Q: what do you get when you mix?
– hometeam ncaa final four win
– dance for mother earth american indian pow wow
– festifools parade
– hash hash
– foolmoon luminary festival
– one man anti-war protest
A: the perfect storm = just another weekend here in ann arbor.
this game was in the silent auction at school and i was not surprised at all that no one bid on it. as it was a leftover, it was very generously offered it to me on behalf of my kindergarten classroom. i happily accepted and looked forward to sharing it with the kinders.
then i put my glasses on.
one in-focus look at this box and i was immediately horrified. between the grinning ‘dentist’ holding the gigantic tooth in massive pliers, all of the other monster-sized tools laying in wait, and the ‘patient/victim’ with missing teeth and a horrified look on his face, i was beside myself. aside from my own dental fear, i imagined that most children seeing the cover would develop a phobia even if they did not have one before.
my free-spirited friend offered to take it home to try on her children, (as well as one of her unsuspecting neighbor kids), to gauge their reaction. this experiment was to serve as an ad hoc litmus test to see how young children might react to it.
upon laying eyes on the game, ‘pearly whites,’ the 3 children in our focus group – sophie, clare, and natalie, instantly loved it and had absolutely no fear of it whatsoever. as a matter of fact, they giggled with delight as they roved around the gaping mouth, moved ahead to the canines, climbed up the bridge of dental floss, slid down mouthwash falls, and moved back 2 spaces as ‘punishment’ for having a cavity. their collective review was, “it was really fun and we want to play again!”
what? perhaps it is just me?
————————————
some tortures are physical
and some are mental
but the one that is both
is dental.
-ogden nash
while looking for holiday lesson ideas to share with my kinder class, i stumbled upon this one from a home-schooling page online. i must say i found it terrifying.
‘jesus in the tomb – cooking lesson’
‘jesus said he would rise from the dead in 3 days. he rose in 3 days.’
supplies needed: crescent rolls, marshmallows, cinnamon, margarine
directions: take one marshmallow and dip it in margarine. roll it in cinnamon. have the children place it inside of the center of the triangle of dough. have them fold the dough around the marshmallow so that the marshmallow is ‘buried’ in its tomb. bake according to the crescent roll package directions. have the children take the role of the guards at jesus’ tomb. have them stand guard at the oven. take the rolls out of the tomb (oven) and let the cool. the marshmallows will be gone, just like jesus’ body was gone!
other suggested lessons:
creative writing – have the children pretend to be reporters interviewing pontius pilate. ask him things like: why did you make your decision? were you pressured into it? have the children use their imagination to answer the questions.
art/literacy lesson – have them lay on large paper, trace them, and write across their chest – ‘jesus lives in me.’
food lesson – make easter sandwiches, crust symbolizes god, white is jesus, fillings are holy spirit. choose your fillings, can use red fillings to symbolize blood, share them, give thanks and enjoy!
after reviewing all of this, i opted to color eggs, hide them, show scary easter bunny pics, and eat a lot of chocolate.
d
once again, i’ve stumbled into a bureaucratic rabbit hole:
in short, i filled out a ‘healthy incentives’ survey in order to qualify for the most cost effective program offered by my health insurance provider. somehow it all went wrong at *step 1.
‘ who gave you this number?’
‘the letter you sent me listed it as the one to call.’
‘who told you to call us?’
‘you did.’
‘can we call you back?’
‘no.’
‘our department doesn’t handle this kind of thing.’
‘i really have no idea who deals with this.’
10. after lots of transferring action, holds, disconnects, etc. – more conversation:
‘i can see the form you filled out online, and it does look like you qualified for the healthy incentives option, but you never pushed the button at the end to get your official score.’
‘so, you do see that i’ve filled it out?’
‘yes.’
‘and it shows i am healthy and do actually qualify?’
‘yes.’
‘but because i didn’t push the button it doesn’t count?’
‘yes.’
‘yes, it counts?’
‘no. yes, it does not count.’
‘what can i do about it?’
‘well it is after the deadline now.’
‘what can i do about it?’
‘i guess file a complaint.’
‘will i be paying the higher rate in the meantime?’
and – after 1 hour and 47 minutes, my favorite and final response:
‘i would definitely not be able to answer that.’
(i believe that if i was to fill out the survey again after this, i may not qualify as ‘healthy’ due to a rise in my blood pressure and an elevated heart rate. though of course this is just a guess, because there is definitely no one who would be able to answer that.)
to my date in the not too distant past:
was it was your tale of being abducted by aliens?
was it was your boast of – ‘you probably would never know that i’m carrying..’?
maybe it was your cologne?
in trying to file some final paperwork following my mother’s death, i found myself time and again in the local social security office. for some reason, (as in, i was dealing with a bureaucracy), it took me forever to complete what i had assumed was an easy task.
the office was only open during my working hours, so i had to wait for a day off to come around before i could get everything filed with them. in the meantime, i got tired of looking at all of these papers and tried to call in sick one day but that didn’t work out as planned, had a snow day at home and drove there through the icy roads only to be told, ‘of course, we’re not open, we close every wednesday at noon’, went during my winter break only to find i didn’t have the right forms, i was missing some obscure piece of original paperwork, and on and on….
well the day finally came when all the stars were aligned, the office was open, i had the day off, and i was armed with every possible form of documentation they could potentially need. i walked through the door, signed in and was handed a number. when i finally heard my lucky #488 called, i went to ‘window z’ to file the papers at last.
upon looking at my form, window z woman said, ‘i’m not sure what this is, i don’t understand.’ her reaction kind of surprised me as it seemed to be a standard form, one provided by their office in the first place, and they are the ones who had insisted that it needed to be completed and brought back to them. with all original, obscure documentation of course. i suggested that she talk to the last guy i had dealt with there, (window x), as he seemed to have had a pretty good handle on it during my last visit. after a quick stop at window x, she returned, said everything was in order, and let me know that i should hear back from them in 6 months or so, as they “usually work very slowly.” i easily agreed with her on this one –
as an afterthought, while there, i thought i’d mention that i’d noticed someone in their office had mistyped my address when sending out my last notice from them, and it was now off by one digit. i explained that only reason i actually got the letter was that my postman saw it, figured it out, and brought it to me. i asked if they could change it back from ‘123 to 124’ so that in the future, i would actually get mailings from them and wouldn’t have to rely on good luck, timing, and a nice postman.
she delivered her quiet response with a straight face and a certainty that only the truest bureaucrat can possess. ‘we cannot change your address once you are dead.’ even though i tried to point out that i was actually alive and sitting in front of her, requesting that my address be changed back to the correct one, and that i was simply representing the dead person, and trying to make sure that i received mail from them that they insisted i respond to, under penalty of federal offense.
she simply looked me in the eye and repeated, ‘we cannot change your address once you are dead.’ i thanked her for her time and her help, and mentioned that i hoped i would actually receive the letter from them when it arrived in 6 months or so, or perhaps my neighbor would get it. with a mutual nod, and new level of understanding, we parted ways.
guilty yes guilty
you will have a new job now
mayor of your cell
so happy the snow fairies have worked their mischief once again and hit us with a lovely, lively,fest of swirling snow, sleet, slush, and snain, bringing us another joyfully amazing snowday off of school. winter does not go easily into the good night. in other news, dairy queen opens in 2 days.
I didn't have my glasses on.... 