To Be Or Not To Be A Catholic School Teacher.

Hi everybody! Sorry I haven't blogged for a while but my internship has taken up most of my time and the time it didn't take up was filled with numbing my brain on reality tv. I'm just about to finish my internship; I only have 2 weeks left! So what's next you may ask?

1. Got a job offer in Toronto teaching in a Catholic school. I haven't decided if I'm going to take the offer yet because I'm pretty sure walking into a school and praying everyday may in fact drive me nuts! Not to mention that I would be going to hell in a hand basket if they found out I was living in sin with my boyfriend (oh my!!). So I have until May 12th to decide. Any input would be appreciated on this matter.

2. I'm going to Toronto next weekend for training to teach the physics section of the Princeton Review (MCAT prep course). Dave's taught it the last few years and turned it over to me this year. I'm excited to teach the course, but very nervous for the training. We have to do mini lessons in front of the class and they're supposedly all Phd students. Anyway...I'm sure it'll be fine.

3. I'm working for the physics department this summer as a TA for the first year physics lab, PHYS1045. I'm super excited about this job cause I haven't had much experience doing physics labs and would love to do more labs in my own physics classroom.

4. I'm graduating in May from both faculties (Science & Education). I was only going to go to my science ceremony but my folks insisted that I attend both. Well, at least they're not on the same day this year. My mother is so excited to see me graduate, I may have to give her a sedative before the ceremony! My Dad on the other hand, is excited for the party afterwards.

5. My annual family reunion is the weekend after graduation at my folks place this year. Should be a great time. I just hope this year I can remember it..hehe

6. June 16th, and 17th is the Dave Matthews Band concert in Saratoga Springs, NY. This will be our 3rd summer going and our 5th and 6th DMB show. This year Dave, Muskie, Adrienne, Jason and I all got super close seats. I can't believe I'm going to see Dave so close, I only hope I don't turn into one of those annoying people who just cry and scream the whole time, although it's quite possible that I do!! There's about 10 of us going this year, so it should be a GREAT time!

7. The first or second weekend of July is "Hooplah part Deux". For those of you who are unfamiliar with the Hooplah, it's a huge party at my cottage in Dundee, Cape Breton with all the bells and whistles. Last year was amazing and hopefully this year will be even better. All are welcome!!

8. At the end of July, Dave and I are making the BIGGGG move to Toronto. Don't know where or when exactly..but we'll keep you posted.

Well that's all for me right now. But I'll try to keep you posted as the summer progresses.

The transition to Miss Boudreau

I'm now a few weeks into my internship at FHS and everything is going really well. I absolutely LOVE my co-operating teacher. She's a lot of fun, doesn't take things too seriously and is an excellent teacher. I couldn't have asked for a better person to work with. Tomorrow I'm teaching my first lesson for the two physics classes. I'm really excited and nervous at the same time but I guess that's pretty normal.

Other than that, I'm also taking one course at the university. It's a math education course, "Mathematics across the curriculum" to be specific. It's a pretty cool course EXCEPT there is a girl in the class who feels compelled to interrupt the professor every chance she gets to introduce some irrelevant detail about her life. It's so bad that I started keeping track of how many irrelevant comments she makes during class. Current tally: 9 times in 35 minutes! At the end of the semester I'm going to figure out how much money I wasted listening to her annoying voice. REFUND PLEASE!! I wish!

Once upon a New Years Eve

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So Dave and I went to Halifax with John for New Years. It was awesome. We knew Joel Plasket was going to play at the Marquee so naturally that's where we were heading. We had heard that the tickets were sold out but figured that there would still be tickets at the door for sale. Well, we were wrong, the whole concert was completely sold out. After trying to bribe the bouncer to let us in anyway we turned around only to find a lady wanting to sell two of her tickets. We decided to take her up on her offer and were delighted when she gave us a discount on the ticket price without us even asking. The only thing preventing us now from experiencing the most amazing New Years was another ticket for John. No worries, after being outside for only 20 minutes John beat 2 other guys looking to buy tickets (who had actually been waiting way longer than us) and found a guy with a spare. Into the Marquee we went.

After waiting 45 minutes in line for coat check we were finally able to squeeze our way through the crowd to the very front and rock out to some Joel. But that's not all folks! Thrush Hermit ended up closing the show! Yup that's right, THRUSH HERMIT! Very cool!! So after experiencing every last bit of the concert we headed back to the hotel, drank some more then walked over to the casino to finish off the night. By 6am we were back at the hotel sound asleep with smiles on our faces from having the most wonderful New Years ever (and being completely drunkidy drunk drunk!) THE END.

Travis, now you are my inspiration!

Ok, so I guess when I said I'd update soon, in the back of my mind I was thinking, "yeah right!". Things have been rediculously bussy lately. I'm all done classes but now I have exams to worry about. I have three written exams, one take-home and an essay to complete before I get my life back. Or has this become my life?? Oh dear, scary thought! Dave and I are still planning on staying here for Christmas, which I'm soo excited about. However, there are things that you take for granted when you go home for Christmas so I've decided to devise a list:

1. You have access to your mother's endless supply of ribbons, gift wrap and bows.

2. You get to decorate a tree while drinking and listening to Dolly Parton and Kenny Roger's Christmas CD (or was that on tape?)

3. If you forget to get someone a present your mother always has a few extras lying around.

4. There is an endless supply of Christmas food.

5. You don't have to worry about sending your presents by bus or mail cause your mother already took care of that for you.

I'm sure I'll come up with some more as Christmas gets closer. Looking back on my list, I think it's fair to say that my parents and espcially my mother spoil me when I'm home. The funny thing is that my mother honestly thinks I'm just saying that I'm not going home for Christmas so I can surprise her on Christmas Eve! And I've been telling her since last Christmas that I wouldn't be coming home so there would be plenty of time for it to sink in. Oh well, I tried, I just hope she's not too dissapointed.

And with this I end my post with yet another promis to update soon. (yeah right!)

Ali, you inspired me to continue..heh

Well I know it's been a while since I last updated my blog and I sincerely apologize to my viewers..heh. In all honesty I wrote a huge kick ass blog right after the Hoopla and my computer spontaneously shut down and all was lost. Needless to say I was infuriated and need several months to get over it ;) Actually, this semester has been absolutely crazy busy. I'm taking 6 classes and as usual one of them is taking over my life. It's a science education class, so you would think I'd be all about it, especially since one of the profs (two take turns teaching it), is the prof I worked for this summer. But instead I've developed a deap loathing of everything science education at UNB.

On a brighter note, I'm hosting the first year physics tutorials again this year and I absolutely LOVE it! I'm also doing a bit of marking and private tutoring too. I just got my placement for my internship that I'll be doing next semester, and thank the high heavens it's at FHS teaching 122 physics!! I was so nervous that they'd stick me in a canadian liturature class or something, and as you can probably tell by my poor grammar and spelling skills, those kids would have suffered at my expence, not to mention that I would have been completly miserable. But all is well, and I got the placement I wanted :)

Well that's all for now, but I promis there will be another update soon! There's still so much to tell!

The end of summer in a 7 X 8 foot office

Well I guess it's been a while since I've posted anything. So, I'm in the process of finishing up work that I was doing for one of my professors with this science club for kids thing. It was actually way more fun that I had originally expected. I basically went to chapters, libraries and little book stores downtown looking for anything bug related. Apparently the first unit this science club will be doing is a unit on bugs. So all I have left to do is organize all my finds and hand it all over to my prof next week. For the month of August however, I'm working with yet another professor. This time I'm suck behind a computer all day creating help pages for a website he created. I have to say, it's not the most interesting job in the world, but hey, it's only for 3 weeks and I get to catch up on my blog while I'm at work ;)

So that's enough about work. August is looking like it's going to be quite a busy month! Dave and I are heading home to the Cape for his cousin's wedding on the 12th. It's in Iona which is beautiful and right on the lake. It'll be nice to be back on the lake, I really miss having water that you can actually swim in close by. God knows the St. John river isn't exactly the best for swimming. The weekend after this, there is a good chance that I will be going to Miramichi with Dave and all the physics folk for a weekend full of tubing and god knows what else.

The last weekend of August is very important. It's the Hooplah weekend! My parents have a cottage in Dundee right on the lake and this weekend I'm planning a big bash for the cottage. EVERYONE is invited! So spread the word. My Dad just got a boat, so we can go water skiing and tubing during the day and then at night there's a fire pit where we can bring out the guitars and play some tunes while drinking responsibly. haha. I don't think there is such thing as drinking responsibly in Cape Breton. It looks like there will be quite a few people from Fredericton coming down for the event as well as a few of my old friends from back home. I might even enlist the help of John to make some t-shirts for the event. There's lots of room for everyone to stay either in the cottage or in tents in the feild by the water. If any of you are interested then you can either post a comment or e-mail me for more details.

Our now annual road trip!

Well instead of revisiting exactly everything that happened on our road trip to Saratoga Springs NY to see two DMB shows, I think I may just refer you to Novascotia copycats blog. Dave had about 7 paragraphs about our trip. In short, I was right about not getting stopped at the border outside Montreal. In fact, I do believe that Muskie still owes me a beer from a bet we made about it. For some reason the car drive down seemed much more comfortable than our drive home. We ate some amazing food while we were in the states and met some real arse holes. But then again, how do you go to the states and not meet arse holes? The shows themselves, were AMAZING! The band is so incredibly talented. It amazes me how they can take several different instruments, like the flute, violin or sax and integrate it all so well together that you get completely lost in the melody. DMB's new stuff is really good too. I had no idea! After the release of "Everyday" and "Busted Stuff", I figured that his new album would be more of the same, good, just not as good as his older stuff from "Under the Table and Dreaming" or "Remember Two Things". However, this time his album does sound like his older stuff. Mellow, light-hearted and full of energy. I LOVED IT!!

Other than the road trip, I'm back taking classes. I was supposed to be taking three classes, but opted to drop one of them due to the fact that I've recently acquired two jobs. Yup, that's right, I'm now working for two professors in the education department. My first job is with Karen Sullenger. Fortunately for me, she's gone on vacation and my job consists of running through a "to do" list she left me. For this job I'm developing a list of resources for a grade 3 to 5 science club. Pretty fun actually. My second job is developing text for a science education journal database for UNB. I haven't started actually doing this job yet since my prof is also gone away on vacation for the month of July. So I sort of work when I want where I want. Karen gave me an office to work out of in the Ed building and I created my own office out of the quiet study room in the physics building (after several buckets of Mr. Clean and a little elbow grease). I hadn't planning on working during the summer at all but just take classes instead. Ironic since last year I couldn't find work and this year they're asking me if I want to work. I guess when it rains it pours.