Blog Stalk Friday

Happy September everyone.  I guess.  I have a lot to say, but I'm to lazy to write it.  (Seems like that happens a lot doesn't it?)  So I'll just be linking up over at Rockin Mama's for Blog Stalk Friday.  Check it out.

WTF Wednesday

So I'm sure that I'm not the only one that thinks of a billion things every day to blog about and then you forget about all of them when you're actually in front of the computer.  And believe me, working at a high school, there's a lot of potential blog material!  Today, I can actually remember something.

First, let me just say, today I saw a history teacher teaching about the 13 original colonies, and he/she spelled Connecticut wrong.  (She left out the middle c) and then he/she spelled Williams wrong (left out the second i) was kind of surprised, just because I think he/she's been teaching for probably at least like 15 years, and you would think that those words would pop up enough over 15 years in U.S. History and Government classes that you could spell them.  And he/she teaches English, so you know, spelling and stuff.....

So the other thing that I'm like WTF?! at, is what's going on in Georgia with education.  I don't remember all the details, but there are a bunch of educators being accused of cheating on state tests.  We're not talking students here, we're talking teachers and principals.  So far, 82 of them have confessed.  Some people are even saying that teachers would have parties where they would get together and change answers on students' tests so that they would score better.  One principal retired after accusations of ordering his teachers to do so.

Why are they doing this?

Because according to No Child Left Behind, all schools need to have 100% of their students testing at a proficient level by 2015 or the school will get shut down.  (Don't go crazy if I'm getting facts wrong, I'm not claiming to be an expert on this, I'm just stating what I remember from hearing on the news.)

Also, the amount of government funding a school receives, are based on test scores.  A large majority of the educators being accused of this cheating, work for districts in some of the poorest parts of Atlanta.  Obviously, these schools aren't going to have a ton of money to work with, and they're not getting a lot of help from funding because of test scores.

This same thing is going on in several other states.

Obviously, there's a huge problem here.  I take that back, there are SEVERAL huge problems here.  Now, I'm already not a huge fan of standardized testing anyways, but that's a whole other rant for another day, but I have some questions about these problems.
1-What is going on in the classroom that makes it so the students are not able to perform 'proficiently'. (The way the teachers are teaching? Not having the funding to get the resources needed to learn? Is attendance maybe an issue there?)
2-Why do kids that are maybe not as smart as other (kids below 'proficient') deserve any less funding than the ones that are testing proficient or above? (Um.....isn't this where the whole 'all men created equal' thing comes in?  Oh, wait, most of our country doesn't believe in that anymore.)
3-Okay, so the teachers are trying to get funding and not get their schools shut down and keep their jobs, but really?  Cheating???  What's THAT teaching your students?  Cheating on a state test is a federal offense and so by cheating, they're putting themselves in danger of a conviction and jail time.  How's that for losing your job?(And probably your teaching license)

Alright, I just had to get the off my chest.  Happier blog coming soon.

Oh, P.S. I need $2000 by the end of September and I'm more than willing to accept donations *wink*.  More to come on that bull shit soon.  Or in a couple months.  I don't really know yet.

Kickin' It Old School

So the other day Cangrejo and I went to my Grama's house to help her clean her garage.  We're kind of using it as storage for the stuff we don't have room for/don't need while we're living in my parents basement, so we figure it's only fair that we keep our shit organized.  So Grama and I started going through pictures :)  I love me some old pictures.  I don't know why but I love hearing stories about 'the olden days' and about when my Grama was little and stuff like that.  I'm a sucker for that shit.  ANYWAY we found some pretty darn interesting pictures.

This is a baby picture of MY MAMA!  It looks like Isabel's long lost twin, right?!

Here's the pic a little bit closer

 You can't see the little kids faces really, but it's my Grama Bonnie, her brother (can't remember his name) and her sister Mae sitting on the car that her family had in front of the house that they lived in during the depression.  This is somewhere in Colorado.

And what kind of post would this be without a picture of ME!  This is me (about a year old I think) with my brothers Mike (in the back) and Vic (next to me).  I think Vic would have been about 14 in this picture and Mike was 13.  Their sweaters are fabulous.  So are their glasses.  Let me tell you how different my 2 older brothers are!  There's an endless list of their differences, for example, Mike would probably KILL ME if he knew I was putting this on the internet for the world to see ;)  Vic probably wouldn't care.  But they love me (they show it in COMPLETELY different ways) appx 2-3 years after this picture was taken they bought me my first bike :)  It was purple and white with flowers.

Photo time!

This post came out longer than expected.  I probably should have split it into 2 posts, but I'm feeling abnoxious sooo.......here we go.

So I realize I never posted anything about Jenny's quinceñera.....probably because like, 3 days after we took of for Colorado and then ended up in Texas for a while.  SO I don't really feel like writing a bunch about something that happened so long ago, but I'm going to post some pictures because, um, hi, we looked fabulous.

My beautiful babies ♥

I realize I'm standing funny but, like I said, fabulous. . . . .except for the weird tan lines.

This is Jenny's brother and Cangrejo's friend from El Salvador..........okay, and my ex, but we won't get into that today.

Sha-zam!

Last week we drove 3 hours to go to a family picnic with my grama at the assisted living place that she lives at.  We took pictures.

Due to the attractiveness of this photo, I've decided to take up cigar smoking.  Or even just letting an unlit one hanging out of my mouth.  I think it will be cheaper that way.

And then Isabel started being all sorts of adorable.

And playing peek-a-boo.

And some other cute stuff.

And some more.

Awww hugging her daddy ♥

And they fell asleep on the way home :)

Big smiles :)

Oh, and my dad gave Cangrejo Twizzler titties when he fell asleep hahaha.

Love Me

Oh, heyyyy!  I didn't tell you all last night that I joined Twitter!  Find me, follow me, love me here.  I used to have one, and then I never used it.  But I think I'll use this one.   

AND 

I dyed my hair black.....

This is before.....

And AFTER!  Sha-zam!

Yeah.  I did my eyebrows too that's why my skin looks purpleish because this picture was taken like RIGHT AFTER I washed that junk out.  But a person CANNOT have black hair and blonde eyebrows.  The end.

P.S.......Look at my cute baby.

She's hood.  And she's FINALLY a walking machine!

There's a first time for everything!!!!

Okay, people, let's get down to business!


......................


I GOT MY FIRST BLOG AWARD!!!  Um, yeah, kind of excited about it.  Special thanks to Destiny over at ★Rockin' Mama★ for giving me my FIRST BLOG AWARD EVER!!!

People, I'm kind of a nerd, and I love awards, and it's been a while since I got any kind of one.  So, you know, freak out...and whatever.  I for real did a happy dance when I found out and my husband considered divorce..

Ta-daa!!!!  The Versatile Blogger Award.  BIG SMILES!

The Rules after accepting the Versatile Blogger Award are:

• Thank the person who gave you the award & link back to them in your post.

• Share 7 things about yourself.

• Pass this award along to 15 recently discovered blogs.

So here are 7 things about myself:

1 - I failed Spanish class in 6th grade, and now I would say that I am proficient in the language.

2 - I got an award in a Dutch Oven Cook-Off when I was 12 for an amazing Apple Cobbler.

3 - My first job was when I was 15 and it was at a chocolate factory.  Best. Job. Ever.

4 - If I had someone to cut out patterns and material for me, I could design, pin, and sew all day long.

5 - One time, I ate 16 roasted marshmallows in about 3 hours.  Half of them were in the form of s'mores, and I didn't get sick to my stomach.

6 - From about 7th to 11th grade I went through what I like to call my 'Punk' stage.  My entire wardrobe was 

black, I wore a spiked belt, and I played the drums in a shitty band.

7 - In 6th grade I sold pictures of my older brother for money because all of my friends thought he looked like Josh Hartnett.

Ezzy Languzzi

La Cabrona

Life in the Pitts

Mexico Mommy

Notes From Sandrah

Sara's Organized Chaos

Canadian Chica in Cancun

Absolutely Narcissism

I realize I only did 8.....whoops.  Here's the thing, I don't follow like, TONS of blogs, and a bunch of them I follow have already received this award.

Blog Swap!

Okay so I'm participating in a blog swap over at 20Something Bloggers and I got this cool swap buddy named Amanda.  I think she rocks because she loves Harry Potter and she lives in New York.  So read her entry and check her out!!! (Oh and I'll post the link to my post over at her blog when it's up.....I haven't e-mailed it to her yet...)  *Here's the link for my post over on her blog*

Ladies and Gentlemen, without further ado, I present to you, Amanda Lucci!

Hi! I'm Amanda (www.amandalucci.com), and as part of 20Something Bloggers' blog swap I'm infiltrating Josie's blog today. 20SB asked us to write about our summer, and I can't think of any summer in my life that changed me more than this one. 

As a journalist, I had always dreamed of moving to New York City after college and starting a fabulous career, but up until literally two weeks before graduation I thought my dream would have to wait. I applied for, I kid you not, like 100 different jobs and internships. With this economy the way it is, let me tell you from experience that the people on the news aren't kidding when they say the job market sucks. It's really, really bad out there. Luckily, the stars aligned and pigs flew and just as I was about to accept defeat, I was offered an internship at a Manhattan-based startup.

So, two days after graduation, I boarded an early-morning flight to La Guardia. I'll admit, I was terrified. I was planning on living with my boyfriend, but with my last minute moving plans we had not solidified a living situation. We ended up living like vagabonds for the first two weeks — I crashed in a friend's vacant bunk at NYU, apartment-sat for a former coworker in Williamsburg and met some interesting insects at a hole-in-the-wall hotel in Chinatown. We eventually decided to sublease from a schoolteacher in Bedford-Stuyvesant, which is not exactly the most thriving neighborhood in Brooklyn (let me put it this way:Jay-Z grew up in the projects two blocks away from us).

We've now been living in New York for almost two months, and though it hasn't exactly been the glamorous city life Carrie Bradshaw made me think I was going to have — think lots of nights spent building rat traps and coming up with 100 different ways to make chicken stir-fry — I can't imagine spending my summer any other way.

I did experience a lot of new and interesting things. I appeased my inner nerd at all the fabulous art museums, saw a Broadway musical and celebrated the legalization of same-sex marriage from one of the most historic places in the LGBT movement. I'm also seeing some of my favorite musicians in concert, eating at great restaurants and doing a lot of shopping — my wallet is shrinking, but my to-do list is still bigger than ever!

This is the first fall since my toddlerhood that I won't be going back to school, so I decided there's no reason to leave the city just yet when there's so much more I want to explore. I went ahead and signed a one-year lease on a fantastic apartment in a much younger, livelier part of Brooklyn, and am working on getting set up at my next internship. A lot of people told me in the beginning that I was crazy to just hop on a plane with no real plan, but I found that the best way to learn was by making mistakes and having no choice but to fix them. Moving to New York on two weeks notice was the biggest, craziest, most exciting thing I've ever done, and I am thankful every day that I took the chance. Like they say, if you can make it here, you can make it anywhere. I might not know what exactly the future holds for me yet, but I do know where I want to be, and I'm willing to live out of a suitcase, get spider bites and live paycheck-to-paycheck until I get it.

Did you have an awe-inspiring, life-affirming, mess-making and/or lesson-learning experience this summer? I'd love to hear about it.. visit me at amandalucci.com or talk to me at @alucci on Twitter :)