Wishful Thinking

Today I received the following message on my school email account:

I would like to discuss a business opportunity that offers the potential for considerable returns.

I work for a privately held manufacturing company, which at this time purchases a product imperative to its processing operations, at a price significantly above the manufacturing cost. In my proposed business venture, you would assume the role of stand-in supplier, providing this key material while retaining the same profit margins. My role would be to introduce you to my company as the supplier and to establish a contract between you and my employer.

I understand that your previous experience may not immediately relate to my field. However, this venture is more in line with your personal capabilities rather than your professional experience.

Please send a return email verifying your contact number and to arrange the most convenient time to discuss these possibilities in detail.  I look forward to speaking with you soon.

Kindest Regards,
Edward Wassermann  

Wasn't that nice of Edward Wasserman, complete and total stranger that he is, to extend such a generous offer? I do have a couple of questions, though. First, I would like to know who actually falls for such bogus bullshit, and second, I'd like to know why opportunities like that don't really just show up in your inbox.

It's Brain Science

We had an all-day packaged training at school today. As it happened, there were many practical ideas offered, and spending the day in the library with my colleagues actually relieved a lot of my usual first day back stress-- there was really no other choice, so I just went with it. My group of four was also awesome, making it that much easier to relax and enjoy the day.

Oh, I still have a philosophical objection to the merchandising of education; I believe we paid a lot of money for nothing more than a common sense set of strategies and the common language that goes along with a whole-staff orientation, but I am glad that we did not buy any test-taking and remediation advice from any subsidiaries of test-making companies. (That will come later.)

The session itself was generally engaging; the presenter very effectively used the strategies she was selling to get her message of structured cooperative learning across, and although I do have some concerns about extrovert bias, this introvert had an okay time. I even learned a few things, like for example your brain is constantly evaluating your experiences and sorting them into threats, opportunities, or neither (which are things to be ignored). Once you perceive a threat, your amygdala goes into hyper drive, resulting in a mental state where it is impossible to think clearly or even learn for up to three hours.

Later, when Heidi and I were debriefing at home, I asked her about one of the activities. "So, what did you say your ideal job would be? Dog training?"

"Yeah, with Cesar Milan," she said. "What about you? Park ranger?"

"Yeah!" I said. "How did you know that? I could barely think of ianything to say myself this morning."

She shrugged. "I know you."

Better than my own amygdala, apparently.

Stupendous, Indeed

Not content to sulk my way into the new school year, I invited my brother's family over for dinner tonight. They were just returning from a week at the beach, and so the timing was perfect, especially since Riley and Treat are off to college tomorrow and Thursday, Bill has business in Buffalo on Tuesday, and Heidi, Emily, and I will be in the library at school at 8 AM sharp tomorrow. Only Isabel and Sonic will be left to this life of leisure.

We had a really fun time, and a fun menu, too-- my dad's family recipe of tomato sausage sliders, served with fennel slaw, sliced tomatoes, and pickled peppers, delicious corn on the cob, and kale salad. We washed it all down with cold beer and followed it up with a South Jersey style peach and blueberry crisp and a variety of homemade ice cream, including a new one, cherry cordial.

We were definitely missing the other five of our family, but even so, I can honestly say that the evening took all the sting out of having to set the alarm in the morning.

Yeah, it Is

We're partial to Life is Good merchandise in our household. Each of has several T's, we also own pajama bottoms, water bottles, dog collars, pool toys, and a tire cover that bear that eponymous slogan. Oh, over the years there have been cynics among our friends wondering where the Life is Crap gear might be found, or criticizing the motto for being overly simplistic, or too optimistic, or just plain wrong. "They're just so bossy," someone once said to me. "I feel pressured to be happy whenever I see their shirts."

As for us, we take it as a reminder, an intentional way of looking at things, even when doing what we like and liking what we do seems impossible. Plus, they sell really comfy stuff.

Today, on our way out of the market, a young girl of perhaps 11 or 12 read Heidi's shirt. "Life is Good?" she asked. "It should say life is great! No! Life is awesome!"

We nodded and laughed and then parted ways as we turned to the parking lot. She popped up a moment later a few cars down from us. "Life is... STUPENDOUS!" she called.

"You're right about that!" I answered, glad for the extra reinforcement.

Buzz Kill

"Hey, did you see they caught a couple of sharks down at Point Lookout?" my friend Mary asked me yesterday.

I hadn't heard the news, so I whipped out my smartphone to discover the details. Two 8-foot bull sharks had indeed been caught just a few hundred yards from where we spent that idyllic day last Wednesday.

According to Wikipedia, the bull shark is known for its aggressive nature, predilection for warm shallow water, and presence in brackish and freshwater systems including estuaries and rivers.

And I was worried about the jelly fish!

Of the First Kind

I've been so busy complaining lately, (which according to an all-day meeting I attended today, is like a rocking chair: it gives you something to do, but you don't really get anywhere,  hmmmm... maybe I'll write about patronizing platitudes sometime) that I haven't had a chance to tell about the very strange experience I had the other night.

I was sitting on the couch around 9 PM, and the sky outside my window was dark; the days have grown noticeably shorter in the last month. I happened to look up, and I noticed an orange light in the sky. I really didn't think too much about it, because we live very close to both Reagan Airport and the Pentagon, so we have all manner of planes and helicopters flying over our house all the time.

However, there was something about this thing that was arresting. It may have been the way it was moving: slowly, so that at first I assumed it was a helicopter, but there was no noise, even though it seemed pretty close by. I shrugged it off since the windows were closed, but I couldn't stop watching the thing. Finally I went out on the deck to get a better look.

"Heidi! Get out here!" I cried. The sky was lit by four identical orange orbs, silently hovering just above the eastern horizon. As we watched, they began to glide slowly up and away, and then disappeared into the clouds.

We looked at each other. "What the hell was that?"

I dashed to my computer, confident that others, too, had seen these things and there would soon be many reports and an explanation to follow, but there was nothing. As I waited for the news to catch up with me, I searched the phrase "Weird orange..."  

lights in the sky? Google suggested, and I clicked to find out what it was.

It turns out that many people all over the world have reported seeing (and photographed and video recorded) lights seemingly identical to ours in numbers from 1 to 20, but there has never been any official military or government acknowledgement of any of these sightings or accounts, and no one knows what they are.

NO ONE KNOWS WHAT THEY ARE!!

C'mon! That's ridiculous.

Evidently, though, nobody else around here saw these lights the other night, or if they did, they have not detailed it in a way that I have been able to find on the internet, so I am reporting it here.

The truth is out there.

(Would somebody mind sending it my way?)

Professional Discourtesy

As I mentioned yesterday, our district is adopting a new grade book application. This one is designed to be seamlessly integrated with our student information system, which on the surface seems to be handy and, with any luck, labor-saving for those of us working directly with students. In order to prepare for the big roll out, teachers were required to enroll either in a face to face training or an online course to introduce us to our new tool.

Technically, people can get the training next week when we're contractually back to work, but that pre-service week is pretty busy, and so we were encouraged to do this over the summer, strongly encouraged, because they couldn't require us since they weren't paying us. Having a plan to meet this requirement was one of the things we had to do before we could "check out" at the end of the year in June. My plan was to take the online course, and I put my plan off until today.

To be honest? It's miraculous that I did it this far (4 days) in advance of the deadline, but I was putting something else off, and this seemed like a good way to do it.

Unfortunately, the class was excruciating. There were 13 modules, each with step-by-step directions and a video which was actually a narration of those same directions. There were four 2-question quizzes and a 7-question final test at the end. There was no hands on practice or other practical application and my brain was numb 30 seconds into it.

Perhaps if I could have accessed my new grade book, or a new grade book and played around with it a bit, these lessons would have seemed more meaningful. It was yet another example of adult learners being bludgeoned by some of the worst practices in education. Why do we do that to ourselves? It seems comparable to doctors treating each other with leeches. Oh wait, they don't do that. They use their best technology and efforts on their colleagues.

Don't worry. I aced the class, probably because mind-numbing and rigor rarely go hand in hand.

AND, I'll be sure to make that comment available in the public portal. (If not, you can always just FOIA it.)