But if pouting helps !

My monitor (the replacement! but not a flatscreen) is being stupid again. I had to use a paper towel as a coffee filter. One of these things is probably going to give me a headache.

Birthday Happies for Trudy!!

hey sara, has the housing market in BLT starting coming down? Rumor has it the market is on a downswing and prices are starting to fall.

Just thinking that an October weekend of openhouses might be nice.

Sillies.

And then they did it again.

SA, how long do you plan on staying in Ireland?

5 years ago was the first time, I think, that I realized what it really meant, being on the "other side" of worrying about somebody who is very far away. You guys have always been worried about me, and I kept trying to find ways to explain to you that things are really not that bad or scary here. For the first time, I realized the helplessness, the ignorance about what's going on and the lack of the ability to actually find out.

So, yeah, I echo the special hugs to NYCistas.

Baltimore Housing Blog.

Happy Birthday to Kara too.

I don't hang out in the Buffy thread, so I'm posting this here:

Anthony Head (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) will provide the lead voice-over in the upcoming video game Destroy All Humans! 2, expected to be released in spring for Xbox and PlayStation 2, the Gameplanet Web site reported.

In the THQ game, Anthony Head voices Ponsonby, a well-coiffed human and head of MI5, who is introduced to help the lead aliens, Crypto and POX, fight against the KGB. But as the game progresses, Ponsonby is not necessarily who he appears to be.

Destroy All Humans! 2 is the sequel to the hit game. Set in the 1960s, the sequel boasts five new locations and more destruction-loving aliens.

Head is perhaps best known for playing librarian-cum-Watcher Rupert Giles in Buffy.

[link]

hi everybody

ok, an update... (apologies in advance as this will sound very me, me, me)

I moved approximately 400 kms south and started my first teaching job about 16 months ago, as a Humanities and English secondary teacher. Within 6 months I was also the Middle Years Coordinator with the additional responsibility of investigating and implementing a Year 9 program. This year, in addition to the Middle Years position, I have been teaching Home Economics and Politics and was also selected by our regional division of the Education Department to reform our school's curriculum and to lead the rest of the staff through the process of upgrading their teaching practices. And now, starting next term (in 3 weeks), I have been promoted to the Cluster Coordinator & Educator, responsible for leading change and reform in the schools within our cluster, 3 primary schools plus the secondary college.

Needless to say, the past 16 months or so have been insanely busy.

I don't know how the teaching scale works over there but down here it generally goes from graduate teacher (4 levels/years, grad1 through to grad4) to accomplished teacher (5 levels/years, acc1 through to acc5) to expert teacher (3 levles/years, exp1 through to exp 3) and then to leading teacher (2 levels). Now you don't necessarily have to go through every level, you can seek promotion and skip a few levels on the way but if you just plod your way through gaining your incremental pay increases each year of service then that's the path that you would follow. Not me though, I've gone from graduate teacher level 2 to leading teacher level1 and managed to skip 10 levels in between. It's pretty amazing.

anyway that's more than enough talking about me for now

Hey, moonlit! Welcome back!

I just read that Anna Nicole's 20 yr old son died shortly after she gave birth to her daughter. How terrible.

moonlit! I'm so glad you popped back with the update. It sounds like you have been very busy. The work you do is so very important. We were just worshipping teachers in Bitches over the weekend. As a parent you have my gratitude and respect.