Inspirational.

I found this online... I liked it. :D

Politics, the way it was.

"What General Lee's feelings were I do not know. As he was a man of much dignity, with an impassible face... His feelings...were entirely concealed from my observation; but my own feelings...were sad and depressed. I felt like anything rather than rejoicing at the downfall of a foe who had fought so long and valiantly and had suffered so much for a cause, though that cause was, I believe, one of the worst for which people ever fought...

"General Lee was dressed in a full uniform which was entirely new, and was wearing a sword of considerable value...In my rough traveling suit...I must have contrasted very strangely with a man so handsomely dressed, six feet high and of faultless form...

"We soon fell into a conversation about old army times...Our conversation grew so pleasant that I almost forgot the object of our meeting."

-General Ulysses S. Grant, remembering the surrender at Appomattox Court House.

After watching debates, politicians blaming everyone and anyone on financial crises, and the overall distaste for taking blame for anything in our country, I wonder...Where are the people like General Grant, Abraham Lincoln, and the other eloquent, kind, caring, leaders of our past. Having never seen or met a politician like them, it's hard to understand, but I miss them.

First day of school.

You know that smell of fresh pencils? The intoxicating scent of dry erase markers? The squeaky clean waxed floors? It's a beautiful thing for kids on their first day of school. But as today was my first day of school it was an amazing thing for me as well. It was very strange entering into the public school system after having been in a private school for the past two years. It's hard to believe all the stuff you have to do as a public school teacher. Papers to sign, papers to pass out for parents to sign, papers to pass out for kids to sign, papers to take from kids signed by parents to file away, papers that have to be in the office before a certain time, papers, papers, papers! And lest we forget all the wonderful tests and assessments we must perform and track with the kids. Oh, and I have a formal evaluation this year with several important people in the school system. Apparently it's not enough that you graduated college, they still need to test you. But you know what? Even with all of that looming over me and making me nervous, the smell of freshly sharpened pencils, dry erase markers, and waxed floors calmed all my nerves today.

The students were excited to be there and I was excited to be teaching them. We did little more today than get to know each other, and get them acclimated with the rules and procedures. There is so much for them that we'll be doing it all week. Most of it will be new until tomorrow and then we'll be reinforcing it throughout the week. But hopefully by doing that it will become second nature to them. Now I have to get onto "Tech Paths", which is how we plan out our units -- because we don't use textbooks -- and decide what we're going to do this month. It's sure to be an exciting year, and I hope you'll enjoy hearing about it here. Thanks so much to Kara and Big Nate who is envious of my sweet job (um, hello? You have a sweet job too, travel the world, save the planet? Ring any bells big guy? And with only 73 days left to go at the time of this writing hopefully you'll have an even better job, maybe somewhere tropical this time!? :D), thanks to mom and dad who are so very proud of me and pushed me and cheered me on time and time again. Thanks to Beth Ann and her family, people who keep me in smiles and stitches (the good kind, the ones that come from laughing at silly lines from Superman movies and Young Frankenstein quotes, and for the eye rolls that say, how do you two know that many ridiculous movie quotes ((That's Grant I'm referring too)), and the chubby cheeks that I love to kiss ((BRADY!!!!!)). Love you sis).And thanks most of all for my wonderful wife Sarah whom helps me believe in myself and helps make me a better person daily (it's our anniversary in less than a week so I'm really laying it on thick). I love you all. Until next time, I remain yours,

Jonathan.

P.s. Why does it sound like I just won some sort of an award? Well I guess CSLA is my reward for patience in finding a job. :D

Jamaican Honeymoon! Courtesy of animoto

Not the Batman blog I promised, but something to tide you over.

Batman: AND BEYOND!!!

The fandango system sold out like 90% of their tickets for all shows of the Batman sequel yesterday! I can't find the article now, but google for it, I'm sure you'll see it. Sarah and I are going to go watch it on Monday at the IMAX with some friends of ours. They say that experience is going to be unique. Quite a few scenes were shot with IMAX cameras so, we'll see if it's worth it. Unfortunately for BIGNATE he won't get to see it in all the glory and splendor. :( Oh well, I'll be excited for ya bro! Ok, gotta go, we're going to Mum and Dad's for the weekend. See some of you Sunday.

Photos! I hope.

Ok, here goes nothing. Hopefully this works. Click the picture below for the Jamaica photos. It took me an hour to upload all these, so give me some time and I'll add some descriptions to them. :) Tonight at the latests. I swear!

Jamaica

Computers, heroic, or evil?

My computer sucks right now... >.< It's very frustrating. All of my internet browsers have suddenly and inexplicably (at least to me) stopped working. When I boot them up they immediately stop and say they have to close due to an error. How am I typing this you might ask? Well I booted Firefox up in "safe mode". I don't know why it's safe, but it's working...Sort of. You see I'm having some problems getting things like pictures to upload. I just figured out how to get this blog to update (there are certain tweaks you can make to safe mode apparently). So hopefully that will also allow me to upload our Jamaica photos. We'll see. That's what I'm attempting next. So stay tuned for that.

The main point of this post I guess is to ask if anyone has any ideas. First of all I have no idea how this happened. Neither Sarah nor I have downloaded anything from any sites we deem untrustworthy, and I've run extensive virus scans a-la Norton Antivirus, and neither that nor Spybot S&D have found any problems. I then proceeded to uninstall both programs and then reinstall them both. That didn't work. Then I uninstalled one but not the other, tried it, didn't work. Uninstalled the other and reinstalled the first, didn't work. Then uninstalled both again installed one, restarted, tried it, didn't work, installed the last and reset, and then tried it. Nothing. I am at my wits end. If I have to I guess I can reinstall Windows, but I really, Really, REALLY don't want to do that. So, after that long winded explanation; Does anyone have any answers or suggestions?

Check back after this for pictures... I hope.