CEA

Short week of school this week...or a long weekend, however you want to put it. We had our CEA convention this Thursday and Friday in South Bend. It's a pretty cool place, a ton of Notre Dame stuff all over and the College Football Hall of Fame is there. We drove down Thursday morning, leaving here at about 6:00 and getting there around 9ish. The main speaker was...alright. I guess he's a well known writer. Walter....something, I think it starts with a W. Anyways, after that we had a few sectionals, I went to one on collaboration in the Science classroom that was alright, and then one about using everyday materials to teach Science lessons. That one was a little better because it appealed to the cheap me who never wants to order anything out of the overpriced Science supply catalog.

Friday morning I went to a pretty interesting one...Fantasy Sports and Mathematics. It was really good...used alot more math than I use in my class, so I think I'll use a bunch of his ideas.

Not a ton going on today either, so I'm sorry for the boring post. I've spent the afternoon so far watching a combination of the Wisconsin/Illinois, and Northwestern/Indiana games, following the Minnesota/Purdue game online, watching the Dordt/Doane game on webcast, and listening to the Northwestern/Briar Cliff game at times.

And people say guys can't multitask...

During down time, halftime, or anytime the games were all slow, I've been working on basketball practice for next week, fantasy basketball (which starts next week with the new quarter), and figuring out what experiments to use to show Boyle's & Charles's law this week in Science.

All from my laptop with "borrowed" internet and my flatscreen tv with "borrowed" cable.

Good thing my neighbors are such nice sharing people, otherwise I wouldn't get anything done!

Artistic Side

Linds wanted to take some pictures of the fall colors around our neighborhood, so I thought I would try my hand at being a little artistic. I think I did pretty good...these are all my pieces of work...and I even managed to keep baseball out of the picture.

enjoy...

This one...I think I got funny looks from the neighbors for looking straight up at the sky trying to get the camera to focus on the right leaf.

I call this one Barak Obama...it wants change and it looks like its headed for it, but no one knows quite how or when it's going to happen.

This is my John McCain, the true red maverick among a sea of green.


This is one of the stupid Canadians that wake us up every morning before sunrise. It'll be nice when they leave and I can sleep in peace, eh?

Actually, my first picture taken on the adventure before I started looking for stories to go with my pictures.


This is my favorite of all of them, its the background on the computer right now and I think I'm going to get it enlarged over at Wal-Mart or something, it would look good hanging on a wall somewhere.

Call it what you like...Republicans vs. Democrats, U.S. vs. Canada, Summer vs. Winter, American League vs. National League..........


so much for leaving baseball out of it (you really didn't think I could, could you?)

I'll admit it, I had to somewhat crack the stem of this leaf to get it to lay like this, but I think it looks pretty cool. Plus by now it would've been dead anyway, and my picture lasts alot longer.

I snuck up on this leaf, it was just looking the other way, minding its own business when I crept up in full camoflauge and took a shot at it....then the neighbor came out of the garage and I stopped humming the "Mission Impossible" theme song and moved on.

Post-baseball??

Well, its over...the 2008 season is history for the Minnesota Twins, who finished 10-12 wins higher than I personally thought they were going to reach. They also finished 2 places higher in the standings than I thought they were going to. They have two potential (though unlikely now) MVP winners in Mauer and Morneau. Next year's rotation looks like it should be solid, along with quite the battles in the 3B and RF positions for the '09 season.

Well...enough about the Twins, because I'm sure you've all already scrolled down to see the pictures I've posted.


This is the entrance to my classroom. Despite the way it looks, the doorway isn't pink, its more of a dark red.

This is a shot from the doorway to the front of the room. My desk and computer are right in the middle of the picture. you can see my SMARTboard on the wall to the left.

...and here is me with my latest edition...my Twins Territory blanket that I feel really "brings the room together". Notice the strategically placed broom there as well...this is what Sox fans had to look forward to last Monday when they came back to school after the Twins sweep.

Well, I think pictures justify it as a successful blog post, even if I didn't say much. We had Chicago baseball day today at school, so everyone was supposed to wear either Cubs or Sox apparel, so I went to Jewel and bought a $3 Cubs "W" shirt that I sported for the day. I could've worn a Twins shirt...I got it OK'ed, but after the loss, I couldn't bring myself to endure the ridicule.

After school today, I was suprised to find my school mailbox stuffed with a manila envelope. I opened it up to find 75+ sympathy cards written to me to offer their condolences on my team losing the night before. Apparently one of the 6th grade teachers (who I know is a HUGE Sox fan) decided to have his class do a writing activity. Most of them are the typical...

"Dear Mr. Van Schepen, I'm very sorry your team lost. But not really. I'm a Sox fan. Maybe next year. but probably not. I slept really good last night." (signed) A 6th grader.

But a few of them were actually pretty creative...

"...you should teach the Twins more chemistry, because they didn't really have it last night."

"...being a science teacher, you can see the Twins lost because they aren't evolved as the Sox."

"Whoop di doo, too bad for you. The Sox have won and the Twins have lost. I bet your face is really cross. Mr. E. made me write this sympathy letter, even though it won't make you feel better."

and my personal favorite...

"The Sox can't exist without the Twins because every sock needs a twin."

...how many times have I heard a similar phrase from my mother???

So long everybody...