Skip to main content

Four Hours with a Second Grader

I spent the afternoon with my Little Sister today and I am exhausted.  She seemed perfectly chipper as I dropped her off, but I came home and fell asleep at 4 pm.  This was our schedule:

Pack a picnic
Go to A&W to buy root beer floats
Drive to Tilden Park (about 30 minutes from her house)
Picnic on the grass with the dog (I forgot the picnic blanket so we sat on a yoga mat)
Tie up the dog
Ride the old-fashioned merry go round twice.  Once on a giraffe because it's a giraffe but it didn't go up and down so she had to go on a horse (with a rose because it was the prettiest) after that which did go up and down.  And I had to go because "it's not fun by myself!"
Go to the Little Farm and feed the farm animals celery
Go to the park and look for blackberries to pick (there weren't any)
Drown the disappointment about the blackberries by finding a very tall concrete slide with lots of pieces of cardboard to use for sliding down it
Do that over and over and over
Drive past UC Berkeley to see what a college looks like
Go home

Wow.  I'm tired.

But remember getting on carousels with belts like this so you didn't fall off?  And having your feet not reach the stirrups?



Two years ago: Black Names

Comments

Anonymous said…
Cool website, I had not noticed tigerthegecko.blogspot.com previously in my searches!
Continue the wonderful work!

Popular posts from this blog

Volunteers

I had some of the most overqualified volunteers ever in my third grade class.  This may have had something to do with the fact that I shamelessly begged my friends to help in any way possible.  I think there were a few friends who I asked to come as soon as I met them, before I was entirely sure of their names.  Some of my volunteers included: -Someone with an MFA helping kids read -a PhD candidate in chemical engineering from Stanford helping with math -a PhD candidate in civil engineering from Cal helping with math -several PhD candidates in engineering from Cal teaching about construction (several years in a row) and helping with a field trip -my extremely talented brother bringing his drums several times -a friend from Pixar who got us tours three different years, once when they were no longer giving tours - and came to the class to sign the kids' toys from Cars . -a physical therapist (who I think has a masters') who helped the kids with reading -many athlet...

The Best Mistake

I recently wanted to get a pedicure (I promise this will be important) and was looking at nail salons nearby. I knew there was a place called Kim's Nails near my exercise class, so I quickly googled to see if I could make an appointment online (I hate calling on the phone) and it let me, so I made an appointment for a few days later and went on with my day. Later that day, I got a text confirming my appointment and I realized that I had made the appointment at the wrong Kim's Nails! I meant to make an appointment for the one in my city and I made one at a nail shop in the next city over (Kim's Nails is a common business name). Because I had already made the appointment and they had taken the time to text me, I figured I'd just go with it. OK, if you're still with me, this is where it gets exciting! A few hours after I got the confirmation text, the owner of Kim's Nails texted me again. the text just said, "Are you a teacher?" I didn't know why they...

A New Prison, Part Two

  Second very long part of the prison visit report.   After we got all the paperwork filled out and went through the metal detector, we got visitation slips with the name of the inmate, and made our way over to the other building for visitation. This is not maximum security so thankfully you can just sit next to the inmates, and not be separated by glass or have to use a telephone to talk.    First, you get a gate unlocked and go into a holding pen that is of course in direct sunlight (or rain if it's that season) and surrounded by fences topped with razor wire. You wait there until the gate at the other end is unlocked. This holding pen was a little bigger and less claustrophobic than the other prison (I do not have any claustrophobia and I came very close to a panic attack once at the other place) and they opened the other gate more quickly. Then you walk, again in blazing sunlight (or rain) to the visitation building. This one was less of a walk than the other pri...