you had time

It was time to create a new blog. It was probably time to create a new blog several months ago, when I first fell in love with teaching, or when I fell out of love with it, or when I was threatened with a pair of scissors. Maybe it was time to create a new blog when the green Volvo turned upside down with Alexis and me inside of it, but my computer got wet, so at the time it was quite impossible. Maybe it was time to create a new blog when we moved into the perfect yellow house off Magazine Street, or when I discovered the window onto the roof opened up and I started to smoke up there, all alone, in such a badass way that I desperately wanted to brag about it. Anyway, clearly, it was a long time ago that it was time to create a new blog. So this is all overdue.

I will warn you that right now I am sad.

That's a good warning to open a blog with, because you want to know what you're getting yourself into. I'm sad and I'm sorting myself out. I have seen every episode of "Gilmore Girls" more than ten times. That is a fact. It's an embarrassing fact; I am obviously opening up to you very early in our relationship. I am on the fast track to increasing that statistic to something like twenty times, which I am trying to avoid. So today is the day I am changing my life.

I used to be an entirely fun person. ENTIRELY. No part of me was not fun. I was much better-dressed back then, too. And thinner, because lately I've been exclusively eating dollar-frozen pizzas and individually wrapped snack fruit pies. This has all got to stop.

Here are the ten main things I plan to do in the next month to get back to a 78 percent fun ratio (100 percent would be ambitious, but not really feasible, and Teach for America has taught me that I have to make goals which are both ambitious AND feasible... aaaand two other things, but I can't remember what those things are... mmm... the goal has to be both quantitative and qualitative... well, never mind, let's move on):

• Start a new blog. Mostly so I can be held accountable for getting funner.
  
• Learn to make jams and jellies.
• Go to every movie theater in New Orleans.
• Take the streetcar all the way in all directions.
• Get at least one student to high-five me or give me a fist pound, not ironically.
• Install curtains.
• Do a photo shoot with my cat, who is the greatest cat.
• Begin to learn Spanish.
• Make friends with someone who is not in Teach for America.
• Eat alligator.

This last one is especially terrifying, whereas I think the last time I ate meat of any kind was in England. It was fish sticks. I have just recently come clean about this. I also had some Italian Dry Salami one time at my grandpa's house. But I think it's time to eat alligator.

Here is a list of things I absolutely do not need to do in order to get to my 78 percent fun level. In fact, these things might actually HINDER my funness. IN FACT, these things will probably DEFINITELY hinder funness! These are not positive things:

• Beat "Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker." Which is too bad. That video game is pretty bomb.
• Write excessively long e-mails to various ex-boyfriends, ex-girlfriends, and other people who have social lives and therefore will probably not ever write me back.
• Cry under the covers.
• Establish the high score EVERY DAY on BuzzDash (Oh. I've been doing this. Every. Single. Day. And here's the nerdiest part about that: I do it by only selecting "Technology" as my topic. TECHNOLOGY!)
• Buy presents for people on Amazon.com.
• Facebook stalk excessively.
• Watch re-runs of "The X-Files" and "How I Met Your Mother" on SurfTheChannel.
• Take three-hour naps in the afternoon, resulting in dreams about owning a small bunny and a carnivorous goat simultaneously. Scarier than it sounds.
• Smoke entire packs of cigarettes while saying "Woe is me" over and over again.
• Pretend like I think it is fun to go to bars and attempt to get hit on by mediocre men because that might somehow make me feel more validated as a human being.
• Do anything in which the primary activity is saying "Woe is me" over and over again.

There. That's mapped out. See how I'm changing my life RIGHT NOW?

I'd also like to buy a piano, a bicycle, and start BOARD GAME NIGHT. I just think life would be so much more enjoyable if there was only a Board Game Night involved. People in Teach for America like to say, "Hey, I don't have time for a weekly commitment like 'Board Game Night.'" And I say, "If you have time to go to the bar and talk about how hard it is to teach third grade, you have time to go to Board Game Night." And then they think I'm being a bitch. Most people here think I'm a bitch. Board Game Night might change that.

So let's see how it goes. Today I am 1 percent fun. Maybe tomorrow that percentage will DOUBLE. Or even TRIPLE! Imagine the possibilities...

Oh and also let me add you to my blogroll. Comment and leave a website and I'll put you all up on that. I've never done Blogger before -- I have an emo LiveJournal account and a political-pop-culture-non-personal-bloggy website, but Blogger is truly new terrain. So... BLOGROLL! Right?