Four Thoughts for Friday - Play Weekend Edition

It's opening night blog world! After talking about the play quite a bit while I was picking a show, I haven't talked about it much since we've been in rehearsals, and besides posting my director's notes, I haven't talked much about it during dress rehearsal either. But now it's here, just shy of 11 hours away, and as I always feel on the day of an opening night, I've got ants in the pants! So let's talk about other things!

Have you been paying attention to the world much lately? It's a pretty messed up place and stories like the Doctor's Without Borders hospital bombing, the Russian airline crash, pre-2016 politics, and the half naked man on the south side of Rochester with residue from explosive materials in his car, don't leave me much confidence in humanity.

Which is why I try to seek out the happier things in life! The moments of good that invariably due shine through week to week, but are sometimes lost in the cacophony of gloom and doom and scandal and politics. And thus, I try to keep my four thoughts on Friday something positive and uplifting, something to make you laugh or smile or keep you mind off the fact that it's opening night. Oh wait! That's just me! Oops...ok...here we go!

1. I'll go to the reunion just to prove I don't do this anymore! I recently received the invitation to my high school classes 10 year reunion. Reunions feel a little unnecessary and redundant in our Facebook connected world, but the invite promised appetizers and drinks, so what the heck, maybe I'll go! I also recently saw this list of things that were hot in 2005 that are definitely not kosher by 2015 standards, which got me thinking I should probably go to the reunion just to prove that I'm not 'that' person anymore. I mean, I'd like to think I have way more going on now than I did in high school! Dear 18 year old self, Don't worry! You grow into you body, develop a sense of femininity, and it all works out just fine! Love, your 28 year old self. PS. In the meantime, you should stop doing ALL THESE THINGS!

2. Am I suppose to root for someone at the next debate, or wear a paper bag over my head? Having bashed politics as a negative news sources in my introduction, it may seem silly that I'd bring it up here. However, with the third Republican debate coming up next week, and voters having just gone to the polls on Tuesday, it seems only fair to give it a passing mention in this positive context...

It's important to participate in our democracy. Voting is one of the key ways that we get to do that, and, in my opinion, if you don't vote...you don't get to complain! So...with a year to think about who you might cast your ballot for when it comes to the highest office, I encourage you to take the "I Side With..." quiz LINK HERE. I had my media class take it this week as part of our discussion of politics in the media. They didn't have to share their answers, but some kids were surprised with their top matches. It's important to know these things! Think about it!

3: I laugh because it's true! When I saw this, I laughed because I'm pretty sure I've said at least 75% of these things! Mostly the rehearsal notes/tech notes/blocking kinds of things. "I thought about it last night, and I solved it!" is probably my mantra. :-)

4. At this pace I'll write 16,000 words by the end of November. As previously mentioned, November is national novel writing month, and I am working on a project of sorts, but it has woefully fallen by the wayside this week during dress rehearsal time. Hopefully next week I can revive my efforts, but in the meantime, I have put together a few pieces of reminiscing storyline, including this tidbit from one of my all time favorite speech classes. Student's names have been changed!

I’ve had many different favorite classes for many different reasons. My Honors English 10 class will forever hold a soft spot in my heart, for it was a class I designed and implemented myself, and the first group of kids I choose saw me all the way through to the end of my time at the first school where I taught. Similarly, college prep English was always a blast to teach as the level of analysis, discussions, and questions I could challenge them with was far beyond that of my normal classes. There was one class, however, that might be my favorite in that the most random and ridiculous things always seemed to happen during this hour, and the students developed an uncanny ability to roll with the punches.      

My first hour speech class was an English elective. For one quarter, students gave a speech a week in an intensive study of public speaking techniques and formats for any occasion. We had tremendous fun in that class! Students gave acceptance speeches at a mock Academy Awards show. They gave toasts at a made up fancy dinner (complete with sparkling grape juice!). They wrote advocacy speeches for an issue they cared about. But before they got into all that good stuff, they reviewed what they already knew about public speaking with a refresher of the good old demonstration speech.

If it wasn’t for the story I’m about to tell, my favorite memory of this class was probably the student that managed to relate every possible speech prompt back to chickens. He did his demonstration speech on how to fold a towel into the shape of a chicken, which hadn’t worked all that well during his demonstration phase. That aside, I  remember vividly because I was writing comments on his rubric while the next student was setting up his speech, which is partially why I missed what was coming until it was almost too late.

As a general rule, students love demonstration speeches because they get to make, and then eat, food. The second year I taught speech, I actually made a rule that students could not make chocolate chip cookies for their speech because it was so overdone that I couldn’t take another bite of a cookie without thinking about class. Jordy was not making chocolate chip cookies for his speech. He was making chocolate covered pretzels that you then decorated to look like little reindeer faces. He set up his ingredients on the front table, and was all set to go by the time I finished writing my comments on the chicken towel speech and found his rubric and outline.

As a general rule, I dislike demonstration speeches because there are too many hassles, and moving parts, and things to clean up, and you can only watch someone mix batter in a bowl for so long before it all starts to blur together in a sloppy mess of raw eggs and granulated sugar. Also, most recipes that kids want to make call for a microwave at some point. Either they need to melt the butter, or they need to melt the chocolate, or they need to boil water. There’s always something. I make kids bring in all their own cooking supplies, utensils, bowls, ingredients, and anything else they may need. But I can’t make them bring in their own microwave. And because the home economics room was being used at the same time as my speech class, I made the only other reasonable decision, and I brought in my own microwave from home.

So Jordy sets up his supplies and begins his speech explaining how this is something his mom makes every year, and she taught him how to do it, and now he’s going to teach us. (Baking speeches almost always start with, “So here’s something my mom taught me how to make.”) Step one: melt chocolate chips together with a little bit of butter in the microwave. Jordy carefully opens a small Tupperware container in which he’s premeasured the right amount of butter, and then cuts open his bag of chocolate chips. He explains all about how you need to melt them slowly and make sure that you don’t burn the chocolate. Then proceeds to dump them into a Hillshire Farms lunchmeat container, to which he also adds the butter.

Freeze.

At this point, you know what’s going to happen! At this point, I knew what was going to happen. At this point, I did the most passive aggressive thing I have ever done as a teacher or maybe ever...I let it happen anyway. In my mind, the irony of the situation was not that he was about to not only melt down the chocolate but also the entire flimsy plastic container, but rather that he’d so carefully cautioned us against burning the chocolate, when he was about to create a molten mess of BPA riddled plastic that would surely make his pretzel treats cancerous. In hindsight, it was probably my responsibility to stop him. I mean, we could have burned down the school or something! But I know a genuine learning opportunity when I see one, and this was definitely one.

Unfreeze.

Having warned us about the dangers of burning the chocolate, Jordy puts the container in the microwave for two minutes. That’s right. Two. Whole. Minutes! And now I feel as if I have to say something, because certainly it’s going to explode in there, but I continue to keep my mouth shut. In the meantime, Jordy proceeds with the rest of his speech, talking loudly over the drone of the microwave as he lays out the pretzels and candies for dipping and decorating.

At one minute in, the smell of burning chocolate becomes evident. At one minute and fifteen seconds, it takes on a distinctly artificial and plasticy smell. At one minute and thirty seconds it starts to smoke, at which point I don’t need to say anything because the class is freaking out and Jordy is in a panic. He quickly pushes cancel, and pops the door open to reveal a gooey, molten plastic mess that’s not only all over my microwave plate, but proceeds to ooze onto the linoleum floor.

Jordy never did finish that demonstration speech. I stopped his official time so that he could go down to the janitor to ask for cleaning supplies, and he spent the next 20 minutes scraping rapidly drying, chocolatey gunk off the floor and out of my microwave. And at the end of the day, I couldn’t even dock him a lot of points off on his speech; one, because part of me felt partially responsible for knowing he was going to fail and letting him do it anyway, and two, because really, when it came to learning something from a demonstration, he had given the class a better lesson than any of the other speakers that day!     

Happy Trails!

Play Week - A Director's Note

Well it's here...dress rehearsal and production week! It would be a bad jinx to say whether things were going particularly well or particularly poorly at this point, so I will say instead that things are, indeed, going. And they will continue to go until Friday night when we open...and then they will need to continue to go all weekend through three performances!

So, as I'm not talking about rehearsals, I'll talk about putting this show together in hindsight, which, as always, comes in the form of my director's notes.

When I first started directing, I wanted to do Neil Simon’s “Fools.” It was one of the very first shows I thought about staging, but the thought of building a balcony scared me away from the script! Eight productions later, I haven’t gotten any better at building balconies; however, as it will be the last all-school play at Pine Island before the new theater opens, it seemed the perfect time to pull the script from my director’s wish list, and put it in the capable hands of my student actors.

When I recently shared with someone that this show was on my shows to direct bucket list, they asked why I didn’t save it for the new space. “Wouldn’t it make more sense to hold off on a main stage production that you’ve looked forward to doing until you have a main stage to actually do it on?” they asked. It is a fair question, and one that makes sense. It’s also one that touches on the heart of the same lessons learned from “Fools.”

If we only ever did theater where we had the best lighting, and the best sound system, and the best costumes, and the best stage rigging, and the best set designers, and the best balconies…very few people would ever get to do theater.

If we only did theater in spaces deemed “theaters” with plush expensive curtains, and slick black stage floors, and orchestra pits, and insulated sound booths…very few people would ever attend a “theater.”

If we reserve “good theater” until all those conditions are met, or one of those spaces is available, we will miss out on a lot of “good theater.”

Pine Island has a good theater program, and they’ve grown it in a space that’s less than theatrically ideal. The new performing arts space will be an amazing and tremendous addition to the school and community, and I’m as excited as anyone to get in there and start creating. But “Fools” doesn’t need to be flashy. “Fools” can be done just as well on a gym floor as an opera house stage. “Fools” is a fun story to tell, whenever and wherever it’s told.

So I pulled it off my wish list…not early, but at the right time. It’s not the right show to christen the new stage. It’s the right show to send the old one out in style. Enjoy the show!

Kate Laack – Pine Island High School Director

Happy Trails, 

All Things November...

Welcome to a new month! I like November, though I feel like it's a month with an identity crisis. October knows it wants to be all orange and reds, and changing leaves, and Halloween, and pumpkin spice everything. December knows it's going to eat, sleep, breathe, puke, ooze all this Christmas. November feels like it should be all cozy, and turkeys, and hot coco, and giving thanks, and football, and snuggly blankets. And it is sometimes. But if you walk though a department store starting today...it might as well be Christmas. And all we'll really hear about between now and Thanksgiving is Black Friday. So November is really just kind of a month in limbo...albeit and cozy month for blanket, candles, football, and giving thanks!

For as long as I've taught, November has also meant the fall play, and we'll open our production of "Fools" on Friday. I've been much calmer about this this year than last, mostly because it's a stage play instead of a musical, and there are far fewer things you have to worry about managing when there isn't singing, dancing, and an orchestra pit involved!

November is also National Novel Writing Month, also known as NaNoWrMo. Authors who legitimately participate in NaNoWrMo are encouraged to write 2000 words a day for the whole month, thus amassing 60,000 words by the end of the month. 60,000 words is about the average length of a commercial novel. Therefore, theoretically if you completed the whole challenge, you would have reached novel length by November 30th.

I've tried doing this once before, but 2,000 words is actually quiet a lot to get down on paper everyday, and my schedule (read the aforementioned fall play!) doesn't always leave me a lot of extra time to sit, relax, and do any quality writing.

That said, those of you who have followed this blog for a while will remember that 'Write a Novel' is on my 30 before 30 list...and time is ticking. To be safe, I already have my bases partially covered in this regard. The last couple months I've worked on rewriting a novel I actually wrote while I was in college. Two summers ago, I also produced well over 60,000 words of a rough draft of the first installment of a would be series. I even sent it out for feedback and started a second draft. The list says "Write" a novel...not publish...I think I've probably done enough to check this off.

Nevertheless, I like to write, and November is a good time to do it as you're curled up with those cozy blankets watching football games! So I've been brainstorming out different writing projects that I could be working on, and I think I've settled on one for the month, and I might even use the blog as a place to keep track of some of it.

I was recently thinking about those moments when you tell a crazy story and someone says, "oh my goodness! You could write a book!" Looking back through my 5 years of blog posts, both those that were published, and those that I took notes on and drafted out but never finished, I found lots of such moments. Though I'm not sure that you could really string all those moments into one cohesive story. They just cover too many facets and areas of interests. That said...they do all fit into my own, personal story, so their must be some unifying elements. I think I've found this common thread, and I'm going to play with it and see where it goes. Like I said, stay tuned. Some of it might appear here first!

The final thing November is good for is sweatpants, slippers, and a warm cup of tea, which is where my evening is headed. I might suggest you settle in as well!

Happy Trails,

 

A spooktacular Halloween post

This coming weekend we'll have lots to celebrate. Saturday is, of course, Halloween, and then (in case you stayed out to late...not that that ever happens on Halloween night!) Sunday is daylight savings time, so you get an extra hour of sleep back! Even if you don't like Halloween, everyone loves extra sleep, and it's the one day a year you actually get a bonus hour...so even if you don't use it to sleep. Use it to do something worthwhile!

I'm exceptionally thankful (next month we get our holiday for thankfulness, but it's good to be grateful year round) for this extra hour of sleep, and for the fact that, for at least a little while, it might be light on either my rive to or my drive home from work. More likely this will happen on my drive to work, which is good, because this morning I slept through my alarm clock, and when I finally woke up AN HOUR LATER, I was completely disoriented because it was still VERY dark outside, and WHY ISN'T THE SUN UP EVEN WHEN I'M RUNNING RIDICULOUSLY LATE?!!?

But I digress. Back to the weekend and Halloween. Since I've started teaching, Halloween has become semi-enjoyable again, mostly because students find it amusing (or really weird) when teacher's dress up for Halloween. As I always enjoy amusing (or weirding out) my students, this is a wonderful opportunity!

Also, students dress up on Halloween, which is sort of fun and gives everyone a chance to be silly. This year with Halloween on a Saturday, Friday is that designated dress up day, and our new principal is actually promoting and encouraging kids to dress up, so that will be interesting. But like I said...also totally fun...maybe...I think! ;)

Student Halloween costumes have provided me with many fond memories, including one particular girl who came to school wearing a crushed cardboard box, colored purple, with patches of tin foil and colored construction paper glued all over it. When she finally came to my class that afternoon, I made a couple of (what I thought were) admirable guesses before she sighed and rolled her eyes and said, "Good grief, I'm a robot! Everybody knows that!"

In truth...nobody knew that. But I'm proud of this student for using her imagination and not being afraid to think outside of the box...or inside of the box as the case was that day!

Last year I went to school as Waldo from 'Where's Waldo.' My "adult," "real" Halloween costume was also Waldo, so I pretty much just dressed like Waldo all day which was great, but did make my after work trip to Target a little awkward and interesting. This year I'm going to school as a girl scout. My "adult," "real" Halloween costume is not a girl scout. I won't be shopping at Target in either outfit I think.

One last thing about Halloween that used to be fun at school but no longer is was my passing out of candy for my students. Unfortunately, new, really strict rules about what I can and can't give them now make it impossible for me to do that (wouldn't want to upset anyone's peanut, soy, lactose, gluten, sugar, allergies). Sometimes, there are loopholes around this, but the hassle has really kind of taken the fun out of it.

That said, I will show them this catchy infographic about the most popular trick-or-treat candies by state.

And then I will share with them my following observations:

1. Really Minnesota? 100 Grand? We like those here? I would never really call that my favorite candy but it does beat...

2. REALLY WISCONSIN?? Laffy Taffy?? The sad thing is I know it's true because I used to get dozens of these while trick-or-treating, but I don't like chewy, fruity candies, so I was never a fan. I know they sell these in bags of 1000 for like $5, so I'm sure people get them because they're cheap. But oh man...it was a bad night if I dumped my trick-or-treat bag and saw 100 of those little guys on the carpet!

Of course, anything chocolate was the big trick-or-treat score. We give out Reese's Peanut Butter cups at our house because they're gluten free. And...if it happens like last year and we get no trick-or-treaters...J Word and I don't mind emptying the bowl ourselves.

So there's all your need to know for the Halloween weekend. Make plans...stay safe...have fun...and as always...

Happy Trails,

Four Thoughts for Friday

It's Friday! TGIF to that! Last week was fall break week...just two days with students, a wonderfully inspiring inservice, and then FREEDOM! J Word and I headed down to Wichita to see Oz, spent a fun and restful weekend exploring the city, spent far too much time in the car, so I balanced that out by taking Monday...and suddenly Tuesday felt like I hadn't been to work in AGES (because, well, I kind of hadn't!) Thus, Friday feels like a welcome relief, not because I haven't had off in a while, but because I'm trying to get myself back in a normal routine...and I feel like I need a weekend and a regular Monday to help "reset" out of vacation mode.

Yes...I said I need a Monday morning...but let's not rush into things! First...Happy Friday! Some thoughts as you head into your weekend.

1. This looked like a good idea on HGTV - Admittedly, I like HGTV, and J Word and I watch it together and talk about how reasonable or unreasonable people are being. J Word has great insight into this because he does home renovation and flipping houses, and understands what it really takes to get some of the projects people undertake, finished. HGTV has a lot of cool ideas...but it's also a little bit like Pinterest in that it gives you unrealistic expectations about what your home could (or should) look like. Enter this list CLICK HERE of vocabulary you should understand before watching any HGTV show. It's not to say you CAN'T have what they show you on Love It or List It...it's just to say you should go in eyes wide open!

2. Public Service Announcement - JK Rowling is writing a play, and it's the sequel to Harry Potter Book 7. Ummmmm....what!!??!?!

3. Prop Master - This week I've been creating all kinds of random things for the school play. I generally like playing 'Prop Master,' and occasionally I come up with something kind of cool that I sit back and look at and think, 'Wow! That looks pretty legit!" I felt that way when I found this list of foods that had been "Giantized." CLICK HERE. I feel like, if I made one of these foods I would feel it too was "Pretty legit!" Oh boy...I'm starting to sound like my students. But really...check these out!

4. Who do you cheer for when your team is on a bye week? - These week, my favorite football team is on a bye, and that means I'm left cheering for a host of other random teams on which I have players from my fantasy football team. Consequently, I also get to cheer against certain teams that my players are playing. So football continues to be the king of Sunday at the Laack house. 

I have two fantasy football teams. Our family league is called "Border Battle" because we're split between MN and WI, and because I'm on the wrong side of the border for the team I actually cheer for, my team is named 'Behind Enemy Lines.' The other league J Word and I play in with friends has a bunch of random team names in it, and my team is called "Rodgers That" (despite the fact that J Word - a Vikings fan - drafted Aaron Rodgers before I could). 

If you don't play fantasy football, you may be wondering what all this fuss is about. But here's the funny thing. Last year I chose a "clever" team name, and only about a 1/3 of the league did. This year, most of the rest of the league followed suit, and we have wonderfully creative names like "Madison Rabid Honey Badgers" and "Space Sloths." Our other league has also had funny names...and they're not all hyper-appropriate. The point is, people think about this stuff. People think about this stuff so much that there is now a fantasy football team name generator. CLICK HERE. And they're actually kind of funny. I clicked around it for a while and came up with 'One Season Too Favre," "I got 99 problems but my Kicker's not one," and "Fire Breathing Rubber Ducks." I'm seriously considering using Fire Breathing Rubber Ducks next year! 

  

:)

Happy Trails,

Is hindsight still 20-20 if you're blind? (And other weird questions.)

I thought I was so clever in naming this post...until I Googled looking for an image to accompany the post, and found out it had already been turned into a meme!

If something has already been memed it is not original, and it may have been clever at one time, but it's not clever anymore. Darn it.

Nevertheless...I'll press on to the 'other questions' part of the subtitle, as that's where the real focus of the post is supposed to go (and not on my inherent lack of cleverness). There has been a prevalent question in my class of late that I've gotten better at answering, but has left me wanting to roll my eyes and take a deep breath before answering.

Did you get my mom's email? I love it when students ask me this because I'm never 100% sure what kind of response they're looking for. Sometimes I go with, "Yes...did your mom share with you the response I wrote?" Other times I go with, 'No...why don't you tell me what's going on." Then there's the ever popular, "Yes...and I told your mom I would talk directly with you in class." Which always seems to scare kids. I don't have a problem with parents emailing me at all. I even encourage it if they have questions. But when kids ask questions about their assignment and grades through their parents, it's time to start learning to have their own conversations.

For example, I recently received a variation of this:
          "Dear Mrs. Laack, Little Jimmy doesn't understand why he got a D on his project. Can you please explain. Thanks, Mom" 

To which I responded to the student, and cc'd the mother...because clearly it's the student's question and not the mom's.
          "Dear Little Jimmy, You received a rubric that explained your point breakdown for the assignment. If you have specific questions on the rubric, please bring it back to class tomorrow and I can discuss it with you. Thanks, Mrs. Laack" 

The aforementioned parent then responded (just to me and not to their student).
           "Dear Mrs. Laack, Thank you. I was unaware there was a rubric on this assignment. I'll have Little Jimmy bring it back to school tomorrow. Thanks, Mom." 

End of conversation...kind of. Little Jimmy never did bring his rubric to talk about it in class. When I asked about it, the student seemed suddenly content with the grade and didn't want to discuss it.

I can imagine what the backend of the conversation looked like at home. The parent likely had no idea there was a rubric, just heard their student complaining about the grade...maybe not understanding some aspect of the assignment and therefore not understanding the grade, and so they email me, and then reassure their student that they're finding an answer for them.

But I'm trying to teach communication, so being asked "Did you see my mom's email?" when the student could have used the same breath to ask me the question they had themselves is a totally teachable moment! And I'm subtly, if not slightly passive-aggressively trying to use that moment. My parents used to make us make our own phone calls to schedule appointments, ask questions, etc. I HATED it. I think email is WAY less scary, but I see in today's 21st century world, kids hiding behind the keyboard of their parents much like I preferred my parents to make calls on my behalf. I needed to be taught, and at some point, it became less scary.

I can't imagine I'm that scary of a person...but if I am, then I'm the perfect person to practice on!

So yes students...I got your mom's email. Did YOU get my response?

Happy Trails,

Four Thoughts on Friday...

This week...was not great. Sometimes life comes at you from every angle and by today, when people were asking what they could do to help, my go to response became, "Can you make it Saturday? Because that's all that's going to help right now!" But in between the chaos and burnout and beating my head against the wall were small slivers of "everything is going to be OK." (J Word likes to follow that up with, 'You know why? Because it has to be!" This week didn't necessarily feel that way all the time...but like I said, there were small glimmers.

For example, have you ever read the book 'The Giver"? If not, you should...here's the quick rundown without giving away any of the ending. The book is set in a "utopia" where all things have been regulated and equalized. People don't see in color, don't remember pain and suffering, relinquish all decision making to committees and the government, and entrust all past memories of the world as it used to be to a Keeper of Memories. In the book, a new Keeper of Memories is selected and has to receive all the memories from "The Giver." This transfer happens through a kind of "dream" where the experience is passed between the old guy and the new guy.

Ok...that's not a very good summary...but here's where I'm going with it. These "dreams" are memories...just pure experiences. So it's not so much that he wakes up remembering a whole story that happened, but more that he wakes up suddenly remembering what it feels like to have sun shining on his face, or what it would be like to run through dewy grass. They're experiences.

So...back to my small, glittering hopes from the week. This morning I woke up at about 4:30 dreading the day ahead, and I tossed and turned for a while before finally dozing back off. And after dozing off I had a "dream." But it's not like I normally dream...which is to say it wasn't a little story that played out in my mind. This dream was very much just being part of a moment/experience part of dream. From 5:00AM to 6:00AM as I lay in bed asleep, I dreamed I was sitting on a sandy beach, wrapped up in a blanket with J Word, and we were watching the northern lights. That's it...the whole dream. That's all we did for the whole thing. No talking...nothing going on in the background...just us sitting and watching the northern lights. And when my alarm clock went off at 6:00AM, I woke up and thought, "That is the best dream I've ever had!!!"

The rest of the day was kind of a nightmare, but that dream was super perfect! And it was a small glimmer in what's been a ridiculous week.

1. I'm just trying to understand: J Word has been exceptionally understanding this week as I've ranted and raved and sometimes just decided not to talk because I was sick of talking to people in general. In fact, I will say beyond even this week, he does a pretty good job of understanding me on the whole...which is probably a good thing to say about the person you married. (Somewhere he might be sitting and reading this thinking I'm the most confusing person in the world and make absolutely no sense...in which case, he pretends to understand me really well!) ;) In any case, despite all that, along came this list this week that CLICK HERE identified 23 parts of the female experience that men will never understand. And I laughed because all women know #12 is true...and #14 was an active discussion at our house this week. So there is, at least, a little bit of truth to be told here!

2. Revealing your true self : It's almost time for Halloween, and that means it's almost time for Halloween costumes!! After abandoning the necessity or desire for a Halloween costume for most of my college years (I just never embraced the 'Slutty __(insert nurse/police officer/fire fighter/kitten/etc.) ____ trend), I've come to like it again now that I get to wear something goofy to school and be silly with grown-up friends. (And by grown up I mean past the slutty college costume phase.) This year J Word and I are doing a couples costume...stay tuned for that big reveal. And if you're still stumped as to what you might want to wear, then CLICK HERE for a few ideas for you/your significant other/the two of you together.

3. We need a 12 step program for this: Today there was another school shooting, bringing the total to three for the week. Today we also participated in an active shooter training for our district, and while it's good to be prepared, I couldn't help but think that it's insane that we need to be doing this. We have a gun problem in the US. Some people will say the guns aren't the problem, it's the people with the guns that are the problem...but the fact that those people have guns is a problem too...so really we have a problem with people and guns and...yeah...it's just all very messed up! Every time something like this happens, politicians and community leaders and activists and lobbyists all start screaming about whose fault it is and what we're going to do. Today I'll add my voice to the cacophony. We can't keep pretending that, because we need "good guys with guns" we should do nothing to keep "bad guys from getting guns." If the government has the right to tell a woman what she can/can't do with her body...they have the right to tell people who can/can't have a gun!

4. This song's been in my head all week. Then I read the lyrics and thought, this might be my anthem this week. So this one's dedicated to J Word, and here's to a better week ahead!

Happy Trails,