- Michael got his wisdom teeth out -- one side before Christmas and the other side last weekend. Poor guy. He originally went in to have a tooth checked out that he thought was cracked. He left on a Friday morning at 8 and the dentist told him he had to have them out. He didn't get home until after 4 in the afternoon! Michael was aware of all that was going on. The dentists there don't like to use gas for wisdom teeth extractions. At one point, the dentist pulled a nerve out, held it up and exclaimed, "Wow! That is the largest nerve I have ever seen! It looks like a brain! (then to the tech) Take a look at this! You won't see anything like this even in a textbook!" Michael was a bit concerned that perhaps the third chapter of his dissertation went with that nerve.... In the end, Michael has been handling the whole thing like a champ. He is just now starting to feel normal again (of course, he had a period of normalcy after the pre-Christmas extraction...) I still have my wisdom teeth. How 'bout you? I would love to hear some funny wisdom teeth stories....
- Ezra has quite nearly legally changed his name to Batman. He corrects everyone who calls him Ezra and even insists that the new name be put on coloring pages or craft projects he does at the Children's Center or at church. In his prayers, he thanked God for the bat cave tonight.
- I mentioned church. We think we may have found a place that we might like. Of course, we've only been twice (Michael only once because he was recovering from his extraction...) I know that doesn't sound like a lot of time but sometimes, you just know. The church is literally two blocks from our home (a very reasonable and delightful walk) and is called Sojourn. It seems a bit like our Crossroads experience in Cincinnati. They have a main campus in Louisville and satellite campuses in other neighborhoods, New Albany being one of them. They just opened the doors of their recently purchased former elementary school in October. The music is amazing and the teaching is AWESOME! On a different note (for us) they take communion every week. We will be participating in a membership class on Friday evening and Saturday. Looking forward to getting the low-down on the place. Really hoping we don't show up and they tell us we have to fork over our first-born son or something...that would definitely be a deal-breaker...
- I am teaching a lot more in this new year. Pretty sure I mentioned this before...sorry...but, it's my blog. I'm teaching seven classes every week, every day but Saturday. (I teach two on Wednesday.) So far, so good. Three of the classes are for kids so the cardio workout is not as intense (for me) as the grown-up classes. Yes. I am teaching fitness classes for kids, namely Zumbatomic. This is Zumba for kids and lots of fun. I teach groups of 4-7 year olds and groups of 8 to 12 year olds and I teach the classes back to back. Let me tell you, it is not easy switching out of the head space of a teacher to 4-7 year olds to a teacher of 8-12 year olds. The little ones laugh at everything I say and are not self-conscious about anything. The exact opposite is the case for my bigger ones. For instance, in both classes, we'll play a game called Freeze Dance. The title pretty much says it all but after every freeze, I give them a direction for a new (silly) way to dance (ie. you can only dance with your arms and hands!) Well, for the little ones, I often will tell them to pretend to be their favourite animals. I accidentally asked the bigger ones to do that tonight...totally not cool. Lol! The little ones really crack me up. Each class is only 30 minutes long. After ten minutes, the little ones are asking for drinks of water and if they can just sit down for the rest of class. (Trust me, this is stuff they can handle easily...they're not doing push-ups or anything....) Also, when one child has to go to the bathroom, of course, everyone else wants to go. This is nothing new but it just cracks me up. Either way, I have a lot of fun with them. I think mostly because they will always try something (unless they're extremely shy...which, of course, happens and is fine.) I just like that kids don't mind looking silly. They just have fun. On another note, I really love the Zumbatomic idea in general. If a person comes into a Zumba class having never done it before, it can be an overwhelming experience. You just dance. There is no break-down of steps or explanations or anything. Zumba does call itself an easy to follow Latin dance inspired class and, for the most part (and depending on the instructor), that is true. I will usually show up 10 to 15 minutes early for class and run through some trickier steps but that's it. The cool thing about Zumbatomic is that the kids are getting in this at the ground level. We break things down in Zumbatomic and even talk about the different Latin rhythms that are used in Zumba classes. Each rhythm has many different dance steps and we break down all of those steps for the kids. I've had so many adults ask if there was a similar class for them which has made me wonder if it might be a good idea to have an Intro. to Zumba class once a month -- a class where we go over all the rhythms and steps. I could be onto something here...
- I busted up the second fight in less than six months on our street yesterday...and by bust up I simply mean I called the police from our porch after yelling a warning to the brawlers that I would be doing so. One would think this would stop the behavior. It doesn't. We live right next to New Albany High School. The first fight was between two mothers who were waiting to pick up their children. I yelled repeatedly that I was calling the cops (the 14-year old son of one of the mothers asked me to please do so), that they were on their way, etc. The cops pulled up and the brawling didn't stop. Insane. Apparently, Mother A's daughter was being bullied by Mother B's daughter. Mother A had told her daughter to talk to the principal about the problem. Apparently she hadn't. "I guess she's learned her lesson," Mother A shouted across the street at me and the police officer, cigarette dangling between her fingers. "Guess she should've gone and talked with the principal!" Oh! That's what went wrong there....wow... The fight that broke out yesterday seemed to be scheduled. Girl A pulls up in front of the house across the street in a blue Jeep, hops out, takes her sweatshirt off and stands in the street calling for her most worthy opponent. Girl B's entourage/family is on the front lawn cheering, hootin' and hollerin' until she comes out of the house herself. She runs down into the street and they both begin to bloody each other...literally. Rolling around on the ground, bludgeoning each other with their fists and I saw the whole thing get started from my kitchen window. I was horrified! I ran onto the porch, yelled my cop-call warning and dialed away. Yeah, I'm that porch lady. Unfortunately, they all pulled away right before the cops showed up (of course) but not before I got the license plate from their vehicle. C'mon! I feel like I've moved to the wild west. I LOVE the fact that I lived in the "ghetto" in Cincinnati for 5 years (my poor parents were terrified for us) and the only incident we ever had was a bunch of kids talking trash in the street to each other. Gotta love the small-town charm of southern Indiana....
- So, this is getting pretty long. Maybe I will have to make an individual post for each of the above bullets. This will be the last one. Michael and I were talking last night about kids getting too cool for their parents -- you know, not wanting them to be around when their friends are around, etc. We both admitted that we never really had that experience growing up. I actually remember feeling bad for a lot of my friends' parents. For the most part, we thought our parents were fun to hang around with -- even with our friends! I made mention of the fact, though, that I only got too cool to be around my parents when I became a senior in high school and I got a boyfriend (my first real one) and I didn't want them to catch us making out. So, in my mind, being too cool for your parents means you have something you want to hide from them. Any thoughts? I'm sure this is a simplistic view on the matter but, then again, maybe not. Did you like to hang out with your 'rents (as this generation calls them?) Were Michael and I just major nerds? (Ok...maybe don't answer that last question...)
7 hours ago
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