Rude.

Supervising a wake-a-thon tonight. Only doing a shift until 2 AM, so that's not too bad. 

Funny thing happened today...

A student of mine left his binder on the back counter of my room by accident yesterday, so I just left it there thinking he'd grab it today in block 4. 

He comes in and is happy because he thought he lost his math binder. Half way through class, he starts flipping through it, and says an unfortunately loud "what the hell?"

I go over to check it out, and on just about every page of the binder, someone has drawn a penis. Some are full page, some are more subtle. But every page for the first one has a penis, and then it goes to every second page, and at the end of the binder where his blank loose leaf is, there is about 1 every 6 pages or so. 

No idea who did it, because it definitely is not any of the students who actually sit in that corner. But whomever it was, that was commitment. Holy time consuming, and they had to make sure I didn't notice. 

So rude. And so funny. 

Brownie Cake.

Had a great but tiring weekend going from conference and dance chaperoning to family dinners to fundraisers. Made dessert for dinner at Dom's, and was pretty happy with how it turned out. I made brownie cake (recipe to come) with maple whipped cream and a raspberry sauce. Yummy!

I also took the opportunity to sneak a bunch of post-its featuring terrible pick up lines into her house, and hid them without her or Ken knowing. Success. 

Overtime.

We have been streaming Olympics on the large TV in the cafeteria at school. This was the scene today, when we effectively canceled block 3 when the women's gold medal game vs USA went into overtime.

Although this was before overtime started. It got really full! Practically the whole school turned out to watch! It was a cool experience to have everyone groan and cheer together (and groan really loud when the feed froze and the action stopped!)

I wish I could share the video of the cheer that erupted when they scored the winning gold! The whole group chanting CA NA DA! CA NA DA! and then the crowd goes wild!

One of our foreign exchange students took a similar picture to me, stating "this would only happen in Canada!"

Prepared?

Instead of prepping to take a group of students to a conference over the next three days, I have spent the evening watching vlogbrothers videos. Productive? Not really. Awesome? Yes.

Venus.

View of Venus out my bedroom window when I wake up in the morning. Won't be long before the Sun is up when I am!

Thoughtful.

It's no secret I am not a fan of Valentines Day. It's so commercial. You shouldn't let the people you care about know you care about them only because greeting card companies tell you that you should.

However, all sorts of cute and thoughtful things happen on Valentines Day, that I enjoy. Teenagers in particular go all out. It's a mating dance. I got a carnation at school, but the sweetest was from my "Valentine" (my friends four year old). 

He told his mother he had to buy me pink flowers for Valentines Day. And was super excited to pick out a little balloon for my bouquet. We made heart shaped pizzas and played Mario. To me, that's what Valentines Day is all about; spending time with those you love because you enjoy it. 

Darwin Day.

Way back in July 2011, when I started this blog, my first post was about a common misconception regarding the theory of evolution by natural selection.

Since today is Darwin Day, I thought I would revisit the topic. (Happy 205th Birthday Charles!)

Evolution is consistently in the media, and is often presented as something that still requires debating, as "just a theory", or as some skewed version of itself. One of the biggest problems is that evolution by natural selection is viewed as being mutually exclusive with religion. Last I checked, Pope John Paul II was a man of pretty strong faith, and he declared evolution to be a fact, so clearly the two can be reconciled. (Phil Platt, the Bad Astronomer, wrote an excellent column about it here)

From here.

Another problem is the issue of language. Words that have one definition in science can have very different meanings in other areas (such as work, law, hypothesis, or that dreaded one, theory). 

One of the words that causes problems is "fitness", as in survival of the fittest.  What does it mean to be fit? Does one have to go to the gym and bench a lot of weight to become fit?

Survival of the fittest at its most basic should really be regarded as survival of those best suited to their environment. Features and behaviors that benefit a organism in one environment might be a detriment in another. 

But fitness also is determined by how successful you are, not only at surviving, but at having your offspring survive to reproductive age, which ensures the passing on of your genes. (My grade 10's are often appalled when I tell them that, from a biology standpoint, if you don't reproduce you are a 'failure'). 

There is also an indirect type of fitness which provides explanation for colony and/or pack behavior. While individuals themselves may not reproduce, they benefit from helping close relatives rear offspring, as the offspring of close relatives contain similar genes, and the survival of those genes is still ensured. 

This difference between definitions of fitness can explain all sorts of physiological adaptations and behavioral adaptations, but often times the link to fitness is not obvious, lending the impression that the trait is not advantageous and therefore would not be selected for if evolution works the way it is stated. The difference between these definitions also highlights the  need for clear communication. Darwin himself knew he was making arguments that went against the popularly held beliefs of man's supremacy over animals, and that acceptance of his ideas was easily challenged in the eyes of the general public due ignorance about the nuances of language. 

I personally think that Chuck would be rolling in his grave if he knew that the debates that raged in the early years of his theory were still being held today, over 150 years after the publication of Origin. 

My Darwin v Lamarck tee has shrunk too much to wear...

...but I did wear these awesome earrings in honor of Darwin Day!

Olympics.

I love watching the Olympics. When else will the average person get super into biathlon?

We had a little Pre-Valentines/Olympics watching party last night, followed up with a little Wii Olympics competition. 

I followed Cupcakes and Cashmere's lead and rimmed some glasses with colored sugar, and attempted to decorate the borderline disaster of a cake  with Olympic rings as well. Since the top layer of the heart-shaped red velvet had already migrated beyond repair... It just made sense for the skiers to make an appearance. 

#SochiProblems

Rustic.

Made scones this evening. I adore raspberry scones. Nothing like some tea, warm buttered scones and Pavarotti music to make a chilly Thursday evening all the better.

Day #1 of teachers convention today. Had a nice, fun day today. Tomorrow  is looking long. Good thing I'll have some biscuits to tide me over. 

They are these ones ... With some minor adjustments. (Less time, more moisture, and raspberries)

Still An Invalid...

Sort of. I can drive. I can (sort of) do stairs. I can wear certain pairs of shoes... I am on the way to being better!

Progress can sometimes be a very slow thing, whether it's a sprained ankle or the students in my classroom. We started a new semester last week, so it's been pretty busy lately. 

My classes consist of boys. Lots of boys. As one coworker described looking out over my block 2's, "that is a sea of dudes." Out of the 85 students I have in a day right now, 19 of them are girls. Just the way the cookie crumbles. 

Having such a massive gender divide in the class does funny things to the dynamic, but I have a lot of fun with boys. (Easier to handle than the semester long slumber party that was the class of 5 boys and 25 girls. Every time I turned around, hair was being braided). 

We've just finished with the getting aquatinted and doing review stage, and come up with the following class motto. I think it will be my motto for 2014 in general.