A True Friend

Okay, so I'm probably the last one on the planet to see this, but I don't care, I thought it was cute; a friend sent it to me in an email, so obviously ignore the "send this to 10 friends" part at the bottom, since I don't expect you to send my blog addy to anyone else.

Are you tired of all those sissy "friendship" poems that always sound
good, but never actually come close to reality? Well, here is a series of
promises that really speaks to true friendship:

1. When you are sad - I will help you get drunk and plot revenge
against the sorry bastard who made you sad.

2. When you are blue - I will try to dislodge whatever is choking you.

3. When you smile - I will know you finally got laid.

4. When you are scared - I will rag on you about it every chance I get.

5. When you are worried - I will tell you horrible stories about how
much worse it could be and to quit whining.

6. When you are confused - I will use little words.

7. When you are sick - Stay the hell away from me until you are well
again. I don't want whatever you have.

8. When you fall - I will point and laugh at your clumsy ass

This is my oath...I pledge it till the end. Why? You may ask, because
you are my friend. Send this to 10 of your closest friends, then get
depressed because you can only think of nine.

Remember: A good friend will help you move. A really good friend will
help you move a body. Let me know if I ever need to bring a shovel!

Assignment Accepted!

Well, I found out today where I will be doing me Pre-Teaching Practicum this semester. The Practicum is a part of my semester where I will be going inside an elementary school and observing a teacher and how she teaching, picking up ideas and whatnot from them. I have to observe for 90 hours, and the university gives us three whole weeks off of school where they cancel classes so we can spend five whole days in a row at our school with our cooperating teacher. We won't actually start our firsrt week of observation until a week into February, but I'm going to get ahold of my teacher on Monday to say "hi" and maybe get a tour of the school.

We also have to teach four lesson plans, while the teacher reviews us, so that's going to be a little scary, but I think it'll be okay. My cooperating teacher is a first grade teacher, so I get to hang out with little kids all day for three weeks; that'll be fun. I was hoping for a slightly older grade, say fourth or fifth grade, but I forgot to put a grade level preference, so I think I just got a classroom that was open, which is fine with me because it's the school I wanted to go to, out of the like, 20 choices I had, that was the school I'd ranked number one.

Anywho, the school is called South Park Elementary, which makes me giggle, but I hope there are no Eric Cartman's in my class!

Oooh, I'm so excited. I like little kids...they likes me, too. I'll let you know how everything goes once things get started. But due to confidentiality, I probably won't be able to say too much or give too many details. Oh well, no big deal.

stuff

Wow, I spent way more money than I thought I was going to...I went to buy some more clothes for school today, as I only had about enough outfits for four days of school...and yikes.

Oh well. I have enough money, which is weird, as I'm not used to having that much money, so it's nice.

Lost is new tonight, so I will be glued to the TV for an hour or so. It's the only slot of TV time that I actually plan for; anything else I watch is by the total random chance that I land upon it while channel surfing.

Oh, I also washed my car today because I could no longer tell what color it was from all the dust and crud on it. Going to the car was is fun now, 'cause there's lots of suds and foam that are different colors! first you get pink, then orange, then yellow, then blue and green. Your car looks like a cotton candy factory exploded all over it. And it smells good, too...weird.

So I was productive today, and I feel a lot better.

stupid technology

What did people do before alarm clocks? Sleep in 'til Noon every day? 'Cause that's what I'd do.

Last night I made sure my alarm clock was set for 6:30am, then went to sleep. The only problem? I forgot to turn the alarm on. Yeah. I slept through my first class this morning. I didn't want to walk in halfway through class and be yelled at or something. So I just didn't go, 'cause I'd already missed so much of it. I'll talk to the teacher today if she's in her office and see if I can figure out what they talked about today. The bad thing about missing one of these Methods classes? You don't really take a lot of notes; you are given some kind of scenario, and asked to discuss it with your group, then talk about it in class and learn more on what you're supposed to do. So missing a class means you miss out on quite a lot. Damnit. I was so mad at myself when I woke up this morning and realized the alarm hadn't gone off.

But other than that, I have been able to stay on top of things so far; getting reading done, doing the little assignments they've given us. I just need to keep up with this "no procrastinating" stint the whole semester, and I think I'll be doing okay.

One of the women at work took her Methods block last semester, and when she realized I was in it this semester, asked me how many days a week I'm working now, and when I told her four days, she gasped, saying she'd only worked one day a week when she was in Methods. Great. She said she can't wait to talk to me in two weeks and see how things are going.

That kinda scares me, because if she only worked one day a week...and I'm working four, AND I'm a procrastinator...Ugh. But I'm not going to BE a procrastinator this semester. That's all there is to it. So I probably won't be blogging a whole lot, and if I do, it's to release some steam about classes and how stressfull they are.

If all my hair is gone by the end of the semester, you know why; I either pulled it all out, or it fell out due to the stress.

Wish me luck!

omigod

I think my head is going to blow up with all the information I have recieved in the last TWO DAYS. That's it. Four classes. And there is just so much stuff being shoved at us. You know how the first day of class, the professor just passes out the syllabus and tells you what's going to happen in the class, and 20 minutes later, you get to go home? Well, not any more. My first two classes were two and a half hours long each...and we stayed for the full two and a half hours. And we got right into it.

But that's not the worst part. What I'm having problems with is the fact that we're pulling all of the information we learned from our Theory classes over the last few years and putting them into these Method classes. Which was expected, but I don't retain information for very long unless I am continually using it, or it strikes me as something very odd and interesting, like the fact that the strawberry is a member of the rose family.

But everyone else seems to be doing just fine with all this information. Or maybe they're just better at masking their confusion. I don't know. I just know that I don't feel like I'm ready for this semester at all. By all means, I am ready for this semester, according to the school. I have created and turned in my portfolio with all the artifacts and rationale statments, transcripts, resume', personal autobiographical sketch of myself, and my philosophy of how school should be. Done. Turned in, ready. But it doesn't seem like in four months I will be ready to take over a classroom and student teach. Ahhh!

I hope all this feeling of being overwhelmed goes away, but I have a weird idea that it just won't because it's only going to get harder and harder, with more and more workload piled on to us.

The nice thing? Because it's a block of classes, I have all the same people in my classes. There's only 18 of us, so that's a really small class. We have a network, we can get ahold of eachother. We all have the same things due, at the same time. We can work together. Hopefully that will work to my advantage, even though I really don't know anybody in the class yet.

Ugh. Time to relax.

ladies and germs, I have arrived

And I'm done! Accepted into the College of Education, and registered for my classes that start tomorrow morning at 8. All I have to do now is buy my books and pay for classes! Which I will worry about tomorrow, as I have half an hour until I have to leave for work, so I'm not even going to do anything more today.

Man, I didn't even think I was going to pull that off in time! I got up early, went to the college to talk to teachers, got my last rationale signed, got my two character references turned in, got the two authorized signatures that I needed to get into the College of Ed., ate lunch, came home, and registered for classes.

Well, I registered for all but two classes. For some reason, it kept saying that there were 2 classes that were clashing with other classes, and wouldn't let me register for them, and they clearly weren't clashing with those other classes. So I had to go to the school again, to the Registration desk and explain that, and she got me signed into those other classes just fine.

Whew. Now the schedule change at work can go on as planned, because I am most definitely IN.

ugh

Sorry about the ranting yesterday; I had some things I needed to get off my chest, and I didn't want to just rave about it at work (not the best place to be saying not nice things about a co-worker), so I just got it off my chest on here...which is kind of the purpose of a blog, anyway. That, and making sure your parents are updated on what's going on in your life.

Slow day today, lots of "bus people" at work, which basically means they show up, eat all the food that's out on the floor for guests, get free money with their coupons, sit around and watch football on the big screen TVs, don't tip, and take up space. I guess it's just something you have to get used to.

We have a double-lock box with all kinds of keys in it - one person has one key, and another person has the other key. No one is really allowed to be in the cage alone with both keys, basically. So when I take my break, I take the key with me, and give it to someone else on the floor (who's not on break), in case it's needed. Well, I guess when I got back from break, I got the key back from the person on the floor, stuck the key in my pocket, and forgot about it. Whoops.

I'm halfway home when I get a phone call, "Andrea, where's the double lock key?" Crap. I don't have it on me. No one else has it on them. It must be in my vest, which is locked up downstairs in my locker. Good thing I gave Aaron my spare key. He was able to unlock my locker, and they got the key from it. Whew. I didn't want to have to drive back to Deadwood.

And that's my blonde moment of the day.

hey cwapface! why don'tchoo blow it outchore eawre!

So on Thursday I go to pick up my paycheck, and the lady who works in the cage who is all butt-hurt about the schedule changing for my school schedule ('cause God forbid she has to work on a weekend, boo hoo), is asking me if I know about classes yet. At the time, I didn't, and I told her so, and she said she needed to know soon, because one of her relatives was opening a bar, and she was going to moonlight there on the weekends or something like that. Bitching about having to work weekends, then finding another job - to work weekends. Then she says, "I'm tired of this last minute bullshit," to which I replied I was tired of it, too.

What happened is I made the mistake of saying that I might not be able to make it into the College of Education, and therefore might not be able to register for classes, allowing us to not have to change the schedule at work. I should never have said that, and just let everyone think that was the plan (which it still is, now...).

A little confusing, yes...but I got things figured out for my portfolio and school stuff, and on Tuesday I'm meeting with a few teachers to get some signatures and character references. As soon as I finish that, I take it to the College of Ed, get signed in, and am able to register for classes.

So I'm at work this morning, putting my vest on and putting the rest of my stuff in my locker, when the bartender comes in and asks how school things are going (because pretty much everyone at work knew my situation), and I tell her that I think it's all going to work out, so we'll go ahead and go on with the schedule change, as planned. She asked how that was going to work, and I said I felt bad for Tammy, the other girl who works in the cage, because she won't get two days off in a row, which sucks, and that the woman in the cage was upset because she was going to have to start working weekends now. And then the bartender starts saying things like, "Well, you have to understand why she's upset, because she was hired before you." I don't care that she was hired before me, because she wasn't hired to work THOSE specific hours, Monday through Friday, 7:30am to 3:30pm. She's so lucky that she got to work those hours in the first place, especially in the gaming industry!

I told the bartender that I was going to college to further my career, my life. This is something important, and it needs to be done. And she replies, "It sounds like you're just saying, 'Me, me, me,' when you talk about this. What about the other people who were hired before you? This is their job!"

Yeah, but this isn't their career. If you're 30some years old and working for $9 an hour, and measely tips because you're a jerk an no one likes you or wants to tip you, that's not my fault. I'm going to school so that I don't have to be working at $9/hour for the rest of my life. And If that involves some measley schedule changes at work, so be it.

You can tell the woman in the cage goes and hangs out at the bar after work and has been talking to the bartender, which is why she was so defensive towards the other people in the cage.

Yeah, it sucks. But it's not like it's the perfect schedule for me, either. I'll be working 7.5 hours on Friday nights, 9.5 hours Saturdays, 10.5 hours Sundays, and 6.5 hours on Mondays. Does that make any kind of sense? No, it's stupid. I have two nights where I'll be working until 12:30am, and then have to get up and go to school at 8am. On Mondays, I'll be at school from 8am to 3pm, and then show up to work at 4pm and work the rest of the night. The schedule sucks for me, too.

So she can sit on it and rotate. Or quit. Or bitch about it. I don't care. But I'm going to school for a reason, and that reason is NOT to end up like her; white trash, hanging out at the bar after work, biker boyfriend, divorced, working for $9/hour. I'm doing something with my life.

Grr.

update

So I said I would give you all an update on the car wreck, and here it is; I found this in the Rapid City Journal on Monday.

Two Spearfish men killed

DEADWOOD -- Two Spearfish men were killed Sunday afternoon when their car collided with a sport utility vehicle on U.S. Highway 85 north of Deadwood.

Four people were taken to Spearfish Regional Hospital with nonlife-threatening injuries, according to the South Dakota Highway Patrol.

The names of the two fatalities - a driver, 22, and his male passenger, 27 - were not released.

The accident happened about 3:30 p.m. about 3.5 miles north of Deadwood when a 1974 Hornet station wagon went out of control and slid across the center line.

The station wagon collided with northbound GMC Yukon driven by Penny Zvejnieks, 52, of Rapid City.

Zvejnieks and her passengers Kyle Zvejnieks, 20, Jaclyn Zvejnieks, 18, and a minor child, received nonlife-threatening injuries. They were taken to the Spearfish hospital.

The South Dakota Highway Patrol, Lawrence County Sheriff's Office, Lawrence County Fire and Rescue, Spearfish Police Department, Lawrence County Advanced Life Support and Spearfish Ambulance responded to the accident.

So my details were a little off, but I was only going off of what I saw, and making my own guesses as to what happened. Tammy, a girl who works in the cashier's cage with me, has been really good friends with the younger man who died since 3rd grade, so she didn't come to work that night, understandably, but I talked to her last night/this morning as I was getting off work and she was coming in to work.

predicament

So this is how it's going to be, is it?

I emailed my SPED300 teacher over a week ago the first time, and six days ago the second time. I have not heard from her. I emailed my advisor six days ago, as well, and have yet to hear from her, also. What am I emailing them about? Trying to figure out what the assignment was in SPED300 that I took two years ago so that I can write a rationale on it, have the teacher read it, sign it, and then put it in my portfolio to turn in so I can be in the College of Ed. and so I can register for classes (that start on Wednesday the 18th).

Another bad thing? I can't find any other teachers who have taught SPED300, so I can't ask them what the assignment is, and I haven't been able to find where SPED300 is even OFFERED at the school anymore!

How am I supposed to do this? This afternoon, Aaron went to the school to check on some things for himself, and on my suggestion, wandered the second floor (education floor) to see if any professors were there. Not a single one to be seen, he said, and he wandered over the whole building. So I'm going in tomorrow to check for myself, and see if I can't find SOMEONE to help me.

Hope this doesn't mean I'm stuck taking Archery and Tennis for a semester. Ugh.

some people are such jerks

At work, we have coupons; people buy 20 dollars' worth of tickets for the slot machines (this is a coinless casino, tickets and bills only), and the cashier gives them two dollars free, giving the customer $22 in tickets. The whole point of these tickets is to get people to play the machines, 'cause we know we're going to get the $2 back (most likely), which is why we give the customers tickets, not cash.

I have a customer and his wife, each recieving $22 in tickets, two $10 tickets, and two $1 tickets. Most people will just try to shove the whole wad of it back at me and say, "Okay, I'd like to cash this in now," to which I reply, "I'm sorry, it doesn't work that way, you need to play them." In all reality, the people could walk around a corner, stuff all four tickets into a machine, and come back to me with a $22 ticket that I would happily cash in for them. At least then it looks like they have attempted to gamble.

So I give the tickets to the customer and his wife, except he takes all of them, sorts out the $10s from the $1s, and gives me back the $10s, saying he wants to cash them out.

Me: I'm sorry, but it doesn't work that way, you need to play the tickets.
PI: They just gave me cash for them last time.
Me: Well, they're not supposed to.
PI: But they did.
Me: I'm sorry, sir, they're not supposed to do that.
PI: Well, I'm a Private Investigator, and I know the Owners, Dad and Son* and-
Me: Yessir, I know who they are. (Thinking: Everyone knows the Owners in this town.)
PI: I'm telling you this: if you don't do this for me, I'm going to talk to the Owners.
Me: Sir, I can't give you cash for these. The whole point of these coupons is to BUY 20 dollars' worth in tickets, and I give you back two dollars free. When people see that I have given you cash, when these aren't redeemable for cash, they're going to want to do that, and everyone is going to want to do that. If people start taking advantage of this, we're not going to be able to do coupons as much anymore.

At this point, I had already given him back his $40 in cash because I didn't want an argument from the so-called private investigator (in a wheelchair, btw), and because I was tired of arguing with him.

And it's strange that he gave back the $10s instead of the $1s, because most people want to get the "free" money back in cash, so they can just take off with it or whatever they do. He was a real jackass, though, and only threw in the whole "private investigator" crap to intimidate me. What is he going to do? See how many speeding tickets I've recieved? Jerk.


*Names have been changed.

horrifying

So it's a cold, 32*, snowy day here in the Black Hills, and I'm driving home from work, down the sometimes treacherous Highway 85. I come around the second to last corner of the highway as it begins to open up into flat land again. And there ahead of me is about a quarter mile of stopped cars in my lane. I slow down and stop behind the last vehicle, a work truck from Wyoming. Ahead of me, where the traffic was stopped, was around eight emergency vehicles; highway patrolmen, ambulances, and policemen. Then come a few fire trucks. Then some more ambulances. The traffic heading opposite us, to Deadwood, is driving past us slowly, in a single file line, while we wait for the policemen to stop that line of cars and let us go through. Slowly, our line starts moving, after sitting still for about five minutes, and as I get closer to the now 15-strong emergency vehicle task force, and I see bits of plastic and metal strewn all over the highway. Closer now, and I can see the vehicles that were in the wreck.

This is what I think happened: the Van was going to Deadwood, the Truck to Spearfish. It's been snowing/raining since 7am today, so the roads were probably slick. The Van was probably going too fast for conditions, and couldn't make it around the bend in the road that curved right. The Truck was probably just going along, down the hill, and couldn't get out of the way of the Van, which then plowed right into the side of the truck (that's the only way I can explain why the Truck was hit broad-side).

The cab of the Truck was on the Deadwood-bound side of the road, on the shoulder, the Van and bed of the truck were on the Spearfish-bound side of the road, in the road.

I don't know if there were any fatalities, but I'm assuming there were, or people were very badly injured, because I don't see why there would be two or three ambulances, two firetrucks, and several highway patrol cars and police cars there if something very serious hadn't happened. I'll check the papers online and look for any incidents, and let you all know what happened and if anyone was hurt.

Puts a somber mood on the rest of your day, eh?

oh, from the mouths of babes

Minor: I'd like some quarters, please.
Me: Can I see your I.D.?
Minor: Oh, I'm only 18. I'm not going to gamble with it, I just need some quarters for the arcade.
Me: I'm sorry, I can't do transactions with minors. If you go to the hotel front desk, they can help you.
Minor: But what if I'm from California and you can gamble when you're 18 there?
Me: Well, this isn't California. You're going to have to go to the front desk.
Minor: Lame.

so glad it's all over

The holidays are over, and I couldn't be more happy! After working Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Years Eve, and New Years Day, along with working a 12 hour shift yesterday. Whew. Our cashier who usually works the day shift called in with a family emergency, and told Tammy, the grave shift cashier, that someone would be in at 9am. Well, that someone never showed, so we think the cashier who called in sick just called and left a message, assuming he would be in. So I get a call at 10am (and check my messages at 11am, when I wake up) saying the day shift cashier called in sick and was wondering if I could come in at Noon and do the last half of her shift, since Tammy had to stay for the first half of it.

Man, it was a long day. The first six hours were horrible. But for some reason, the last six weren't so bad. Not sure why. The worst part was that it happened on a Tuesday, which is one of our slowest nights at work.

Then today was the only day off that Aaron and I have together, so we had a vague plan of what we were going to do. We went to lunch at Roma's (I had lasagna), then we went to Maurices to find some clothes for me for next semester, since I have to have a professional wardrobe when I'm in classes, and got quite a few outfits, but no shoes. Then I had to go to the middle school to meet with a professor from last semester to get something signed for my portfolio. Then it was nap time, dinner at Sanford's, and renting The 40 Year Old Virgin. All was going well, until his phone rang at around 10:45pm. It was work calling, one of the grave cooks had a fever and had to go home, and they were wondering if Aaron could come in for a few hours 'til the day shift cook got there. Boo.

So now it's time for video games! G'night!