Look at the cool thing I made!

Julianna got her Martin Luther King, Jr award on Thursday night.  It is apparently part of the “Character Counts” program (in which, thankfully, our school does not participate), with the nominations coming from the teachers.  We showed up at the high school a little later than the requested 6:30 to find the lot nearly full, no seating for more than two people in a row, and slight sense of chaos.  Julianna got whisked to her seat and the rest of us split up to find chairs.  I did my usual grumbling that stems from not liking it when things do not go the way I expect them to.  But seriously folks, assigned seats.  Every group of two or three or four left at least one empty seat to keep the next icky group of two or three or four from being too close and giving cooties or assuming amorous intent.  So there were all these empty seats, but no where for four people to sit together.  grr.  Anyway.  Lily and I found a spot, Steve and Ben found a spot, Grandma and Grandpa found a spot.

It was probably for the best that I didn’t get to sit next to Steve b/c we tend to get a bit snarky in these settings and set a bad example for the children.  When the main speaker introduced himself as “the supervisor of Education That is Multicultural and Gifted & Talented” our eyeballs likely would have smashed into each other as we rolled them.  I mean, seriously, what the hell does that title mean?  Was there racial segregation in the G&T programs before?  Or did they only let the kids do advanced studies of The Wonders of White Culture?  Now when *I* was in the gifted program in high school, we primarily used the one period a week that each teacher was required to give us (so a total of 6 periods off each week) to take a whole day off and watch Monty Python.  Admittedly all white dudes, so point taken Mr. Supervisor.  Under this program, perhaps we’d have alternated Python with Eddie Murphy stand-up.  We did watch Star Trek though, which was famously multi-culti….

When the all-white African Drum and Dance club came out, I admit I did snort a bit derisively.  But, in the end, the drumming was really good and the dancers were clearly having SO much fun and the African Americans around me were really enjoying it and not nudging one another and threatening to start an all-black clogging club, so I let it go.  They were great.  Bless their hearts.

Of course the most important part of the night was Julianna.  Ask anyone there, they’ll back me up.

Only one kid from each school could get this award, so we’re pretty proud that it was OUR kid.

So how cool is she?  And we made her with stuff we had around the house!

It’s sooooo cold….

How cold is it?

cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey

colder than a well-digger’s arse

so cold, lawyers have their hands in their own pockets

so cold, flashers are describing themselves to women

My mother, who is in no way otherwise responsible for my affection for salty language, used to say it was “colder than a witch’s tit” which I’ve heard lengthened to “…in a brass brassiere”

Dudes, it is COLD.  The wind is icy and plentiful.  It’s so cold we’re actually talking about insulating instead of complaining that there isn’t any.  When you open the door to my house a little light comes on.

(’cause, you know, it’s a refrigerator.  Even though MY fridge light hasn’t worked in at least 2 years)

It is, of course, all perspective.

Buddy.  It is time to move.