week in review

It has been a week.

There was the amazing high of the Saints winning the Super Bowl.  I remember when they had their first winning season (after 20 some years as a franchise). That was the year of the "strike" teams.  I remember the fans in the Super Dome chanting "Stay on strike!" because the Replacements were winning!  I remember once - about 20 years ago - being in New Orleans in the French Quarter on a game day - the reason escapes me.  Under the windshield wiper of a car parked on the side of the street were a pair of Saints tickets with a sign that said "Take Me."  No one had.   I remember when they finally made it to a play-off game.  And then when they won a play-off game!  I remember 2005 when all of their home games were played on the road.  I remember the emotion of their real home game after Katrina.  And I watched the Super Bowl this year and watched them win!  They did NOT manage to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory - something they have raised to an art form over the years.  We set off fireworks in the driveway.  On Monday, "Who Dat?" sufficed for a greeting.

On Tuesday, a parade had been planned for the Saints - win or lose.  New Orleans knows a thing or two about parades.  But I don't think they anticipated that this would possibly be the biggest parade the city had ever seen.  Close to a million people - it was said - celebrated Lombardi Gras/Dat Tuesday.  I would have liked to have seen it myself, but there was work....

The low of the week was my sixth grade girl students.  In the past 2 weeks, three of the four have been in a fight.  Seperate fights.  Teachers who have tried to stop the fights have been injured.  It is crazy.  One morning, I left one parent meeting in the office to see one of my students sitting cuffed and shackled.  She didn't want to stop fighting.  And like night follows day, paperwork follows fights -especially "big" ones like this. And so, paperwork must be completed with i's dotted and t's crossed, and more instructional time will be lost when we meet to decide whether this behavior was "related" and where the best "setting" for her is.  Why can't they just do what they are supposed to do??

Today there was snow.  But snow merits its own post!!