Tantrum Tuesday

Okay, first off, I want you all to know that I try and try everyday to get the pictures copied, but everyday I get kicked off. Today I tried and only made it through 30 pictures. I'm not even at 200 yet. Sorry, you're not the only ones who are tired of waiting, I'm getting pretty antsy myself.

The whole tantrum Tuesday title comes because the new addition to our preschool is pretty much driving me crazy. I wrote Kim a nice e-mail about it. After school things got better, but we'll still have to see what it's like tomorrow. I can't help it, but I'm not very patient. And apparently she doesn't deal with sarcasm too well. That's difficult seeing as the definition of Brooke Kerby is sarcasm incarnate. I am trying though, but for some reason today was terrible and made me cranky with the students. That's when I realized how bad it was so luckily I was able to catch myself and suck it up because it's not fair for the kids to suffer when Mommy and Daddy are fighting, oh wait, wrong child/adult scenario, but you get the point.

Today it was a good run, like the actual running, but that's also where the ground got shaky between the new arrival and myself. Okay, I'm not using her name in case she happens to find out I have a blog, but it's going to be pretty obvious if she does ever read this. I'm such a goon.

My lessons went well. The kids really enjoyed making tents out of chairs and blankets in my morning class. In the second class I taught about stranger safety and not talking to strangers. The 3 and 4 year olds are pretty safe, they know how to scream and squeal and say no (well, Una might get nabbed). The 5 year olds on the other hand are toast if the stranger has stickers. Or, if they're in a group, there are a few of them who will grab the stranger to try to get their friend back, so if one goes, apparently two go. Let's hope the 5 year olds never encounter a stranger.

At lunch time I went to the post office to buy a box, came back and boxed up a package and then took Natalie back to check out the post office. She wanted to go but wasn't ready when she said she was going to be. That's when I decided to make two trips and get the package off in the mail all in one day. She kept telling me that she needed stamps but when we got there she didn't see any airmail ones and didn't want to ask. I told her that when I have a letter I just bring it here and they put the stamp on and tell me how much to pay. She decided that's what she's going to do too. So I guess I only really needed to make one trip to the post office (I could have taken my stuff to package) but whatever, I was ready for my lesson and had nothing else planned.

My afternoon class was on triceratops and it wasn't too great, but they got to color for 15 minutes and they love that, so all's well that ends well I guess.

Yuling told me right after school that my tutoring class was canceled. I was excited because it was in the afternoon class that I realized how miserable my day had gone, not the actual day, but the mood I was in was terrible, and so I was not looking forward to tutoring for an hour and a half. But I was also sad because that means I'm not making the money from that session. I guess it's not that much and so in perspective, my sanity is worth way more then how ever little I make in one session. (I really have no idea how much I make, Yuling takes out money from what the kids pay to take care of electricity and then I don't get it until the end of the month and it comes from all the class and goes in at the same time as my teaching money so I have no idea, I just except whatever's there.)

I took a nap after school. I was really tired because one, not getting along with your roommate is stressful and takes a lot out of you. And two, I wasn't able to fall asleep last night and so I didn't get to sleep until 2am or later and I was up at 6am. The trouble is, my nap from 6-6:45pm is probably going to make it so that I can't fall asleep tonight too. Let's hope that's not the case.

Anyway, when I woke up I took Natalie to the night market for dinner. We got the coffin bread which is the french toast-ish stuff filled with different meats. After that we went to the visitor information office by the train station because Natalie really wanted a map of Taiwan. She grabbed just about all of the English pamphlets possible so I hope she picked up some good maps. While we were there a guy from Sweden came in and grabbed some maps. We talked to him for a little bit. I tried to help him find where he was going, but he just needed to find his hostel and I had no idea where it was. I apologized for being helpful but he promised that I was. What a liar!

Since we were already out that way I swung by the movie theater to see what was playing. Nothing good. Good, I won't feel the need to waste my time and money there any time soon. And that's it, we stopped at the grocery store so Natalie could buy peanut butter and some other snacks but then we came home and I went straight for my computer so that I could blog.