Good end to a good week

I have been so spoiled this week. It was a good week. Thank you Lord, for answered prayers. Today there was nothing entirely out of the ordinary. I talked with collegues, had lunch with people, and had a regular but somewhat special class. I revived First Amendment Fridays (something my kids absolutely love and which is a treat now since we haven't had them since we ended US Government). So, for 10 minutes they just got to talk, and, oddly enough they didn't want to goof off and complain about freedom of speech violations by the administration, but they actually wanted to talk about what was going on politically in our nation--the troop funding bill that passed today and the attorneys. I was happy.

We learned about Russian Oligarchs and watched video clips on them. 17 billionares in Moscow just from '93 onward. Pretty impressive, and most of them are under 40 years old. In '97 Boris Berezovsky admitted that he and 5 of his buddies controlled half the Russian GNP...sheesh. ANYWAY, after we had fun with FAF and were shocked with Russia's oligarchic excesses, I had yet another awesome treat. Last night on youtube I found a very funny video. My students are in love with Tony Blair. I found a youtube video that, if you understand the political situation in Britain (Tony's out of a job soon, but he has to call for elections before he technically has to go), is very funny. Here: http://youtube.com/watch?v=a1vwKZiDsY4. I laughed so hard. Someone edited his farewell speech to the Labour party so that Tony Blair sings and dances to "Should I Stay or Should I Go." So funny. Kids and I loved it. Because they were still chuckling from Tony's singing, they didnt' even hate me when I handed them back the test they bombed.

On a sidenote, I found out today that one of the students I'm having the toughest time with right now took my advice and bought a copy of The Communist Manifesto (these kids are crazy. They have no time, get no sleep, but thirst after knowledge so they do things like go out and buy the Communist Manifesto to see why I said it was so well written and such a charismatic piece of writing. Then they read it in their non-esistent time. Sheesh.). She actually talked with me a little bit about it in class. OH! And! Apparently 5 of my 3rd period boys spent a good amount of time last night searching for the song "A Man Like Putin" online. They showed up this morning and said they couldn't find it anywhere (Jeff does the announcements, and he always introduces it with some music. He wanted to use "A Man Like Putin" for the anouncements. Yay!) but they knew everything about it! They knew the background of how it was written and told me the whole background story! Two of these boys hardly ever did any work last semester but they love CompGov and are actually spending time going above and beyond (at least if it involves Putin Techno).

I stayed and worked for a while and then went out to dinner with my sister. We were there forever and it was very fun. Instead of coming home and sleeping I was so energized from the week that i was ready to enjoy myself.

Reflection :I am very thankful for this week. It gave me much-needed encouragement, and energy to continue to plug on through. I realize it may not be like this forever, but at least now I know that it is there inside, even if they don't always show it.

Related Items