Excuses, excuses.

All right, here's the deal:

1.  Maxine dropped our camera a couple of months ago, and now it no longer works.  The lens is extended, and won't go back in to the casing.  Hence the lack of pictures on the Roblog.

2.  Our summer vacation started last Monday, a week ago, and I am just now feeling relaxed enough to write.  Seriously.

During the last week of classes I started getting a tooth ache.  A real doozy.  I had only recently had my upper right wisdom tooth extracted and the tooth next to it capped, but this pain was in the bottom front right.  I was sure that that's where the pain originated, and it was so bad that it made my jaw hurt the first couple of days, then the whole right side of my face. The kind of pain that makes your brain go on strike.

I found that if I could lie down and relax before it hit hard, it passed quickly.  I found that sometimes Tylenol helped and sometimes might as well have been nasty candy.  I found that I am a wimp when it comes to taking pain, so I called my dentist (i.e. had Horyon call) and begged for an appointment.

They took some x-rays, tapped the culprit tooth, asked questions in halting English, and told me that they could find nothing wrong.  Treatment?  Wait and see what happens.

I figured this meant that it was all in my head.  Of course, an actual toothache would be in my head as well, but this must have been me being mental.  So I made a conscious decision to not be stressed.

It worked.  I did not let myself raise my voice in class.  I did not let myself get upset when students were obnoxious.  I dropped my jaw, and found that I had been clenching.  I still wonder how long I had been doing that.

Next thing I knew vacation started.  I woke up last Saturday feeling like I had lost 50 pounds.  I don't remember longing, hungering for a vacation like this since my days in Nepal when escaping to Thailand felt like going into orbit.

I don't think I'm cut out to be an elementary teacher.

3.  We are giving Maxine an allowance of sorts, in line with a presentation Horyon attended a couple of weeks ago.  We are all excited about it, especially Maxine.  She is actually getting paid for doing work around the house.  I think this deserves a separate post, so I'm closing this one down.

Maxine's Thank You cards

Maxine is changing schools this month, and these are the thank you cards she made for her teachers, and a birthday card for my brother-in-law's wife:

Undersea B-Day Partay!

 Open your eyes, duck, or you will seriously run into a tree:

 Either a lot of love, or practice drawing hearts:

 A combination of Tangled and Frosty the Snowman, perhaps?

 The Birds!  The Birds!

 Translation:  Happy Birthday, Auntie (wife of parent's brother, to be exact)!

 Look out fly!  You can't tell from the scan, but this composition used glitter crayons to great effect:

We plan to encourage Maxine to continue to express herself through art.  She will be six in October.  Someday people may look back on Roblog as the first documentation of her career.

A Good Monday and House for Sale

Our house is for sale.  Of course, this link won't last past the house selling, and maybe not even that long.  Hopefully it will sell quickly. Our agent has described it as a

Totally Updated and Super Slick SW One-Level!" Not sure if those are the words I would have used, but it does look good on the virtual tour. And today when I came in to work I found that my morning classes had been cancelled.  And I don't have any afternoon classes on Monday!  Happy day!  Got some planning done. Selling the house is depressing.  It will be nice to have those financial resources freed up, but... It was our first house.  Maybe our last, if we've learned our lesson properly.  It was our shot at the American Dream, and we missed it.  Yes, our timing was bad.  I understand that the American economy has maimed and destroyed many, and that we are fortunate to have a fall back like Korea.  And I can now see clearly that I was naive about moving back to the states and teaching in a public school.   I am so glad that we had the chance to live close to my family, and to make new friends in Lawrence.  But we just couldn't make it work. So much for a good Monday, eh?