Pied, productive weekend, football (of course), "Remember When", and Alzheimer's

When I got home Friday, I had to clean up before we could leave for the lake. The pep rally theme for this week was "Mute the Mustangs." The way it works is that each of the cheerleaders asks a teacher to be their partner for the pep rally. On Friday, the cheerleaders cannot talk unless it is necessary in class and only when directed to by the teacher. If they talk, the teacher gets to pie them at the pep rally; if they don't talk, they pie the teacher. Last year, Saylor asked if I'd be her partner. She was in my English 10 class and I knew there was NO WAY she could go all day without talking, so I agreed, and just as I thought, I got to pie her. When she came to me to ask this year, I agreed without hesitation. It was SAYLOR. Guess who managed to stay quiet ALL DAY. I wish I had thought to take my camera so someone could have gotten our picture. I must say I looked quite lovely wearing my shower cap and garbage bag with Cool Whip all over my face. hahaha (OOPS--I had a spelling error--hope you caught it "deb-in-the-city.")

We got to the lake about 9:30 Friday night, and I went right to bed. I was exhausted. I think I slept like the dead, too. I don't even remember John coming to bed, but I know he did because he was there when I woke up yesterday. ;)

We were both very productive yesterday. He got the fascia board caulked and painted. For anyone who didn't know what it looked like before, they'd think it was no big deal, but if you have seen it--it looks TONS better! Mr. and Mrs. Ward had not been out there much for about 5 years, so there really hadn't been any maintenance done on the trailer at all. We're slowly getting it back into good shape. About the time we get everything done, we'll hopefully be ready to start building.

While John was working outside, I was checking bib cards and note cards. Misty and I decided to assign our students to research groups that they will work in throughout the research process. On Friday, I had them get into their groups and check each other's cards. I really think it helped a lot. I had a couple of students who realized they had left the publication date off one of their bib cards, so they were able to dash down to the library and get it. There were very few mistakes with the punctuation on the cards. That is typically the biggest problem--they forget to put a comma, they use a colon in the wrong place, or they forget the period at the end of the URL for their web sources. The end period was still something a few of them left off, but overall, their grades were much better than usual.

Misty and I decided to provide the students with a list of pre-approved topics this year instead of making them do a literary analysis on the works of the British author. The productivity of the students has improved so much. They still have questions, but they are typically about how to cite a source or whether or not a source is one they can use. I'm looking forward to reading all of their papers, but some of the ones that I am most interested in are the ones on Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and Bi-Polar Disorder, all of which are things our family is dealing with. John's mom has Alzheimer's, his older brother has Parkinson's, and my brother is Bi-Polar. Another student is doing his paper on night terrors, and as a child, my brother suffered from them as well.

Since I was grading, I didn't watch football non-stop, but I did have the TV on. What about the Georgia-LSU game? 90 points total! Wow!! I would yell out to John when one of them would score. I did a lot of yelling. hahaha We were really glad that Georgia beat LSU--it helps our chances of going to Atlanta for the championship game. IF we do make it to Atlanta, I hope that John and I can go. The '99 game was one of the most fun games we've ever gone to.

We certainly enjoyed the Bama-tennessee game last night. I don't think I sat down for more than 15 minutes during the entire game. Once, Bama (the dog) was snuggled up with me, and Bama (the team) did something really good--I think it was when Javy had a good run. I jumped up screaming and threw Bama (the dog) down. Bama (the dog) stood in the middle of the floor barking at me. I know he was saying, "Mom, would you PLEASE shut up and sit down so I can go back to sleep???" He finally crawled up in John's lap and snoozed with Ali for the rest of the game. Susan and I usually text each other all during the game, but at the bottom of the world, we don't have cell service. At half time, I called her, and we talked about how the game had gone to that point.

This morning, we rode over to Ron and Cindy's. They have done a ton of work on their place. It's going to look so good when they finish. Ron decided he wanted to have a "Remember When" room. That will probably be THE place everyone gathers when we're all out there. The plan is to have old pictures of everyone from their younger days. Of course, their "remember when" days were WAY pre-me. I was, oh, 10 or 12 when they were all hanging out back in the day. It's so much fun to look through the pictures of them. They were all skinny and they all had hair. A lot of the guys still have hair, but it's a different color now. hahaha The stories are quite amusing, too.

After we left the Livingston's, we went over to get the boat out of storage and took it to Tim's for now. After we dropped it off, we went over to Billie's. For now, she is still staying at her house. I told both John and Connie today that IF she were my mother, I would have her in the assisted living facility already, but she isn't my mother and I can't make that decision. The plan is still for her to go, but when hasn't been decided, and a lot of it depends on the availability at the facility. I know that Billie is extremely resistant to going--she thinks it's a nursing home--but I think once she sees it and realizes it isn't what she thinks it is, she'll feel a little better about it. I hope so anyway.

The entire time we were there, she talked about how no one has been over to see her in she doesn't know how long. Now, John and I neither one feel that she sits there day after day after day with no one coming to see her or to call her. We KNOW that someone is going by daily, but she just doesn't remember it. Today, John called Danny while Billie was sitting there, and in five minutes, she had completely forgotten. We told her probably 6 or 7 times in not more than 30 minutes that John had talked to Danny right after we got there. It is so sad, and it just breaks my heart. Alzheimer's is such a horrible disease. No one should have to be subjected to it.

I guess that's it. I've got to check on the laundry, and then I'll settle in to watch True Blood--if I can stay awake that long. Have a GREAT week!