I, for one, welcome our inflatable rodent masters.

Yay for S going home! Yay for A's!

I just accidentally sent an incomplete e-mail to a bunch of business associates because I sneezed with my finger on the mouse. Tres embarrassing. I'm either coming down with something or I'm having an extreme allergy attack. I'm sneezing so loudly that askye and Laura may have heard me.

This morning at the Y, I heard a woman talking about what her kids were doing. She apparently has some teens and a 5 or 6 year old. They have a stuffed elf, and the older kids have been having the elf do something every night for the benefit of the younger one. One morning he found the elf at the end of a trail of Hershey's kisses and wrappers. Another morning he found the elf set up to wrap packages and entangled in tape and ribbon. One night the elf piled cardboard bricks into a wall in front of the kid's bedroom door. She said all the kids are having a great time with it.

I will never be ready for Christmas and I've lost all sense of fun.

Skipping to the end to share something that is making me laugh (and cry a little, too).

One of my students rated her grammar skills as an "area of strength" and then wrote the following explanation:

"I am very good on grammatical concepts. I spent years learning it, so it enjoys me to use it in my writing."

Nothing like a little irony on a hard winter's grading day...

It enjoys me to read that sentence.

I have known grammar a long time myself and would like to be enjoyed by it.

My student story:

Everyone graduating from this program has to watch some tapes/DVDs to fulfill an ethics requirement. A student graduating this semester just came into the library because he hasn't done this and is leaving town -- he tells me the Dean's office only told him last week that he had to do this, he's not going to graduate, yada, yada, boo-hoo.

And then he asks me to sign something that says he watched the tapes, and swears he'll do it "someday". See above re, subject of tapes? Ethics.

I think he even said, "Aww, com'on!" when I said "no."

See above re, subject of tapes? Ethics.

That is just too funny....

I'm sure he wouldn't have asked me to lie for him if he'd just had the time to watch the tapes, poor ethically-challenged lawyer-to-be.

Forty-eight hours of celebrations are taking place to mark nine new states joining a European border-free zone.

The Schengen agreement, which allows passport-free travel across the area, now embraces 24 nations.

The Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia joined the zone.

And at the same time, the US is closing it's friendly borders. Gah.

Congrats on your A Epic!!! Crossing fingers for your other grade and requesting crossing for my outstanding grade, too.

Barkeep! A round of A-ma for the house, please!

Also, still wanting to off some cow-workers.

Oh, I'm so there! Maybe we could have a Strangers on a Train -style trade-off?

Yay for Nora's (clearly well-earned, since not a surprise) A!

Yay to all A's and to all school going folk, regardless of grades. Woot.

Yes, this. We're very pretty. And smart 'n' stuff, yo.

Yikes, Kristin. Very laugh to keep from cryin'.