediction was that they would.
Carrie's songs were so incredible,
That the seats in the back section of the concert weren't dreadable.

We are going to inject and insect,
It was so flexible it was incredible.
We're going to introduce the reduce fat,
A section of education.

The council enjoyed the desserts.
The cookies that Megan sent were sweet.
They were probably not the best for our waist.
We will send our thank you on blue stationery.

I got a friend named Bobby, he is an insect.
He got a bad infection.  I had to inject a needle into him.
This had no benefit to me.
This had no credit to him.

cows

Student:  "You never heard any cussing growing up?"

(Somehow we were discussing the topic of swearing.)

Me:  "Nope."

Student, matter-of-fact, with very high eyebrows:  "Wull I guess your dad never got stepped on by a cow or anything."

Me, suddenly remembering something distinct:  "Well, come to think of it, the closest I ever heard my dad come to that was when he was trying to milk a cow."