Your English is good

Got both the Vinyl and the CD. Both signed. I was shocked I got it signed. I didn't see what number I was, but figured with the server crashing I didn't stand a chance. I was very upset with the Decemberists because I thought they just hadn't sent my stuff out yet. Three days after the release! Please! But it turns out that they sent them out earlier than the release date and it was just the fault of the USPS, they even managed to bend the package causing bends in the corners. Sheesh.

Preorder for the Decemberists new album The Hazards of Love began today. If you were one of 750 CD preorders you'd receive a signed copy, 250 for vinyl. Along with a vinyl preorder you get entered to win two tickets to the upcoming "A Short Fazed Hovel" tour and a Baglama Saz (Turkish instrument) signed by the band.

After waiting a few hours for the site to work, I successfully preorderd a CD and a vinyl. I wanted both because there is something elegant about placing a record on a turn table and be able to really listen to it. I want the CD because I'll be able to pass it around and allow people to experience the Decemberists in a completely legal way.

Speaking of the "A Short Fazed Hovel" tour, my oldest brother, Bill, bought us tickets as a Graduation Present for me. We're seeing them, front row, June 10th at Radio City Music Hall. This will be my third time seeing the Decemberists Live, first part of the Orcastra tour at the Mann and second part of the Bridesmaids Revisited at the Electric Factory. Both times before have been concerts in Philadelphia. I'm excited to see the Decemberists vibe outside of the same city.

On an unrelated note it's my younger older brother's birthday. He's turning twenty-two, but telling everyone he's turning twenty-one so he gets free booze from dorm friends. What a clever idea. Happy Birthday, Wes!

Today in SILC the kids were doing a project where they had to identify and answer different questions about the Monroe Doctrine. They were given a copy of the Doctrine, but some didn't understand the strange wording in it. At one point one, while I was helping one group of students, another group raised their hand for me to help them. Mr. Mallon asked what they wanted help with and she said "No! I want Caroline to help me!" I was in awe that the students wanted me to help them instead of their actual teacher.

Today in SILC I taught about the different inventions during the Industrial Revolution. The kids were really awe-struck when they found out that the guy who invented the mercury thermometer was a guy by the name of Gabe Fahrenheit. I guess it's one of those situations where you always hear Fahrenheit, Fahrenheit, Fahrenheit, but never know where it started. Honestly, when I made this power point I had the same reaction. I knew that there was a scientists named Gabe Fahrenheit, but I didn't know he invented the mercury thermometer. It's neat things like this that make history stick with you.

Yesterday I tried to talk to my student that is always 10+ minutes late to class. I walked over and said "Hey, why are you always so late to class?" I was expecting some stupid reason, but I wanted her to know that I've notices. What I got instead is from her staring me straight in the eyes to her awkwardly turning her head. That's right, she blatantly ignored me. After class I talked to Mr. Mallon about what happened and he assured me he'd talk to her within the day about it. Nothing happened until I walk into my 7th period class where her boyfriend confronts me about how I'm giving his girlfriend a hard time. I told him that it was starting to get ridiculous that she was that late every day. I told him that we're not strict about being late, normally, but being late by ten minutes is just unacceptable. Throughout the period he proceded to talk to me about it and it almost felt as if he was trying to prusuade me to tell Mr. Mallon not to punish her. I felt very blindsided because I wasn't doing anything more than just following the rules. I tried to talk to her about it one on one, and she didn't listen to me, infact she ignored me. I told Mr. Mallon what happend, and he tried to talk to her one on one. Tomorrow I'm going to have to talk to Mr. Mallon about this whole situation and find out what we should do about it.

So, I just created a Twitter account. I'll fool around with it for a while, at least.

Follow me, and I'll follow you!
http://twitter.com/CarolineEnglish

This week we started our Baby Projects. We had to create a baby out of flour and carry it around with us as if it was our own flesh and blood. Initially I was excited about this project, but as the first day progressed I regretted wishing this upon myself. The project is so unrealistic it makes me sick. They portray having a child as a burden. Children are not a burden and the fact that the school is trying to push that impression onto us is disgusting.
Speaking of disgusting, we had to watch a child birth video today. One lady was getting a Sea Section, the baby was STILL inside of her and you could see the baby's arms swashing around, trying to get out. This other lady was giving birth naturally when the doctor told her to lean over and look at the baby as he pulled it out.
Before, and even after, watching this video and caring for an inanimate object I still want a huge family. Five kids sounds crazy, but I want a house full of life and full of happiness.

Oh, and this thought just crossed my mind. They assign this project to us when it is physically impossible to have a baby while in high school, after all it takes nine months to "cook."

Today Megan accidentally said "Have a nice day!" when she handed a man his cup out the drive though window, this usually green-lights people to leave, so he left. Unfortunately was behind her waiting for her to move to give him his change. He blew through both stop signs, so he lost $17. Di told us to keep it in the drawer until he came back, but he never did. I felt like crap afterwards, but there wasn't anything I could do. I even ran out of the store trying to catch him, much more than was necessary .Poll #1331293 What would you do?
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 2

What would you do?

Yesterday was a very stressful day in work. Basically it was Joey, Megan and I working and Mary was doing "Sift leader" duties (yeah right). It was getting really busy around two in the afternoon, and Megan was leaving because she came in at 6 in the morning. I asked her if she had clocked out, she said yes and I accidentally clicked the button to speak to the costumer and said "damn it!" really loud! I realized I did that and said "oh my god! I'm so sorry!" The lady that I said it to was really friendly and laughed for about 20 seconds. When she came to the window I explained what happened and we laughed about it some more. I'm so glad it happened to a friendly lady instead of a jerk.

I figured I should write a blog about 2008 just before it starts it's journey to the Archipelago of Last Years.

I always feel bad on New Year's Eve. I always get this overwhelming feeling of life passing me by, well, more than I do on an average day. Today didn't help at all. I went with my parents, aunt, and grandma to see The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. Boy. It was depressing. The movie was great, but it haunted me with the fact that life, itself, has a life of itself. What I mean is: life is always changing. The moments of your life are here in a flash and gone in one, too.

Now that I have depressed you all, I'll list a few things that made this year worthy of depression, haha.

I met my favorite band! The Decemberists
I became a Senior!
I fell in love, and applied to Rutgers!
I have grown as a person and became a better one.
We elected Barack Obama as President!

This list is lame, but it's almost 2009. Happy New Year! Have a Safe and Full one too!

Today in work I almost cut off my thumb.

I was walking around from the front of the store to go behind the counter, I was talking to my Mom about the Christmas Party we're having in a few weeks. Honestly, I wasn't paying much attention and when I went over to the counter door I pushed with my thumb in the hinge instead of pulling it. The lock on the door has been broken for months, according to Megan. Anyway, I crushed my thumb all the way up to the first knuckle with the metal hinge on the door. I got a white hot shooting pain in my thumb and fell to my knees. Everyone behind the counter ran over to me and asked me what the hell is wrong me with me, the door swings out, not in.

Well, the good news is that It's still attached, but it's purple-y.

Today was my first time teaching, I was told to teach the kids about the Constitution. All of my kids are really amazing, so it was easy for me to teach them. I found a really awesome powerpoint online that broke the constitution down really simply. I edited, it was last updated in 2003, and I deleted some of the clauses that were just excessive. We got 28 slides done out of about 43, today. I probably would have finished, too, but Mr. Mallon was interjecting sillyness. I talked to some of my kids to get their feedback, later in the day, and the only thing they said was that I should not let Mr. Mallon drag out some of the slides. When they said that I really laughed hard because they're telling me to make the teacher not talk. Of course I'm not actually going to make Mr. Mallon not talk, I think what he added to the powerpoint was the flair I couldn't because I didn't know the material as well as he did, but it sure is flattering to have my kids tell me that they want me teaching, not Mr. Mallon.

On a sad note, Pushing Daisies was canceled. It's so insanely sad that something as brilliant and aesthetically beautiful can't last because it's to "advanced" for everyone to tune in. It's just another casualty in the war of wit on television as of late. May you rest in peace. If only I had the magic touch that Ned possesses, surely this would be the one show I would resurrect (Along with Gilmore Girls and Veronica Mars' flesh-eaten corpuses [having been gone slightly over two years now]).

Decemberists Concert tonight! I’ll post pictures when I get home!

Add: It's so much damn stuff to type that I'm going to do it in slices, apparently out of order slices, too! Enjoy!

/Orate: This concert was my first time meeting a /Orate-er, Emily. I was lucky enough to meet and hang out with Emily and her two friends Marc and Austin, for hours. We literally got there at 3-3:30 and hung out the entire time. Hell, we even got there before the Decemberists got there! We got to wave and say hi to them all, they didn't come over and meet us, but we did that afterwards =D

Crazy Gail Story: In line, Emily, her friends Marc and Austin and my Brother Bill and I were standing first in line and this older lady comes over and starts talking to the security guards. Apparently she had to pee really bad but they won't let her in. She comes up to us, after being rejected, and says "Can I stand in line with you guys? They won't let me in, and I have to pee so bad I'm shitting myself." Of course we let her in. The entire conversation after that was these insane stories about her at different shows with her daughter (who she's telling us to facebook stalk, pretty much), and then this one story about crushing her daughters heart by telling her she'd have forever to see Elliot Smith and she couldn't go to his concert because it was her dad's birthday.

So after she "does her business" she comes over to us in the concert and starts reading Emily, Marc, and Austin's palms. She described the girl Austin is going to marry, she told Marc to write "the damn book already" because he'll be famous, and told Emily she's going to get into a bad accident when she's 40 or 50, but she won't die.

Towards the end of the concert Colin throws a pick into the audiance. Someone hits it out of my hand, so I lose it. A little while after Colin throws another one towards me, and it falls in the press area. This lady started to pick me up and tried to throw me into the press area head first! These security guards start walking over with a kind of "wtf" look on their face, and this lady starts to scream about how that pick is mine. Meh, I guess I shouldn't be complaining, I got the pick, but I almost died in the process. There was a metal step right where she was trying to throw me.

Loch Lomond: As soon as I heard that the Decemberists had asked Loch Lomond to play with them on this tour I quickly went and got all of their albums. I soon fell in love with the band. While we were waiting for them to come on stage, at the Electric Factory, I kept reassuring people around us that they were amazing. My brother, Bill, didn't really believe and thought they'd just be another "opening band" but after the concert he admitted to me that when Ritchie (lead singer) said they only had two songs left he wished they had a two hours left instead. After the concert we met up with a few of them, and Dave assured me they'd be back around March headlining their own tour. I'm holding him to that!

More to come later!

My brothers went to Coney Island, while they were there they took this picture. As soon as I saw this I decided I had to ... edit =D

Yesterday I got my Decemberists Tickets for November 7th at the Electric Factory in Philadelphia! Heck Yes!

Last week I asked Megan if she could get me an application for the Dunkin' Donuts she works at. She did even better; she got me a job.
Megan works on Saturdays and Sundays, so the next Saturday she talked to her [our] boss, Di, who told Megan "Just bring her in!" After applying to all the places I've applied to it's so shocking that I didn't even need to fill out an application! I hope I'll be working until 12, which is usually when I wake up on the weekends. Working when I would, otherwise, be sleeping sounds great to me. Time that I'd normally be wasting is now going to be spent earning me some serious cash. I hope I won't become too stressed out with homework and college-y things.

Edit: My shift is 7am to 3pm. Eight hours. That's a long time, but it'll be fine. I find myself too exhausted from working to do anything else during the day, and now I have to catch up on sleep DURING the week.

I was on the bus, and some kid starts attacking Obama just to make me mad. He was saying ridiculous things like the first pet will be a goat and such. I told him if he wanted to have a real discussion with me than come back and we can talk. I was getting pretty mad and he was too. So, I put my headphone in to end the conversation. As I did this I got a text message and started to read it in my lap. All of a sudden I see this hand coming towards my chest in an open fashion. In the heat of the moment my instincts kicked in and I just lifted my leg and went to kick him in the chest. Mid-kick I realized he was taking my ear bud out to say some other comment, but it was too late. My leg was already going and I couldn’t pull back fast enough. I ended up kicking, more like pushing, him very lightly. As soon as it happened I screamed “Well, how was I supposed to know where you were grabbing!” As a girl in modern times, how can I react any differently. And to top it off, I apologized to him and within 5 seconds he slapped my neighbor on the butt as we walked off the bus.