Day off

I had today off--end of the trimester holiday. This is so wonderful. I needed the time to clean and rejuvenate. I spent the morning doing laundry and going up and down the stairs to the dryer in the other building--our dryer died about a month ago and we're just hanging on until we move into the new place. Luckily the owners are leaving the washer and dryer. I also swept and mopped the floors and did my federal taxes.

13 more weeks. I wasn't going to count the days, but when I was setting up my grade book, it told me that the third term has 64 days in it. That's not so bad, right?

Going to make a decision and order envelopes and a stamp today. We can now make the stamp with our new address, which is great!

Offer accepted!

The sellers accepted the $1800 although they are withdrawing their promise to pay home warranty. Fine with us, and we probably won't buy the warranty ourselves. You have to have at least a $500 repair to make it worthwhile, and with a new furnace and water heater, we are unlikely to have such a costly repair within the first year. They also got the gas leak fixed yesterday. We signed the acceptance and will send it today. Hooray!

I chewed out my kids yesterday for talking too much. I have a list of parents to call about their childrens' talking habits in my class.

Grades are due tomorrow at noon, and then we have a 3-day weekend before we start the next trimester. I will be SO glad to have the break. I need to get back to working on invitations--that 8-week deadline is looming closer than I think. To send things out early enough, they probably need to be sent by May 1st. Yikes!

14...and inspection

14 more weeks.

Kids are bugging me. I need to start calling some parents.

We had the inspection yesterday. A few major things...

• there is a leak in the gas line (in the storage shed) that leads to the gas fireplace. This must be fixed immediately.
• the water heater and furnace are OLD (the furnace is the original 1977) and are ready to go.

So we are asking them to fix the gas leak and give us an extra $1800 to help defray costs of new water heater/furnace. We would be perfectly happy with $1500 so maybe they will offer a bit less and then we can negotiate.

Various and sundry

Have you ever seen the word sundry without the word various?

But I digress.

-Condo inspection is on Monday. Hopefully everything is okay (or only minor) and we can proceed.
-Wax model of my ring is done, I saw it on Tuesday. With a few minor alterations, it will look great.
-Something is in the water this week. All over the school, the kids are going insane. The office has been overloaded with referrals and bad behavior. Is it a full moon or what? I was trying to find out but gave up because it was taking too long.
-Alcohol is good. I wanted to have a drink last night before D got home, so... I found a recipe with wine in it. Then I had to open a bottle, and what's a glass while cooking? Julia Child did it all the time! So, dinner was almost ready when he got home from playing badminton with a friend, and that worked out well. I like cooking, especially when I get to play Julia. :-)

15

I did my ceremonial changing of the Post-It next to my desk this morning. 15, ladies and gentlemen. That's five times three. Three times five. We had a blissful half-day of school today, which is why I have a minute to sit down and write this post. I did send one kid to the office though, just because he was getting on my nerves and has been for the past few weeks. I had just had it with his constant low-level misbehavior.

I can't believe we're almost done with second trimester. Grades are due next week Friday. I hope my kids get off their butts and get some work in, because some of their grades are really bad.

So excited about the condo...inspection should be happening soon.

We got it!

Well, we met with the realtor to put in our offer last night, and it was accepted less than two hours later. The couple even offered to leave the large (possibly attached to the wall?) computer desk in one of the bedrooms. We offered full asking price but are asking the sellers to pay $2500 in closing costs and a 1-year home warranty. This means that our loan is still for the full price but we won't have to come up with as much money at closing time (hooray...more money to actually furnish the place!) We're going to be homeowners!! Now we just need to make friends with the neighbors so that we can be on Trading Spaces. We close April 15th, so we will have some time to move out of here without too much rush. The realtor is arranging for the inspection to happen and now we need to call our insurance to get a binder that shows they will insure us.

Went to Red Lobster last night to celebrate (well, that and Valentine's Day). So tasty. I am so excited!!

The details

The place has 3 bedrooms, 2 full baths and laundry hookups (they are leaving the washer and dryer!) as well as an eat-in kitchen AND separate dining area. The kitchen is rather small, but I have dreams of expanding it into the eating area. The master bedroom has 2 large closets (thank God! after almost 3 years of sharing one tiny closet, we can finally have some space) and the large master bath has a nice long vanity top that looks like it was made for two sinks, though there is currently only one sink. The two other bedrooms are a decent size--certainly big enough for a study and a study/guest room. The dining area/living room runs almost the length of the building and just makes the place feel huge. There is a woodburning fireplace, done in red brick (I'm just itching to paint it, though) and something must be done about the brass on the dining room light. But the things I don't like are cosmetic, and it has good bones. The subflooring was replaced in 2003 and I'm guessing that's how old the carpet is, because it looks great. The place is just really well maintained in general. The building itself only has 3 condos in it, so we basically have the entire top floor. No shared walls, just people living below us. This is good too, because at 4:45 this morning the baby who lives in an apartment near us woke me up. Not sure what we're going to do with all this space, but I'm sure we'll find a way to fill it up. We are meeting with the realtor tonight after school to put together our offer.

I'm so glad it's Friday. The kids are driving me insane this week. I've been sleepy and irritable, and they can't seem to be quiet and listen for more than about 30 seconds.

Condo shopping

D and I drove around Saturday and looked at the outsides of a bunch of places that the realtor sent us. We found two we liked and wanted to see the inside. So we met her Monday after school and saw the places. One was a townhouse style, we really liked the outside but the inside felt cramped and the bedrooms were really small. The other was a top-floor condo...we are going to make an offer. It's almost 1700 square feet and really nice. 2-car garage, balcony running the length of the place except for a storage shed that is behind the fireplace. More later.

Rant

All my children are giving me headaches.

Okay, not really. Just the bad ones.

I am so exhausted. D is in LA until tonight and I have been going to bed too late, so I am tired. I am sitting at my desk drinking some crappy instant cappuccino so that I will have enough caffeine in my system to make the drive home.

I'm so tired of kids acting like idiots. I told a kid to spit out his gum today and either he didn't spit it out or he got a new piece, but I had to tell him again. It was ridiculous.

The other thing I'm tired of is being lied to, and kids not taking responsibility for their actions. Bald-faced lies, day in and day out. The most common one is "I didn't do anything!" It's reflexive for some kids. It drives me insane. I can see a kid talking and the first thing out of their mouth when I call them on it is "I wasn't talking!" My usual response is "when your mouth is moving and sound is coming out, that is called talking." Just admit it and move on, damn it!!! Do they really think that claiming they didn't do anything is going to get them out of punishment?

I'm getting better at shutting kids down and not arguing with them. That's a difficult skill...you have to realize that they are not having a rational conversation with you, most of them are just trying to talk their way out of punishment.

I feel like the police too often lately. I hate that. I get the feeling that on a good day, about half my kids are actually listening to what I am saying.

The thing that drives me MOST insane is when all I see is the end of an argument between two students. Like I see one hit the other. Then the other claims that the first started it, etc...I have just started punishing both offenders because more than likely they were both involved. I hate playing referee, and I really hate the "he started it" game. And this is mostly with boys. Girls, I'm sure, are much more catty and backstabbing when they fight.