This time I'm going to finish my post! No, really, I mean it!

Seriously!

It's been a busy year so far, but not busy enough to justify two plus months without a post...

Lately, what's been keeping Jill and I both our busiest is Outside Looking In. We both went to the first meeting (way back before Moose Break) thinking we'd check it out, and maybe see what we could do... run a fundraiser here, offer our classrooms as rehearsal space there... or run rehearsals four nights a week. Well, that wasn't part of the original plan, but that's kind of how it's ended up! After joining a whole bunch of high school kids three weeks ago on the ice-less surface of the arena to learn a 7 bar dance routine, we've both spent a lot of time and effort since learning (and sometimes re-learning) dance steps, helping kids to remember them, and moving around the furniture in our rooms. In the picture here, you can see that everyone but me is wrong. Obviously. That's why I'm facing a different direction than everyone else, really.

The biggest beneficiary of all this effort (other than the kids, I guess) has been Moe. All that dancing at night has finally motivated me to get up in the morning and take her for walks consistently! Otherwise, I'm way too sore to move, let alone teach the class I've got this year...

Here she is in a Mexican stand-off with her arch-nemesis, Wretched.

Here she is at the window, wondering why I won't let her in... If she'd only listen, and pose for a picture next to her little sister (don't worry, one Moe is enough for us!) then I'd let her in!

Oops! I guess I'd better let her in, before we do have two dogs in the house!

I might as well get all the other animal pictures out of the way now, right? Right...

Here's Moe, the ever vigilant guard dog.

Here she is playing with her new friend Lyle. Lyle hangs out in our back yard a fair bit (not as much now that it's a little colder, but still on nice days), and although Lyle doesn't say much (he's hearing impaired), he still manages to command Moe pretty well using sign language.

Here's Wretched... I'm guessing the thought that's running through his head right now is something like "why don't the birds ever come to the feeders when I'm up here?"



Here's our neighbourhood mongrel Poo-Face. She's still doing pretty well this year - we've gone through a couple of bags of "budget" dog food on her. She had puppies a couple of weeks ago, and I keep meaning to go see them, but I haven't yet. Probably best I wait until they're not cute anymore!

Now for two in the category of "the things I put up with..."

You'll notice one of my usual blog topics has been conspicuously absent so far... hockey! Well, there is some good news... some news I'm not going to attach a qualitative value to... and some news that I seriously hope truly is just a rumour! First the good news: Last year's attempt at an outdoor rink left enough remnants to build a new outdoor rink this year, and as you can see, it's looking a lot more sturdy! There's the start of a fence around the top of the boards now too (in place of glass), and there are two lights on buildings that shine directly on it, so I'm looking forward to reviving my love of pond hockey! I wonder if the City of Toronto will come and flood this rink...

Now, the news I'm not so sure about... This weekend, our EBS Hawks will be going out to Red Lake to take on the Bantam AA team there. That may sound as though it should be a mismatch, being that we've got kids who are 18 and 19 on the team, and Bantams are 13 and 14... and it is. But it's not the mismatch you think. Our kids haven't been on the ice yet. There isn't ice yet. And a lot of them aren't that great of skaters to start with. Oh well, the theory is that this trip will show them there's more to come and be a motivating factor, both to come to school, and to come to practice. I hope that's how it turns out.

The rumour... It has to be just a rumour... is that the town generating station doesn't kick out enough electricity to power both the arena and the new community centre that's almost finished. And as much as past priorities in Pik might suggest that the community centre would just get boarded up until there was enough power, apparently, it has friends in high places. But, it's ok, because it's just a rumour. There will be ice at the arena. I pity the foo' who tries to tell me any different.

Yes, this was part of my Hallowe'en costume. But now, Hallowe'en's over, so I'm just a guy with a mohawk! Not for long though, I've reached the point of looking at myself in the mirror and saying "Schwindt, you're ridiculous."

Here was Jill's Hallowe'en costume. She was a ghost. And so were all of the other girls in her room? What? Oh, apparently this is spa club. They dressed up as ghosts for spa club.

Here are our class Jack-o-Lanterns! We had parents night the night before Hallowe'en (ask me which one was scarier!), and Each of us had kids help us carve the pumpkins that night. Mine looked better before my hooligans got at it the next day. Funny story: The hooligan (not behaving hooliganly at all) in this picture is the one whose design won the contest and got carved into the pumpkin. He was so proud the next day (at least that's what I'll assume) that he carried the pumpkin around for half the day and knocked out all of it's teeth and gave it a severe cleft palate. Note to self: always take the picture right away!

Wow! Publishing an incomplete blog entry is a strong motivator to come back and finish the job! Otherwise the rest of these pictures will go entirely without explanation, and there's no way anyone will be able to figure out what they are! ;-)

These next few go right back to the start of the school year. First, our welcome BBQ for all of the new teachers. Well, old teachers were welcome too, but there weren't many of them around yet at that point. You know how Jill and I came up early so that we'd be prepared and organized? Apparently, it wasn't early enough. Either that, or we're just not meant to be organized.

I think this picture is from the BBQ too; either way, it's a cute picture and I wanted to include it. I really do like having Brentyn and Delaina come visit; now that there's snow on the ground, I'm going to miss their visits. Oh well, it'll be spring again before I know it. Hopefully I'll have done at least one more blog posting before then!

Again, going back to the start of the year, we had a garden when we got back! All of the times that the birdfeeders got knocked down and emptied by kids paid off! We've had sunflowers pop up all over the place. This was one of the nicest ones, but they keep on coming - there was one that sprouted and bloomed as recently as three weeks ago.

After school got going, Jill started to reap the benefits of having Tracey Quill as a paraprofessional this year. Number one, teaching is a lot easier when you have a very capable assistant. Number two, occasionally she brings home a treat, like moose meat (moosawiiyaas) and potato stew! Mmm... moosawiiyaas...

That would be a good reason for Jill to be looking so smug, but it's not the real reason. The real reason is because after merely a year of teaching here, she already has her own business cards! I've been here way longer, and all I've got to show for it is a kick in the pants! No, wait, I haven't even gotten one of those! Umm, that's ok, I guess. Jill has worked hard at her division leader duties, and I've got my hands full again with my class this year. As much as I like meetings, I don't think I'll try to become a division leader next year so I can get my own business cards.

In the category of "things we may never have learned anywhere else", here's our colleague Jonah, performing a hoop eagle dance. Cool. I just managed to get a hula hoop to stay up for ten hulas - I think this skill may be a little beyond me!

A couple of pictures now from Moose Break: first, our Thanksgiving dinner! Just kidding. We sure got close enough that we could have had wild turkey if we wanted it, but we didn't... sigh. Probably best; this was as we were leaving the cottage on our way back up. It would have been hard to dress a turkey on the road, and even harder to find a hotel that would let us hang it to bleed in their shower! Maybe next time.

Since I've already told you that the turkeys were on our way up, I guess I can't claim that I'm pondering how this evolved into those, but will you believe that I'm pondering something? It was probably something profound like "wow, cool." I'm pretty deep like that.

And with that, I've now officially finished a blog posting! Hopefully not everyone has completely given up, and it'll get read at least once or twice... Whew, I'm dog tired!