Smoking Buses and Statistics

Hello blog! I have missed you. I have missed sleep for that matter as well. The last two weeks  of trying to get in the school year routine and getting used to being a graduate student again has been hectic to say the least.

Even now I have so many things I want to blog about, but my eyes are drooping even as I type.  I am running on empty and no sleep.  I have spent the last two days working all day and then coming home to hours and hours of my own studying and homework to do.

Yesterday, we had a field trip to the Dallas Museum of Art.  It was our first field trip of the year. We are a very small school, so the entire school grades 2-12 go on field trips together. I wish I could tell you I loved going to art museums with elementary kids, but I don't.  They get bored. And you spend the whole time trying to keep them in some sort of suitable etiquette. Well, as we got about halfway to downtown the bus started smoking.  Smoking as in kids were asking why the bus smelled like BBQ. The bus driver pulls over on the side of the highway and has us get off the bus quickly and go stand in a grassy area off the highway. The older kids are videoing and tweeting pictures of the smoking bus. Two fire trucks stopped to check out what was going on, as well as the toll road authority.



The firemen clear the bus as okay and tell us it is okay to get back on the bus.  We teachers are all thinking you rushed us off a smoking bus on the side of the tollway and now you want us to get back on the bus? We really kind of wanted to wait for a new bus, but the bus driver and the firemen all wanted us off the grassy area on the side of the tollway. They assured us if things started smoking again we would get off on the next exit.  We did not have any more smoking bus, so we made it to the museum like an hour late and missed most of our guided tour.  Then, we had 2 hours of self-guided tour time.  Two hours... Two hours of self-guided time in a museum asking kids to walk instead of twirl and reminding them like 5 seconds later. The last 45 minutes or so we went to the park across the street so the kids could play.  They were done.  We got a new bus for the ride back in the afternoon.

I ended my exciting field trip today with a 3 hour graduate Statistics class. Did I mention I had done 8 hours of homework Monday night and had only had 4 hours of sleep that night?  After Statistics, I came home to a couple more hours of homework last night.

I'm not sure I really have a point in sharing all of this other than sometimes life can be a little crazy, and you have to find the humor in all situations...especially as a teacher. Today was actually a great day! I think I was really happy to have normal routine day and know that I did not have any assignments due tonight for grad school.  I am excited to actually go to bed before midnight or even eleven.

I hope you are having a good week...one with maybe no smoking buses or Statistics.