What a big mess! I went back to school for the first time today and found I had a new room. The buildings and grounds people are taking down the library shleving and I straightened much of it, but there's still HOURS of work to do to prepare for the school year.  

"Is that a pink dog purse?" -- Yes, yes it is. There are some questionable fashion designers out there. 

Here's what the deck looks like from standing on the deck. 

We passed the second inspection on our deck this morning. The structure is complete, and now, we dive into laying the decking, adding hand rails, and building stairs. The excessive curve on the deck is a function of photo manipulation, not construction. 

Yesterday, I staked out all of the posts for my deck, and tihs morning, I'm going to dig all the holes and insert the forms for concrete. 

Can you smell all that wood? I open up my garage and the pungent perfume of freshly cut wood wafts through my backyard. The wood is organized according to my Type A personality traits, by cut and by length. Yes, that is 24 backs of concrete in the corner. No, I hope not to use that many! 

These are two holes that I cut into the blacktop for posts for my deck. I used a circular saw with a masonary blade to make the incisions, then forked it out with a giant crowbar.  

The Interpretation

The Interpretation - Joe's new blog. He's trying to bring an artistic dimension to the world of blogging. I'm still confused, but I'm sure in time it'll come to make some sense. He's a good writer, I'll be interested to read further.

Yuck! I took down the stairs to our backdoor this evening. Tomorrow begins the big construction--I'll be installing the ledgers along the house, measuring out for the posts, and digging the post holes this weekend. 

Jane and I saw Allison Krause last night at Ravinia. We had awesome seats (thanks Joanna) with Brittany and Michael, but Amanda, Paddy, and her mom joined us on the lawn for some pre-concert eats. 

Whoa! We almost didn't get our deck supplies into the back yard, but our handy home depot delivery man somehow manuevered over my tomatoes to safely place our deck materials in the garage.  

John, Kerri, Elizabeth, Erin, and Jane. Erin and John are friends from IU, and Kerri is Erin's sister from Urbana-Champagne. All were in town today because John is presenting a paper at U of Chicago. Elizabeth is so cute (and pudgy!) 

Run, girls, run! 

My buddy Scott organized field day. Yes, ladies, Scott is still single. 

Just a reminder, I do work. This is a picture with Mrs. Coleman and I serving hot dogs at our annual, Greenbay Elementary School field day. Four hundred kids served in under an hour! It was awesome. 

Congratulations, Nancy! Nancy graduated from U of Chicago, and we celebrated with her family down in Chinatown for dinner. 

Michael and Britt joined us for Ravinia. 

Jane and I went to hear Garrison Keillor at Ravinia. We sat on the lawn, ate great food (Thanks, Britt and Michael), and laughed hard at good, old-fashioned midwestern humor. 

What a mess! This is one of the intermediary steps towards our deck project. I removed ten posts from the ground by hand. (Growl here) 

This is a photo-stitched version of my school, Greenbay Elementary, in North Chicago, IL. 

We love Saul! We've been dogsitting for about three weeks now while Amanda has been on her big road trip across America. Our new best buddy will be leaving tomorrow with her mommy. We 

Looks like hell without the deck. After removing the old structure, we found a huge ant investation in the north wall which forced us to remove the foundational plywood, bug bomb, reinsulate, and put up a new wall. Plus side: I practiced my circlular saw skills before working on the deck. 

Voici ma dumpster! We re-packed this dumpster twice to make sure we would get everything in. Said Mike our neighbor, "I've seen many dumpsters over the years, and I've never seen one packed as perfectly as yours." We're type A, what can we say?! 

These are my trumpet buddies from Northshore Concert Band. From left to right, you see Renee (we went to IU together), Herb, Dave, and Barry. Go 3rd trumpets! 

Golf

Tiger Woods: On eve of Western he tees off on a number of issues - I note this story because of the last line. When asked if he had ever thought of reaching the $50 million dollar carreer winnings goal, Tiger replied, "No, God, No. You don't play for money. You play for hardware."

He's a true golf geek. Let's discuss.

Grilling

Right now, I'm manning the medium webber in the backyard, grillin' up some burgers for a little summer grub. Saul, Amanda's chocolate lab, has been hanging with us for the past three weeks and has been keen to watch me carry the platters in and out, hoping that I might drop a bit of burger for him. No luck, though. When I sit down for dinner, I'll serve him up his own meal.

Good news. I reconnected with Chris and Marti over email last night and they have a new baby girl, Lucy. Congrats, Floridians!

Matthew is coming to visit next week for work. I've already got plenty of ideas cooking for fun evenings out for us. I'm excited!

Liberals turned conservative and vice versa

How many of you know people who started in one political stripe and changed sides? I am having an internal conflict lately in political belief (and so should many of you!) My democratic party is floundering to such a great degree that I hold no hope at this point in their resurrection of a viable campaign and political agenda. The party has fragmented to such a diverse degree (diversity being the lynch-pin of the democratic agenda), that no consensus seems possible amongst people that do not value a cohesive values system.

Three people really stick out as voices of reason today: new liberalism proponent Robert Reich, values czar William Bennett, and ultranationalist Michael Savage. Each brings a unique, outsiders view to politics that I really value. Seeing as I'm reading and buying into many of the ideas that each man represents (far left to far right), I'm having a difficult time orienting myself to the current political landscape.

Currently, I feel we need to lock down our borders to illegal immigration and open the borders to highly screened immigrants. We need to end programs for illegal immigrants in schools, hospitals and public services. We need to push on a national, state, and local scale increases in educational reform and place our students back to the top of the world's most highly educated populace. We need to end the huge budget imbalances, trade deficits, and internationally held debt, and learn to buy american again. (So long as american means the best, high quality product, but perhaps not the cheapest?)

We need to fix voter fraud issues to ensure we have the most accurate and fair voting system in the world. We need to promote personal responsibility in savings and long-term financial planning, while keeping key safeguard systems in place for people that meet with unexpected problems.

Despite what I've said above, my political planks are not secure, yet. I've still yet to come to internal consensus about many of these key issues. Beyond my increasingly conservative political orientation, however, I do beleive in gay marriage--anything that strengths families should be supported wholly and earnestly.

I cannot buy into George W. Bush, however. I'm not sold on the republicans. But who else is there?

Whack!

Thoop! Yep, Golf season has begun in earnest again this past weekend in Chicago. After a week of whiffs, I really started hitting the ball today with my new set of clubs (thanks, Mom!) I've been working on my stance, relaxation, and form with my short irons. After a bunch of great short iron shots, though, I had to whip out my new woods and take a wack at some balls. Wow! What fun! I hit a few balls about 200+ yds! Awesome.

Novel Update: 1200 words in 1 chapter.
Flower Update: Tulips and Daffodils in full bloom, hostas spreading, and iris growing rapidly.

Excerpt #1

But to commute via I-55 or the Kennedy or to head into the City on a weekday morning at rush hour, seemed like one of the most foolish, wasteful activities you could ever attempt. Accidents created huge gaper’s delays as drivers gaucked at the misfortunes of the slow footed cell phone business people that made a daily habit of talking a bit too much, and watching a bit too little. One car would careen into another, sending the lead car flying forward like a sling shot, only to squeal on their breaks a second time to pull to the side of the road and assess the damage. Taillights broken, trunks crushed in, spewing forth all of the condiments assembled in the Chicagoans trunk—windshield wiper fluid, scrapers, Morton rock salt, blankets, Cubs hats, Bears hand-waving thingys, last week’s Tribune covering the latest Daley scandal, the current Reader listing the current Malkovich performances at Steppenwolf, and some other large, unwieldy lawn care device—some of these things always scattered themselves behind the wreck and attracted even more gazes from the passing cars. The gaper’s delay is not a phenomenon distinct to Chicago, sure, but the City that Works has turned it into a full holiday from driving the speed limit. Radio, TV, and the Weather bug keep everyone informed of the lastest traffic delay, and even though an IPass user can drive through any lane in the toll plaza and use their nifty RFID box, most stay to the inside lane just to ensure a delay. Why start the habit of moving fast on the way to work?

Spring is coming. I noticed my garden has really come alive this past weekend. All of my easter lillies have started to appear.  

Busy, Busy Day...

So, I know it seems like I'm always saying things are busy here in Chicago, but today was a topper. I started my day late--I slept in purposefully until 7:00 am. Then I ran off to school, getting my first mailing together for all of the school teachers. I taught three sections of general music and distributed treats as part of my new incentive system (and I also wrote a couple of notes home as part of my deterent system). During my lunch hour, I set up the PA system in the lunch room to prepare to calm the lunch room. Chowed my lunch, read about Taruskin's new book (The Oxford History of Western Music), and finally, ran off to my lunch duty. On duty I tried to corral 150 kids into orderly lunchroom behavior. Then I taught four more classes of general music to bilingual kindergarteners and the such. Finally, I performed my first teacher observation as part of my practicum program to become a principal. Once the school day was over, I put together my second mailing for the music teachers in the district. At 4:15, I finished addressing and sending my fifteen letters and I rushed out of the door to teach my trumpet lesson half-way across the city. On my way home, I stopped by Sears and bought a new outdoor patio set (to be picked up later). Once home, I slammed down some food and ran off to my principal's meeting at my graduate school. We interviewed a CPS principal and met in small groups to discuss our progress in the program. Then, (while trying to keep my car from overheating), I drove up to Evanston for a dress rehearsal with the Northshore Concert Band.

Now I'm home, eating a salad and a hardboiled egg, very pleased with everything that was accomplished today, but bummed that I didn't get to see my buddy Matthew while he was in town. I would have loved to have joined him for a reuben at the Artists Cafe.

Off to bed to do it again tomorrow!

New Portfolio Site

As part of my master's practicum, I needed to develop an administrative/teaching portfolio. Rather than create something in a book, I decided to put the portfolio online so that I can add some interactive elements like video, guestbooks, online recommendations, etc. It's nowhere near complete, but check it out and tell me what you think so far: N. Pedretti Portfolio

Henderson the Rain King

I took an old reading suggestion to heart this weekend and took to reading Eric's favorite Saul Bellow novel. Henderson is a beast of a man, drunken, cross, inappropriate, maladjusted, and one hell of a wealthy man. In his quest to find himself, he sets off to Africa with his friend Charlie to try to calm the voice in his head that pleads "I want, I want, I want."

In one part of the story, Henderson recounts the library he inherited from his wealthy father. If books weren't valuable enough for their ideas, Bellow furthers the metaphor by having Henderson's father use money as book marks. As he opens books, money literally falls out of them, even old yellowed big backs--a reference I interpret to mean an older type of money. What a clever way to highlight the value of books!

I took my first master's exam this morning and five blue books later, two exam questions answered, I've confidently completed my first assessment. Hopefully, I answered the questions to the level that they required, but I know full well, there was plenty more that could have been written. So now we wait for the results.

Congrats to Irena for her acceptance into an MBA program! Matthew good to hear from you. Joe, how about that album? Chris, update your blog buddy.

Thursday evening with Mark and Saul (the chocolate lab)