The List 2.0!
The Mission:
Complete 101 preset tasks in a period of 1001 days.
The Criteria:
Tasks must be specific (ie. no ambiguity in the wording) with a result that is either measurable or clearly defined. Tasks must also be realistic and stretching (ie. represent some amount of work on my part).
Why 1001 Days?
Many people have created lists in the past – frequently simple goals such as new year’s resolutions. The key to beating procrastination is to set a deadline that is realistic. 1001 Days (about 2.75 years) is a better period of time than a year, because it allows you several seasons to complete the tasks, which is better for organizing and timing some tasks such as overseas trips or outdoor activities.
Start Date: Saturday, January 1, 2011
Goal Date: Saturday, September 28, 2013
-Items in italics are currently in progress.
-Items that are stricken out are completed.
-Some items are more important than others.
-Will not be completed in order.
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Bunny!
Previous list success rate: 36.7%, but that’s ok. This years list will go better. I know what I am doing this year!
Happy new year, everybody! 
Merry Christmas! I love this day, even if it doesn’t quite feel like Christmas yet because my brother’s at work for the next hour and a half. I’ll just leave this here. 
Have a wonderful and safe holiday!
101 in 1001
The Mission:
Complete 101 preset tasks in a period of 1001 days.
The Criteria:
Tasks must be specific (ie. no ambiguity in the wording) with a result that is either measurable or clearly defined. Tasks must also be realistic and stretching (ie. represent some amount of work on my part).
Why 1001 Days?
Many people have created lists in the past – frequently simple goals such as new year’s resolutions. The key to beating procrastination is to set a deadline that is realistic. 1001 Days (about 2.75 years) is a better period of time than a year, because it allows you several seasons to complete the tasks, which is better for organizing and timing some tasks such as overseas trips or outdoor activities.
Start Date: Sunday, March 16, 2008
Goal Date: Sunday, December 12, 2010
-Items in italics are currently in progress.
-Items that are stricken out are completed.
-Idea stolen from nitesh_update.
-Some items are more important than others.
-Will not be completed in order.
Writer’s Block: Get those creative juices flowing
Ray Bradbury, plain and simple. The man is so versatile and his prose reads like poetry. A lot of the techniques he uses are ones I’ve tried to use (with mixed results) in my writing. I try very very hard to keep it to trying his techniques as a tribute and as an apprentice to this whole writing thing as opposed to a wholesale “HEY THIS WORKED FOR HIM IF I WRITE LIKE THIS I WILL BE SUCCESSFUL TOO!” You know, using others’ techniques to find your own voice, and all that. Also, Peter S. Beagle. He writes the perfect mixtures of the magical and the mundane. Also Neil Gaiman, who walks the razor edge between horror, fantasy and science fiction. And Diana Wynne Jones + Terry Pratchett for their whimsical, lampooning of fantasy cliches.
…hmm. All of my favorites go skating willy-nilly through genre boundaries. Awesome.
Anyways. Placement is going good. I’m usually in bed by 10:30 and up around 5:45, and my body is still not used to that schedule, but I imagine it’ll adjust eventually…I hope…
Writer’s Block: A charming defense
As usual, I feel the need to preface this with the fact that I don’t believe in any such thing – however, if I wanted an animal to represent protection, I would pick a horse. They’re loyal and harmless until threatened, have no predatory instincts, but are devastating when they’re angry.
I’ve started a music blog (yes, again. Hopefully this one sticks) here. Right now it’s just Song of the Day, based on themes like CONELRAD used to be. Eventually (as in, probably after student teaching) it will probably have more.
I am halfway done with finals already. This feels strange and shocking. My last classroom-based learning experience happened on Tuesday. I had my math final on Wednesday (I feel pretty good about it), and my Literacy final yesterday (I got a 91 on it, for a final class grade of 88). Social Studies in on Monday (not really worried about that other than the geography section;) and Science is on Tuesday. Not really worried about that one either. We have options – we can take a 75 M/C question test on seven chapters, or 25 M/C questions, and 2 essay questions on 3 chapters. That…seems like a fairly obvious choice to me, considering those 2 chapters are all pedagogy, aka The Content We’ve Been Learning For The Last Three Years (assessment strategies, differentiated instruction, etc). Then I have a day of work, 4 days of nothing, followed by a classroom management meeting and the start of this semester’s placement. I am about two months away from starting the permanent student teaching – scary.
(Thinking of taking the English PRAXIS, so I can teach 6th grade English in a middle school – thoughts?)
I’ve been doing more socializing things this semester. My friend Jen and I tried to get the bloc to have Classroom Trick-or-Treat (which was something of a failure; only ten of the thirty-four of us actually brought candy, but it was fun anyways). My friend Alyson and I went to Green Dragon (a huge outdoor flea market type of place) where I got an epic mixture of Mad Bomber and Lumberjack hat (plaid with earflaps and faux fur!) and loads of candy, and then Jen and Alyson and I went student-teaching-clothes shopping yesterday after the Literacy midterm. It wasn’t such a success (I only got a sweater), but Aly and I had fun playing cards outside the dressing room, and we got Chinese.
Then, we (thejokerlaughs and I) went to see Deathly Hallows last night/this morning. It was my first midnight showing, and it was pretty fun! We went with some friends, so friends-of-friends I had never met, and we’d been in line for about ten minutes when I saw one of my friends from work come through the door. There was a moment of “Wait, is that….?” On both of our parts, followed by tacklehugs and “Sarah!” “Courtney!”
This adaptation was definitely the truest to the book, and they did a really good job balancing the grimdark and the humor. Favorite visualizations: the destruction of a row of telephone towers, the trio wandering a deserted trailer park, and the ending. We all knew it was coming, and yet everyone in the theater went, “ARE YOU SERIOUS NOOOOO KEEP GOING.” My two only notable complaints were: HP is taking place in the 1990s, so the styles shouldn’t be the 2000s, and there was a severe lack of Snape, but that makes sense ‘cuz he’s not in the first half of the book so much.
Incidentally, the commercials for Red Riding Hood look so.horrible.
We wound up at a friend’s house for the night, since I didn’t feel like a 45 minute drive at 3am. Unfortunately there was cloud cover, so I didn’t get to see the tail-end of the Leonids. I fell asleep pretty quick, and then Theresa and I went out for breakfast on the way home. Next time, I hope to go to the midnight release in my hometown, not in Millersville…
Anyways. My brain is fuzzing out now, but that’s been my last few weeks. How’ve y’all been?
HALP PLZ.
I can’t ask this on Facebook because it is for a school project that we are all supposed to keep secret in our groups. :[ I need a good link or way to get a WAAF uniform from WWII (preferably blue). Google has frustrated me thus far. Any help would be WONDERFUL. We’re going retro/antique shopping on Monday and I need to figure out how to get this getup by the 19th, so….yeah. Things are in hand, but if any of y’all know where I might be able to find something that I haven’t found yet…
(incidentally: this semester is driving me mad!)
Writer’s Block: The day the earth stood still
It was the first day I realized how small the world really is in this day and age. When you’re a kid, everything seems so so so very big, but information and communications technology means we can see all corners of the globe almost instantly. It means places like Iran, Iraq, China and Africa are our neighbors. I had something deep and meaningful to point out about that, but then I lost it in a brainblink. It was a variation, though, on words that don’t ever need variations: “Love thy neighbor.”
It was also the first and only day I can remember almost every moment of.
Which brings me to a strange story!
One of the girls at the daycare visited Washington DC with her family over Independence Day weekend. When she came back, she was full of stories. One of the days she looked up at me and the other teachers who were there – this is the conversation that followed:
Girl: Did you know they can’t fly airplanes near the White House anymore?
Me: Yeah…
Girl: Do you know why?
Me: Oh, yes. I remember when it happened, too.
Other teacher: Every second of that day, pretty much!
Girl: *confused look*
Me: ….granted, you probably….uh
Other teacher: ….when were you born?
Girl: I’ll be 8 in August. :3
Me & Other teacher: ………aslkasflkhf;
Girl (con’t): Did you know they had to rebuild part of the Pentagon?
Me and other teacher: (con’t) …aihfapsofaspodghaiohfpadofhpifhgaoihfasfhafih
Third teacher: Hey what’s up?
Girl: Did you know they can’t fly…
Other teacher: She wasn’t even born yet!
Third teacher: …but I was only in hig…you were only in high….AHHHHHHHHHHH AHHHHH AHHHHHH.
Girl: ….
Three teachers: *continue to have miniature meltdowns about something we experienced in high school already being thought of as history by elementary school students*
[fin]
