Think about it

To my future boyfriend/roomie:

Here's what I have done on this Friday night:
-watched Simpsons followed by several hours of Law & Order: SVU
-checked my email certainly more often than necessary
-made some dinner (pans and dishes still "soaking" in the sink)
-browsed the best of craigslist
-went to the gym during Leno
-made instant fudge, which is currently cooling in the fridge as I am licking the spoon and consuming the leftover contents of the mixing bowl

Beware, this is what you are getting into. But at our place, I'll let you eat some of the fudge. You too, McClain, if you're willing to walk a few blocks for it.

Aside from a sad Friday night, life is great lately. Nate and I found a place (!) at Addison and Lake Shore Drive, on the 21st floor, with a balcony looking onto the lake. The lease is signed, we move in May 1st, woohoo! I ran 5 miles a few days ago, at my fastest pace (which is still not terribly fast, but I felt accomplished), and yesterday was gorgeous and I finally got to go for a bike ride in the forest preserve, which is the most relaxing activity I can think of (I think it's possible to sweat and relax at the same time). I've put in around 10 job applications and I'm working on many more. I had a really good cookie yesterday. I had sushi for lunch today and the guy at the restaurant gave me free miso soup. Yes, I know every sentence in this entry starts with "I," I'm feeling a little "what I did over my summer vacation" vibe. My parents are out of town and I have the house to myself for a week.

Life is lovely.

Except my dog keeps pooping on the floor.

Oops...

Ok, this one was totally my fault, although completely unintentional. Ok, so I was in a 1st grade classroom today, and at the end of the day, they were packing up before going to an hour of specials at the end of the day. They had five extra minutes, and they were getting antsy, so I had to think of something that just takes a couple minutes. I figured hangman is fun and quick. I thought of a word that related to what we did during math that day, and they started guessing letters. They got through about half of the alphabet (not too much strategy going on), I was drawing eyes and hair and everything, I just wanted them to get the word. So anyway, the word was "clock" and they got the L last. Ooooooops. So I jumped in and said, "Alright, let's all put in the last letter together. L! Clock! The word is CLOCK!" Because see, we had been working on telling time in math that day. One of those moments when you're so glad to be the only adult in the room, and glad the kids aren't old enough to notice what was temporarily on the board.

Also, my mom and I were watching Oprah, and they were talking with teenaged girls who feel pressured to have sex to be accepted by their boyfriends, and this psychiatrist woman was talking about how they're missing something, and said "you have to figure out how to fill your hole with something valuable." My mom and I just about died.

Good times.

Know anyone with kids?

If you do, spread the word, I am officially in the birthday party business.
Check out my website: www.geocities.com/nryanparties/welcome
If this works, a few hours on the weekends could be very profitable.

Ok, on to the Oscars: Crash? Whatever. Did not like it, and dammit, that does not make me a racist. Racial dialogue can be a good thing, but not through contrived interweaving stories. Boo. The rest of the winners were good though. Yay Philip Seymour Hoffman (or as one of the Williams sisters said, Philip Semen Hoffman).

I went to Chinatown for dinner with Marina this weekend, and we went to an okay place. Weird thing though, we never had a server. I have never been to a restaurant, somehow gotten food, but never had a server. Some random woman brought us tea, the host noticed us sitting around looking for someone and took our order, and a kitchen guy brought our food. We had to flag down a waitress, who I think was supposed to be ours, to get a check. There was a little survey in the checkbook about the service, and even if we had known how to explain our situation, there was no pen. Good moment, thanks Chinatown. Then we went to a bakery and got gigantic almond cookies, yum.

security settings, seriously

So this subbing thing is picking up a little bit. Let's hope it stays that way. I subbed in kindergarten last week, and I'm in that same classroom again tomorrow. Today I subbed in 4th grade working with a kid who can't read. I guess it's just never made sense to him, but he's good at math and all that. Nothing about reading was automatic for him. Weird and interesting. I had a scary moment today while working with him on the computer. He was doing a powerpoint presentation on the secret service, and we were looking for pictures. In the middle of all these pictures of officers, badges, and police vehicles, I saw something that looked not quite right. It was a little thumbnail thing so I wasn't sure, but after looking for a second, I was pretty certain I was looking at a woman with a penis about to go in her mouth. Oh my God, cold sweat, there's a child who hasn't noticed it sitting next to me, holy shit. My hand flew up to the computer screen, and the kid was scrolling down, so I had to keep moving my hand up the screen, finally I grabbed the mouse from him and went to the next page, where there was mercifully no pornography. What the hell, it's a school, they have all these things blocked and all these security settings, and all this shit still gets through. I had nothing to do with the image on the screen, but I was so embarassed, I don't think he saw it though. Damn, teaching is dangerous.

When not shielding children from the dangers of the internet, I've been working a lot at mommy's store and scrambling to get on more sub lists. I'm also at the beginning stages of a little home business. Yes, you guessed it. Children's birthday parties. Can't you see it? My years as a camp counselor have got to be good for something, and I've decided they qualify me to relieve parents of the job of entertaining children for a tidy sum. It's the north shore, people will pay anyone to take care of their kids for them. Wish me luck.