Mixed Messages

So I worked again two days last week. Yay!! Double yay, because I didn't work at all the week before. And like the first week I worked, I had one day at Millville and one day at North Park. After two days at each place I'm starting to notice some differences.

Millville has a really confusing and maze-like layout to it. I'm seriously not sure I'll ever figure out where everything is . . . it's all ramps and stairs and halls and curves and first grade classrooms next to fifth grade classrooms and what-the-crap-is-going-on-ness. North Park, on the other hand, is really easy to navigate. Two halls, and a hal to connect them. Imagine the symbol for pi . . . only the top hall is straight, not wavy. :-) Plus with North Park all the tutoring is done in groups, so even if I got lost there's someone around to show me where I'm going - at Millville I'm pretty much on my own. Crap.

But the biggest difference is the kids. The kids at North Park can get restless and rowdy sometimes, but it's been pretty easy to keep them on task, even when I have no idea what that task really is. But I can make it up as I go along and they just roll with it and are generally cute and adorable, and I go home and tell Luke how I wish I could take on of them home with me because they're just so cute!

The Millville kids are little terrors. Not paying attention, interupting, every time I try to pause and look at the teacher book (that always makes feel just as important as it did when I was in elemenary school, lol!) to figure out what exactly I'm supposed to be doing they're jumping out of seats, telling me "that's not how our normal teacher does it," they've completely forgotten what we just read, you name it. I feel terrible for the mess I must be leaving for the real aide since I never get all the way through a lesson, and I'm pretty sure that a lot of the things I manage to get done I'm doing wrong. Grrrrr. So then I go home in a mood of "never, ever having kids. Ever. Let's get a kitty . . . a stuffed kitty."

Luke's probably getting pretty confused.

And then, there was Saturday. And I got to babysit Sammy, yay!! That was bunches of fun. Well, except for when the drum thingie wouldn't stop playing . . . and apparently it starts on its own sometimes . . . holy demon possessed!! . . . and when Sammy dropped his chocolate milk . . . holy crap, how does milk splash that high?!? . . . but he was really enthusiastic about helping clean up, so he wiped the floor and I wiped the counters. And drawers. And dishwasher. And stovetop. And fridge. Good freaking grief. But Sammy was soooooooo cute being all careful to get all the milk off the floor. It was one of those "aaawwwwwwwwww" moments.

But the best part of the day was before that. Luke and I spent the day on youtube, watching all the old shows we loved when we were kids. Anybody remember these?

Ducktales
Muppet Babies
Gummi Bears
Garfield and Friends
Legends of the Hidden Temple
Guts!!!!
What Would You Do?
Wild and Crazy Kids
Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?
Schoolhouse Rock!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh, how I wanted to be on those shows . . . it's so sad that they're not on anymore. It's so sad that Nickelodeon and the Disney Channel had to get all dumb . . . everything on those channels are so cheesy. They're all adult-style shows shrunk down to tween-sized plot lines - LAME!!! So we decided that if/when we have kids they're gonna watch the good stuff. We'll gt all our old cartoons on dvd and watch them with them. Because that will be pretty darn awesome. And fun. For the whole family, yay!! (side note: so now if you're ever looking for gift ideas for us, you've just been supplied with a great big list :-) . . . score!!!)

And that was all we did aaaaaallllllllll day. Cartoons and old kid game shows. Well, until it was time for us to head out and make some money. Good times.

But yeah, I'm pretty sure I've got Luke thoroughly confused. Oops.

P. ost S. cript
I remember even though I never actually got to be on the show (sad!) that even I got intimidated when the kid went to Africa for the final round of Carmen Sandiego. That map was HARD!!! Nobody won the Africa map!!! Which makes this clip even more awesome.