it's so pretty out, I am contemplating being bad, going shopping in search of a new purse, and maybe hitting starbucks on the way.

Bad Jen can not spend money, bad Jen should not consume calories...

but I still have a christmas gift card...hmmm. Wonder if I should be a little bit bad, just to enjoy the sunshine?

I'm on break for the next two weeks, and I'm really, really bored. Sigh. Anyone want to come visit?

...!

Phew! Passed both classes this semester, one with an "a" and one with a "b", which makes my total to date:

6 A
2 B

4 classes left!

Grad classes are done for the winter break...

and I wanted to share my reflections on the last day of teaching in 2009...

It wasn’t the pile of presents on my desk that made me realize these students were something special. It wasn’t the hot apple cider or the Peanuts’ Christmas music on the loudspeaker, either.

It was when my 8th graders, all 34 of them, leapt up and flew to the window because someone said the word “snow”. At first, I couldn’t even see any flakes, and I laughed at them, my southern students, and told them that we Yankees had a different version of snow. But then it started falling faster, in fluffy flakes that one malaprop prone student referred to as “chunks”.

Still, I tried to maintain some semblance of my lesson plan. It was the Friday before winter break, and the students were wound up and bouncing on a sugar buzz through the day. They wound up even tighter when our principal’s voice was heard echoing through the buildings, announcing that school would close an hour early today due to “inclement weather”.

By the time those eighth graders rolled around to my class, I should have known better than to try and teach. But when I saw their faces, aglow with belief and beauty when the snow started to fall, I fell in love with my students. There was nothing for us to do but to line up, march past the assistant principal in his office, and play in the snow.

And play they did! Arms spread open, heads thrown back, every tongue trying to catch the biggest snowflake. They pranced about and giggled, spun in circles, and jumped up and down saying over and over again, “snow! Snow! Snow!”.

I have never in my life seen children of any age so wholeheartedly joyful and young, and watching them playing in the snow made me fall in love with the idea of a white Christmas all over again.

Just passed 50,000 words...15 days and 50,000 words!!! Watch out world, here I am.

(I'm still tweaking, but...anyone want to read it? Historical fiction narrative about a woman accused of witchcraft + modern woman who begins researching the witch trial)

Just finished my tenth book review for VOYA.  I've been reviewing for them now for over a year, and it's awesome.  I love getting free YA books, even if they do keep sending me a million copies of one of the books I reviewed last year, a book I didn't really enjoy...I'll just have to keep donating them!

Haven't worked on the novel lately, but today is a holiday from school, so I plan to do some of that this afternoon.

In other news, I HATE my grad classes this semester.  Why can't I be done already?

Date:	2009-11-08 16:02
Subject:	as long as Ruth
Security:	Public
Mood:	accomplished

0ver 40,000 words and the story isn't done yet...

sad that my break ends tomorrow, meaning that I don't know when I'll have another six solid hours to devote to my writing...

but I will have to make the time.

Fame and fortune will be worth it! ;)

Over 30,000 words...phew!

24,000 words...I am making good use of my break!

Inspired by the year and a half it took to write my first draft of Ruth, I have decided to unofficially participate in THIS

I have over 5,000 words already, a tenth of the way there, and four more days off from work to keep pounding this out...it may be crap, but I WILL write a novel, from scratch, in one month...and then we'll see where it takes me.

I am doing this mostly to keep myself writing yet give myself a break from Ruth until my readers have feedback for me...distance can be good on a piece, and I have been pretty emeshed in Ruth, what with it being first person and all.  This novel I have started this month is third person, which is a challenge for me, but I am enjoying it and being melodramatic in a way that  would make Hawthorne proud...

In other words, i'm writing a bunch of crap...but maybe there is a core of good stuff here!

I'm a geek.

finished a 40,000 word draft of my novel today...short for a book, but according to wikipedia, longer than classics like "Animal Farm".

It's just a draft, and I know that I have a lot of work to do before I can send it off to countless publishers, but it's a draft and I did it!

Anyone willing to read/edit, let me know.

Ashville was AWESOME,
and having two more weeks of break even more so.

Kara comes to play this week,
and it's almost my favorite holiday.

Joy!

I am good-principal kryptonite...

my principal (that I adore, love, enjoy, want to follow around like a puppy) has announced her unplanned and early retirement...

let's see here...

this is my fourth principal.  my first hired me, then quit the school.  my second....would have been amazing, but I didn't stick around...my third was just plain bad, and now this.

Sad meeting at school today.  I cried.  She cried.  I cried harder when I thanked her for giving me this chance and told her I wished I could have more time to get to know her.

The weekends never seem long enough...went downtown to an art show, which was fun, and now I'm just wishing it were Friday instead of Monday...

Not much to say...not sure why I even keep this LJ

My grad classes have started again, and I am already stressed.  This is going to be an intense year.

For the past two weeks, I have been writing for a solid half hour every day (minus the day of the flight and last night due to a late dinner), and Ruth has grown by 7 pages and the teen poetry novel has grown by 13...plus about 15 pages of personal journaling.

Kids back in on Monday, not sure if I'm ready, but I am woman hear me roar, I single handedly hooked up At&t DSL and VONAGE.

Go me.