Joy - I'd forgotten what it felt like!

Our school system has been having a lot of absences - both teachers and students - due to illnesses. We must have hit the magic number yesterday (just over 11%, according to the local paper) because the Director of Schools shut us down until next Tuesday. We don't have to make these days up because they come from our snow days. (A few years back, our system added 30 minutes to each school day. Adding this time gives us 13 days to use at the director's discretion. He sets 7 of those aside as designated snow days. The others are used for teacher training and various other ways to torture us.) Since adding the snow days, I don't know that we have ever used all 7 snow days. If we don't use them, we just work that many extra days. The last 2 or 3 years, we've gotten two illness days each. This is the first time ever we've used 3 illness days. When you add the previously scheduled Monday holiday for Presidents' Day, we've got a good break! (And, oh yeah, to all the families in my county dealing with sick kids, thanks, and I hope you get well soon!)

When our assistant principal made this announcement yesterday afternoon, you'd have thought we all (the teachers) won the lottery. There was dancing in the halls! I was so excited. Having these days off is wonderful. I am slowly getting back into the swing of things but it's still hard sometimes. I need these days! I'd forgotten what "happy" felt like and appreciated being reminded!

We went out to eat Chinese with my teacher-neighbor and her family last night. We have a favorite restaurant and just happened to have a gift certificate for there. You'll remember that Cori has vomiting issues that involve Chinese food, so I gave her the option of staying home and we'd bring her home fast food or going with us if she would promise not to puke. She opted to go with us and, at least, didn't throw up in the restaurant. She did when we got home, though. I really think it was purposeful. I didn't address the puking at all. I never said a word to her about it. She was trying to get me to get angry with her and I refused to give her that power. After throwing up and repeatedly telling me about it, which she knows pisses me off, she dared to challenge her recent grounding for dress code violations. Again, she was just trying to make me angry. I didn't cave and engage in the fight she so obviously wanted. I wasn't going to let her ruin my new-found happiness over my free days off. (This is the LAST time she'll have a choice to eat Chinese at my house. I'll leave her at home next time!)

Today is going to be all about things that make me happy. I have promised the kids to make pancakes for breakfast. I'll need to make a lot since Beth had a friend spend the night and Boy Wonder (off work due to the weather) came over early when he heard there were pancakes involved. I don't mind that. We've been experimenting with adding things to them. Last time I made chocolate chip pancakes and Cori was so impressed that I had a recipe for that. LOL - what recipe? I used Bisquick and threw in a handful of chips! I didn't let on that it was that simple, though. I just let her think I slaved long and hard over a hot stove. Today's variation involves M&Ms and Reese's Pieces. I don't see how they can be bad. After the pancakes, I'm headed back to bed to watch a few (or a few dozen, maybe) episodes of the Gilmore Girls. My fascination with this show continues. I'm on disc one of season 6. There are only 7 seasons so I'm about done. If you know me in real life and have ever had a desire to watch all 7 seasons of the Gilmore Girls, let me know. I own them all!