Armchair BEA - Introduction

Please tell us a little bit about yourself: Who are you? How long have you been blogging? Why did you get into blogging? Where in the world are you blogging from?

Hello, Armchair BEA-ers! My name is Jessi, and this is my first time participating in Armchair BEA. I started book blogging in 2006, fell off the wagon in 2009, and I've recently started getting back into it. I've already written more blog posts in 2014 than I did in 2010-2013 combined, so that's something. I started book blogging because I LOVE to read, and it was a great way to make new friends and find new books. I currently live in a tiny little town in Georgia that you've never heard of, but I'm moving back to Atlanta in a few weeks and I couldn't be more excited!

Describe your blog in just one sentence. Then, list your social details -- Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc. -- so we can connect more online.

Casual Dread is a place for me to share my thoughts and opinions and to keep track of what I read - which is a lot!

Twitter
Tumblr
GoodReads
LibraryThing

What genre do you read the most?

I love to read YA because I teach high school English and I like to know what my students are interested in. And because I enjoy it! I also love to read sci-fi/fantasy because I enjoy the escapism and Jane Austen novels because I adore her characters.

What was your favorite book read last year? What’s your favorite book so far this year?

My favorite book last year was Rainbow Rowell's Fangirl. It reminded me so much of myself and my own obsession with Harry Potter fanfic in college. I wasn't quite as socially awkward as Cath, but I found her incredibly realistic and relatable. A close second would be Rainbow Rowell's Eleanor & Park, which is one of the sweetest and saddest YA love stories I've ever had the pleasure of crying over multiple times while reading. My favorite book so far this year was Attachments by (you guessed it!) Rainbow Rowell. My boyfriend gave me a first edition hardback for Christmas and I absolutely adored it! The protagonist, Lincoln, reminded me so much of my boyfriend that I couldn't help but love him. I'm sure Rainbow's newest book, Landline, will make it onto this list when I get my hands on it in July.

But seriously, if you haven't read any of her books, do yourself a favor. They're spectacular!

Share your favorite book or reading related quote.

I read To Kill a Mockingbird every year with my tenth graders, and every year I point out this quotation. It makes my day when my bibliophiles agree with Scout!

What book would you love to see as a movie?

One of my favorite books is Frank Herbert's Dune. I blame my dad, since he named me after one of the characters! Although it's been made into at least two movies (a theatrical release in the 80's and a Sci Fi channel TV mini-series), neither really captured the book accurately. After watching Jodorowsky's Dune, a documentary about the original attempt to translate the book to a film, I really wish he had gotten the chance. Check out the trailer below, and if it seems like your cup of tea, the entire thing is available on YouTube!



Thanks for learning about me! I'm looking forward to discussing books with everyone this week. :)

Bout of Books 10, Day 6

Today's goal update:

1. Read for at least two hours every day. [Done!]
2. Finish Dune before Saturday's book club meeting. [Done! I actually sat in the car for 15 to finish before the meeting started, but I made it! We had a great discussion - everyone liked the book.]
3. Read Jaka's Story before Sunday's comic book club meeting. [Done! I didn't like the ending as much as the rest of the book, but I'm  excited to talk about it tomorrow.]
4. Participate in one twitter chat (probably Wednesday's). [Done!]
5. Any other books read must be ARCs on my Kindle. [N/A.]

Since I've met my two biggest goals, I'm spending the evening reading my comics for the past two weeks. Tomorrow I'm going to knock out The Here and Now, which has been unfinished for months and needs to be reviewed on NetGalley. This readathon was exactly what I needed to get motivated again!

Bout of Books 10, Day 5

Today's goal update:

1. Read for at least two hours every day. [Done!]
2. Finish Dune before Saturday's book club meeting. [I'm on page 339; I'm sure I'll be finished in time.]
3. Read Jaka's Story before Sunday's comic book club meeting. [I'm on page 354 and on track to finish by Sunday.]
4. Participate in one twitter chat (probably Wednesday's). [Done!]
5. Any other books read must be ARCs on my Kindle. [N/A.]

This post is going up late because we saw Godzilla last night and I didn't have the energy to post after. It was NOT better than Pacific Rim, no matter what anyone tells you. 

Bout of Books 10, Day 4

Today's goal update:

1. Read for at least two hours every day. [Done!]
2. Finish Dune before Saturday's book club meeting. [I'm on page 321 and plan to keep reading tonight.]
3. Read Jaka's Story before Sunday's comic book club meeting. [I finished the second book, but I left it at school and don't know what page I'm on.]
4. Participate in one twitter chat (probably Wednesday's). [Done! I had so much fun, I decided to participate in today's challenge, too!]
5. Any other books read must be ARCs on my Kindle. [N/A. Today's reading was all Jaka's Story and Dune - I still haven't read my comics from yesterday!]

I'm feeling really good because I've actually done more than I thought I would. I like having a lower-stress goal and a longer time frame in which to read and get involved. How's BoB10 going for you?

Bout of Books 10, Day 3

Today's goal update:

1. Read for at least two hours every day. [Done!]
2. Finish Dune before Saturday's book club meeting. [I'm still on page 296.]
3. Read Jaka's Story before Sunday's comic book club meeting. [I'm currently on page 262, so I got a lot read today! I'm planning on reading more before I fall asleep - I want to finish book two tonight.]
4. Participate in one twitter chat (probably Wednesday's). [Done! My first tweet-up ever and it was so much fun! I'm craving potatoes like whoa, though.]
5. Any other books read must be ARCs on my Kindle. [N/A. Today's reading was all Jaka's Story - I didn't even crack open my new comics yet!]

Hope day three went as well for you as it did for me!

Bout of Books 10, Day 2

I didn't do a wrap-up post yesterday because I joined the fun so late in the day, but here's where I stand with my goals as of day 2:

1. Read for at least two hours every day. [Done! Although I fudged it a bit - more on that with #5.]
2. Finish Dune before Saturday's book club meeting. [I'm currently on page 296, so I'm a little more than halfway.]
3. Read Jaka's Story before Sunday's comic book club meeting. [I've started it now, at least. I'm currently on page 78 and plan to read a bit more before bedtime. There are lots of text-heavy pages that have significantly slowed my usual graphic novel reading pace.]
4. Participate in one twitter chat (probably Wednesday's). [N/A]
5. Any other books read must be ARCs on my Kindle. [Like I said, I fudged it a bit. I did read Jaka's Story for an hour, but I also read a bunch of student journals and essays to try and get my grading under control. This close to the end of the school year I'm really pressed for time, so I'm counting it.]

How is your bout going? Good luck with day 3!

Bout of Books 10

I saw some book bloggers tweeting about this today and thought, why not? I have a pile of books to read (including two to finish for book clubs this weekend!), so I could definitely use the motivation.

The lowdown:

The Bout of Books read-a-thon is organized by Amanda @ On a Book Bender and Kelly @ Reading the Paranormal. It is a week long read-a-thon that begins 12:01am Monday, May 12th and runs through Sunday, May 18th in whatever time zone you are in. Bout of Books is low-pressure, and the only reading competition is between you and your usual number of books read in a week. There are challenges, giveaways, and a grand prize, but all of these are completely optional. For all Bout of Books 10 information and updates, be sure to visit the Bout of Books blog. - From the Bout of Books team

My goals:

1. Read for at least two hours every day.
2. Finish Dune before Saturday's book club meeting.
3. Read Jaka's Story before Sunday's comic book club meeting.
4. Participate in one twitter chat (probably Wednesday's).
5. Any other books read must be ARCs on my Kindle.

And...that's it! This is my first read-a-thon in years. If you'd like to join in, visit the Bout of Books blog.

Only With You Blog Tour

Exciting news: I'm part of the Only With You Blog Tour! I reviewed the other books in the series earlier this year, and this is the one that I was the most looking forward to - Emma is my favorite Austen heroine! Come back tomorrow to read my review and find out how to enter an awesome giveaway.

Resolutions

Happy New Year! It's the first day of 2014, which means it's time to start making some changes (most of which will revert back to old habits within the first month). Reading this article on Lifehacker earlier this week got me thinking. There are several changes I would like to make in my life (lose more weight, save more money, eat healthier, get a new teaching job closer to Atlanta, be more productive, get caught up on my reading...well, you get the picture) and the way I usually go about it probably isn't going to stick. So, I only have two things that I'm going to hold myself accountable for this year: eating healthier and saving money.

The first one I've already discussed with Batman. We did the slow carb diet for a while, and it was great for losing weight! Unfortunately, it wasn't so great for my lifestyle. Being a vegetarian, I get a lot of protein from dairy, eggs, and fish. I also really like bananas before a run. Instead of going back on slow carb, I'm making a conscious decision to eat better during the week. I'm also going to try out at least one new recipe a week, probably from Pintrest.

My second resolution is to save more money. I've already got a Smarty Pig account to help me save for a down payment on a new car, but I want to have money in my bank's saving account, too. I decided to try the 52-Week Money Challenge. This first week I'll deposit a dollar, then next week I'll deposit two dollars, then three, etc. until the last week of the year I deposit $52 (which, given my end-of-the-year paycheck situation, might not be ideal). Doing this will ensure I have $1,400 in savings by the end of 2014 - plus whatever I have in there now - and that seems like a doable start.

There are other things I'd like to work on as well - I'm still training for my yearly half-marathon, as well as doing smaller runs throughout the year, and I'd like to finally complete the 100 push-ups and 200 sit-ups challenges - but these are the two I'm going to focus on for right now.

Happy Fourth!

...or, as my aunt told me on Facebook this morning, "May the Fourth be with you!" (I'm not entirely sure she understood my Star Wars Day post.)

Today I completed my fifth Peachtree Road Race. It was a great day for running - drizzling and overcast, with just a bit of wind - and I actually made pretty good time. I started out the race with my buddy Jason:

but I couldn't keep up with him for too long. 

My right knee has been bothering me since I finished my fourth half-marathon this past March. I went to the doctor for my yearly check-up yesterday and she checked it out (I even got it x-rayed!) and told me it's probably fine, just normal getting old stuff (hmph!), but I should take it easy after this race and work on strengthening my quads. So, I was a little worried about running today and decided I would take it slow. Of course, all that didn't stop me from signing up for three more races at the Expo when I picked up my number! 

Batman met me at the end of the race with chocolate milk and a car ride back to his apartment (which was awesome, because I really didn't want to walk that hill after doing 6.2 miles!). My post-race tradition is to hit up the Midtown Vortex for a veggie burger, Yokohama Mama-style, with tater tots and ranch dressing for dipping. Technically I'm still on the slow carb diet, but I took a mini cheat day. It was worth it!

Now we're just relaxing at home. Fireworks have been canceled or postponed until Labor Day, so I'm pretty sure we'll just be chilling out and playing Tetris for the rest of the day. 

Happy Birthday, America! :)

NYC 2013, Part One

Last week, Jon and I went to NYC. It was an incredibly packed trip - we had something planned almost every day! This is already a super-long post (really unusual for a blog that rarely gets updated anymore), so I'm dividing it up. Here are the highlights from the first half of the week:

Saturday
Our first night, we went to a D20 Burlesque show. This one was especially awesome, because it was a tribute to Joss Whedon!

Even the drinks were Whedon-themed! I had a Slayer-Ade and it was delicious.

"Anya" and "Xander" sang and danced (and stripped) to "I'll Never Tell" from the "Once More with Feeling" episode of Buffy.

The best was definitely Astonishing X-Man Cyclops - he even had tasseled pasties over his eyes to mimic optic blasts!
Sunday
That evening, we saw ASSSSCAT 3000 at the UCB Theater. It was so crowded, we actually sat ON the stage. I didn't take any pictures in the theater, since that was a big no-no (and would've been really noticeable during the improv, considering we were practically sitting in their laps), but one of the shows is available on YouTube:


Monday
At the crack of dawn (seriously), we arrived at the Dominique Ansel Bakery to wait in line for our cronuts:

Let me tell you, the whole cronut thing is NUTS. Jon discovered them while he was researching stuff for us to do in the city, and the hullabaloo over them only intensified in the days leading up to our trip. This is an approximation of a conversation I had with my mom the day before we left:

Mom: Are you guys going to get cronuts while you're there?
Me: How do you even know what a cronut is?
Mom: They were talking about them on the news.

Holy cow. You know it's big when my mom has heard about it. So anyway, we got to the bakery a good two hours before the opening and ended up being 10th and 11th in line. One of the men in line in front of us turned out to be a homeless guy who had been paid $40 by a yuppie to wait in line for him. (!) When Dominique opened up the shop, he was really nice and said hi to everyone, but he refused to allow one guy in because he was an honest-to-God CRONUT SCALPER. Seriously, these people buy the cronuts for $5, then turn around and sell them for $20 - $50. EACH.

Long story short(-er), the cronuts were delicious. Maybe not worth standing in line for two hours again, but definitely worth it for the experience. We also went back to the bakery later in the week to try some of the other pastries; I actually preferred the salted-caramel eclair to the cronut.

Our Monday night was spent at my favorite Brooklyn bar, The Way Station. It's Doctor Who-themed! The walls are decorated in steampunk paraphernalia and the bathroom entrance is a TARDIS (because it's bigger on the inside):

The reason we went to the Way Station on this particular night, however, was because of the band playing there: The Doubleclicks! My current favorite song (and not just because they dedicated it to me, the only English major in the crowd) is "Oh, Mr. Darcy," which you can hear here:


Tuesday
We didn't have anything planned for Tuesday, but while I was getting ready in the morning Jon managed to get us tickets to that day's taping of The Daily Show. This involved going to Hell's Kitchen in the afternoon to stand in line to pick up the tickets, then coming back an hour and a half later to wait in line for the actual taping.
The show was great; John Oliver is incredibly funny and the guest was one of my favorite comedians, Jim Gaffigan.

Continuing our comedy motif, that night we went to the Sweet Comedy Show. It was kind of a weird show - the comedians were great, but there were some very drunk hecklers in the balcony that really detracted from the show and threw off the vibe of the room. By a strange coincidence, I had read this excellent essay by Patton Oswalt earlier the same day. To read about how hecklers can affect a show and then to actually see them do it was disconcerting. I was glad when they finally left (after being called out by the comedians and yelled at by the rest of us in the audience), but I felt really bad for the comedians who had to put up with them during their sets.

That seems like a really weird place to end this part of the travelogue, so instead I'll leave you with this list of the 10 most satisfying cases of hecklers getting destroyed. Stay tuned for Part Two!

Slow Carb Day 1

Last month, some of my friends started the Slow Carb diet and really enjoyed it. It's basically a modified paleo diet: no dairy, fruit, or carbs. It sounded terrible to this particular cheese-bread-and-banana-lover, but they lost a lot of weight and felt healthier, so my boyfriend and I decided to give it a try, too. We He invested in a fancy scale that measures BMI, fat %, muscle %, water %, etc, and I set up a new Excel document so we can track the numbers (nerd alert!). One thing I've already learned: weigh yourself in the morning! I lost 4.5 pounds between last night and this morning.

We just finished our first meal on the diet: a breakfast of egg whites, spinach, black beans, and salsa. It was more eggs than I'm used to eating early in the morning (1 1/8 cup of liquid egg whites!), and it's definitely filling. We get a cheat day on Saturdays, so went spent yesterday eating whatever we wanted to prepare. This included dim sum, Moe's (which is actually okay on the diet, provided you forgo the rice, cheese, chips, and sour cream), and King of Pops. One of the suggestions for the diet is that you take a picture of everything you eat. The idea is that if you are too embarrassed to post the picture where others can see it - and mock you for not sticking to your diet - then you probably shouldn't put it in your body. I've been using Foodspotting for a while now as just a way to keep track of foods that I like, so if you're at all interested in seeing what I'm eating you can follow me there.

The creator of the diet claims that you can lose 20 pounds in 30 days without exercising. I'm curious to see if that's true (my friends didn't lose nearly that much), but I'll also be continuing with my walking/running training with my Nike+ app. I just recently finished my first half-marathon of the year and am contemplating doing the Women's Nike full marathon in San Fransisco later this year with Team in Training. My only hesitation would be the fundraising costs associated with it, but I feel like I have a good support system in place and have gotten to the point in my training where I can take it to the next level. I was really proud of my performance in the Publix Georgia half. I beat six of my records (at least according to Nike+): 1 mile, 1k, 5k, 10k, half-marathon, and distance.

"When life gives you wheelchair, make lemonade."

I don't have cable right now (I was only able to keep up with Glee by using the elliptical machine at my gym), so I'm not really up on what's going on in the world of television. But apparently, Oprah's giving away a TV show, and I sincerely hope it goes to this guy:



If you have the time, check out Zach's other YouTube videos - his "acting reel" is comedy gold - and vote for his show here.

In other news, I acquired a kitten yesterday. She's spent the majority of the day hiding under my bed, chewing on my comics, and chasing a laser pointer. She's pretty awesome, and should probably have a real name (other than "Kitten") within the next few days.

Also, I'm leaving for Montreal in nine days. Suggested attractions to visit are welcome and encouraged, s'il vous plait.

What are you doing? What, what, what are you doing?!

Hello, everyone. Yes, it's a blog post. Shocking, I know. Sorry to have abandoned all my wonderful book blogging friends, but this school year was crazy. Plus, I've been really lazy about keeping up with my reading and reviewing. Right now, I'm sloooooowly making my way through Android Karenina. The steampunk elements (robots! gears! electromagnetic skating ponds!) are awesome. The actual classic-book-part is a little boring. Am I a terrible English major/teacher, or what?

To tide you over until my next (real) post, here's a funny video one of the other (good) English teachers showed me today. We justified looking at YouTube during post planning because a) for some reason, it wasn't blocked, and b) it's semi-Shakespeare, so it counts as "educational." Or something. Enjoy!

Hi, there.

I'm still around, just really busy with school. Our brand-new building is beautiful, but my air conditioning doesn't work and I'm still getting used to the seven periods a day (as opposed to four 1.5 hr-long blocks). I'm hoping to get caught up with grading this weekend, which would give me more free time for playing on the Internet. I'm still posting (sporadically) on Twitter, but I do have a bunch of books to review and new recipes to post, so those will hopefully go up in the next week or so. Congrats to all the BBAW winners! Hopefully you'll all be hearing from me again soon. :)

Is anyone else reading Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters? I'm loving it! I'm only a few chapters in, but it's so much fun. I loved P&P&Z, too. It was pretty much 75% Austen, 25% zombies. S&S&SM is more like 25% Austen, 75% sea monsters, and it works. Poor Colonel Brandon with his face tentacles...

Zombie Chicken Award

The wonderful Care has bestowed upon me the honor of a Zombie Chicken Award. Thanks, Care!

The blogger who receives this award believes in the Tao of the zombie chicken – excellence, grace and persistence in all situations, even in the midst of a zombie apocalypse. These amazing bloggers regularly produce content so remarkable that their readers would brave a raving pack of zombie chickens just to be able to read their inspiring words. As a recipient of this world-renowned award, you now have the task of passing it on to at least 5 other worthy bloggers. Do not risk the wrath of the zombie chickens by choosing unwisely or not choosing at all.

My five worthy bloggers are: Ali at Worducopia, Veens at Giving Reading a Chance, Laza at Gimme More Books!, Staci at Life in the Thumb, and Andi at Tripping Toward Lucidity. These ladies are amazing and if you're not reading them regularly, you should check them out!

Die, spam bots!

Sigh. I've dealt with the occasional comment spam every once in a while since I started posting here. But I just got hit again, and I'm sick of going through old posts and deleting them. So I've decided to turn on word verification. Sorry for any annoyance/inconvenience, but this will keep me from going crazy. Hopefully!

#gameondiet Challenge Wrap-Up

Today was the final weigh-in for my Game On! diet, and all I can say is, "Thank God!" I enjoyed playing this game. It was definitely a challenge, and definitely different from every other diet I've tried. I only ended up losing about 5 pounds, but I hope I've made some lifestyle changes that will enable me to lose more.

Things I liked about the challenge:
* Drinking lots of water. This was an easy part of the challenge; I normally drink unsweetened tea or water anyway. I never felt bloated or thirsty (except maybe after exercising) and my skin has really improved over the past month. I don't know if that's because of the water or not, but it certainly didn't hurt.
* Eating smaller meals throughout the day. I wasn't hungry all the time, because I felt like I was constantly eating! But I also ate less at each meal, so I didn't end up feeling full and lazy for a few hours.
* The good habit/bad habit changes. The good habits I decided to pick up were flossing every day and taking my vitamins. I did two, because these were things I really knew I needed to do. I don't eat red meat, so I took an iron supplement in addition to my women's multi-vitamin. Hopefully this has helped with my anemia. And for the bad habit, I stopped going to fast food restaurants. I have no idea how much money this saved me, but I can bet it's a lot!
* Doing the challenge with a friend. Having Brandi around really helped - we walked together in the mornings and commiserated over our wonky food plans daily. I probably didn't need the excuse to talk to her, but it was nice to have someone to talk to about the diet and my frustrations.

Things I didn't like:
* Drinking lots of water. Yeah, it's a double-edged sword. Drinking all the water also meant that I had to, um, get rid of it as well. I can't tell you how many times I woke up in the middle of the night to stumble to the bathroom.
* Eating smaller meals throughout the day. This was another good/bad aspect - I felt like I was constantly eating, which meant that I sometimes had to eat even when I wasn't really hungry. Plus, it was kind of a pain to plan my life around food.
* Eating protein at every meal. I'm a vegetarian, so this meant I was eating a lot of soy, cheese, and fish. Not terrible, but sometimes I just wanted a little variety. I did discover a love for Greek yogurt, though, which counted as a protein and served as a base for many a smoothie. So this wasn't all bad.
* Fresh fruits and vegetables. Let me explain: I have nothing against them, per se. I love fresh fruits and vegetables! But buying them all the time got really expensive (and probably canceled out whatever money I was saving by not eating fast food). Plus, they went bad really fast. I bought a couple of peaches one week and had finished all but one when I went to Atlanta for a few days. I put it in one of those Debbie Meyers Green Bags (which usually work), but when I came home it had molded and I was suffering from an infestation of fruit flies. Gross.* Not entirely the diet's fault, but it's something I associate with it nonetheless.
* The alcohol penalty. Oh, man. This one was huge for me. If you didn't lose 1% of your weight one week, you lost alcohol privileges for the rest of the game. I lost them after the first week, and it really sucked. I'm not an alcoholic or anything, but I do spend a far amount of time socializing in bars with my friends and I enjoy an occasional glass of wine with my dinner. This penalty made me miserable, and I really don't think it helped that much because after that first week with no alcohol I didn't have any significant weight loss. Le sigh.

So, will I be doing this again? Eh, we'll see. I'm definitely going to keep up with the daily exercise (Brandi and I walk three miles almost every morning!) and the good habits. I've learned to read my body a bit better, so I'll probably continue to eat smaller meals throughout the day to keep myself from feeling hungry and deprived. I have a permanent place in my fridge for Greek yogurt (those smoothies make a great quick, easy meal!). I think the biggest thing I learned is moderation. Today, for instance, I know I'm going to be having a big dinner (with beer!), so I'm going to eat less for the rest of the day. Brandi and I talked about recruiting some more teachers into our next challenge, but I'm going to wait and see what our schedules are like when the school year starts.

Oh, and I totally kicked Brandi's ass at this thing. :) We had a lot riding on it - a car wash, morning duty (teachers are assigned an area of the school to patrol every month), balloons, a trophy, flowers, and a haiku written in the winner's honor - so I'm super-psyched. I would've enjoyed a bit more weight loss, but now that I've started I'm pretty sure I can continue losing even without the challenge. :)

* If you ever have to deal with these annoying little pests, here's what you do: roll a piece of paper into a cone shape, tape it together, and snip off the tip so you have a funnel. Put some cider or balsamic vinegar in a glass, and tape the funnel (cone side down) onto the rim. Make sure the tip of the funnel doesn't touch the vinegar, and make sure there are no gaps between the rim of the glass and the paper. The fruit flies will fly down the funnel to get to the vinegar, but they won't be able to fly out again! When I first read this (after Googling "getting rid of fruit flies"), I was like, "Yeah, right! How stupid are fruit flies? Do they not know how to fly back out through the hole in the funnel?" The answers are: "Very, apparently," and "Nope!" You have to make sure you toss the vinegar and paper funnel daily, though, because they will lay eggs and you don't want to have to deal with even more of the little suckers. The good news is, fruit flies only have a ten day lifespan, so you shouldn't have to deal with them for too long. *Cue "The More You Know" music*

New York, New York!

Sorry, no Recipe Tuesday for today. The blog's going to be a bit quiet for the next week or so. I'm currently packing for my trip! Casey and I are going to Atlanta tomorrow morning; my sister and brother-in-law are letting us stay with them, and my sister's taking us to the airport Thursday morning. I'm taking my camera (of course!), but not my laptop, so I won't be updating. I will, however, be twitting my way through the Big Apple, so if you want to get a condensed version of my trip you can follow me there. I'll even be posting pictures!

A big update and more book reviews when I get back. :)

School's (almost) out for summer

Dear blog,

I am terribly sorry I've been ignoring you for the past few weeks. School has been crazy-busy; thank goodness tomorrow is the last full day before finals. Unfortunately, I still have a week of post-planning and prep for moving to our nice, nearly-completed new high school. But after that, I'll be back to a regular posting schedule, I pinkie-promise. On the plus side, I've been reading tons of books, so I'll have lots of reviews to write*...after I finish grading all these persuasive papers. Who knew so many 10th graders were opposed to school uniforms? Too bad the school board already voted - I'll be rockin' khakis and polo shirts next year!

For now, though, I'm off to bed. Thanks to Glee, I'll have "Don't Stop Believin'" stuck in my head for at least the next three days. Not that I'm complaining - I love me some Journey.

Love,
A frazzled first year teacher

* Including, but not limited to: Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (which I finally broke down and ordered online), The Thirteen Clocks, the first three trades of Jack of Fables, Mr. Darcy's Diary, Don't Eat This Book!, Smoke and Mirrors, The Eternals, and The Graveyard Book. Yeah, I went on a Neil Gaiman-themed reading binge recently...