A Trip to Austin

Hello, there!

My 88-year-old mother and I returned 7/29 from a trip to Austin for Annual Assembly and to Houston to visit with my son. We were loaded and set to depart last Monday morning, but the car wouldn't start, lazy thing. A call to AAA saved the day--that and a new battery. Did you know that AAA tow trucks now carry a variety of batteries which they will happily sell you? They can even print out a receipt.

We left later than expected, and we were hot and sweaty, but the air conditioner worked just fine, and we arrived in Austin and found our way to the Hyatt with no trouble. OK, there was a little, eensy-weensy bit of trouble because I am directionally challenged, but really, I was awesome!

I just love the Hyatt. We were on the 16th floor of the hotel, and there was a river view. Just beautiful. Since it was raining, we ate in the hotel, and the food was way overpriced but very tasty. Mother ordered tortilla soup and quesadillas, and I had tortilla soup and crab cakes. Delicious. I was able to talk Mother into riding the escalator, which is my favorite Hyatt pastime, so life was good.

The exercise room is on the first floor, and I was all alone in there so I felt comfortable weighing myself on their dirty, lying scale. Someone should do something about that. I had a great time. There is a little refrigerator full of cold wet towels so one can refresh oneself, and one did.

The next morning, I hiked up one flight of stairs to the Lariat List Committee meeting and had fun greeting returning members and meeting our new ones. Already, we are divided in our opinions about books, and that is the fun of being on this committee. In a later post, I will regale you with anecdotes about some of the books we are reading.





Goodbye, Hyatt, and hello, Houston! My son said he had been working in our apartment and I should not let his grandmother come inside. I had an idea what the place might look like so his grandmother and I stayed at the Holiday Inn Express two minutes from my own home. My son was sick, had been to the doctor, and tried to visit with us, but he just felt awful, so we excused him and fell into bed ourselves. I was out before my head touched the pillow.




After a family breakfast at Denny's the next morning, Mother and I set out for home. We made a brief stop at Buc-ee's (their bathrooms are so, so nice) and at the Collin Street Bakery in Corsicana. The rain began to fall, and I wished I had not left the ark at home. When we turned into the driveway in Richardson, my sister was on her way out to teach her night class. She was glad to see us since both cats had behaved abominably in Mother's absence.

This is a pitiful account of a trip, but this is why I haven't progressed any further on my Things. :(

Project Information from the Birdbrain

My colleague at school plans to work on author studies and webquests with her students, and she thoughtfully gave me a list of proposed authors before school was out. I didn't want to select an author whom a student might choose, but I wanted to work with an interesting, well-respected, living author who intrigued me. I chose Ellen Hopkins, author of many children's nonfiction books as well as several edgy contemporary novels for mature young adults.

There are several places within the LA High School TEKS that one could justify an author study, and I would need to be guided by the teacher and work with him/her on just which TEKS our project would include. One I am thinking about is 110.C (5):

Reading/Comprehension of Literary Text/Fiction. Students understand, make inferences and draw conclusions about the structure and elements of fiction and provide evidence from text to support their understanding.

Students are expected to:(B) analyze the moral dilemmas and quandaries presented in works of fiction as revealed by the underlying motivations and behaviors of the characters.

The outcome of the analysis could be to (15) (D) produce a multimedia presentation (e.g., documentary, class newspaper, docudrama, infomercial, visual or textual parodies, theatrical production) with graphics, images, and sound that appeals to a specific audience and synthesizes information from multiple points of view.

I believe that students given the opportunity to create a multimedia presentation as a culminating activity and as a showcase for their research will find the project much more palatable than a text-only product. Using technology to research and to create new information also makes that information accessible to a wider audience.

Middle to Front

I am still attempting to get it together. Of course, I started in the middle with the research and now have to go back and think about a project or product, and I know that I am not being a good role model for others. My advice to any readers, few though they may be, Vaughn, in fact, is, "Do as I say and not as I do!" To be perfectly frank, I wouldn't do anything I say, either.

Two of the English teachers I most admire are working on 23Things and are doing such a fantastic job that I am totally eclipsed. In an effort to redeem myself somewhat I am going to work on an author study webquest that one or both of them might be able to adapt for their classrooms.

On another note, completely unrelated, my mother, my sister, and I went to The Chocolate Angel for afternoon tea yesterday. The little tea room was furnished in 1950s style with black and white photos of 50s debs and brides under table-sized glass. Each of us selected a tea--chocolate decadence for my sister, pomegranate for my mother, and I have forgotten what I had, but it wasn't black currant. I am going to have that next time. While the tea brewed, the server brought us each a crystal tray of sandwiches (cucumber, pimiento cheese, chicken salad), a slice of quiche, a brioche and a fruit cup. After that, came the sweets--bite-sized brownies, Italian cream cupcakes, strawberry truffles--so good!

Bringing It All Together? Surely, You Jest!

Never in my life have I brought it all together, and I don't suppose it will happen now. I work back to front or middle to either end, but I am not linear sequential. What I am is tired and cranky and nervous and very, very distractible. Distractible. Case in point. Googled "distractable/distractible" and found just what I was looking for in a blog entitled "Musings of a Distractable Mind." I quote:

More people get it wrong than right. I have more people coming to my blog doing the search “Musings of a Distractable Mind” than by the correctly-spelled version. I made this same mistake when I started. English is dumb. Shouldn’t it be “able” because it means “able to be distracted?” Nobody is “ible to be distracted.”

This is why I don't think I am going to finish my project on time.