The post I don't have a catchy title for

Finally, I think I can faintly see a few specks of light from the end of the tunnel shining through the mountain of work I have ahead of me. Ten weeks down and 6 more to go. I reviewed my list of ridiculous crap assignments that must be completed in order to graduate the other day and made a list. I have four and a half more normal papers to write. By normal I mean the usual 10 pages or so. One beast paper to write. By beast I mean I am slightly over halfway done writing it and I am currently on page 36, it will be 50+ pages when it's completed. And lastly I have 18 rationales to submit. That means I have to go back through my work over the last two years and find 18 papers that show my competence as a teacher and that my school wants me to upload to this professional portfolio thing. Then I have to write a rationale explaining why each paper fits the professional standards they require. I've already done about 15 or so, the 18 is what I have left. At the end of this semester this silly portfolio thing with all my papers and rationales gets evaluated, and if it's good I can graduate, and if they don't like it I get to kill someone. However, I did get some exciting news this week. It seems there is some discrepancy in the end dates for the student teacher thing I am doing. Originally the paperwork I was given said I would be done student teaching on May 5th. Now the date of April 23rd is being thrown around by the university and the students are confused. A counselor is checking on it for us and there is a possibility that I could be done with the student teaching part sooner than excepted. I'm ALL for that!

In other news we acquired another mouth to feed this week. Notice I didn't call it a family member. Remember that trip to the zoo? The one where my son was glued to the rodent cages staring in wonder? Well Shelby thought Colin would like to have pet and has been scouring ramsteinyardsales.com for something suitable. Yesterday he came home from work with a cage and said there was a hamster in it. Inside the cage is a tiny little plastic house. Inside the plastic house is a bunch of straw and hair and the literal definition of a rat's nest. I poke around at the ball of bedding, still waiting to see something that resembles a hamster, when this squealing, chattering noise starts. Then I saw it, well I saw it's teeth and the inside of it's mouth anyway. Whatever it is....it's ANGRY! Apparently it's a dwarf hamster, which is maybe the size of half a kiwi. It's a pretty little thing, but I'm fairly certain no one is ever going to get close enough to touch it. The lady he got it from claims she held it and it ate out of her hand, I'll take her word for it.



Colin was very interested in the cage when he woke up from his nap. He layed there very patiently waiting to see something, but the angry hamster never came out of his house so Colin lost interest.



This morning I tried to get the hamster to come out of his house and took the top off and moved the bedding around some. Again I was met with angry chattering and teeth. Colin thought it was funny, I put the house back together and left the damn thing alone. I think Colin needs something a little more sociable and durable. He loves the sitter's rabbit and gets to feed him every day at her house. Shelby says no rabbits though. I'm not suggesting anything, the last thing I need is something else to clean!

Then, I must not have been excited enough about the hamster because my insane husband took me to see a dog last night. No, I take that back, not a dog...a horse. I am not kidding, this thing didn't even have to try lick my face while keeping all four paws on the ground. It was a beautiful, blue merle German great dane. This thing is a MONSTER, they said he weighs 180 pounds right now and he's down a bit and needs a little weight put on him. Colin was standing behind him, the dog was wagging his tail and it was totally above Colin's head. His head was well above kitchen counter height. HUGE. Beautiful but a handful, more dog than I think we need right now. I've badly missed the boxers every day since we gave them away, but I'm not sure this problem child is a good fit for us.
Since I'm on the subject of dogs, I heard from Kalia's new owner this weekend. She updated us and told me how well Kalia is doing with her and their other dog (a sheltie) Prince. Clearly we were just not a good fit for Kalia anymore and she seems to be much happier and better adjusted than she was here. As hard as it was to give them up, I think they are better off living in separate homes and with the families we chose for them.

Colin's latest obsession is with his shoes. He wants them on all the time and asks for them constantly. That is because with his shoes on he can get enough traction on the back of the couch to climb over it and get into the tv/couch area and play with all the electronics and pull the dvd collection out of the drawers. Yep that kid is no dummy. His other new thing is outside. He knows how to say it and he knows what it means. He asks 150 times a day, while pointing, for "outside." If only spring would hurry up and get here so I could take the kid outside.

Sorry no fun pictures from the weekend, Shelby worked and I had to write papers, nothing fun to photograph. Next weekend we were supposed to go TDY to Belgium for 4 days. He was tasked with going over there to evaluate another control tower and telling them what they need to do to get ready for their inspection coming up. He obviously doesn't need 4 days to do that so Colin and I were going to tag along on this little all expenses paid trip and see Brussels. Unfortunately manning sucks right now and when someone had to take emergency leave back to the States Shelby had to put himself on the schedule to cover shifts and there is not enough man power to allow for the TDY to happen right now. Oh well, it was a nice plan anyway.