"Cyclops Rock"

I spent most of the week getting over being sick. I feel pretty well now, though I'm still a little stopped up and I still have a bunch of junk in my throat. The air conditioning at work hasn't been working properly, so on top of being sick I've been hot and sweaty. Makes for a rather miserable work week, in a lot of ways, but things were pretty good for the most part. For one, I convinced my boss to stick me in another history class starting Monday. Our student-teacher's last day was yesterday, so we'll be a teacher short for all the classes she was working in. Myself and the woman who has been a student's one-on-one mentor person are stepping up to fill in most of the gaps (I'll have my 4th period US/VA History class all to myself, though). This new schedule takes me out of a class of six English students which had three teachers (and it didn't really need three. Two, yeah, I could see that. But three was unnecessary). So that'll all be exciting.

I'm also trying to figure out what I want to teach/will be asked to teach next year. I'm leaning towards getting out of the English classes altogether and sticking almost exclusively to history. What I really want to do is create a history elective that would only cover the twentieth century. I feel that most history classes on the high school level end up giving the 20th century short shrift. They always focus on the same things: the colonial/Revolutionary period, Industrialization, and the Civil War and Reconstruction for American history; the ancient Cradle of Civilization, Greece and Rome, the Middle Ages and Early Modern periods for World History (admittedly, at least we've got two years of World History at Accotink. You get a chance to cover a good majority of stuff, though even the World History II class is only up to the French Revolution at this point). And while those are all important and need to be taught, the students live in a world that is the direct result of the 20th century. The World Wars, the Depression, the Civil Rights Movement, the rise and fall of Soviet Communism, the emergence of new world powers...these are all things the students need to know about. Plus, it's probably more relevant to a lot of them. I'm going to pitch the idea to my director on Monday and see what she says. If that flies, I'm asking for a Philosophy class for the next year.

Michelle managed to snag us tickets not only to Tom Petty, but to Bruce Springsteen. This'll be my third time to see Petty, but I've never had the chance to catch The Boss in concert (admittedly, that's because he never really comes out to Oklahoma, despite his growing obsession with the midwest and the southwest in his music).

The school is doing a camping trip next week. I'm actually really excited about this. I haven't been camping since I was in high school. I even went out and bought a tent and sleeping bag earlier this week in anticipation. I'm really just a big geek who can't help but get excited about strange things.

Recent music purchases have included the new Pearl Jam, Glen Phillips, Bruce Springsteen, and Mark Knopfler/Emmylou Harris records. The new Pearl Jam album's pretty solid, old-fashioned straight-up rock; the Glen Phillips record falls somewhere between his first and second studio outings (leaning more towards the former than the latter); Bruce Springsteen's latest is the loosest and most fun album he's ever recorded (admittedly, most Bruce records aren't designed to be fun, mind you, but this one certainly is); and the Mark Knopfler and Emmylou Harris duet album is gorgeous, meandering country-rock. They're all worth picking up.

Well, back to laundry. Mine is an exciting and event-filled life.

~chuck

Song of the Moment: Glen Phillips, "I Want a New Drug"