Oh the Frustration

Well its around 11P.M on the Monday evening of the Anzac Day long weekend. Spent primarily most of the weekend resting and relaxing around the house getting ready for what is to be a busy week at work. Today went for a 19Km run, did some cleaning, finished the book I was reading and went to bed early to start a new book. However, there has been a wrench thrown into the works, I can't sleep. This has been going on since about high school. As soon as Sunday night comes before the start of the week I struggle to sleep. Everyone says it is because I might be anxious for the upcoming week, but I'm not. I think its become a mental block that when I go to sleep before the start of a new week I fool myself into thinking I can't sleep.

Running has been going fairly well as of late, not great, but adequate. However, there is one small problem and I'm not sure there is much I can do about it. I am getting old, or at least my knees are reminding me that I am getting old. My first few strides of every run my left knee struggles to straighten and takes some time to have the proper hinge movement it is designed to have. At night after I have gone for a run and sometimes on nights I haven't I can feel the stiffness in them. I honestly do a decent job of taking care of myself and my body, but I'm starting to think that I may just have to start icing my knees when I get home.

Oh and for the record I am sitting here in sweatpants and a long sleeve shirt. This may not appear to be anything of consequence, but what it does mean is that summer is ending and winter is starting. The house is getting quite chilly at night and it is only a matter of time before having to turn on the single room heater designed to heat well one room, leaving the rest of the rooms in the house like an icebox.

Things I Like This Week

• It is Tuesday, which means it is one day closer to the weekend
• I have to stay late after school Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. One night for a meeting and two nights for parent teacher interviews. Oh wait this is to go in the following section
• The Blue Jays seem to have gotten off to a decent start this year and might not lose 100 games this year
• Roy Halladay is a very good pitcher

Things I Don't Like This Week

• See above

One Week Down

How I wish it didn't rain on my vacation, but sadly it has done nothing but rain. Regardless, I have manager to squeeze in 3 rounds of golf this week. it has been easy to go golfing as I am a brand new member at the local Blue Lake Golf Course. Yesterday I shot my course record oof 89, which included two birdies and a handful of pars.

Not much else has been going on for my first week of the holidays. First soccer game of the season is tomorrow and then I will be driving down to Adelaide (about a 5 hour drive) to catch up with friends from uni. and to do some sleeping bag shopping (please conain your excitment).

I wish the school breaks were 3 weeks instead of 2 weeks. I am not asking to add on an extra three weeks of vacation over the course of the year, but rather to cut the summer holidays in half and add the weeks to the mid year breaks. Two weeks in theory seems like a long time, but in reality you use the first week to wind down and the second week to start getting a set for school to get back into the swing of things. having that added middle week would truely add to a proper vacation.

Things I Like This Week

• Baseball season getting underway
• Going to watch the last two episodes on Mad Men
• Going to buy grade a sleeping bag

Things I don't Like This Week

• I have a feeling this sleeping bag is going to cost me $300

It Has Been Awhile

Hello everyone,

For those of you I caught up with over Christmas, I promised you that I’d do a better job of keeping in touch with you… well I lied, but that doesn’t mean I can start trying now.

Things are fine. The school year didn’t get off to a cracking start as I was under the impression I was going to be teaching P.E., but such is not the case. I was welcomed back to school with 3 Society and Environment classes, a Personal Learning Plan class and one grade 9 P.E. class. I’m pretty sure that my face was beat red with rage for the first week of school. The fact that most of the people I work with were continuously asking how I was doing only added to my rage. However, I’ve dealt with it and moved on. The first term has come and gone and it was pretty good I guess. I helped run the schools year 8 camps, went on an Outdoor Ed. Camp and also went with the schools Athletics Team down to Adelaide (I live in Mt. Gambier for those of you who are unsure). Those were all enjoyable and as for the rest of the term… it was fine and more importantly nobody got hurt in the process. I guess the only other point of interest for my first term is that irony reared its ugle head and the one P.E. class is the worst class that I’ve taught in my short and tenuous teaching career. Another good example of how you should be careful what you wish for.

As for my extracurricular activities, Baseball and Touch Footy seasons have both some to an unsuccessful end. Our baseball team had to amalgamate with another team because of a lack of players. The skill level of the guys we joined… not so good and to add insult to injury, most of them weren’t the type of people you wanted to spend your Saturday afternoons with. As for Touch Footy, well we had an okay season, but lost in the semi-finals.

Now up and coming is soccer season mixed with a heavy dose of running. We’ve lost quite a few players from our soccer club and I think we are going to stink, but hopefully we’ll have fun in the process. I’m hoping to run a half-marathon and two full marathons this year (this is being very wishful with soccer) and have started training hard over the last month or so. I’m running about 40-50Kms a week with my longest run being a 19km run. Running is looking good, but I’m going to need some luck to not get the banged up over the course of the soccer season.

I’m sure most of you know, but for those of you who don’t know Brad and Lisa got engaged. I am very, very happy for them despite the fact they or anyone else did not tell me and I found out via Facebook. Facebook is one of life’s great tragedies. Text messaging, Facebook and Tweeter have made it possible to pretty much not have to talk to anyone anymore.

As for what is on the horizon. Well I have the next two weeks off and will hang around Mount Gambier for most of it. Possibly a camping trip in the area and a trip to Adelaide to meet up with friends from University. Next term will be business as usual except for an 8 day hiking trip with about 10 of the naughty kids from school. The hike is about 100km up and down hills. It’s the equivalent of boot camp, but thankfully I enjoy hiking. Guess I need to decide whether or not I am going to apply for Permanent Residence, no idea what to do. I guess its easy to stay here and keep working , but the idea of moving back to Canada is very enticing.

Things I Like This week

Vacation
Writing a blog entry
My new John Butler CD

Things I Don’t Like This Week

Starting to feel an awful lot like winter