Trying to figure out how to add links

Here is the link for the Jonah Goldberg column. Oh! I think I've done it!!! (I'll try it out and see) I feel so proud of myself.......

At least someone is defending us!

I don't know if you've paid much attention to the Proposition 8 conflict out in California, but here is the Reader's Digest condensed version. In June, the California Supreme court "found" that the state constitution allowed for gay marriages. So, California immediately began issuing marriage licenses and 18,000 gay couples tied the knot over the next five months. Many people in California opposed the idea that five judges should make the final decision on this issue for the millions who live in the state, so they started a movement that eventually got the issue on the ballot in the Nov. election. Come November, the citizens of California voted 52% to 48% to prohibit gay marriage. Well, you'd think the gay rights folks could accept a legal and lawful election, but noooooo. They've been protesting and interrupting various faith's church services and picketing the LDS temples and sending white powder to LDS temples and beating up old ladies while stomping their crosses into the ground, etc. ever since. Last week they picketed the temple here in Dallas, and security personnel had to lock the gates of the temple to keep them out. A bit much don't you think? Today Jonah Goldberg, who writes for National Review (my favorite online political site--I highly recommend it if you are of the conservative persuasion--and even if you're not, it's a good read) stood up for us Mormon folk and his column is quite good. Here is the URL:

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=YWZiMzYwZDNjOWI1NGVlZTk5OTg4Y2E3YzIyZTllZTg=

I'm not clever enough to figure out how to put links in here; maybe someone can show me someday. Anyway, I was pleased that a nice Jewish fellow stood up for us.

Thanksgiving

First--I'm so thankful that Lauren made the trip to and from California safely. Against my advice (amazing that you cannot pray away other people's agency, isn't it?) she decided to spend Thanksgiving in San Diego with her old friend Kat. Off she went. traveling 700 miles each way. The trip south was quite eventful. She called me from Victorville, California, to let me know that one of her back tires was completely shredded. Lovely, my beautiful daughter is stranded, alone, on the side of the highway more than 1,000 miles away from me. Luckily, we have the road hazard insurance on our cars, so she called GEICO, who promised to send help within a half hour. The California Highway Patrol also stopped to help; she got the donut tire put on, was advised to drive no more than 60 miles on it, and she went on her way, searching for a tire shop as she went. Unfortunately, no shop appeared, and about 100 miles along the way she stopped at a gas station and realized that the other back tire was shot. So, another call to GEICO followed by a tow to Kat's house. The insurance only covers a five mile tow, not a 60 mile trek, so it was an expensive outing, but she was safely there (albeit with one donut tire and two shredded ones). She had a lovely Thanksgiving feast with Kat and crew, then bought two new tires on Friday. Thank goodness, the return trip to Provo was totally uneventful--no problems at all, and now she's back where she belongs. Mike said that perhaps the whole thing was a blessing in disguise--she and I could have had the tire problems later this month when I fly up to Salt Lake City and then drive her home--to stay this time. It was a worrisome time for old mom, though. I pray and pray and pray, but somehow I seem to lack faith because I still worry about my kids (and grandkids). I'm just thankful, thankful, thankful that she made it back safely. And I hope the two of us have a much less exciting trip Dec. 19 and 20.

Our Thanksgiving celebration was lovely. The food turned out well--I even managed to make pretty good cornbread dressing this year. It's not as good as grandma's yet, but I'm steadily improving. Julie, Kelly and Shannon joined Mike, Kara and I and Nana came, too. We also invited our friend Joe (he's Mike's home teaching companion) and an old friend, Jeff, with his seven-year-old daughter, Holly. We had a fine meal, good company, great conversation--what more could you ask? Then, Julie, Kara and I topped off the day with an outing to the movies. It was perfect.

In fact, the whole week was restful and lovely. I had the entire week off, so I relaxed, read, slept, accomplished almost nothing, but had a great time doing it. I'm very thankful for vacations and time to be still.

Other things I'm thankful for:
Today Mike helped pull a man from a burning car. The accident happened right in front of him on the way home from work and he, along with two other motorists, ran to rescue the unconscious man from his burning car. I'm thankful to have such a good, kind, brave husband.

Terrific, fun, thoughtful daughters. I am blessed with three of the world's best.

Grandsons!!! Two are Terrific!

Many dear friends who love me despite my many faults and shortcomings.

The gospel of Jesus Christ and the freedom to worship in peace.

A career that fills and fulfills me. I love my students and I am blessed to be a teacher.

Meeting and writing about endlessly fascinating people and programs at UT Arlington.

The opportunity to travel all over the world.

Beauty in all it's forms--art, music, literature, marvelous creations brought to us by fellow children of our Heavenly Father.

This wonderful world--every creature and creation testifies of Christ.

Twilight

I had read the first three books, so on Thanksgiving, Julie, Kara and I were off to see the movie. I really liked it! Actually, in my humble opinion, it's much better than the book. NO WHINING!!!! My biggest complaint with the books is the pages and pages and pages of Bella's internal whining. Too much for an old woman who has lived through three teenage girls and currently teaches a boatload of them. And, though I have already expressed this sentiment to some, let me now put it on the record: the writing in Twilight and its sequels is mediocre at best. These are NOT classic novels. While the author does have a fairly compelling story, she really has enough good plot for about two books and the editors/publishers/money grubbers have stretched the series to four books. Too, too many pages of no action. Another confession, I skim and/or skip when the action wanes. Kara says that you must read every word, but I say there are no word police and if it's boring (unless you're reading for school, then you must read it all) skip it! There, I'll bet you never though you'd hear that from an English teacher. However, as a teacher and a professional writer, I just don't have the time or patience to wade through badly written, boring material. There are too many great books for me to waste my time on dreck.

However, don't think I'm consigning Twilight to the dreck bin. It is better than that. And, after seeing the movie on Thursday evening, I spent all day Friday reading the last book in the series just to find out how it all ends. (skipped the boring parts, though).

Gifted and Talented--Me?

So, it's time to try to catch up a bit. First, the Texas Association for the Gifted and Talented conference which I attended with Lisa on Nov. 13 and 14. I really enjoy going to this conference because I get so many good (no, great) ideas to use in my classes. The best two sessions I attended this year were presented by Lisa. One, "Laughing Yourself Smart" revolved around ideas to bring humor into the classroom. (Although this conference is directed at teaching gifted kids, the information is really great for everyone). From her workshop, I got the idea to use the squawking chicken that we've had laying around the house as a motivation for my students. This chicken has a strong rubber neck that you can pull on to launch the fowl across the room and it squawks when it lands. So, I took it to school, and used it as my visual aid while telling them the story of the eagle who was raised with the chickens and failed to achieve his full potential. He just kept scratching in the dirt when he should have soared in the heavens. I told the kids they are all eagles but sometimes they act like chickens and when that happens, they can expect this fine feathered friend to visit our class. Then I launched the chicken across the room. It was great. And even better, during 7th period, one of my students fell asleep. Amazing how startling a squawking chicken can be when it lands on a sleeping student's desk. He jumped a foot at least. I was highly amused. (and he hasn't slept in class since).

I also submitted proposals and made two presentations at the conference. It was an okay experience, but I don't know if I'll repeat it. I can put this on my vita and it will look good, but I didn't really enjoy myself. In part that was because both of my presentations were the last of the day. On the first afternoon, only three people attended (my dear friend Lisa being one of them). It was called The Amazing Technicolor Dream Class and was about ways to engage students of different ethnicities and cultures. I thought it was pretty good, but the attendance was disappointing. Thus, I had few hopes for the second presentation on blogging (because I'm such an expert at this). Actually, I decided to talk about blogging and use myself as a testimonial--If I can do this with my students, anyone can. And even though that was during the last session of the entire conference, about a dozen people came. They seemed to enjoy the presentation; they were willing to participate and add their ideas, and it went pretty well. So, if I can come up with a really great idea, I might do it again, but I'll have to think about it first. Lisa has been doing this for three years and has built up a great reputation--almost 200 people were in her morning humor session. I don't pretend to be as gifted as she is, but I think I'm a good teacher, so we'll see what happens next year......

The Great Eight

Best friend tagged me on this and now that I have some time off, I'll give it a whirl. By the way--I have the entire week of Thanksgiving off (definitely something to be thankful for!) and will try to do a bit of catching up on the blog.

8 Favorite TV Shows (certainly not all current)
1. Law and Order
2. Law and Order SVU
3. Law and Order Criminal Intent (are you seeing a pattern here? I guess I like these so much because there is always a puzzle to solve and they make me think. Sometimes their liberal politics DRIVE ME BATTY, but I mostly I enjoy them, so I keep watching).
4. Hannity's America (here comes politics again....)
5. Rick Steves' Europe
6. Samantha Brown's Passport to: Europe, Latin America, China, anywhere....I love to travel!
7. The Antiques Roadshow (probably my only often-watched reality show)
8. Most everything on The Food Network. (I also love to eat)

8 Things I Did Since Friday
1. Babysat the twins so Julie could go with friends to see "Twlight."
2. Watched a very strange movie, "3000 Miles to Graceland," with Mike when we were insomniacs in the middle of the night
3. delivered stuff to the stake library
4. Went to church
5. Bragged on Kara --she got a 32 on the ACT. If you're not familiar with the scoring system for the American College Test, that's amazingly good. (ask me more about it; I'll be happy to brag some more)
6. Fed the missionaries and enjoyed their company
7. Took a lovely nap
8. Read the Sunday paper--although the local paper is steadily decreasing in quality, I still enjoy reading it.

8 Things to Look Forward to
1. Thanksgiving Dinner on Thursday--family and friends filling up the house (For it to really be Thanksgiving we'd need 30 people at least--like we used to have at Nannie and Papa's house. But I'll be happy with about 10)
2. Having the week off
3. Accomplishing some things around the house during my week off
4. the upcoming Christmas season--Deck The Halls!
5. our trip to Europe next summer--London, Paris, Berlin, Prague, Budapest, and Vienna!
6. Lauren graduating from BYU
7. Lauren moving back to Texas
8. Kara getting a great scholarship to BYU (we hope, hope, hope!)


8 Favorite Restaurants (or five I like and three I'd like to try)
1. Texas Roadhouse (delicious steaks, not too pricey)
2. La Madeline (French--need I say more?)
3. The Brass Bean (a delightful sandwich shop near my school)
4. The Black-eyed Pea
5. Rockfish
6. Grace --a new place in Fort Worth--sounds really expensive but delicious
7. Nagoya Japan--I want to learn more about Japanese cuisine
8. Estellas (a local mexican place I've been wanting to try out)


8 Things on My Wish List (in no particular order)
1. Much love and happiness for me and my family--and for everyone else.
2. Somebody needs to open a great gelateria in Arlington!--and they also need to sell Leonidas chocolate
3. More time at the temple and more quiet time to reflect
4. More time to spend with wonderful family and friends
5. Success for all my students--on the TAKS test, SAT, ACT, AP and in Life!
6. A summer in Great Britain
7. Another summer in France and Italy
8. A master's degree in Humanities

Cute Monster

I went to this site from bestest friend's page and since I'm not as clever as her and have no clue how to put the picture in here, I'll just give you the web site and you can go find out what kind of monster you are.
http://www.blogthings.com/thecutemonstertest/

I'm the blue one and here's their take on me:

What Your Cute Monster Says About You

You are both a realist and an idealist. You're able to see the world as it is - and how it could be.
You dream big, and you never give up on your beliefs. You have big plans.

Your inner demon is depression. Sometimes you build things up in your head.
People think you're cute because you're determined. You're a fighter, and that's charming.



All in all, a fairly accurate evaluation of yours truly. I'm afraid I've been feeling pretty down and worthless lately, and so haven't posted much. However our church services today were wonderful and I'm feeling more inspired to try to do better. I'll give it a go.