13 Hours at the Park

Sunday was the dragon boat races and it was exhausting. I was up and working by 6 am and spent 13 hours at the park in the heat. The first race started 40 minutes late, the second was 10 minutes late, and the final race was about an hour late if not more. In the final race one of our boats placed 2nd and the other placed 4th (there were only 4 high school teams). So then we had to stay for the awards ceremony, though we knew at least one of our teams would place, thus we didn't get home until after 9pm last night. Overall it was a good day, just exhausting. After work Chris and I went up the street for a few beers. We definitely deserved it. We had a really good talk to.

I did run into a girl who I went to high school with at the race, which was exciting. She is the team caption for her team and said anyone is welcome to paddle, so who knows what team I'll end up on. My coach for the team I was on offered for me to be on the new team she is coaching too. I don't know who I'll paddle with, I think it depends on when practices are and what is more convenient for me.

That's all for now.

Oh, forgot one of the best, well maybe best is not the most operative word, part of the day. Dan (a friend of mine who is working for us this summer) got one of the kids to lick my foot in order to get free Subway! It all started with the student looking at my dirty feet and it escalated from there, but he actually did it. It's crazy that one of my students licked my foot!

End of Week 2

It's hot, I'm bored and it's the end of week two. The kids had a good first week of work. We had dragon boat practice twice this week and the kiddos seemed to really like it. We are teaming up with another high school team for the dragon boat races tomorrow at the Beat Festival. The kids will be racing three times. It is really impressive to me that the high school team teaming up with us is willing to sacrifice a championship in order to paddle mixed in with our kids. There is a high possibility we may get a place because there are only four other teams in the high school division. We'll see how we do tomorrow.

Watching the kids paddle made me a little envious. It wasn't that I wanted to paddle with them, I just wanted to paddle. I ran into my coach for Lethally Blind and she told me I should paddle with a new group who has just started to learn how to paddle. They practice on Monday and Thursday nights at 6pm, which could be fisable after SWEP is over. Sue told me I should do it at least once a week to keep it up and I should not stop since I am such a natural. That made me feel good. Paddling is a lot of hard work, but I do enjoy it once I'm back on shore.

Let's see what else has happened . . . oh we had a student go home already. He had some personal/medical issues to deal with. I think if his mother would have pushed him a little he would have tried to stay. Her comment was, I'm surprised he made it this long. What a way to set you kid up for failure.

Next week shall be exciting. It's a short week due to the fourth of July. The kids work Monday through Thursday and then on Friday we spend the day at Oaks Park. My twin is planning on joining us this year, which will be fun. Now I am reminded we have to go to Costo to shop for the 4th for all of the food for the BBQ. Yum!

Ok, that's all for now. My lap is getting hot from my laptop.

Day 4 Blog

Here it is only day four and it seems like a heck of a lot longer than that. It's been good though. We have a few trouble makers and two who are clinging onto each other (even though one has a boyfriend). Well see how that fiasco goes. I did have to tell them to split up a little because they were almost sitting on each other. Overall though it still looks like a good group.

Today and tomorrow have been/will be Orientation and Mobility (O&M) and shopping days. The last three days students have made dinners for the whole group with their team. Tonights team was the most interesting night, but sadly I missed the whole hells kitchen bit because I was in the girls dorm hanging out with Jack. Actually, I'm not really that sad, but I glad I didn't have to deal with it. I have dealt with immaturity issues including anger, name calling and tattling. I'm sure I'll have more interesting stories in the future. It is only coming to the close of week one. I do have to say that I feel a bit better after a few beers up the street. Now I am going to bed so that I get up for work at 7am. Ah, the life of a dorm counselor . . . .

SWEP Has Begun

SWEP actually started about a month ago for me. I've been doing all the prep stuff for the summer. I officially began work on Friday as I met with my boss and then the movers 3.5 hours later when they finally showed up. Of course since I rely on Tri-Met I had to stick around here which then messed up my whole schedule for the day. It didn't help that the movers were in crappy moods either. I was a bigger person though and tried to be cheerful for them even though they had screwed up my day plan.. After the movers were done (at 5:30pm) I went home and packed in a rush so I could be here when McCall, Chris, Jordon, and guess who - Jack got here. The main reason I made it through my day was the thought of seeing Jack near the end.

Well, today went well. Today was sign-in day. This year we have 15 students, which isn't a bad number. We'll see how many we end up with at the end of the summer. Maybe this year will be year number two for not having to kick anyone out. We almost made it last year, but no. This year is quite interesting because we are in two houses instead of one dorm. I've been telling myself that we'll make it work, which we will, but it sucks. The main reason why it sucks is because we (staff) can't hang out. We have to have a staff in each dorm at all times. I think after next week we may get more lenient, but we have another student coming next week who we know we need to keep an eye on. She likes to hang on the boys a little much at times. So really, we probably won't get to hang out much. BUT we do have these cool fun walkies to chat back and fourth on instead of just using our phones. Chris even went down to 711 and still had signal to the house!

Ok, well it's 10:30 and I need to start doing my job and reminding them of the time so they'll all be in bed at 11pm. Plus, my butt is getting sore from this hard chair, not that you really needed to know that.

Look for more updates. I'll probably be better this year since I'll be the only staff in a house at a time for most of my shifts.