Confessions of a Lipitor Eater

I was reading the newspaper today,the dead tree version, when I skimmed over the advice from a doctor collumn. The first letter was from a woman who said she was taking Lipitor and she knew that it could cause problems with short term memory. She'd stopped taking it, but her colestrol levels went up. What should she do? The doctor said that he knew about the problem of short term memory being affected by Lipitor. How come my doctors never knew? Lots of times when I was having a regular checkup I would mention to the doctor that I was having trouble remembering things. Just getting older he would say. It wasn't until I was having a conversation with other Lipitor eaters in the family that one of them mentioned that Lipitor was causing some negative side affects involving memeory. At least that's what I think he said..... Well, it was almost time to get my lipids checked so I told my doctor I wanted to change my medication and I started taking Lopid again. My memory has cleared up and so have most of joint related aches and pains. Now if I can just remember . . . .

The Mercenary Librarian

Ok, I confess. I'm a mercenary. I sell my skills to the highest bidder; I've no loyalty at all. I ended up recieving offers for a library position from both Ashland Public School and Lame Deer High School and I took the job that paid the most. With the difference in salary between the two schools I could easily buy myself a new car in case I wear mine out driving back and forth to Lame Deer. Plus I have tenure at Lame Deer and I'd have to start over again at Ashland. Maybe when I can retire in 4-5 years, I can work part time at Ashland.

Vacation Blues

Not really blue, it's just that it's been so dreary weatherwise, first rain, then snow, then both. And cold too. I was going to put away the heavy blankets, but it's too cold. Maybe next month. The ISP was down most of yesterday and I spent most of my first official day of vacation sulky and pouting because I couldn't get online. I spent this morning cleaning out my dresser drawers and closet so I could take the afternoon and do as I please ie. take a nap, read a book, watch how to clean your dresser drawers and clean your closet home improvement shows on TLC, an play a few hours on my Playstation. All the while of course trying to decide where to work next year. I've pretty much decided to return to Lame Deer, since I've been told they will be offering me the high school library. If I went back to Ashland I would be losing tenure and about $15,000. BTW, I think there's definitly something wrong when teachers in the same county can have such a difference in salary. I haven't seen an actual contract yet, but since the respective school boards passed a motion to hire me,the contract is a formality.

Good thing I got a new car when I did. Even with 30-35 MPG I'll still have to find something else to do when I get the urge to drive to Billings or MIles City on a whim. Gas in Ashland was 2.79 last Thursday. I haven't been brave enough to check it out recently. Maybe I'll drive by tomorrow and see if it's up to 3.00 yet. Maybe not!

Happy Birthday to Me

All in all I had a lovely birthday. Bill brought me some tulips that were such a delicate pink that they almost look white, but you know at their heart they are pink. We had dinner at the local cafe and that's always a plus 'cause someone else gets the clean-up duty. My name was mentioned on the birthday announcements at school so all day I was greated with "Happy Birthday Ms. Taylor" from good hearted students. And at the end of the day I treated myself to an hour of video games, an almost unheard of event for a "school night."

MONDAYS!

Now one might expect that an article titled Monday would be nothing but bad news. But this Monday has been a good news day for me, so I thought I'd share it. It started off with me finding a box on my desk when I got to work. I'd been gone last Thurs. & Fri., so I'm not sure when it arrived. Anyway it was a box of chess software I'd won in an essay contest,for my school. I wish I could find a copy of the essay, but I got the software, so who cares? Only one essay was chosen from each state and I know that there were at least 2 essays from Montana, mine and Bill's, so it wasn't a total given that I'd win.

Then there was my evaluation. I'd kinda been worrying about it all weekend, not much,just wanted it over with. I haven't been evaluated as a classroom teacher for many, many years. It was to have been this morning during 1st period. So I started my class,and 4 out of 15 students were there. I asked them if maybe the rest of the class got the dates wrong for our vacation, which is next week. One of the girls shrugged her shoulder and said, "It's Monday." Whatever. Anyway the two principals show up; I'd only been expecting one, and one of them says. "You know I was suppose to be evaluating you this morning?"
"Well, yeah."
"Well the office scheduled all those meeting for students who missed more than 18 days this semester for this morning. So I won't be able to evaluate you this morning."
"Whatever." I actually expected this. Not the specifics, just that my evaluation would be cancelled. That's one reason I didn't plan a big song and dance like usual. It's normal for everything to not go as it is expected. Our students are actually very good students. They learn from our example. Why should they bother to come to class on time or be prepared? The staff isn't. Well, the good news is that I was prepared to present a lesson to my students and class continued. The principal can just drop in whenever he doesn't have something more important to do.

So I give the assignment and all the students are busy writing when the phone rings. It's the principal from Ashland Public School. He called to tell me that tomorrow night,in all probability, the Ashland School Board will offer me a contract for next year as a librarian/Eng teacher. The Lame Deer School Board meets on 13 April and I'm tenured so they have to give me a contract. This may be the only time in my life when I have two schools offering me a contract. Ain't it nice to be wanted?

The Taxman

The Taxman cometh and the Taxman taketh away. Even as I write, my printer is busy churning out our tax returns. I started doing our taxes last weekend but gave up in disgust at how complicated it all is.(Taxes are complicated, children are complex). So Saturday, I broke down and decided to download Turbo Tax. Mind you we fill a 1040A, standard deductions, as simple as it can get, but I was so blinded by the unfairness of it all that I just looked for an easy way out. It took from about 8:00 in the morning until 5:00 at night to download the program, so I watched movies and played my new video game. Yesterday I filled in the little boxes and calculated our returns. (Bill deals with taxes every day with his job, so he gets the day off when it comes to our taxes)

Now ordinarily I look for the easiest explaination for things, but there is nothing easy about taxes, remember they are complicated not complex. TAXES have spawned an entire self sustaining industry. Tax lawyers,tax accountants,(no offense to my bro the tax accountant),tax preparation sofware,tax preparation franchises, and a whole other nonprofit business for people who can't afford to pay the tax lawyers. Why does it have to be so complicated? Who writes the tax laws? Could it be the same people who charge you fill out your returns? On the other hand, if ordinary people could pay their taxes without any help, that would put a whole industry our of business and our taxes would go up to pay for the unemployment TAXES.

Well, the returns are printed. So you don't have to read any more ranting. Now I need either to do some mending or bash some boogy men in my video game.

Toolips

No tulips for me this year I guess. I went out in the yard today; it was sunny and warm and I thought I'd check and see if the tulips were leafing out yet. It seems they were, cause some critter decided to crop them to the ground! Only half of them so far though. I guess I'll get my cheap entertainment seeing how long it takes them to eat them all. A lady at the store in town says the deer eat them, but I'm putting my money on the rabbits. I haven't seen too many deer in the yard this year, but I have seen lots of rabbits, and here I thought they were cute! Come to think of it, when we first moved out here I tried to put in gardens, flower gardens and vegetable gardens. I quit when I realized all the work I was going through just to feed the wildlife. Let them forage like the other animals is what I say. Nowadays I just hope for a wet spring and enjoy the wildflowers that bloom au natural, cause the tulips were the last of my efforts to domesticate my yard.