Some uneasy times right now and I’ve finally opened up an account with SchoolsFirst. Actually they call it being a “member”. I should have done it like, last year, but oh well. Oh, and my family members can join too. There is a branch pretty close to me so I’m happy with that.

Anyone else sad that they can’t say WaMu anymore? WaMu! WaMu! Better get it out now.

It was just half of the stadium for a more “intimate” setting.

Chandeliers!

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This is how she came in…so dramatic. Her dress was really flowy, and they constantly had a fan blowing her dress up, similar to her album cover art of her album “Symphony”. She really swung her dress around a lot. A lot. A lot. But I don’t blame her; if I were wearing that dress, I’d do it too.

I am…Darkwing Duck!

Here is a short video of this first song. I love the colors! Notice the billowing dress. One day I want to wear a huge dress with a long heavy train, and stand on top of a cliff on a windy day. Like in Elizabeth: The Golden Age, during the montage scene where the British defeat the Spanish Armada.

Can anyone tell me the name of the song being played? To me, I know it’s been made into a techno/trance song, but I never knew what the original was. I love at the end how the lights turned off one by one.

I absolutely loved this song. She sang “What a Wonderful World” while plants bloomed in the background. If you look at the set, she’s actually standing behind the glass. I still can’t decide if the images are being projected onto the floor, and the reflective glass is picked up on it, or both. The glass is bordered by white screen material. She stands behind the screen so that her shadow isn’t cast on I think?

A darker image so you can see her dress. I want!

Here is the video of the song. Love love love.

This is what really weirded me out. I’ve never been to a concert, so I don’t know if this is like..totally normal, but I was pretty amazed. If you look at the left gap, there is a dancer there, but that isn’t part of the reflective glass. It’s that opaque white screen stuff….so if it’s not being reflective, how does the image get on there?

See for yourself. Mesmerizing.

I want her dresses. All of them. My battery ran out later (stupid me…I really didn’t think I’d take so much) but they added an extra long train to her dress and lifted her up on a swing while she sang.

Princess and the Pea-like

I reeeeally love this song too. He came out when the male’s part started. His light wasn’t was big as Sarah’s.

That didn’t do it justice.

Noooow, after the intermission, she sang Phantom of the Opera…bless her…and when she left the stage, Alice came on, and the rabbit, mad hatter, the deck of cards, and Little Red Riding Hood. what?! Yeah. And then, eerie music plays while the familiar sounds of Dance of the Superplum Fairie tinkled its way in (That’s from the Nutcracker for you uncultured, jK). You have to see it for yourself. I managed to find it on youtube. I was blown away. It’s so different from what she’s usually sung but I welcome it wholeheartedly. It’s very Nightmare Before Christmas. Doesn’t it sound like something Gwen Stefani would sing??

The left and right screens scrolled through a forest of trees like she was actually moving. So twisted. The next song on this video afterward is reeeeally good too.

If you poke around youtube you’ll find more. I am totally enchanted by her now. I am now digging through my cd collection to find all my old cds of hers. I hope this tour is made into a dvd, or even better Blu-ray.

Here is a good review with nice pictures. Totally digging that weird song also: http://voyagesextraordinaires.blogspot.com/2008/12/sarah-brightman-symphony-tour-2008.html

Could he be any hotter over 40? Could he?? And look at that rain…and Jennifer Connelly is soooooo cute in this movie too.

Anyhow, Keanu is pretty good in this movie because he gets to talk choppy and be all “awkward human” like.

The movie itself was reeeally pretty, special effects are great, the plot wasn’t boring and wasn’t too long. The ending was a little abrupt though. Could have used more Keanu.

Mr. S: By the way, Mrs. M (the other teacher I work under), her husband plays that game. He gets together with friends and they like…play. WoW right?

Me: Oh! Yeah. Does she play too?

Mr. S: Nooooo noooo…she…..she hates it. It’s the bane of her existence.

Me: Ooooh haha…I know how she feels…

Later on, in the second class, this kid goes

Kid: OMG you went to BlizzCon too?! What, what do you have?

Me: oh…..<sheepish> a priest…

Kid: I’m Undead Warlock! Dude! <calls out to other kid> She plays WoW!

Other kid: What?

<unintelligible shoutings back and forth of I don’t know what but it had something to do with the armory…and the fact that Kid1 was still level 72, and he was denying it…>

Then, I went to Mrs. M’s class

Mrs. M: Do you play World of Warcraft?……

Me: Yes…

Mrs. M: I’m a WoW widow…….okay???? It’s…..it’s just….wow. I catch him sneaking around to play that game…he gets together with his friends, because they work at Blizzard…

Me: >_<

Girl: ooh my brother plays too, he used to play Everquest also…

I think if you got all the WoW players together, they would be a small country…like Sweden or something. That might have changed since last year by now though. A little bigger. Soon, nobody will do anything but play in the alternate reality of WoW. Raiding is a full-time job and we’ll be fed by tubes in our chairs. And conflicts between countries will be resolved by 5-man arenas.

(x^2 – 2x – 15)

Okay, so we know the answer is (x+3) (x-5), but this girl had the signs mixed up for many of her answers, and she was rewriting them on her homework. Plus for minus, and minus for plus. So I’m looking over her shoulder, and I ask

Me: Hey, so what’s going on here?

Girl: Ooh I just got these signs wrong, I mixed it up.

Me: …so…what happened, do you understand it now?

Girl: oh, yeah, if they are both negative in the question, then the answer will have a negative and positive, I forgot and made them both negative…

Me: …..(wth…)…so wait, you’re just looking at the signs to determine what the signs in the answer will be?

Girl: Well, yeah, that’s what our teacher told us…

Me: (….what kind of lame cheap shortcut is this teacher teaching?) So, you understand that you have to find two numbers that multiply to the 3rd number, but add up to the 2nd number right? -5 and +3 multiply to -15 but add up to -2, that’s why you use those signs, not because of just memorizing how they should be. You should know why they are like that…

Girl: …….mm..yeah…

Me: You can also check your work by foiling again to make sure you get the right numbers too…then you’ll know for sure you have the right signs…

Girl:…well..yeah..i mean…but our teacher told us we could just do it like this…

And that, my friends, is why I get depressed working at schools sometimes. But! I’m glad I got to snap some of these kids out of it. You know some kids aren’t even writing their math homework correctly, working horizontally instead of vertically? With lines written haphazardly in different areas of the paper? It kills me when I see it and it makes it hard for me and the student to follow. Did no one teach them an organized and logical way to do their math? Grrrrrrr…I’m dedicating a lesson to how to write in good math format when I’m a teacher.

Kid: Want to hear a joke?

Me: Sure!

Kid: (to Kid 2 across the table) Hey I’m going to tell her that joke…about the…

Kid 2: Nono…don’t! don’t……don’t!

Kid: (shaking head) no, I’m gonna do it.

Me: <Attentive and alert!>

Kid: So, there is a farmer and he has a donkey, and he wants to make his donkey laugh but he can’t. So he tells the village that he’ll pay 600 gold to anyone who can get him to laugh, and everyone fails, except for one guy, and he gets the donkey to laugh. But then the donkey can’t stop laughing and the farmer tries to get him to stop but he can’t. So he tells the village he’ll give anything 600g who can get the donkey to stop laughing, and everyone fails, except for the guy who got the donkey to laugh in the first place. So the farmer asks the guy how he did it, and

Kid 2: Noooo no…don’t do it….

Kid: I…..I can’t…..I can’t…..No, nevermind…I can’t say it….<turns away from me>

Me: …..@_@……(and?!?!)

Sigh…I really am in this position right? Try to connect with kids but still am apart.

Me: Hey, what is that book?

Girl: Oh, I’m reading it for silent reading time.

Me: <grabbing the book and leafing through it> man…it’s huge!…….That’s what shhh….<gasp>

Boy: (that I’ve taught since his 8th grade last year): That’s what SHE said…!

Me: @_@….<pretending not to hear it and quickly walks away>

I need to be a lot more careful. I don’t know what got into me.

Boy: Hey, smell my cheek

Me: …@_@…uh…no thanks!

Boy: Just smell my cheek! It smells like cologne!

Me: ^_^… <walks away>

To be fair, another boy had been spraying cologne, and this boy must have gotten some on his finger…and then smeared it on his face…and he might have been honestly wanting me to smell his cheek.

Still, I’m gullible, but I wasn’t falling for any of this. After my experience with “Let me tell you a secret”, I’ve become wary of things like these. All I need is his head to turn at the last moment. @_@. No thanks!

Kid: Can you help us on this question?

Me: Sure! <reads it over. It is a word problem involving velocity, time it took, and asks for how long the distance was>. Okay, so, you use this equation. V=D/T. Do you guys know your algebra yet?

Kid: This is science.

Me: ….uh…..okay but, do you know your algebra? What math are you taking right now?

Kid: But this is science. It’s from science class. We’re learning about velocity.

Me: ….right….but…this is math. You have to know the math to do this problem. We’re using algebra to find the missing variable, D, the distance the train traveled.

Kid: ….oooh……           …

Yeah…I’m not sure why the kid thought that you didn’t need to know math for a science question.

Whelps, I’ve been at work again at the schools. So far no cute or funny stories. I went to a high school that I hadn’t been to last year, and saw some of my eighth graders that had gone up to ninth grade. They would be like, “Hey! I know you!” And the teachers are always have a thankful look when I walk in the room and would be like “omg thank goodness you are here. We’ve been waiting for you!” Maybe all teachers should get a tutor. Or just get paid more.

It’s raining today. Sporadically. I love going to schools when it rains. Rain just makes everything more interesting.