Math Spam

After nearly five months of paperwork...I am finally a substitute teacher for the American dependant schools on this island. I had to go through finger printing, two background checks, a couple thousand pages of application materials (ok that MIGHT be a slight exaggeration), a couple ID checks, and then weeks and weeks of waiting. But today I subbed for a middle school science class, so it's official now! Horray!

In other news, my night job is paying off. I have successfully converted at least two math-phobes into nerds. Yesterday in my inbox I found a link to a math game website from one student:

What Math Freaks Do for Fun

And a picture from another student:

Instead of interpreting this as a commentary on how I make my students feel, I have decided to congratulate myself on the fact that two of my ten students are now surfing math websites in their free time. Let's just hope I don't hear about any math related suicides on the news tonight.

Edited to Add: Make that 3 out of 10 students that have become nerds. When I met with one of my tutorees today, he told me that when he busted out his math book at work, another one of my students started teaching him (or possibly just excitedly babbling to him) about math.

When Japanese Engineering Fall Short

There are amazing Japanese mechanical engineers. For example, they make this:

A hydrogen fuel cell powered vehicle

And this:

My amazing car....which is now owned by Meg. MEG YOU BETTER BE NICE TO IT!

Japanese electrical engineers are fantastic. They make things like this:

My husband's favorite toy.

There are even great Japanese civil engineers. I mean, they build skyscrapers that can withstand earthquakes. Down the street from me they are filling in the ocean so they have more land to build on. They move inconvenient rivers out of the way. They even built an island specifically to hold an airport! (Well ok, maybe that's a bad example, since that island and its airport are sinking into the ocean).

But....

Japanese traffic engineering SUCKS.

They hide stoplights in trees. They build narrow roads. They expect alleys to contain two-way traffic. They do not time their lights, so a single light can back traffic up for miles. They have no parking rules...sidewalks, the middle of the road, driveways, walls...they're all fair game. They like blind intersections. They build dead end roads with walls on either side, so it takes a fifty-one point turn to get the car turned around again. Roads rarely connect destinations. Sometimes they go in circles. Sometimes the stoplight will be red...with green arrows pointing in every direction. Sometimes they build telephone poles in the middle of the road. Sometimes they build poles or walls for fun, just to see if Americans will hit them.

They drive on the wrong side of the road. Except for when they drive on the right side of the road that is. The paint the lines so the lanes are too narrow...resulting in lanes that are merely suggestions. They don't have highways. Sometimes they build turn lanes...with no road to turn onto. But they rarely build turn lanes where they are needed. There are stoplights where there aren't intersections or crosswalks. There are only stop signs at about every third intersection.

And best of all...they don't use street names. Addresses are secret codes only known by the postman, and landmarks are required to drive to another location. These directions are usually along the lines of:

Take the first right. It's an alley.
Then turn left at the brown building. There is a green sign over the door.
Turn by the park. There will be some trees.
Park by the fence. Not the wall...Americans aren't allowed to park by the wall.
Walk down the street 100 yards.
You should see a building with a Japanese sign that has three characters and the first one looks like a fish. That's the one.

It takes a lot of luck to get where we want to be when we want to be there. Alive.

Next time, I'm taking one of these:

F-15

Look At Me!

There are times when looking young is extremely inconvenient.

Like when I walk into my classroom on the first day of class and my students, who are typically older than me, look at me and see a good chum for their daughters.

Or when I walk into a bar, and the entire group gets carded because of me.

Then again when said bar "forgets" my drink....all evening.

Or when I say I'm married, and get shocked glances, and questions about my religion.

Or when I hold a small child, and get a lecture on teenage pregnancy.

But it has it's advantages too.

Like my cultish following of students who think I'm a child math genius, and are willing to give me lots of money to solve all their math woes.

I have seriously had so many comments this week on how "professional" I am, or how "mature." Well, duh!! Just because I LOOK like a sixteen year old, doesn't mean I AM a sixteen year old!!

The bird is a Japanese White-Eye. At least, I think it is.

The Plan that Backfired

My strategy for dealing with Peter's deployment was to stay so busy that I wouldn't even notice he was gone. To that end, I got some jobs. My "real" job is teaching Math at the local community college, but it's only twice a week in the evening. To kill time during the day (and bring in some extra money!), I applied to be a substitute teacher at the local middle school. I'm still waiting to get sorted out on payroll for that job. Then, since my teaching job has the potential to get cancelled every 8 weeks, I cultivated a tutoring business for myself. The tutoring business is thriving to the point where I am going to have to start a waiting list. The problem with all three jobs is that they're irregular part time employment. It's boom or bust.

So I picked up some hobbies too...to fill in the times when I'm underemployed. I write. I make crafty things. Usually involving paper - cards, scrapbooking, origami. I take photographs. Word is getting around that I like photography, so now friends request photo shoots. I volunteer with an animal rescue group. Word got around that I can do crafts too, so my dog rescue efforts have extended to making and selling crafts to raise money for dogs.

I was successful at keeping busy. Peter didn't deploy, but I never have time to see him anymore. He'll just have to make an appointment.

These fishermen "ruined" my photo. I'm glad they got in the way.

PS - My boiled fingers are fine now.

Dog Days

Finger Update: I'm too addicted to the computer to stop typing, so I'm sucking it up and dealing with it.

My husband, my dog, a couple of random strangers, and I spent the day tramping around in the jungle trying to catch a feral dog. There is a huge wild dog population on our island, and this particular puppy was "rescued," adopted by a family, and then escaped. Unfortunately, because she was "rescued" as a puppy, Mia didn't learn hunting skills needed to live in the wild on her own, so now she is dependant on humans to survive. She is happily living on a tropical beach, where she is fed twice a day by humans, sleeps in the sun, plays in the sand, and doesn't have to be confined by her pesky owners. BUT her owners are getting fed up with driving to the beach to feed her everyday, so a "rescue" mission was organized.

Mia (pronounced Maya)

We volunteer with an animal rescue group and we fostered Mia for a little while, so we helped try to catch her yesterday. She does not want to be caught. She was quite happy to take steak out of our hands, but she wouldn't let us touch her. She was quite happy to play with our dog...as long as the humans didn't get close. But after she ate our steak and finished playing, she disappeared into the jungle again. I wasn't about to crawl on hands and knees through impassible undergrowth where all the creatures I mentioned a few days ago live to catch her, so we're going to have to go back for round two. Hopefully we will catch her before anything happens to her. I have lots of rants about the problems associated with trying to "rescue" wild dogs, but I'll save those for another day.

Score:
Humans 0
Mia 2

I Cooked Myself

Yesterday I boiled my fingers. On my right hand. It is extremely inconvenient. There will be no typing for a few days. There will also be no snide comments about my cooking skills.

It's a good thing one of us can cook. Chicken Parmesan by Peter. This is why I don't starve.

Wildlife Encounter

I used to live on a hill in Colorado, where wildlife sightings were fairly common. We had deer, elk, foxes, coyotes, bears, and assorted small animals like porcupines and squirrels in our yard on a regular basis. Since moving to Japan, I have discovered a different variety of wildlife - the Mutant Invertebrates.

I have seen spiders the size of a dinner plate:

(No I did NOT take this picture...there's no WAY I'm putting my hand that close to one of those!!)

Snails as long as my hand:

(This one is my hand)

And Hermit crabs tenacious enough to climb three flights of stairs:

(Also my hand. This guy was most of the way up the stairs to my third floor apartment.)

I've also seen Lots and LOTS of fish:

(Ok, this was an aquarium, I cheated.)

Yesterday I found my first island mammal. First I almost hit one with my car. Then later that day, I found one trapped inside our trash corral (think dumpster, but it's a walled off place with a gate). It looks like a cross between a weasel and a squirrel. I had to google it. It's a mongoose.

(I didn't take this picture either. Horray for google images!)

So that was my new thing that I learned yesterday. Also, my story is 17,000 words long now. Horray for that too!

Brilliant By Accident

Happy Valentine's Day...a day late. I was happy to have my Valentine with me this year.

Today I was trying to find a better organization system for my photos and I found a series of flower pictures that I forgot I took. They were amazing, if I do say so myself. I love it when I discover my brilliance by accident. Now if I only knew what I did, so I could repeat the accomplisment.

This is a tropical water lily in Riatea, French Polynesia.

In other news, my pets nearly gave me heart failure today. I went to run some errands and our back door was standing wide open when I got home an hour later. For normal animals, an open door is no big deal. However, I have particularly neurotic pets. Our dog is terrified of everything, particularly humans. We have a jusitified fear that he will escape and never come home again. Our cat is an American indoor cat, recently introduced to Japan. We aren't sure how she feels about living here. My first thought when I saw the open door was that the two of them teamed up to run away...and with an hour head start they would have been nearly impossible to find again. Luckily, they were both sitting out on the balcony looking sheepish. What a bunch of weenies.

I Knew Being a Nerd Would Pay Off Someday

Quote of the Day: Smartness runs in my family. When I went to school I was so smart my teacher was in my class for five years.

Yesterday was a sad day. My "sexy" jeans (the ones that are really too tight, but I wear them anyway) got a hole in the butt. And since they're really too small anyway, a hole in the butt is extremely dangerous. Time to retire them. They were good jeans.

Last week one of my co-workers told me that I am lucky to be a Math teacher, because everyone hates and fears Math, so if I am the least bit nice I exceed all of my student's expectations of the class. I AM nice, and the result is that I have a fan club of students that think I'm their Math savior.

The lady I was talking to used to be an English teacher. She said English is the other way around. Everyone walks into English classes thinking that they already know everything, and that it's only a matter of time before they become wonderfully famous best-selling authors. If the teacher criticizes at all...well clearly she's wrong and is just being mean.

I think most other creative subjects are probably the same way. Obviously I am going to be the next great author to come along (as soon as I finish my book...only 15,000 words so far). And the next great photographer. And the next great artist. And clearly anyone who says otherwise is wrong. On that note, here's a photograph:


No need to criticize...I know it's perfect (especially the date stamp - that's class itself). I'm sure it will be published in my next best seller.

Hijacking the Blog

Quote of the Day: The New England Journal of Medicine reports that 9 out of 10 doctors agree that 1 out of 10 doctors is an idiot - Jay Leno

The original intent of this blog was to reassure all the worried people out there that Peter was alive and well in the desert.

Well he's not in the desert. He has started a new job at a local clinic. The biggest trauma in his life at the moment is dealing with idiot doctors. Or possibly his half hour commute. I am sure we will be hearing an announcement soon that he has found a cure for the common cold.

Since he probably couldn't write a complete sentence and the only things he has to say are mean anyway, I am hijacking this blog. It is now mine. I will flatter myself with thoughts that someone is enjoying reading about my life. Please don't disillusion me.

I am posting this picture today in the hopes that author Patricia Wood, who said Hi to me yesterday, will come back and tell me what I took a picture of.

Who's the Boss?

Quote of the Day: Cats have nine lives. Which makes them ideal for experimentation - Jimmy Carr

This is my Cat:

NORMALLY, she is well adjusted, mature, and lazy.

But last night, she decided to embrace her nocturnal roots.

Instead of doing this:

She climbed the walls.

Literally.

We have woodpaneled walls. I guess they could be mistaken for a tree.

But since claws on wood is not a pleasant sound at 3am, we forcefully removed her from the room.

So she howled.

Then it was quiet for a little while. We fell back asleep.

The shut door upset her. She started racing down the hall and flinging her body at the door like a battering ram. The whole house shook. There was more howling.

I opened the door again, this time, accompanied by a squirt bottle. She climbed the wall. I sprayed her face. The wall climbing adventure was over.

But that didn't stop her from finding every metal object in our room and noisily chasing them around for the rest of the night.

Conclusion: One very cranky human is going to get revenge on one very sleepy cat today. And if I have time, I might try to sand the claw marks out of the wall.

12:45

Peter's plane leaves at 12:45 today.

Peter is not on it.

HORRAY!!!!

Stupid Quote of the Day:

Warning on a bottle of hair coloring: DO NOT USE AS AN ICE CREAM TOPPING.

Picture of the Day:


This is us escaping from the jaws of death. Or deployment. However you want to look at it.

Peter Leaves

Stupid Quote of the Day:

Game show host to Peter Marshall: What do you like if you're a carnivore?
Woman: Um, I go to carnivals.

Photo of the Day:

Moorea. This suits my mood.

News of the Day:

Peter got his orders today. And plane tickets. He will be leaving on Sunday. He will be gone 302 Days. If things go as planned. But it's the military, and we all know they like to lie.

There was a farewell luncheon for Peter at the hospital today. A very large group of people turned out to wish him luck. Everyone had nice things to say about his impact on their lives, and the wonderful job he has done turning around problems in his department. By the time Peter gets back, most of the people we worked with will be gone. There were more tears than I expected, and none of them were mine. I was good at being brave. In public anyway.

We're setting up this blog so that everyone who wants to know can have the most recent news about Peter. And so that Peter can be reassured that I am eating well while he is gone, and not burning down the house in the process.