Just another post where I talk about boring things, post weird pictures of myself, and maybe piss off people with my perhaps over simplistic take on Christianity and on politics.
Lexi was sick all weekend. She's doing much better, but still not up to going to school, so we're home. I tried Zofran for Lexi for the first time, and I'm not sure if I liked that. Her doctor always gives me a prescription for it, and last week when I was in I was telling her that Lexi had gotten really sick a while back and her doctor was like, "And you handled that on your own?" And it didn't sound like a compliment. She was like, she probably could have used some IV fluids. Yeah, whatever, suck it, I handled it. I know everyone loves Primary (or as her doctor calls it, Children's) but I have had some less-than-stellar experiences there. I hate calling the after hours diabetes nurse hotline up there, which is what you're supposed to do, and I refuse to call it anymore. I can figure it out on my own. If I can't, I will come in to the ER. Anywayyyy, so I tried the Zofran, and basically it made her stop throwing up... but she still heaved and gagged. For about 24 hours. So I mean, it helped her to not get dehydrated or whatever, but she was still miserable until the next day when she could finally throw up again. Anywayyyyyy.... no one cares. But sometimes I just feel like writing about things.
I wish Brittney would ditch her stupid internship (it really, really is stupid) and come home, bearing a delicious lunch.
Two weekends ago we had a debate tournament at Ogden High. What a beautiful school! We didn't do spectacularly, but we did OK. It was the novices' first tournament debating against JVs, so the competition stepped up a notch. We (the former coach at my school and I) are hosting a tournament the first weekend in December, and that is quite the undertaking. We host one of the biggest tournaments in the state, and it's talked about and looked forward to all year. Other tournaments are compared to it. It's crazy and it's exhausting and it's fun. And it's just a wee bit of pressure to live up to the reputation, but since I have help from the expert, it will be fine. In fact, that was one of my requirements if I took over the job... he had to help me host this tournament because I wasn't going to be the coach that killed it. We only have 2 tournaments this whole month because one was rescheduled and nothing else worked out in its place, and I was feeling a bit guilty about that, but now I think it was a good thing. Give them a little calm before the storm, because things gear up again in December and go pretty strong for a few months.
One of the joys of teaching Honors: We are reading Julius Caesar, and one of the characters made a joke, and kids in my 6th period actually laughed! Without me explaining that they were supposed to! It was beautiful.
So here's something weird... I woke up a few mornings ago with scratches on my neck that I have no idea where they came from. It was really... unsettling. I didn't feel them at all. I first knew they were there when I took off my bathrobe and saw them. When I touched them they stung. I tried to figure out if maybe I had done it in the shower somehow... but how would I scratch myself in that pattern, and how would I not feel it? I thought maybe I did it while blow drying my hair... like maybe the brush scraped me? But I was wearing my thick terrycloth bathrobe which has a collar, so that's two layers of terrycloth right there.
Really weird. It's hard to tell from the pictures, but they were bright red. Honestly, the first thing I thought is that my house is haunted by evil spirits and that I need an exorcist. If it happens again, I'm moving.
Something I've been thinking about for a while... I guess I've been thinking a lot lately about what it means to be a Christian, or rather, if it really means anything anymore. How many people now days are actually followers of Christ's teachings? Not nearly as many as claim to be Christians. I'm not a religious person, so I'm not an expert, but I do know something about Christ. And I listen to people every day who identify themselves as Christians say things that Christ would never condone. And do things that He would not condone. And hold beliefs that are in direct opposition to what He taught. And I just wonder... what does it even mean anymore to be a Christian? I think it's almost more a political ideology than it is a religion or a follower of a set of teachings. Sometimes when people who I know to identify themselves as Christian talk about shunning certain groups of people, or mock the poor, or treat others with condescension and disrespect, or justify lying and cheating and being less than honest in business, I just want to quote The Princess Bride... You keep saying that word [Christian]. I don't think it means what you think it means. I mean, I know that nobody's perfect. I'm saying that I think there is a large population of people who don't spend a whole lot of time thinking about what Christ taught and what He stood for and then trying to model their lives after that as His followers. Like, at all.
On a somewhat related note, I'm baffled by people who support things that are not in their own best interests... and then are shocked by the outcome. I have spent so many lunch hours talking to teachers who are die hard Republicans who lament the anti-public education Republican legislators in Utah. Yet they will still vote for them every election because they couldn't possibly vote for one of those dirty, Godless Democrat baby killers. Right after No Child Left Behind was enacted, I was teaching special education, and the law had some unsavory implications for us. I sat around the table with all of the other sped teachers in my school, and our department head shook her head and said, "Well, we all voted for him so I guess we can't complain." I didn't want to be a jerk, but I wasn't going to agree with that, so I said, "Not me. I didn't vote for that guy." And there was silence and then we moved on. But I've had shades of that conversation many times. Lately it's been tea party supporters (or very conservative Republicans) who work for the federal government or have jobs dependent on federal dollars flowing into their business or the local economy. They support people who want to shrink the federal government, yet somehow don't realize that this would... eliminate their jobs? This last go-round with the government shut down... All year my facebook feed contained tea party rhetoric posted by people who then turned around and lamented the government shut down. I don't understand that! If you support the tea party, shouldn't you be fine with a government shut down? Shouldn't you believe that only the most essential government services should be funded anyway? I'm so tired of people complaining about the debt, complaining about the deficit, complaining about how much the government spends, complaining about how much they pay in taxes... but then any time spending cuts are proposed that would affect them and their own livelihood, President Obama sucks and it's all his fault. That happened with the sequester. All these people who support people like Cruz and Lee start talking about how Obama sucks for letting the sequestration budget cuts happen. I do not get it. Another example: before our scandal-ridden crook of an attorney general was elected, the Democrats were saying, "Hey! This guy is not to be trusted! He's a lobbyist for payday loan companies, which are pretty much just modern day legalized loan sharks! Our candidate is the Weber County prosecutor! Why would you vote for a payday loan company lobbyist for attorney general when you could vote for a good upstanding county prosecutor?" But it didn't matter. The Republican won in a landslide because this is Utah. I've talked to several people since all of these scandals started coming to light who have said, "It's a shame, but there's no way we could have known he was going to turn out to be dirty." Um, some of us had an idea. And as taxpayers, we now get to pick up the bill for a $3 million investigation of the guy, which may or may not lead to his impeachment.
Having said that, I realize that politics is complex. Just because a person registers with a party, or votes for a candidate, it does not mean they have to agree with everything that party or candidate does. But that's not what I'm talking about here. I mean, I don't agree completely with any party. I'm fiscally conservative and socially liberal. If the Republicans ran a Jon Huntsman, a fiscal conservative and businessman who doesn't seem to hate poor people and is also pro-gay rights and pro-choice... man I could totally go for that. Anyway, enough of that.
