December 25: The sun barely breached the mountain top that hunched over the Blue Lagoon before it started sinking into sunset again. It was defenseless against the fog that would make Nick disappear every time he swam more than five feet away from me.
December 26: Various similes that came to mind while watching the Northern Lights:
Like water coloring painting with the inside of a green glow stick.
Like god playing a galactic keyboard.
Like the flickering steam that bubbled up when my dad threw an ice cube on the still hot teppan table at Shogun.
December 27: It was a 45-minute walk to the plane wreck on Black Sand Beach, which might explain why on our trek back to the car, we saw a family flying a drone out to view it instead.
December 28: The cabins had a three hot tubs stationed nearby. Nick and I ran to them, barefoot through the snow and only marginally wrapped in the tiny bathroom towels they provided. The sensor for the light above the hot tub was too cold to register movement and continued to flicker on and off while we mapped out our plan to get back to the cabin without slipping on the ice-coated steps.
December 29: The Friðheimar restaurant is built inside of the greenhouse that produces 18% of Iceland’s tomatoes. Inside the building, you can find hundreds of bees and tomato ice cream.
December 30: I will forever be indebted to The Ghost Bus Tours for teaching me about the ghost story that ran in the newspapers with the headline: Scratching Fanny of Cock Lane.
December 31: I’m a little disappointed at how dignified the souvenirs are in London. I was hoping to find a ridiculous magnet of Mr. Bean or a dolled up corgi, but everything I could find was frustratingly tasteful and refined.
much love,
hedgie
Sunday, December 31, 2017
Sunday, December 24, 2017
a country, a hot tub, and a solid gold hedgehog
December 18: Today’s community circle question was what everyone was going to buy me for Christmas. A few were modest and said cookies while others were more generous and claimed they would buy me a country, a hot tub, and a solid gold hedgehog.
December 19: Last year, Eddie went home with a giant carton of Nutella and a Magic Mike dvd. A lot of people were jealous. Especially since over the years, people have left the White Elephant gift exchange with a paperclips, one pack of batteries, or an empty box.
December 20: Briana won the poetry contest. Her prize was a new soccer ball, a special notebook, and a fluorescent pink pencil. On the first page of her new notebook, she drew a picture of me. It melted my heart until she began pinching people again ten minutes later.
December 21: I know I’m not supposed to judge children’s likes and dislikes, but when one of them claims that Johnny Depp’s Willy Wonka movie was better than the Gene Wilder one, then I can’t be held responsible for my actions.
December 22: Margaret was obsessed with Daniel Radcliffe when we were in high school. There was one day when one of her sisters had a dream where Daniel Radcliffe was speaking directly to her and told her to check all her pant pockets when she woke up. Then he said he was going to go into Margaret’s dream. When they went through all her sister’s pant pockets, they found a scrap piece of paper with half of a phone number. This was the part of the story where Margaret bemoans that she couldn’t remember Daniel’s message in her dream and finish the rest of the puzzle. This is what I love about her. Not once did she just shrug off her sister’s dream or even doubt that Daniel Radcliffe tried to communicate with her. She immediately jumps to the conclusion that it all happened as dream Daniel promised it would and she just forgot.
December 23: It has been an adjustment getting used to Icelandic cuisine. Today, Nick ate fermented shark in a marketplace and we both had course that was dung-smoked at dinner.
December 24: Nick lead us down a rocky path where we used a foot bath-sized hot spring on the beach next to a shack filled with hanging chunks of fermenting shark in a snowstorm. I am not positive that Iceland is real.
much love,
hedgie
December 19: Last year, Eddie went home with a giant carton of Nutella and a Magic Mike dvd. A lot of people were jealous. Especially since over the years, people have left the White Elephant gift exchange with a paperclips, one pack of batteries, or an empty box.
December 20: Briana won the poetry contest. Her prize was a new soccer ball, a special notebook, and a fluorescent pink pencil. On the first page of her new notebook, she drew a picture of me. It melted my heart until she began pinching people again ten minutes later.
December 21: I know I’m not supposed to judge children’s likes and dislikes, but when one of them claims that Johnny Depp’s Willy Wonka movie was better than the Gene Wilder one, then I can’t be held responsible for my actions.
December 22: Margaret was obsessed with Daniel Radcliffe when we were in high school. There was one day when one of her sisters had a dream where Daniel Radcliffe was speaking directly to her and told her to check all her pant pockets when she woke up. Then he said he was going to go into Margaret’s dream. When they went through all her sister’s pant pockets, they found a scrap piece of paper with half of a phone number. This was the part of the story where Margaret bemoans that she couldn’t remember Daniel’s message in her dream and finish the rest of the puzzle. This is what I love about her. Not once did she just shrug off her sister’s dream or even doubt that Daniel Radcliffe tried to communicate with her. She immediately jumps to the conclusion that it all happened as dream Daniel promised it would and she just forgot.
December 23: It has been an adjustment getting used to Icelandic cuisine. Today, Nick ate fermented shark in a marketplace and we both had course that was dung-smoked at dinner.
December 24: Nick lead us down a rocky path where we used a foot bath-sized hot spring on the beach next to a shack filled with hanging chunks of fermenting shark in a snowstorm. I am not positive that Iceland is real.
much love,
hedgie
Sunday, December 17, 2017
chair privileges
December 10: I spent all day in my pajamas. It was awesome.
December 11: Two of my students lost their chair privileges today. They kept purposely sitting in them wrong so that they would loudly tumble to the ground and get everyone’s attention. They had to spend half the day sitting on the rainbow rug.
December 12: I held the envelope up above my head for all of them to see. It contained the name of the winner of the poetry contest between us and my dad’s creative writing class. The fifth grade boys were legitimately terrified because if we lost, the bet stipulated we had to eat bugs and I told them I went to the bait shop that morning to buy a bag full of earthworms.
December 13: Maria bought tickets for her and her parents to go see Aladdin for Christmas. I mentioned that I was going to see it too. Then we found out that while Nick paid $80 for two tickets, Maria had paid $500 for three tickets. Her eyes narrowed as she looked at me, “I hope your seats have partial obscurity.”
December 14: The latest toy trend is squishes, which are just the squishy versions of everyday objects. The more popular ones are ice cream cones and slices of chocolate cake. But at recess, I saw one girl squeezing a squishy entire loaf of bread.
December 15: During the school Christmas showcase, we had to break up a fight between two parents. Their sons had gotten into a fight and while relaying what had taken place, one of the mothers repeatedly yelled the n-word over and over again right in front of the TK class.
December 16: Nick trimmed my hair using electric clippers. The vibrations tickled my neck and made it very difficult to sit still.
December 17: Greg’s favorite feature of his new Tesla is what he calls the “chivalry button” that will open the passenger door for Elaine without him having to leave the car.
much love,
hedgie
December 11: Two of my students lost their chair privileges today. They kept purposely sitting in them wrong so that they would loudly tumble to the ground and get everyone’s attention. They had to spend half the day sitting on the rainbow rug.
December 12: I held the envelope up above my head for all of them to see. It contained the name of the winner of the poetry contest between us and my dad’s creative writing class. The fifth grade boys were legitimately terrified because if we lost, the bet stipulated we had to eat bugs and I told them I went to the bait shop that morning to buy a bag full of earthworms.
December 13: Maria bought tickets for her and her parents to go see Aladdin for Christmas. I mentioned that I was going to see it too. Then we found out that while Nick paid $80 for two tickets, Maria had paid $500 for three tickets. Her eyes narrowed as she looked at me, “I hope your seats have partial obscurity.”
December 14: The latest toy trend is squishes, which are just the squishy versions of everyday objects. The more popular ones are ice cream cones and slices of chocolate cake. But at recess, I saw one girl squeezing a squishy entire loaf of bread.
December 15: During the school Christmas showcase, we had to break up a fight between two parents. Their sons had gotten into a fight and while relaying what had taken place, one of the mothers repeatedly yelled the n-word over and over again right in front of the TK class.
December 16: Nick trimmed my hair using electric clippers. The vibrations tickled my neck and made it very difficult to sit still.
December 17: Greg’s favorite feature of his new Tesla is what he calls the “chivalry button” that will open the passenger door for Elaine without him having to leave the car.
much love,
hedgie
Saturday, December 9, 2017
she said, “I just ate the skull” and then giggled
December 1: Miss Connie brought in balut to work and ate it while standing over the trashcan. All of our coworkers were horrified, especially when she said, “I just ate the skull” and then giggled.
December 2: There was a sushi restaurant on the corner that advertised their “All You Can It Sushi”. The sign went uncorrected for years, which my brothers loved. I wasn’t much of a fan of actually eating there. They shared a wall with an exotic bird store, so the restaurant always smelled like birds and seed.
December 3: My new laptop arrived! It’s so beautiful and doesn’t take fifteen minutes to load a three minute long video!
December 4: One of our neighbors has now taped a sign on his trashcan saying that he has installed a camera inside of it and would post photos of anyone who threw dog poop away in it on social media. I can’t decide if this guy is just really weird about his trashcan or if it’s a genius ploy to get angry people to actually clean up after their dogs.
December 5: Rah has been working on his own version of “Diary of a Wimpy Kid” and has been gathering quotes from all the teachers to write on the back.
“This looks awesome!”—Miss Heather
“Where am I on there?”—Miss Ana
December 6: Kiara started in my class today. She has made quite the impression on all the other staff members as she began a wrestling match at the beginning to class and was picked up half an hour after we close.
December 7: Shanah cried at least a dozen times today. What surprises me most is that she didn’t collapse from dehydration at any point.
December 8: Dora wants to leave the soccer team because the boys won’t stop making ball sack jokes.
December 9: The Google Christmas party employed two women who did nothing but swing back and forth on long poles. They wore long, white dresses that covered the poles so that they looked like they were fifteen feet tall. When they climbed down from on the poles to go on break, they pulled up the long fabric draping down to reveal that they were both wearing leggings and converse underneath.
much love,
hedgie
December 2: There was a sushi restaurant on the corner that advertised their “All You Can It Sushi”. The sign went uncorrected for years, which my brothers loved. I wasn’t much of a fan of actually eating there. They shared a wall with an exotic bird store, so the restaurant always smelled like birds and seed.
December 3: My new laptop arrived! It’s so beautiful and doesn’t take fifteen minutes to load a three minute long video!
December 4: One of our neighbors has now taped a sign on his trashcan saying that he has installed a camera inside of it and would post photos of anyone who threw dog poop away in it on social media. I can’t decide if this guy is just really weird about his trashcan or if it’s a genius ploy to get angry people to actually clean up after their dogs.
December 5: Rah has been working on his own version of “Diary of a Wimpy Kid” and has been gathering quotes from all the teachers to write on the back.
“This looks awesome!”—Miss Heather
“Where am I on there?”—Miss Ana
December 6: Kiara started in my class today. She has made quite the impression on all the other staff members as she began a wrestling match at the beginning to class and was picked up half an hour after we close.
December 7: Shanah cried at least a dozen times today. What surprises me most is that she didn’t collapse from dehydration at any point.
December 8: Dora wants to leave the soccer team because the boys won’t stop making ball sack jokes.
December 9: The Google Christmas party employed two women who did nothing but swing back and forth on long poles. They wore long, white dresses that covered the poles so that they looked like they were fifteen feet tall. When they climbed down from on the poles to go on break, they pulled up the long fabric draping down to reveal that they were both wearing leggings and converse underneath.
much love,
hedgie
Thursday, November 30, 2017
eight grown adult women spend half an hour trying to take a picture that had all nine dogs in it
November 24: For National Heidi Day, we ended the night by building a blanket fort and watching “Big Trouble in Little China” with wine and while wearing cartoon animal face masks. We are adults.
November 25: I watched eight grown adult women spend half an hour trying to take a picture that had all nine dogs in it. They did not succeed.
November 26:
November 28: A Mission Graduates student from Bryant died in a car accident over the weekend. Everyone is trying to raise money for her mother because the girl’s body won’t be released until she can pay for the expenses. Who does that to a person who just lost her ten year old daughter?
November 29: All the parents actually remembered it was pool day today and they packed their kids with their swimsuits and permission slips. Unfortunately, about a third of them neglected to give their children towels to dry off with after.
November 30: 50,000 words! I won NaNoWriMo. Now I’m to go to bed and dream about this book getting published and then made into a movie starring Benedict Cumberbatch, Dame Judy Dench, and Simon Pegg.
much love,
hedgie
November 25: I watched eight grown adult women spend half an hour trying to take a picture that had all nine dogs in it. They did not succeed.
November 26:
When I first met Michael, he informed me that he had yellow fever and I prayed to god that he had the viral disease transmitted by mosquitoes.
November 27: The kids like to play a game where they ask you your name, ask you to name the part of their face they are pointing at, and to ask what they are holding in their hands. This way, they can try to get me to say “Ms. Heather knows nothing”. But a lot of them manage to ruin the joke on the first question by asking me “Ms. Heather, whats your name?”November 28: A Mission Graduates student from Bryant died in a car accident over the weekend. Everyone is trying to raise money for her mother because the girl’s body won’t be released until she can pay for the expenses. Who does that to a person who just lost her ten year old daughter?
November 29: All the parents actually remembered it was pool day today and they packed their kids with their swimsuits and permission slips. Unfortunately, about a third of them neglected to give their children towels to dry off with after.
November 30: 50,000 words! I won NaNoWriMo. Now I’m to go to bed and dream about this book getting published and then made into a movie starring Benedict Cumberbatch, Dame Judy Dench, and Simon Pegg.
much love,
hedgie
Thursday, November 23, 2017
crying and hyperscream
November 17: Maria’s class are making little super hero versions of themselves. Some of their super powers include crying and hyper scream.
November 18: Nick made us start the drive to Mission Viejo at six this morning. I immediately fell asleep in the car for four hours, but I still don’t love Nick anymore.
November 19: We had Nick’s dream birthday party: board games and all food stuffs are covered in melted cheese.
November 20: Katie had a severe hangover after Nick’s birthday party. She, Dylan, and I went out to Irvine to get some ramen and watch surprisingly graceful sumo wrestling.
November 21: The server at Casa Franco’s shaved off his mohawk. I almost didn’t recognize him. Everything is now officially fixed from when that car drove in through their front wall.
November 22: Nick took dad and me to the Venice Beach Google office. Nick had a conference call, but dad and I found a quiet room in the rounded section of the building’s binoculars that was full of beanbags and one giant light bulb hanging from the ceiling to write in.
November 23: We started drinking by lunchtime and the only note I had in my phone for the entire day was: “Ghost haunting poop—unfinished business”.
much love,
hedgie
November 18: Nick made us start the drive to Mission Viejo at six this morning. I immediately fell asleep in the car for four hours, but I still don’t love Nick anymore.
November 19: We had Nick’s dream birthday party: board games and all food stuffs are covered in melted cheese.
November 20: Katie had a severe hangover after Nick’s birthday party. She, Dylan, and I went out to Irvine to get some ramen and watch surprisingly graceful sumo wrestling.
November 21: The server at Casa Franco’s shaved off his mohawk. I almost didn’t recognize him. Everything is now officially fixed from when that car drove in through their front wall.
November 22: Nick took dad and me to the Venice Beach Google office. Nick had a conference call, but dad and I found a quiet room in the rounded section of the building’s binoculars that was full of beanbags and one giant light bulb hanging from the ceiling to write in.
November 23: We started drinking by lunchtime and the only note I had in my phone for the entire day was: “Ghost haunting poop—unfinished business”.
much love,
hedgie
Thursday, November 16, 2017
i feel like fire
November 10: Nick’s dad decided to call his brother that Nick and I did not invite to the wedding on speaker phone. He brought up the fact that we didn’t invite him to the wedding twice. I feel like he’s trying to start a feud between everyone. He knows that so many of his family members have refused to speak for decades over smaller things.
November 11: I never thought that I would ever write the phrase “a giant golden dick” on my wedding gift thank you cards, but here I am now.
November 12: Nick bought me a plain rose gold band so that I can have a full set of rings to wear at work that won’t scratch my kids. I love it. Now our rings also match a little now since Nick’s wedding ring is wood and rose gold.
November 13: For a team building exercise, Melissa lead up in a group MadLib. We ended up writing about expensive summer vacations where people hunt teachers and parents ate teachers for dinner.
November 14: When we got into our discussion groups, Eddie told us we had three minutes to go around and each share our biggest mistake. Miss Connie went first, saying that her biggest mistake was putting the wedding ring onto her husband’s finger.
November 15: Briana wrote a beautiful and heartbreaking poem in Scores Poetry today.
“I feel like fire because I don’t have my dad. He is in another country and my dad is sad. When I am eleven years old, I can go to the other country where he lives.”
November 16: Nancy Q. and Kaylee got had a huge falling out over something that one of them did in kindergarten. Melissa had to lead a peace talk for something that happened half of their lives ago.
much love,
hedgie
November 11: I never thought that I would ever write the phrase “a giant golden dick” on my wedding gift thank you cards, but here I am now.
November 12: Nick bought me a plain rose gold band so that I can have a full set of rings to wear at work that won’t scratch my kids. I love it. Now our rings also match a little now since Nick’s wedding ring is wood and rose gold.
November 13: For a team building exercise, Melissa lead up in a group MadLib. We ended up writing about expensive summer vacations where people hunt teachers and parents ate teachers for dinner.
November 14: When we got into our discussion groups, Eddie told us we had three minutes to go around and each share our biggest mistake. Miss Connie went first, saying that her biggest mistake was putting the wedding ring onto her husband’s finger.
November 15: Briana wrote a beautiful and heartbreaking poem in Scores Poetry today.
“I feel like fire because I don’t have my dad. He is in another country and my dad is sad. When I am eleven years old, I can go to the other country where he lives.”
November 16: Nancy Q. and Kaylee got had a huge falling out over something that one of them did in kindergarten. Melissa had to lead a peace talk for something that happened half of their lives ago.
much love,
hedgie
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