I got in an argument today with one of my classes. It was over the theme songs to Full House and Family Matters. I was singing "Whatever happened to predictability..." and insisted it was the theme song to Family Matters. The entire class insisted it was the theme song to Full House. I kept asking what the song for Family Matters was, then, if this wasn't it. Nobody could answer. Since I knew I was right, I decided to make it into a friendly little wager. I was up to a total of 113 dollars (most kids bet 2 or 3 dollars, one girl bet 100) when the bell rang and one girl finally tuned into the conversation and asked what we were arguing about. She turned out to be quite helpful.

"Mister. Full House goes, 'Whatever happened to predictability? The milkman the paperboy the evening TV...'"
"Then what's Family Matters?!?" I asked with frustration.
"It's a rare condition, this day and age to read any good news on the newspaper page..."

I started singing along with her and it finally hit me. They were right, I was wrong. The kids got very excited and reminded me how much I owed each of them. ("Tomorrow," I bluffed.) But I made them all admit that the two songs WERE very similar, and perhaps even sung by the same guy.

Sure enough, they sound EXACTLY alike, and they ARE sung by the same guy.

http://www.sitcomsonline.com/sounds/familymatters1990.wav
http://www.sitcomsonline.com/sounds/fullhouse1st.wav

Please tell me you agree, and that you can understand my confusion. I mean, both songs even have the same THEME for crying out loud!

And if you would like to donate to my $113 debt, please feel free.

(the following was supposed to be posted last week, but i never got a chance. here it is.)

This past weekend found Erica and I on a somewhat spontaneous midwest tour. Over the course of three and a half days we visited 16 people in 6 different locations, driving 1,389 miles in approximately 22 hours, equating to an average of 63 miles per hour (a calculation that includes stops for gas, food, and the like), which earned us only one speeding ticket that put a damper on the evening but was really quite humorous in hindsight for a variety of reasons I will not discuss now.

So yes, after my in-service on Friday we took off for Akron, Ohio. There we visited Nate and Kileigh and their beautiful little baby boy Samuel. On Saturday we drove to Indianapolis for some time with Yoder and his very nice girlfriend Angela. After church on Sunday, we met Erica’s aunt and uncle and cousins in Castleton for lunch. Then, we traveled to Muncie, got a speeding ticket, and hung out at Village Green Records with Jared. After that, Chalupa and Liz fed us chalupa, and then we visited Jamin and his haircut at his hip coffee and custard shop. Yes, it was pretty much as simultaneously wonderful and exhausting as it sounds.

I spent the majority of Sunday deciding whether or not I should visit my old floor, the Penthouse. I found out Pelz wasn’t there and Grunden had graduated, so I began to wonder if there was anyone else who would care to see me up there. I wasn’t sure if it would be more rude to not visit at all, or to run through the floor and say, “Hi guys, I can’t stay, but I was passing through and wanted to say hello! Welp, see ya later!”

I decided not to visit, and so we pretty much avoided Taylor’s campus completely. It is odd how much you miss a place, how much you long for it, and upon the first opportunity to encounter it again, it becomes unexciting and unappealing and uncomfortable. I know many of you can relate. (Yet, as a student, I couldn’t quite understand why graduates wouldn’t come back to visit us!)

So, on Sunday morning we left the Super 8 and as we began our journey eastward, I pulled onto Reade Avenue and drove around the loop, simply to remind myself of what it all looked like, how it felt, and to make sure it was still functioning without me. I think I was somewhat disappointed to find that it was functioning just fine.

It was about 8:50, so while things were still somewhat quiet, there was a considerable amount of people walking from their morning classes to the DC, or from the DC to their morning classes. Page France, which Jamin had given to me the night before, was playing loudly on our car stereo, loudly enough to make it feel like we were watching the whole scene on film, disconnected from the world outside of the car, simply passing through invisibly. And this CD (which I highly recommend) somehow balances pure honest joy with a yearning melancolic sadness in perfect equilibrium, which only added to the emotion of the moment. Erica and I were silent, observing the scene with no dialogue, and I was left alone with my thoughts. I drove past people I knew, people I probably should’ve stopped to talk to, but when I noticed they didn’t know I was there and they were getting along fine without me, I wasn’t sure why it would be worth interrupting their daily routine.

I passed through the scene with the clear realization that life goes on. This place that was my home and my life for four years is now a home and life for 2,000 other kids and not me. I am not missed there. Taylor mattered to me, but I didn’t matter much to Taylor. Sure, Nate Shorb might be lingering in the yearbooks or in the folklore or in the blog archives or in the admissions propaganda, but all of that will fade soon enough as well. I felt very small. It was a sense of sad closure, I guess, and the reality of adulthood struck me harshly once again.

And so, we turned right out of the loop and onto 26 with Page France continuing to play. Without speaking, I put my hand on Erica’s thigh and tears filled my eyes. We started the 10+ hour drive and I wondered if I would still miss Taylor now that I saw it again, and I wondered when I would make the trip to campus next, perhaps not until I take my children on college visits (the same trip I made with my father almost exactly five years ago), when all of my professors and friends are then long gone but Taylor will still be running and all of these realizations will be all the more drastic.

I know all of this was very melodramatic and overboard, but I think it's a pretty accurate representation of what I felt.

i've only seen one of the videos, but i think that this little project called 'directions' (http://deathcabforcutie.com/directions/) is really going to talk me into liking the album 'plans' after all.

adam thomson - do you still read this? i meant to say happy birthday to you yesterday. happy birthday.

winter has returned to its heatwave self again, which couldn't feel any better. as i left school today there were lehigh students having a snowball fight in short sleeves. it made me miss college life. driving past these kids makes me feel so much older, but for some reason, they all look like they're older than me.

so i did get to see sigur ros on friday night. nate and i had a very enjoyable time. it was the first time i was ever really IN atlantic city, which was kind of weird, kind of exciting. i got to gamble for the first time, and i lost miserably. it gave me a good taste of why it's such a dangerous thing, because when you're down you just want to break even, and when you break even you just want a few dollars more. but anyway, it was pretty weird to see a bunch of indie kids taking over a casino. the concert itself was pretty great, not QUITE as great as i was expecting, but pretty great nonetheless. Amina opened which was an extremely pleasant surprise, persuading me to make the musical saw my next instrument purchase. also, if any of you have those little silver bells you sit on a desk or a counter and tap, i'm collecting those in all pitches, because they did some amazing things with those as well. sigur ros seemed a little.....uninspired. like they were going through the motions. that doesnt mean the music wasn't beautiful, or that i didn't get chills when the horns marched across the stage. it just wasn't all that i was expecting. the encore WAS incredible, and it made me wish i would have caught their ( ) tour.

did you know pedro the lion is now dead? mr. bazan has dropped his band name and is going solo. i just found that out, and it's kind of sad. why was there no official announcement? did i miss it?

on to other things...

yesterday several teachers and i had a meeting with a mother and her daughter. this is the girl who, on monday said to me, "I can do whatever I want, whenever I want, however I want." when i told her i was going to be writing her up she said, "you're acting like i care!" the girl is a very intelligent and capable girl, but she craves attention so badly that she is caught up in the social scene and is busy following classmates who are getting suspended every other week. last quarter she got an F in every single subject. we sat there as her mom explained everything she has tried to do at home. her intense love for her three girls was incredibly obvious; it was good to be working with a mom who cares about her kids, and it was draining to see everything she tries to do for her daughter to help, none of which seems to work. at one point she said to her daughter, "i carried you for nine months, i know when you are telling the truth, i know when you are lying." while these words really struck me, i knew that, sadly, they weren't quite as true as she thought or hoped they were. but they reminded me of sufjan's writing, of someone who has carried us for more than nine months, someone who really does know us. anyway, something about that meeting gave me some sort of hope, or at least put me in some sort of mood that transcended the rest of my day. does that make sense?

in the faculty room today, an english teacher talked about how a girl wants to write her persuasive essay on why dating relationships in middle school are a bad idea. i thought this sounded like the best thing to come out of a middle schooler since that girl admitted "i don't care about trees, i care about ME." but someone quickly asked, "you're not actually going to let her present that to the class, are you?" (why not?!? first of all, it's not a bad thing to hear some ideas that oppose the normal trends, especially when they're GOOD ideas!) and the english teacher went on to talk about the girl's father and how much brainwashing must be going on at home. i didn't really understand. they're probably a christian family.

all in all things continue to go well at school. but at this point in the year i have lost all patience with certain kids, and i find myself being really incredibly mean to some of them. i know many of you might think that isn't possible, but i will admit that i am downright cruel at times, finding myself humiliating these kids in front of their peers. it leaves me feeling pretty crappy about myself. it is a nagging reminder of my intense need for god's grace and the spirit's work in my life. so, that's the struggle of the moment.

erica and i found this hole-in-the-wall-mom-and-pop italian restaurant right down the street from us over the weekend. it was really really good and the cute italian lady that runs the place talked to us a lot. we liked it so much that we went back last night for our valentine's dinner. the mother of one of my students was our waitress, which was just kind of weird for a variety of reasons.

hear ye hear ye

the next listening party at the shorbs will be anathallo's new cd "floating world." it comes out on the 25th, so the party will go down shortly thereafter. we would love to have you join us, but the number one rule is this: you may not listen to any of the new mp3's before the party. deal? deal.

i'm serious about this one. don't give in. no pre-listening. no sneak peeks.

jamin, you can still come if you want. you're so weakwilled, always listening to cds before they're released. i guess i ruined it for you back when "how to start a fire" was released and it was sold out and we couldnt get you a copy and you waited all that time for nothing. HA!

Let's just say I was much better at long distance Valentines Days. This is the first one we've been together in what - 5 years? - and I really blew it. In my defense, I DID try to make reservations somewhere, but they were already booked up. I know, that's not much of a defense.

Many of you know Oopsilon, my fish, who has amazingly been living for about 5 years. Well, he's not doing so well. He's been doing lots of tricks that really aren't that cool, like floating vertically, not eating, taking nose dives, and laying on his side on the bottom of the bowl. We're a little worried.

apparently there are random times when blogger isnt blocked at school. i can tell when i go to liz's blog and i am able to see her pictures, cuz normally those are blocked and they just come up as little blue squares with question marks. but not today.

there are 2 minutes left in my prep period. long story short: that nice fellow dustin who told me not to give up hope was right; i scored 2 sigur ros tickets last night and after calling about 20 people to find someone to go with me i found nate diehl and he and i are off to atlantic city in a few hours. i am very very excited.

furthermore, it's ok that mewithoutyou was sold out, because we're going to get a foot of snow tomorrow night. it being sold out was just the good lord's way of saving me 20 bucks.

as if the fact that sigur ros is sold out on friday isn't heartbreaking enough, the mewithoutyou/saxon shore/bangbangbeautiful show on saturday is sold out now too! i waited too long to get tickets, i guess, and now i'm really depressed. there's still ester drang/metal hearts coming up in a couple of weeks. let's hope i dont mess that one up too.

A girl made my day this afternoon, so much so that I told her she did. A boy in the middle of the classroom was talking a bunch of baloney, which is nothing unusual at all. This is the kid who, after failing the first two quarters miserably, has turned a corner and somehow so far has an A in my class for the third quarter. But today he started talking and said to his classmates (loudly enough for me to hear of course), "Mister doesn't care if I keep my A or not. He doesn't care about me."

A girl in the back of the room got his attention and said to him very sternly, with a very serious look of concern on her face, "No. He DOES care about you."

It made my day.

Whether she meant it or not I couldn't tell, but she said it like she believed it was true. Maybe she believes it's true because the other week she and I spent a half hour after school figuring out a complex problem together that I had assigned for bonus points. And during that time after school I asked her if she was going to be a teacher, because she should be. She said no. I asked her if she was going to college, because she needs to. She said no. I gave her a hard time about that and told her she was much too smart to let it go to waste. She gave a bashful smirk and avoided eye contact and told me she'd think about it.

Maybe she believed what she was saying today in class. But even if she wasn't being serious, the way she said it so dry with sarcasm was priceless, and dry humor makes me just as proud as trying to defend the teacher. So, whatever the case, it still made my day.