Hi everyone!
Well, I am officially on summer vacation, which will hopefully mean a return to the semi-regular blog postings. I still can't quite believe that one of the "perks" of this new job of mine is getting 10-12 weeks of completely unrestricted free time in the middle of the summer. Not to make you year-rounders jealous, but it's fantastic.
Anyways, I had a great school year. It was my first time teaching AP Physics, and it was truly a delight to have such mature, motivated students. They definitely challenged me to stay a step ahead of them, and I really just feel like I'm learning more and more Physics all the time. 42 of them took the AP exam in early May, and they seemed to feel like it went well, so we're all crossing our fingers until we hear the scores in July. After the exam was over, we all took some much-deserved leisure time in class, building projects and just spending time playing with things we hadn't had time to investigate earlier in the year. We launched rockets and tennis balls with air pressure, froze all sorts of stuff with liquid nitrogen, blew up a watermelon, did a photo scavenger hunt, watched funny short Physics videos from youtube, rode on a student-built raft in the pool (and all ended up swimming), and had several potluck breakfasts. Apparently high schoolers love nothing better than eating corn dogs at 7:25 AM.
My "regular" Physics classes were also super this year. I would often sit back and marvel at what nice kids I had - always willing to help each other out, never bullying or picking on anyone, and showing up each day ready to work hard in class and have some fun as well. Their final projects are always a yearly highlight for me - this year I learned what a "talk box" was, how to program an arduino microcontroller, how to build-your-own electric guitar and telescope, what sorts of household chemicals are fluorescent, how to build a motorized skateboard, and, probably most importantly, that it takes 30 lbs of cornstarch to fill a kiddie pool with oobleck. Incidentally, no one stopped to think about how we would get rid of a kiddie pool filled with oobleck - apparently that is part of my job description.
Anyway, school's out for summer, as they say. I celebrated by putting some neon pink highlights in my hair (as seen above). I think it is a good look for me, but the photo is out there now so you can judge for yourself.
In big Tom-and-Kate-and-Banjo related news, we've decided to move to Portland, Oregon at some point during this summer. We've had a wonderful 7 years here in the bay area, but we're just not sure it is where we really want to settle. It's a pretty big city here, and property prices are still just outrageous (900 sqft houses in our neighborhood tend to start around 700k). Portland has a lot of what we're looking for... a great outdoorsy culture, affordable houses, lots of funky people, dogs everywhere, microbrews everywhere, a mountain, trees, Dustin and Cara, and a short drive to my sister and her family in Seattle. Of course, what it doesn't have a lot of is jobs. I managed to snag the only Physics position I've seen posted there - teaching freshman Physics at a Catholic school in SE Portland. On the upside, I'll have small classes, don't have to teach to any standardized tests, and will still get to teach all Physics (I have a much-regretted Chemistry certification, as well). On the downside, I'm a little worried that freshmen won't find my particular sense of humor (aka Sarcasm) as funny as my seniors do. Also, I have to lead prayers for every single period of the day. I was thinking something along the lines of "Jesus leaves Bethlehem on a camel traveling 3 meters per second. If Jerusalem is 4000 km away, how long will it take him to get there". Amen.
Tom is still looking for a job, although he has a full-day interview next week, so we've got our fingers crossed that he loves the place. We often question the wisdom of quitting jobs we like and leaving a place we're happy for the unknown, but we also know that we could always come back. We got lots of good advice from both of our sets of parents, and eventually decided that it was worth a shot. We'll be living with Dustin and Cara for a while, until we decide for sure that we want to stay and jump into the housing market. But they've assured us that their house is our house too (commune!) so feel free to come visit any time you're in the area!
I think I'll stop there for now - save some stories and news for another post. Come to think of it, I'm not sure anyone is actually reading this blog any more except Tom's youth-group friend Charity who not only checks it but could actually quote the date of our last blog post. Hi Charity! And hi anyone else too - hopefully we'll be around a lot more this summer.
