Come To Your Senses...

I'm currently listening to the Broadway cast recording to "Tick...Tick...Boom" and that song is playing. The song is also a great title to today's entry.

I realize that it's been a while since I've given anyone a glimpse into the world of Erica, but I didn't realize that it had been THAT long ago since I graced the world wide web with my thoughts and daily doings.

I've stopped running. I've "come to my senses" so to speak. My knee isn't getting better. It's not getting worse, but running will only exacerbate the feelings of soreness, so I'm going to stop. Hopefully I won't stop forever, but I'm stopping for now. I miss it. I still read Runner's World, but more with nostalgia now than true excitement. What I won't miss, however, is running in the summer heat. Hopefully no running for 4 months or so will do the trick and I can train for the Houston and Surfside halves beginning in the fall.

I wish my students would "come to their senses." I'm grading research papers, and I am growing frustrated and sick. I've given these kids assignment sheets with directions. I've gone over them in class many times. I've even given them yet another sheet with "Mistakes Most Commonly Seen" after they turned in their rough drafts. I've harped on the evils of plagairism. I've stressed that they need a works cited page. I've gone on and on about the minimum page length of 6 pages and the minimum number of sources as 4. They've had 6-7 weeks to write this paper. Most of the papers turned in thus far are failing. They don't have 6 pages. They don't have a works cited page. They didn't use parenthetical citations with their quotes. They didn't use 4 sources. They plagiarized. Now I have to call parents and tell them that their child didn't follow the directions and will not only most likely fail my class this term, but they'll fail their science class (since this was a joint assignment). It's times like this that I can't tell if I did my job as a teacher wrong, or my students are just lazy. Knowing my students, I'm opting for the latter, especially considering the amount of classtime spent on this paper.

Ok. Enough about school. Well, almost enough. This is my last year at my current school. I have been accepted at another school district, one outside of the city and one that I've wanted to work at since earlier this year. Yes, I am moving. Technically my address will still be Houston, but I'll be in the Clear Lake/Webster/Friendswood/League City area. I'm excited. I've been slowly buying new apartment stuff and all I need now is a couch, a new dining set (I'm not fond of my other one), a new mattress set and new curtains. A new apartment means new changes, new colors, new stuff. I move in July, and will spend an entire month decorating and relaxing (I'm teaching summer school to afford new apartment stuff).

I'm off to Louisiana in a couple of weeks. I need this weekend trip. I need to spend time with my Louisiana buddy, I need to get out of Houston for a weekend, I need to be on LSU's campus again for a partial day. I need to do very little school work that weekend. I need to have fun, and fun is already promised to me.

Time to grade more papers. I hope they get better than this.