The Three Best Things About Being A Teacher

Well, I'm back. And I can't say that I've missed it, but the nice thing is that it seems to get easier each time I do it. Oh yeah that something that causes me to sparkle and shine and drag my weary bones out of bed is the ongoing, everloving, death-defying start to creep back to school. Last week when I was back in Colorado, I was in a Safeway with my seventeen year old niece. I paused only briefly to note the stacks of looseleaf binder paper and spiral notebooks behind a hastily arranged "Back To School Savings" display.
It's still July, people. Nevertheless, I feel compelled to help dispel the myth that all teachers race out to their catamaran after the sixth of June and drink themselves into a stupor until August 30th. The party didn't start for me until after I had taught three weeks of summer school, which took me into the second week of July. Then I had to return for training July 31. I am currently enrolled in the Advanced II section of Mastery in the art of teaching reading. I am told that next year I will further my Mastery in the Advanced III section. The following year should put us right about in line with another textbook adoption, so we'll all get to start learning a brand new curriculum then.
For now I'll be spending the week at the Hilton, loading up on the buffet and reveling in the massive amount of air conditioning they make available. Today I got to see one of my fellow teachers draw a ferret (or was it a dog? maybe a cat) to explain the importance of Consonant Digraphs. Or something like that. Now that's what I call a party!