Anyone want to be KIND?

So, one of the very, very best books I’ve ever read is “Wonder” by R.J. Palacio. I read it several years ago, and I instantly fell in love with it.  In November, a Wonder movie is being released. I’m terrified!  I love books but most often, when they turn them into movies, they mess them up.  I have TWO signs that say “The book is always better.”  I have high hopes, as it seems to have a great cast, but I’m still worried.
My library bulletin boards this year are  Wonder-themed. I chose blue paper for the background, as the Wonder books are a unique blue color. I’ve actually had students come to the circulation desk and ask for “the blue book.”  My board says “It’s going to be a WONDER-ful year” and has a place for a precept from Mr. Browne, who is a character in the book, a precept from me and a precept from my principal.  I hope it works!

R.J. Palacio has also written a book for younger students called “We’re  All Wonders.”  It is really good too! I already bought a copy for myself that is going to end up in my media center. . .

Wonder is all about being kind.  The first precept that Mr. Browne shares with his class is this: 

“When given the choice between being right or being kind, choose kind. - Dr.  Wayne W. Dyer”

I hate being wrong. I hate it with a passion – it’s part of what makes me a bad loser when I play games.  I want to make it my goal to always choose kindness instead of right. I think the world would be a lot better if we all did that.
I have two copies of Wonder in my media center – one on the middle school side and one in the 3rd to 5th grade section.   I’m going to make this book a big deal, so  I'd like to have a few more copies.  I’d also like a few more copies of  “We’re All Wonders.”    I have seen copies of Wonder on sale at Walmart, Books a Million and of course, Amazon.com.  If I had an unlimited budget, I’d buy a copy for every teacher at my school to add to their classroom library – but I don’t have an unlimited budget.   Would you like to be kind? How about buying a book for our media center?  I know a LOT of people who do LOTs of good for LOTS of people. If any of you could spare roughly $10.00, I could have plenty!
If anybody is interested and would like to buy a book for our library, our school address is 1775 Sand Mine Road, Davenport, FL 33897.  You could have it shipped directly to us!  I have cute little stickers that say “This book was donated to the  Citrus Ridge Media Center by our friend ________________.”  You could be part of our school’s history!  I’ll even put you on our “Friends of the Library” list!
In a perfect world., media centers would always have enough books.  We don’t live in a perfect world, but maybe we can make it a world that is a little more kind!
(If you happen to be a member at www.firstbook.org (which is free and you should be if you ever buy books for children) you can get it for $6.20

I take it back, sort of. . .

A while ago, I wrote a post about my feelings about stick people and stick families on cars.  You can read that here, in case you missed the joy of that post.

http://jim-merson.blogspot.com/2017/02/you-know-youve-seen-them.html

This week, I’ve been in Daytona for a church conference. (Brace yourself, there’s more about that coming too!) Right before I left, I got a surprise package in the mail. It was from my friends, the Everharts. Dr. E was my professor at FSU, her husband Harry is a retired school teacher and now, we’re friends.  Inside I found this:

I have to say this may be one of the cutest things I’ve ever seen. I know what I said, but. . I may just have to put this one

on my car.  And look, that could be my Bubba-cat on there too!  Isn’t she just absolutely adorable? I love her! 

It makes me laugh every time I see it!

I’m back. . .

For several years I used Windows Live Writer to write my blog posts. It was easy-peasy, lemon-squeezy. But a while ago, Windows Live Writer quit working, it wouldn’t send my posts to my blog. I could still do it, it just took some extra steps. I miss my blog. I like ranting and raving like a lunatic.  So, since it’s summer and I have a little more time than during the school year, I have been looking for some replacement.  I found it – OpenLiveWriter. It’s open-source, which makes me happy. It looks like Windows Live Writer used to, which I like.  (It may be the exact same thing, which I don’t care, really where it comes from.) This is my test to see how well it works. If it works like I hope it will, brace yourself. I’ve got LOTS of stuff rolling around in my head.

If You Give a Curvy Girl Curly Fries. . .

If you give a curvy (feel free to read that as fat) girl curly fries. . .

                She’s going to eat them. She will also eat the broccoli, because it’s good for her, but she’s going to eat the curly fries.  Then, she may ask the server for cheese sauce for the curly fries.

                After she eats the curly fries with cheese, she’s going to feel guilty, so her friend will talk her into a bicycle ride.  She will try to ride the stationary bicycle and watch her friend on the elliptical, all while trying not to gossip. (Although this fat girl may begin to wonder how it is she even has a friend who can ride? Use?  Whatever the word is for what someone does on an elliptical. Honestly, most of her friends prefer cake.)  After she rides the bicycle for 5 miles, she will feel like her legs are jelly and she will be all sweaty. . .

She will hobble back to her room covered in sweat. Because she’s so sweaty, she will need a shower.  After she takes a shower, she will be exhausted, because she didn’t sleep well for the last two nights. So, she’ll try to take a nap. Because her hair is wet from the shower, it will get flat and dry funny because she’s lying on it.  She will get up, and have weird hair from both the attempted nap and because she has ridiculous baby fine hair that won’t do anything when it’s freshly washed anyway. . She will try and fix the weird hair, by wetting it and trying to dry it properly.  It won’t work.

Because she rode the bicycle and attempted to take a nap, she won’t have time for dinner.  She will go to her meeting with weird hair and feel strange the whole time. She will go to dinner after the meeting with her friends, still feeling strange about her hair. It will be late, so they will have to eat at the IHOP.  She will want pancakes, because DUH it’s IHOP. She will eat half of her best friend’s pancakes, which will make her feel guilty and think about a bicycle ride. . . 

You know you’ve seen them. . .

I know you’ve seen them. I don’t know how you feel about them, but I know you’ve seen them.  I don’t like them.  There, I said it. I don’t understand them and I don’t like them at all.  I don’t hate them with a white, hot burning hate, but I just don’t like them. It’s none of my business if you want one, but I don’t even like looking at them.
What, you may ask, are these items of my distaste? Think about it. You’re driving down the road and all of a sudden on the vehicle (read mini-van) in front of you, appears a family.  A stick family on a car.

 One day, I was with a bunch of ladies from church and I’m not lying, the entire back of the van was COVERED with stick people. It must have been grandchildren.  They were EVERYWHERE on the back of that minivan. 
There are all kinds of stick families. Superheroes.  Zombies. Families with Disney ears. Feet. Flip flops.  People with hobbies – golfing dads, soccer playing kids, cheerleaders. . . You can find any kind of stick family you want.

If I were forced at gunpoint to pick one, I’d pick this one:

 This one makes me laugh.

I saw this one the other day:

But, I think my all time favorite is this one:

 And then there’s this:

I bet I could really find this one in Polk County!

For some reason, the stick families just creep me out.  I get it, it’s not really my business. You may not like my JoyFM sticker or my AWANA “Kids Matter to God” sticker but hey, that’s my thing. Your stick family may be your thing.   But, every time I see one, I cringe!

This one made me snort:

Thankful to be. . . “Library Girl”

    The other day at school one of our kindergarteners couldn’t remember my name. He said “Hey, hey, hi, hi Ms. . . Miss. .  . Ms. .  Hi Library Girl!”  I laughed and laughed  and then laughed some more.  I love that!  I started to wonder and think about how I went from the Social Studies teacher to Library Girl. . .
     Have you ever wondered what would have happened if you’d gone left instead of right?  Or asked that question? Or taken that chance? I have been reminded lately of the best decision I ever made.  When I make a list of the things I am thankful for, this is near the top of my list.
     Raise your hand if you know I have a Master’s degree in Library and Information Science from Florida State University!  I thought so. . . Most people who know me know that!
     But here is what some of you DON”T know:  Two professors at FSU got a brilliant idea to transform classroom teachers into school media specialists.  They wrote a plan and  got a HUGE amount of financial help from the Laura Bush Foundation to turn that idea into reality.  Doctors  Eliza Dresang and Nancy Everhart created this whole thing called Project LEAD, and that’s how I got my degree.
     Way back in 2006, somehow I got an email from our district media services person. There was a meeting about this brand new program that would help teachers become school media specialists. There were going to be six spots in our county – and a meeting on September 11, 2006.   That was my fork in the road – and the choice I made has literally changed my life. I went to that meeting, met Dr. D and Dr. E and the rest, as they say, is history.
     We started class in January 2007.  It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done.  Looking back those  2 1/2 years just sort of seem like a big blur. I learned so much more than I ever thought I needed to learn,  and was stretched so far out of my comfort zone.  Part of that time included my 6 week trip to London in the summer of 2008,  an absolutely fabulous trip, but again, way out of my comfort zone. I could count on one hand the times I’d been in a different STATE than my family, but to be in a completely different CONTINENT?  For 6 weeks?  I’d spent TWO nights in my life EVER in a hotel room alone.   It was hard, but it was good!
     Here’s the most surprising thing.  Somehow, along the way, my professor, Dr. Everhart, along with her husband Harry, turned into my friends.  I’m not sure how or when it happened – it may have been the 6 weeks in London.  Maybe the time we were both got carsick on the bus on the way to Stratford –on-Avon was the bond.  (I’m not sure but I think throwing up together may do it! )  I know  she moved to the “One of My Most Favorite People Ever List”  – when she found grits for me in London! I know it sounds silly, but I’m a Southern girl and I missed my grits!
     Oh and her husband, Harry? We just clicked. We talked about middle schoolers and there was just a connection there!  I read his blog (and so should you – it’s great – (http://everhart.blogspot.com/)
Since our graduation, we’ve seen each other here and there,  off and on. We’ve had dinner together a few times when they were in the area. I was looking at my old emails and when I got the media specialist job at my old school – I sent Harry an email. When I got my new job at my new school this year, I sent Harry an email!   For years, they have invited me to their home to visit Tallahassee.  So, finally I decided to take them up on it and headed north on November 10th.  had a fabulous weekend – but  that’s a story for another day!

     Here’s the thing. . . I can’t even imagine what my life would be like now if I hadn’t attended that meeting on September 11, 2006.  If I’d decided the GRE was just too hard, or I didn’t want to write that essay, what I would have missed. Today is Thanksgiving – and we think about the things we’re grateful for. I’m grateful that Dr. D and Dr. E had an idea. I’m grateful the Laura Bush Foundation funded that idea. I’m grateful that I could get my degree while I was still working, grateful we could do class in our pajamas at home.   I’m grateful for the friends I made along the way – the other girls in my county, the other Project LEAD people, for Dr. E and Harry. I’m so, so grateful for the opportunity I was given. I’m thankful that because of that, I get to be “Library Girl!”

A Magical, Mystery Place, right here in Florida. . .

Apparently, there’s a magical place right here in our state that very few people know about. But I’m going to share it with you.  What is this wonderful place?  The Florida School Book Depository!!  If you Google it, you can find this picture:

What is the Florida School Book Depository? Who really knows? Here is what I do know. . .
All textbooks in the state of Florida apparently come from the FSBD.  I have no idea how the books get there, or how big it is or how many people work there.  I really don’t know much, but I have very strong feelings about that place.
Here is what I think happens there. They (whoever “they” are) receive an order from the Polk County School Board. Apparently, it’s split up by school, with all sorts of rules – you can’t deliver on Fridays, this is how many, blah, blah, blah.  So, somehow there’s an order placed and “they” get ready to fill it.  When I say “filling the order” here’s what I mean. Someone (or maybe it’s robots, I have no idea) picks the books for my school off a shelf.  Then, they pack them on a pallet. But, before the pallet is packed, all of the boxes are thrown into a big, huge pile somewhere on or near a giant pile of dirt. They roll the boxes around in the dirt for a while, and then they put them on a pallet.  But, when they pack it, they put all the pallets they are going to pack the order on to, and put one of each kind of box on each pallet because, God forbid, we end up with two boxes of the same kind of material anywhere NEAR each other. 
Now, the packing must be some kind of big Jenga game.  Instead of little blocks of wood, they use boxes of textbooks.  I think there must be several  rules to this game: first, no two boxes of the same thing can be next to each other.   Next rule, they have to stop occasionally and throw even more dirt onto the boxes.  Last rule, they get bonus points for having all the labels on the inside of the pallet, so that no one can tell what’s actually in the boxes without unpacking the entire pallet.
Finally, when all of the pallets are packed, making sure to follow all the rules, they wrap the pallets in GIANT Saran wrap.  This must be super, duper Saran wrap, or maybe it’s the industrial strength Press and Seal.
Last, but not least, just for fun, they pack “Mixed Title” boxes.  These involve throwing a few lonely items from each kind of book into a box.  And again, if there are 4 Mixed Title boxes and there are 8 copies of a book, they put two in each box, instead of all 8 in one box.  Again, even Mixed Title boxes must be covered in the obligatory layer of dirt.  And these must always be placed on the very inside, very bottom layer of a pallet, so that just when someone thinks they are done with one book, SURPRISE – there’s ONE more in a Mixed Title box, buried under 22 workbooks of an entirely different grade and maybe even a different subject.

I really don’t know what goes on at the Florida School Book Depository.  I do know that I was so dirty the other day after digging around in some of my 12 pallets of Reading materials that I blew dirt out of  my nose later in the day. When I washed my hands, I made mud.  One of the men who is building our school walked past me and he was cleaner than I was. (And that is not an exaggeration.) 

I’m sure the people who work at the FSBD are very nice.  I’m sure they are loved by their mamas, daddies, spouses and children.  However, they are NOT on my Christmas card list. In fact, every time I think about it, I hear this song in my head:

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZQVSxXTCjg