Oh my...you might want to check out this blog...beware!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Getting geared up, and PUMPED UP!

Casey and I have been finalizing our specific whereabouts and bookings, even down to a drawing of his truck bed labeled for packing.

Yeah...so!

Also, I drew, redrew, packed, and repacked my cool new Columbia backpack for England!

Yeah...so!

It is necessary to optimize and minimized the one bag for simple, LIGHT travel. Plus, I'm about to send a couple items via snail mail (like jeans and nicer clothing types) to 1040 for a lighter camping load until July's England departure.

I think I have it accomplished, but the "light" part is to be determined after long, EXCITING, walks around the England country.

The other night I watched Miracle, and it was good. One of my bball players said a long time ago, "I saw Miracle, and it was so good..."

Me: "Ugh, it's about hockey though..." Her: "Oh no, you'll love it...you're a coach!"

In relation to that, and watching Justin's Pseudoshorts of youth group, I remember why teaching (and coaching) is a great occupation. We can make them do whatever we want! HA! Jk, they are so fun to be around, and we can help mold the youth of America into godly wonders!

Thank you Jesus for the opportunity! It is enjoyable.

Whoa, that's a rare form of optimism at the end of the year? I am a little nostalgically sentimental in watching a lot of my students never be in my class again. That's the stink about having freshman sort of...blablabla pointless ramble stopped now.

Well, I'm looking forward to hearing more about Mom and Dad's trip, as well as the Mexico trip!

Matt and Tracey don't forget I'm crashing your SD scene Saturday afternoon! WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!

So here's an admitting statement. Hanson's new song, "Penny and Me" is a good, fun song. :)

Currently, I'm getting into Iron and Wine and Magnetic Fields from J. Matt I know you're a Camria and Coheed fan! Can I burn!?

OH MY! IT RAINED!!!

It's so wonderful, refreshing, clean, and cool temps.!

I walk outside my classroom and smile with a YES! Meanwhile the kids are all mopey, tired looking, like it's horrible weather.

However, IT IS FRIDAY EVERYONE!!!

It's also payday! And a three day weekend!

Matt and Tracey I think I'm going to go ahead and confirm that I'll be in SD Saturday afternoon! WOO!! Their (still) talking about that bunco party for next August! Excellent.

Next topic: Apparently I get free sunglasses from our local optomitrist (sp), Casey found out yesterday in accordance with our eye ins. coverage.

So this afternoon I'll do that! As some may know, and experience themselves, sunglass shopping is an addiction of mine :)

In addition, we'll hit the Merced scene of buying a cool (very small and simple) bike rack that goes on our canoe rack! We now will have a hitch rack for 2 people's bikes, and then the simple racks for the back of our truck, and our odd shaped bikes!

Also, Best Buy in Merced will hopefully get my money on a digital camera belt/bag, some rechargeable batteries, and a BIGger memory card.

Perhaps a video camera will be purchased by Case. YES, this IS out of control purchasing. Yet, saves money on souvenirs for all this summer's travelling!

Instead of souvenirs! Pictures!

Well, this is a long entry about random, long winded things. I pray for safe travel for my parents, and for everyone this summer holiday!

Until next blog: Happy 3 day weekend Memorial Day!

Verizon IN network happened to us last night. Check your emails for the phone numbers ---well fam at least. I presume I would like to give the number to some other friends too. :)

Anyways, it was a nice afternoon yesterday after school. We took the bug to Merced and got a lot of info from AAA on our trip this summer.

And so if you don't know the plan here it is:

1)Oregon coast: camping, cabins, sand boarding, fishing, relaxing, some historic lighthouse/Lewis and Clark scenes.

2)Yellowstone Nat'l Park. COOL! website: http://www.gtlc.com/lodgeCBV.shtml

3)Drive across Idaho b/c we've both never been there, hit up some Cabela's stores.

4)Mt. Rushmore for one day and a cool cabin. website: http://www.powderhouselodge.com/index.html

5)Home to Ohio :) YAH!

6)White Water Rafting with Sanfords in North Carolina. website: http://www.deepcreekcamping.com/Cabins.html

7)ENGLAND!!!!!!!!!!!

And now I will proceed to tell you all about what I have eaten each day of this week thus far:HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!jk

Here's a feel good sentence from mom's blog: "I meet Bruce at 5 for dinner and a ball game."

So cool!

WOO!

I don't have time to report it all right now. But it was an amazing weekend.

Despite ridiculous flight turbulence to and fro (except for the longer flights-thank goodness :)

Here are some highlights, and I will have to comment on them later today:

Dad's lefty bomb.
Buckeyes.
Mini cast iron stove.
Gangsta' Grampa, and his homey Mabel.
BGCC.
Learning "Fecha"
IHOP greeting. So good after a long night.
The lady next to me on the plane reading No. 1 Detective Agency.
Pseudoshorts purchased and watched.
Indians footage, a la Justin/Mike's filming only.
Lots of DVD's borrowed from 1040 :)
Hugging my family.

More to come.

Welp, off to the classroom existence. Tonight we're going to Merced to get Verizon phones. Yes, everyone should change to Verizon b/c it's a deal with talking to other Verizon people or whatnot.

PEACE!

Hello readers!

It's Thursday! And there was some sweet blogs to read today!

WOO!

It's the weekend real SOON too!

Well, time to get back to the kiddies. This blog was pointless :)

There was fresh cut grass right in front of my classroom this morning. It looked so lush and was a vibrant, gleeming green.

They just planted it two weeks ago and it is now perfectly beautiful.

So that fragrance filled my delighted to be alive face after already being in great communion with the Lord.

I've been realizing what my job is, on earth that is, and I've been going with that flow the last couple days.

And before slumbering late last night, the Lord was just like,

"Way to do your job, Mary!" Way to do your job.

It was fun and funny, b/c I say that to my pitchers when they're striking people out (in softball that is).

Tracey put it pretty clearly the other day (in an email)when she said, it's amazing how God finds unique ways to relate to us His love and His ideas! Like for me, it's through sports or other fun things.

Oh awesome!

Also, on one last side note, I stagger when I remember how Justin put the Lord the other day with the following we've read maybe, and I could read and reflect on every waking minute:

"But on these walks (with Jesus) I make it a point to lay my cares at his feet. Sometimes he kicks them far, far way. Sometimes he pauses for a moment, looks at them, looks at me, and then picks them up and carries them himself.

Sometimes he looks at them, looks at me, and points at them. And we both bend down and grab them and I understand we will carry it together for a time. And it is always beautiful. What always happens as a result of a walk is that I stop trying to carry things myself, all alone, all trying to be in control. No.

Gotta remember, gotta remember, gotta remember to invite the Lord!..."

SO TRUE! Just remember to invite Him! Woo that's what we need to do!

I love thinking of the Lord looking at, and pointing at my troubles!

Yum! Just finished eating the best pizza in town, which is NO JOKE, Casey's homemade pizza.

Well, some jaws may drop but I just woke up from 18 hours of sleep. Seriously. 4 p.m. Sat. - 10:30 a.m. Sunday.

We went to Troy yesterday and it was full of junk food and sour skittles. Anyone ever had those? Those are so GOOD!

I think too b/c it's the end of the semester, and I FINALLY FINISHED softball and this weekend was a mini summer vaca before the real one in 2 1/2 weeks! WOOOOOOO!!

Today I guess is Sunday and I'm pumped to get more school over with!

Anyways, Troy was a good story and really played off my knowledge of just teaching The Odyssey in class last month. It didn't seem as long as it was in minutes.

It reminds me of Gladiator, but you can never figure out who's side you want to be on. B/c with Odysseus (in The Odyssey) I always saw him as the good----and he's sort of the bad.

Well, I'm going to take care of some little errands of work in the house!

"Allison...Allison...Allison" ---"Allison Krause" by The Stills

"And all You ever wanted,
Was only me, on my knees.
All that matters is You are holy." ---Nichole Nordman

Another two days of this...I can handle that!

Sleep till whenever, do whatever, just CHILL! WOO!

Except for the chill part b/c it's 90's and above in the temperature aspect.

Today I got a great little gift of cds to sample from dad! Looking forward to getting into those!

Also, Casey ordered some inflatable kayaks that arrived today. Quality, thick canvas type plastic. Used by professionals on rapids...interesting that they (the professionals) don't like the hard plastic kayaks.

Mobility and movement is my guess for that decision of theirs.

So this office is a pig sty and I will now go organize it while listening to my fresh Servant burn from a cool record purchase of dad's!

England...I am brainstorming you England! Research and word of mouth from Justin (and mom and dad's) recommendations will guide this trip. YES!

Yah! Dad and Mike blogged!

Wish I could hit some of your concerts Mike, and make sure you cut out the Sentinel's list of your venue.

Mom, I looked at our great uncle (?) Alan Clark's website. His history is pretty cool with lots of famous people and all. Excellent! Wonder what his music was like....

Tracey and I are pursuing yet another sweet event called an adventure run to be done in teams. YES!

Go here to check it out:http://havingfuninc.com/sprint%20series%20home.htm

Dad I'll be looking and responding to the USPS thing...what is it?

I'm scoping the half.com scene for Writer's Markets!

Have a great day friends and fam!

"Suha! Hey I had a friend named Suha in high school, Casey!

Hey Casey listen to my amazing pointless one sentence story about a girl named 'Suha' (Araj)."

Last night on Survivor the reunion, I'm walking thru to the kitchen and hear the announcer say, "Let's hear from Sue Hawk, everybody". "Here's Sue Hawk's story, audience, let's welcome her with a round of applause!"

Sue Hawk. Her name was Sue Hawk.

One time we were playing the normal wiffle ball homerun derby in the back of 1040. Then all the sudden we hear humongous fart noises and other odd yellings, followed by intense explosions of laughter and other jeering.

Who, and what, in the world is going on? Shrugged off, and the wiffle continued. Then more and more loud raunchy fart noises obviously made with the fore arm or a flatulent face to hand proportion.

It was our back yard neighbors, Rumsy and Suha Araj. Our first encounter with them, and our best encounter.

We were never friends with them persay, but through the years of BGHS the hilarity remained in the back our heads, and apparently still remiains in my head.

I'll bet if you see one of them on the streets of BG today (no doubt in BG like all other BGHS's, no offense of course) and you mentioned the Edwards to them, they would immediately refer back to their days of fart noise making and ridicule to our innocent wiffle ball homerun derby.

Does it get any better?: Suha, Rumsy, and the Edwards' wiffle ball team.

"That's great it starts with an earthquake ... birds, and snakes, and airplanes..."

"Monday, Monday"

Mamas and Papas.

I've decided they need to have little musical notes (along with Justin's idea of the "cent" symbol).

Only 2 more Mondays left.

Wow there are lots of roaring trucks going by with the fair this week. Can you say patience factor?

I remember seeing Matt do a cool "rippa, rippa, wah" type of DJ spinning the rap record movement right after the "MTV NEWS..."

It was always a guess whether it would be the record waht wah noise, or the guitar.

And they still use the same two things after every single MTV news report.

Well, this entry is bland. Peace!

YES!

I looked a little harder and was able to come up with the pinky pink fun!

Just still figuring out the "Contributors" part. Pretty funny that it randomly chose my name and Joan to put under it.

It think it's to profile our personal facts or background info. But Joan on mine?! Weird and funny :)

Have a great Monday everyone!

Happy Mother's Day Mom! Glad I got to chat with you a while today :)

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WHOA NEW BLOGGER SET UP!?! Okay...

So it was online all night by accident AGAIN. I was going to try to catch Matt and Tracey on the tele earlier tonight, but we ended up watching The Game with Michael Douglas and Sean Penn.

Such a good twist. Kind of long---now I know why I've fallen asleep in it twice before or some other college rememberance of that movie. You should rent it if you haven't seen it.

Well needless to say, the next few weeks of entries will be full, FULL of hype for the upcoming events! YES! WEEEEEEHOOO!!

One of the best parts of all is starting to train for my (Tracey and I's) first triathlon! To be held in San Diego, Oct. 3!

Anyone is welcome to train with us (correlatedly at each of your locales) and then meet us in S.D. for the event! WOO!

Tomorrow there is work, but it doesn't seem like it. Like, I mean I actually feel like going, b/c it's coasting in teaching the Steinbeck novel, Of Mice and Men.

Blablabla, why was that just put on my blog.

Welp! Off to watch Arrested Development and/or read No. 1 Detect. Happy May 9 to you all, and Happy Mother's Day especially to Joan and Pat Sanford, Michelle Good, Jenny Mavis...(Theresa Penny maybe)----do I know any other mother's who read this?

Justin thanks for the Evil Trocey link! Way cool, and I hope to have my $25 up from my next paycheck. That's an official pre-order count of: 1 of each (3 of them right).

Slept from 5 p.m. Friday till this morning 9:30 a.m. WOOOOO!

YES! I haven't done that in a long time and loved it.

Didn't see much of Case though. He had practice yesterday (me not), and today he has a double header to coach.

Side thoughts creeping in the blog: Bo is out of food, and the house is unorganized.

Just talked to mom and dad! Happy pre-mo's day Mom! Looking forward to Thanksgiving now! Except for there are too many other things to look forward to this summer! WOO!

The Yeah Yeah Yeah's are banging out the speakers and I will call Matt and Trace before clean!

Have a great Saturday!

posting #2 for a Thursday:

A pinnacle moment of realizing I have awkward social skills happened a couple weeks ago.

I was briskly walking through the office areas of school, one normal office, the other nearby official superintendent's office. There's Dr. White, one of the stone figurines recently removed from Medusa's cave.

"Hello, Dr. White." "How is your softball team doing?" "It's going well, we beat Dos Palos last night"

Sounds normal right.

Then she says something encouraging and yet surprisingly enthusiastic, where in turn I respond by putting my hand up for a high five.

A high five for the superintendent of our entire school district.

She responded with a stone cold pointless look of yeah right ignoring. The end.

Well, I'm flopping Friends and Extreme Home Makeover back and forth this evening. It has turned to just plain not interesting in my mind. Although Friends is quite funny tonight, and the ending of any home or person makeovers are the best.

Two things that make me cry with joy:

1. Basically any U2 song. Bono must know the Lord entirely through and through b/c His spirit (the Lord's of course) is strong in every song!

2.Seeing the overly joyed people who recieve a makeover or a home makeover.

Two things that I fear the most:

1. Circus folk
2. Cabbage

jk to the old austin powers there. Did anyone know that Michael York is sort of a reoccuring role on Gilmore Girls, WB Tuesday night drama?

Dad and Matt? He's your friend, don't tell me you've lost touch with him?

Gilmore Girls. Lots of girl talk and topics, sarcasm, and senseless analyzations. Why I like it? I don't know. At least most of my analyzations on life don't come out in word form like these ramblers----or do they! HAHAHHAHAHHAHAHA

In the mail today:

The Sundays "static and silence", Pretenders "The Singles", (a Montgomery Gentry--country cd for the country boy in this house), and a redundant Small Town Poets --unless Mike wants his copy back for memories sake..(?). I stole it, and I love it still.

Trace I knew you used to like The Sundays, and/or still do. I absolutely still love this album. Classic and predictably correlated to good, fresh open times in the young adult life!

Times where you're out of college and confused but free. Free to earn money and work your face off for it too. Times of summers off and pure travel alone, yet also with many others.

Oh! I love solitude and a good album to accompany.

And I love a good album and the multitude to enjoy it with!

It's the weekend people! Believe it!

Snow Patrol: I want full details, unless they're not good live, boohoo.

Kim, funny blog. Enjoyable!

p.s. Somehow I've blogged every day this week! YES! That's gotta be some kind of a cookie reward. Yeah it'll be a 100 Grand or a Fastbreak! Mmm...not a good vice to have: chocolate!

Ladies and dudes!

We might buy a forclosed house and fix it up, and make $80,000!

Not kidding. Well, not sure on the making $80,000 part...but it's kind of exciting. Should figure it out this week to come.

Today I had to wear a bunch of stupid eye make-up as if I were going clubbin'. They had the Miss America theme going on, and it was funny but glad that's over.

Anyways, back to the house idea. It would be totally sweet to recarpet, repaint, and make a house amazing. It potentially might be a house on Circle Drive. Apparently, a lot of well to do life long important Chowchilla people live in this neighborhood and if anything goes down the cops drop everything and get there asap.

But if not there, there are about 10 houses forclosed upon currently. Yes, there are shady things and secret stipulations to watch for, yet Casey's dad and sister are such pure professionals at this financial world.

And it would definitely make our last year more fun with redecorating excitement. YES! I can't wait to dive in on the remodeling/decorating world. And we plan to continue in this profession up in Alaska too.

The profession of buying and reselling or renting out houses: yeah that.

Here's something new: travel agent from home....hmmm. Seems overwhelming, but exciting.

This b/c I made up an itinerary for my shopping excursion in 2 weeks. I'm going to IKEA, REI, Casa de Fruta, and the Gilroy Outlet Mall! YES!

Perfectly timed against rush hours, including the essentials and moola type issues, and get this!?! I TOOK A DAY OFF OF SCHOOL! WOOOYEAH!

Well, I will now be reading my No. 1 Detective Agency book while dosing off most likely for sure.

Have a great pre weekend mindedness tomorrow!

Emo night. Lost to that team, and our team just plain stinks.

Not sure why it was so emo. It was just like pinnacle to the entire season. Not a good one. Boring sport to coach---love to play it, but no mo' coaching. 2 games left. Man.

I gave the normal, did some good things, did some bad things speech, and we all walked off the field just-- done. It was like some slow mo or soundtracked scene in a sports movie.

Maybe it was the 2 hours of 97 degrees and blazing sun in our face. Maybe it was b/c my sophomores ("team leaders") gave Gatorade to the other "arch-rival team" and I had to embarrassingly go over and say it was a mistake.

Then we put it on a table and had to share it with them to save embarrassing face.

But probubly all this b/c there's 3 Mondays left and 16 1/2 days left.

Yeah that's it. I'm ready.

So I went and shot some hoops at the gym by myself. Yeah "shot some hoop" great phrase. Great game. That shall be the only sport next year. All those years on the bench "learning the game" won't go to waste.

Trace, your ill timed emo rememberance of Encinitas added to my emo and made me happy at the same time. Cannot wait for June 6.

Justin, I'm very excited for your new apartment. Score!

Just caught the end of NBC's "10.5" earthquake movie.

Ummm.....

Today was a Monday of fastness. Don't blink.

Friday I was "purchased" as a "maid/butler" by a student I do not know. Weird. Yet, she is in the circle of people on my bball and softball team and apparently in cahoots (spelling on that?) with those children.

Word on the street is that I shall be turned into Barbie. #1 thing: straightening my hair and goin' on with the make-up.

News for them: NOT ON YOUR LIFE!

Wearing my hair down would be a complete and utter disruption to my day of teaching. Lots of hoopy la la's going crazy, not to mention the staring. Let's not go there on the "staring" thoughts that I can't deal with.

A hair change is purely a decision of mine, considering it is on my head. I certainly would not be venturing into a realm of cool, new hair ideas in correlation to teen bopper week of craze.

You know the phrase, "mi hair-a, es tu hair-a no no". Well, that is in effect here.

HA! Booya to my adulthood/teacher status giving the clue to that tomorrow morning!

Other teachers are experiencing silly costumes, uni-brow make-up workings, and other clown type make-up dealios.

Anyways, regardless of my hilarious problem with hair, it shall not be ended like so.

Tracey, and/or others who have the school calendar mindset (well is that really anyone else reading this...?) Okay then, so Tracey: this is the breaking point week!

At least for me! We have the fair next week, and then a shopping excursion the next week, and one week before exams! PEACE! THAT'S IT!

Lots of fun things to raise the stakes in the mind against the school focus. Apparently, we're reading Of Mice and Men starting tomorrow. Riiiiight.

One last thing, 99 (ninety-nine) degrees today! Kerman softball tomorrow, must defeat number 1 team and laugh about it afterwards!

Nothing to lose!

Softball stats. I figured I'd do the stats for the chicas this year. Last year's stats were half a__ done. Pretty rude, I guess.

We just watched (and own of course--cheaper than renting): Dickie Roberts. It was cheesy but some good one liners. I burst out in a "one chuckle" about 5 or more times. If I was a movie teacher, or movie critic like other fam friends, it'd be a C- or lower.

Thirteen Days was also purchased, after paying a SolCom II rental late fee from when mom and dad were here. Yeah, Matt, Case loved it and had to rent it and tried to beat it. Said he was close to winning it...sure, sure.

On the other hand, we have a new PS2 golf game (purchased last month) that I finally played. Normal, cartooning, reminding me of Mario Golf, but of course not comparable. It's actually a really nice, easy (or as hard as you want) game to play.

I only shoot about 18 over each round. HA!

Makes me want to play real golf. Yeah. I like sports. Always.

I was just thinking how dumb it is that more people I know don't have blogs. I'm proud of Kim and Jenny for doing this. It's great to keep up with you guys!

Well, back to the stats. It's another well earned lazy weekend. Oh and p.s. we've won our last two softball games. Good league victories (currently 6-18, 5-4 in the league) OUCH!

"This memory of you holds more
Than a photograph.
It’s much more than a book of
Old pictures locked away
Without a name."

"Crutch" by Pinback