Well...?
What happened?
Miss you guys! I'm in Chicago for my (gulp) 25th high school reunion. So far I went to the homecoming Morning Ex. (like an assembly), at which I was pleased to see one freshman girl will be picking up the long, proud tradition of Parker swimming (I was the only swimmer on the team one year; long, funny story; we don't have a pool).
Then I went to a Spanish 3 class at which I burst into tears telling my teacher how much she'd influenced me (whenever we took tests, she'd walk around the room and point out answers we should revisit. It was my first sense ever that tests weren't just a punishment and that she actually wanted us to do well) but then had fun playing "20 Preguntas" with the students trying to guess what I did for a living. They did not, of course, come up with Juggler.
Next, on to Functions, which I chose because a high school classmate of mine is now the teacher. He gave a word problem about fences, and I successfully expressed the area of the fence as a function of one side, drew a sketch of how to maximize area, and almost found the x-value that would maximize the area of the fence all by hand while the kids were frantically punching buttons into fancy graphing calculators. I was very proud of myself only I got the wrong answer because at the final step I divided 125 by 2 and got 75. Cursed division!
Last, I took a tour of all the changes in the building (wow) and finally got to see old friends and catch up while enjoying curiously delicious food (mostly provided by Parker alumni I knew) at a cocktail reception. Good times. Ditched the bar invitation after to go to Capitalism: A Love Story with my folks. It wasn't as annoyingly self-centered as whatever the last MM one I saw was and it actually had a positive, activist message instead of just whining. Of course some of his stunts are still very silly (and similar to Penn & Teller's Bullshit tactics).
First night here had terrific and weird Mexican street food at a Rick Bayless restaurant. Tonight will have overpriced probably not-terrific food at some bar, but it's the big party for my classmates so I'm psyched.
That's it from the home front.
Viveca
What happened?
Miss you guys! I'm in Chicago for my (gulp) 25th high school reunion. So far I went to the homecoming Morning Ex. (like an assembly), at which I was pleased to see one freshman girl will be picking up the long, proud tradition of Parker swimming (I was the only swimmer on the team one year; long, funny story; we don't have a pool).
Then I went to a Spanish 3 class at which I burst into tears telling my teacher how much she'd influenced me (whenever we took tests, she'd walk around the room and point out answers we should revisit. It was my first sense ever that tests weren't just a punishment and that she actually wanted us to do well) but then had fun playing "20 Preguntas" with the students trying to guess what I did for a living. They did not, of course, come up with Juggler.
Next, on to Functions, which I chose because a high school classmate of mine is now the teacher. He gave a word problem about fences, and I successfully expressed the area of the fence as a function of one side, drew a sketch of how to maximize area, and almost found the x-value that would maximize the area of the fence all by hand while the kids were frantically punching buttons into fancy graphing calculators. I was very proud of myself only I got the wrong answer because at the final step I divided 125 by 2 and got 75. Cursed division!
Last, I took a tour of all the changes in the building (wow) and finally got to see old friends and catch up while enjoying curiously delicious food (mostly provided by Parker alumni I knew) at a cocktail reception. Good times. Ditched the bar invitation after to go to Capitalism: A Love Story with my folks. It wasn't as annoyingly self-centered as whatever the last MM one I saw was and it actually had a positive, activist message instead of just whining. Of course some of his stunts are still very silly (and similar to Penn & Teller's Bullshit tactics).
First night here had terrific and weird Mexican street food at a Rick Bayless restaurant. Tonight will have overpriced probably not-terrific food at some bar, but it's the big party for my classmates so I'm psyched.
That's it from the home front.
Viveca
