Today, there was a little snowstorm here and it took me 25 minutes just to get to Shef's school from mine, when it usually takes about 8. It took about a million more years to get to Dan's parents' house where we were going for dinner in lieu of swimming lessons.

When I was almost there, my car died at a red light. The people behind me were less than pleased. I turned on the hazards and marched with Shef to the Amoco station which was about 200 feet away. I marched there in my high heels, which I wore today without looking at the weather report.

A guy from the Amoco jumped the car, and it started, but the ride was tenuous. The heater wasn't working, the windshield wipers weren't working, and the dash lights were ominously dim.

When I got to Dan's parents' house, Dan went out to check on things and locked the keys in the car because Subaru has a dumb "safety feature" wherein you can lock your keys in the car even if you have the remote entry device in your hand.

And also, Mac who has been home sick for two days with an ear infection (Dan was with him today, and I was home yesterday) now has conjunctivitis (aka boogers in his eyes), which means he also can't go tomorrow. Dan, our savior, has volunteered to stay home again. God bless you, Dan. I love you so much.

Tonight, I finished The Road. I sobbed uncontrollably at the end of the book because it is so ridiculously sad. Dan laughed at me, but he hugged me.

"I must console you as a husband," he said.

For some crazy reason, he's decided to read the book. I wept openly for the last ten pages, and he kept saying, "Don't tell me what happens! Don't tell me!"

I had already told him about the terrible cannibals and the dead baby on a spit and the death of the father, so I'm not sure what else there is to tell.

"This is the most terrible book I've ever read in my life," I sobbed.

Dan asked if I wanted a picture of myself with tears streaming down my face holding the goddamn Road. The answer to that question was a big fat NO.

Twice this fall, Shef's been dancing along in front of me not really paying attention to where he's going, and I've tripped over him while holding Mac. I've found that when you trip while holding a baby, you have a greater chance of falling all the way to the ground because you won't let go of the baby to break the fall. Rather, you try to roll to the side while protecting the baby's head with your free hand. Also, you instinctively try to hold your chin up to avoid slamming it on the ground.

The results are sort of humiliating. Both times it's happened to me, I've been completely prone with the baby in my left arm. Once, his head flopped at the last second and hit the street. He wasn't hurt, but we were both pretty freaked.

These falls cause a lot of soreness. My entire right side is aching today because of the spill yesterday in the fanciest mall in the Twin Cities. Dan was there, and he stared at me sprawled out on the floor for a few seconds before jumping in to help. I think it took him a little while to figure out how I'd gotten all the way down there, with my belly touching the ground.



In other news, Shef has a new podacast! It's a Harry Potter podcast, and in it he reads from his retelling of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. It's about three minutes long. You can click here to hear it.

I feel a little anxious today because I had to send out surveys to all of my students and their parents asking them to evaluate my performance as a teacher. I also had to send a survey to my colleagues, but since I got to pick who to send that to, it doesn't make me quite as nervous.

I generally try hard and do a pretty good job of teaching, but you never know what someone might say about your performance. I have 140 students, so there's a good chance that someone or someone's parents might not care for me at all. They'll probably feel free to say something mean about me to the principal on this survey.

In the meantime, I'm relieved to have a break from reading The Road. The kids don't have pages due tomorrow. Last night I read about cannibals who cut off their prisoners' limbs one at a time and then burned the wounds to stop the bleeding, and also about a dad giving his son instructions on how to blow his brains out with a pistol. I read it right before I went to sleep. It wasn't pleasant.

I need to start exercising again because I registered for the Minneapolis Marathon, which happens on June 6th. I'd like to run another sub-4 race, even if I can't run my PR time of 3:40:12.

The only way to get enough workouts to prepare for this will be to run after school one day per week. Today was the first day. I brought some workout clothes in order to make it happen.

But when I told Rachel about the plan, and she discouraged me. "I wouldn't do that," she said, shaking her head when I held up my running shirt. "The children will SEE you."

I immediately saw her point.

"At least drive your car over to the other side of the highway and run over there," she said. She was feeling trepidation on my behalf, which made me nervous.

Still, ten minutes later, I went out to the parking lot and started running. I made it about fifteen steps until I realized I absolutely could not jog near the students' cars. So I got in my car, as Rachel suggested, and parked on the other side of the highway. Then I ran for 30 minutes. It's a victory.

When I extended the deadline for the sophs' short stories, I told them that they'd still have to hand in complete rough drafts on the Friday before Thanksgiving break.

"Okay!" they said, cheerfully.

Then, on that Friday, some of them convinced the sub that it would be okay to just show him their drafts and then take them home again. They were annoyed when I took one of their draft points away because of this.

"But the sub said!" they said.

"But I told you to hand in a complete rough draft."

"But that's confusing because we asked the sub!" they said.

"But I had already told you," I repeated. "I was very clear."

They appeared stumped, but I was finished explaining. Some other sophs have been pulling paper games like this one: "Oh, hey! I just realized I only printed half of my story! Can I bring just the rest tomorrow?!"

In ten years, I still don't know the right response to these types of ploys. Today, I told a kid I knew she was scamming me and felt trapped by the situation. She just shrugged and walked away.