I don't know why I do it

I really don't know how things like this happen, but I seem to take on way more than I have time for. I'm super busy with a million projects...and I don't even have time to go outside and enjoy the nice weather. Anyways, I'm hoping to have time to write something substantial tonight and post it on my blog. I've been dealing with a lot of "big" decisions lately and I think it will help me to figure some things out if I write about it. So there might be a big post on its way....we'll see.

Adios,
Andrew

The Last Week

Well....

I finished teaching my grade 9 math class on Thursday of last week, and my supervising teacher is taking over on Monday of this week. I'm pretty sure that those kids will be in for a bit of a shock. I'm pretty laid back in class and I let a lot of things slide that, in my opinion, don't really matter. Some students listen to music while their working on math and I just let it go because it stops them from talking to others and keeps them concentrated on their work. I'm not sure if my supervising teacher will be letting anything like that happen. She came in on Thursday while I was talking to a student who didn't do any work all class...since she's taking over this week, she decided to make him come in at lunch on Monday to make up the time he wasted. Ya, she hasn't even taught them yet and she's already got one in detention. Don't get me wrong, I was going to give him a detention as well, but their going to be in for a shock I think.

This week I'll be teaching my grade 9 computer class and grade 11 computer class. Both classes are making web sites as their final project for the web development unit. As you can imagine, the grade 11 web sites will be far more advanced than the grade 9's. It's going to take me a long time to mark all the sites though. But, I'm looking forward to being done. My last day of teaching will be Friday of this week and then I observe a few days the week after that. The end is very much in sight. It wouldn't have been such a long stretch if I was actually getting paid for the obscene amounts of work that I've been doing, but I don't get paid. And now that my bank account is down to only $90....I'm feeling the need to find a real job where I get paid and can go home from work and not have extra things to do (marking, lesson prep, assignments to create, quizzes, tests, tutorials, homework, worksheets...).

But, I'm excited about making a video for the DYC this year, and I've been working on a few other projects as well that are fulfilling. I'm not going to say anything about the other projects until I've done some more progress on them...they're a surprise. But ya, I'm not even done being busy from this teaching practicum and I've already started to fill my life with other things that need to get done. I guess I'll never really learn....

I don't know....maybe I just like being busy.

Anyways, I'm off to bed.

Adios for now,
Andrew

A quick update

So, Jane sent me a text message the other day complaining about the lack of updates on my blog. So here I am....writing a little something to update anyone who still comes here. I suspect that Jane might be the only regular and the odd person might show up on my site when they have absolutely nothing to do. I really surprised myself today while trying to get to my blog....I actually forgot the web address of my blog for a moment...it took me about 30 seconds to remember how to get to it. During that 30 seconds I even considered going to Jane's website because I know she has a link to my site. But after a few more seconds I managed to remember.

So an update is in order I guess:

1. I'm still teaching right now (3 classes a day...Computers 9, 11, and Math 9).
2. I have no life because of all the prep and marking that I'm doing for the classes (it's very sad.....).
3. On weekends I sleep in on Saturday, and then try and forget about everything I need to get ready for Monday. Sunday, I get up early and work on things before church, then come home and work on things until supper. Then (most Sunday evenings) I stay home again and try and prepare things for Tuesday.
4. I'll be starting to "Phase Out" next week and I'll be officially done my teaching practicum on April 21st.
5. As soon as I'm done my practicum I'll be setting up all my flights to Europe in September. Right now I'm still waiting for my travel agent to get back to me on the main flights. September will be quite the month for me and Anthony....Germany, Czech Republic, Ireland, Scotland, and Italy. It will be tons of fun!

Anyways, that's all I got for now. I could go on for about 10 pages about how much I have to do and how disorganized my life is....but I don't think very many people want to read about that.

That's the best I can do for now.....Adios,

Andrew

I've got a spare few seconds

Well, actually...I've had some free time lately, but I've opted to spend it doing something else other than being in front of the comptuer. I've been working all of last week preparing for teaching this coming week at Kelly Road SS in PG.

Here's what I'm teaching:

• Information and Communication Technology 9
  
• Information and Communication Technology 11
• Core Math 9

I start teaching this week and I finish on April 28th. It's my final practicum. After this I'll be a teacher. Well, actually, I have to wait for the BC College of Teachers and BC Teachers Federation to certify me....but that is just paperwork. I get a normal high school spring break March 11th to March 26th which is going to be great. The youth group is going to Smithers on the 10th and I get to drive the bus....it's gonna be a riot.

Lets see, anything else special? Ummm.....not really. Well actually, Tyler and I are almost done making a video slideshow for the houseboat trip that we did last summer to Shuswap Lake. We took about 4500 pictures during the week, so there were a lot of things to go through. But, I'm excited to see the final product. Speaking of videos....one of the other student teachers and I are going to start a film club at Kelly Road....we're thinking of getting them to do some kind of short video and then we'll work with them to edit and produce it. It should be fun.

Well that's about it for now. I might actually update this a little more often (at least once a week I think)....it's nice to reflect on what is going on in my life and where I'm headed.

Adios,
Andrew

Birth and Resurrection

Well...I'm turning 24 this Friday. Friday the 13th.

Talked to my sponsor teachers today at Kelly Road. Looks like I'll be teaching Computers 9 and 11, and core math 9 for the 10 weeks. It should be fun....but I'm sure it'll be a challenge. I guess I'll know for sure if I want to be a teacher at the end of this practicum. The dilemma in my mind is whether I'll be happy as a teacher...I've already established that I can do it...but the question is whether I would be happier doing something else. We'll see.

I just found a replacement motherboard for my old laptop on ebay. Imagine that! You really can find anything on ebay. So it will be shipped to me tomorrow and hopefully arrive next week. If everything goes according to plan, I will be able to resurrect my laptop before the end of this month. I'm a little depressed that I didn't look on ebay earlier, but I'm still pretty happy with my new laptop....and maybe now I can sell my old one and use the money to make payments on my new one.

So I was in class the other day...actually it was before class, and decided to fire up msn to see who was online. Then I realized that I had my mini webcam in my bag which clips on my laptop screen, so I hooked it up. I started chatting with Jane and got to show her my classroom and the view that I had of the admin building. It was cool to be sitting in class...connected to the internet wirelessly...and chatting on msn. I don't know...maybe only other computer geeks can understand why I think it's so cool.

Adios for now,
Andrew

Many things to be said....

OK, so even though I've had lots of free time in the last little while I still haven't updated my blog. But why you say? Well...a lot of things have been happening and I've been filling all my free time with things that don't have to do with computers or sitting at desks....there will be plenty of that to come over the next month.

First, I want to talk about my new laptop. I am really enjoying it. I actually got it on December 18th which was a really great early Christmas present. I'm loving the wide screen....it makes me feel so free....there's so much room....I don't fee cramped like I used to on a square monitor. Now, granted this machine is not much faster (1.8GHz instead of 1.6GHz) than my last laptop, it has a substantial upgrade on RAM (1 GB) and hard disk space (100 GB). I think that it will last me a long time. I've already installed Battlefield 2 on it and it runs like a dream. Also, during the break when I was out at Camp Morice Pete and I got a chance to play some Warcraft II using our wireless cards and setting them up to run ad hoc (with out a base station for all you non geeks out there). It was tons of fun and I managed to wallop him twice and Matt once. It was lots of fun.

Second, I'd like to tell you about my (not relaxing at all) month off. I finished classes on December 1st and didn't have to come back until January 3rd. It was nice, but I didn't relax very much....I filled all my time with decorating, buying gifts, playing hockey, organizing Warcraft tournaments, cleaning the house, and hanging out with friends. I'm actually surprised at the small amount of time I spent on the computer during the holidays. I espessially am surprised at how little I've used my laptop. But, now that I'm in school I'm sure that I'll be using it lots. Anyways, the days surrounding Christmas were filled with marathon after marathon of eating. Big dinner at my house, turkey dinner at the Parrish house, a ham dinner at our house, plenty of food at the retreat at Camp Morice, and another ham dinner at Camp. I loved it. Food is my second favourite part of Christmas....the first being the birth of Jesus (of course). For Christmas, I got a new pair of hiking boots that look like they are more than adequate to climb Everest....they are pretty skookem.

Third, I'd like to tell you how much fun I had after the retreat at Camp Morice. The Daigles, Bagnalls and myself stayed out at camp for new years and had lots of fun. The best part was when Pete, Matt, and myself went out on the lake and cleanned off a full sized hockey rink on the ice. Later that day we all played hockey out on the rink until it was so dark that we couldn't see the puck....it was a blast! To bring in the new year, we took a whole lot of wood out to the sand on the beach and started a huge bon fire which was lit about 10 minutes before midnight. We stacked the kinling about 2 feet high and then pilled on the regular firewood after that. It was a pretty sweet fire.

Lastly, the start of another university semester....and acutally my last university semester. I'll be finished at the end of this April. When all is said and done, I'll have been at UNBC for 6 years which is 12 semesters which translates into $24,000 in tuition and about $6,000 in books for my university career. That's a whole lot of money! That's about 40 different professors, 50 different classrooms, 66 different courses, and over $400 spent on hashbrowns for breakfast. It sure adds up when you think about it. This semester I'll be in classes until the end of the month of January, and then I begin teaching in February at Kelly Road Senior Secondary. I'll be teaching 2 computer classes and one math class for about 10 weeks. I think it's going to be a lot of fun.

Adios for now,
Andrew

It's on the way!

YESSSS!

My new Dell Inspiron 6000 is on the way! I have to put myself into debt to get it, but it's done now so who cares. I didn't want to get a $700 laptop that I'd be dissapointed with, so I went a little further and got something that is equivalent to my old laptop....but a few upgrades (mostly just the ram and the hard drive). The estimated arrival date (on my doorstep) is Dec 20th...so I'll have a new laptop for Christmas! And....at least I can have the satisfaction of getting Airmiles for the purchase that I made. Maybe I can use the points to get some gift certificates for Coast Mountain or something.

I'm excited about making a video of my Shuswap houseboating adventures in the summer. I've been working on it a bit and it's turning out pretty good. I've been making the video in high definition widescreen...so it should look pretty amazing on my projector! I picked a Fatboy Slim song to go in the background...and it is turning out nicely.

Anyways, that's just a quick update. I'm not in the mood for typing a whole lot...this keyboard sucks and the spacebar doesn't work very well. When I'm typing it sounds like I'm using an old typewritter....everyone in the house can hear me!

Cheers!

What am I going to do now?

Well...I feel terrible. The world is coming down around me and I don't know what to do. A terrible thing has happenned. I feel lost and alone. Everywhere I go I feel confused and incoherent...I've lost what makes me happy. Yes...the unthinkable has happenned....the worst thing imaginable. It's so terrible that I have trouble getting out of bed in the morning.

My laptop has died.

It's unrepairable. Dell doesn't make the parts anymore.

Bye,
Andrew

I Have Returned

I know...I'm a loser. It's taken me forever to actually update my blog. I figured that today was the 8th, so I should probably update my blog before the 11th because if I didn't, it would mean that I hadn't updated it for an entire month. Anyways, I'm back from my short 8 day practicum at PGSS and it was a riot! I had a really good time teaching and my sponsor teacher was great. I still don't know how I did (marks wise) on the practicum, but I'm pretty sure I did well. I should find out this Thursday. I was lucky enough to get to teach combinatorics which is one of my favourite subjects in math, so I had a fun time. This week, I'm back to UNBC classes and my teachers are making us feel the pain by loading on a hundred assignments for us to do before the end of the semester. Speaking of that, it was pointed out that I've only got 7 weeks of university classes left and 10 weeks of practicum. How sweet is that? Another Bachelor degree!

Tomorrow is going to be a good time. I don't have any classes, so I'm off to Camp Morice with Jane, Andy, and Berta for most of the day. I hope it's nice weather. It will be good to be out there and to bring Jackie some calendars. That's right! The Camp Morice calendars are done! If you want one send me an email or go to the website and order one. We'll even ship it to you if you're too lazy.

Anyways, that's enough for now (start slow and taper off...and all that stuff).

Andrew

Thanksgiving...and thanks to be safe

So I went caving yesterday. It was a really good time.

But, the excitement comes at the end of the day. We came to the exit of the cave and looked to see that it was snowing like crazy. We were thinking…it 3:30…we’ve got lots of time. We’ll start to get out (a 30 foot climb), and then start down the mountain right away. But, once we started down the mountain we realized that it was going to take a lot longer. Let me tell you…snow covered, wet, and cold rocks are not that easy to climb down on. We got to the car at about 5:30 and headed to town thinking that we’d be back by 7:30 (only about 1.5 hrs late). So we were driving down the 39km road (going about 60km/hr). After about 19km I started to feel my car really pulling to the right. I knew what it was right away…a flat tire. 20km from a highway or paved road. So, luckily, I had the little donut tire for a spare….but there is a problem with that…you can only go 80km/hr at maximum. After the slooooowwww driving on the dirt road we got to the paved road and started home. Most of the paved road was free of traffic until we got to the highway. On the highway, there were a bunch of vehicles flying past us the whole way…probably a little annoyed that we were going 80 when they were all wanting to go 110 or faster. At one point a black Jimmy pulled up behind me and was flashing his highbeams, swerving back and forth on the road, and honking his horn. I was thinking, “Who is this A$$hole? And why doesn’t he just pass me?” After a few seconds he passes me and there are people waving their arms and making gestures in the window as they pass. He pulls right in front of me and starts slamming on the brakes, putting on his signal (to pull over right), and waiving his arm out the window. By now, just about anyone would be thinking “what is going on and what is this guys problem?”, but I knew better. I told Rachael to roll down the window so I could give them an earful as we drove by…I knew there was something familiar about that black Jimmy, and now looking into the window I could see that it’s my new cousin Marcio, his friend Chris, and my dad in the vehicle. They’d been looking for us for a while…they were worried because we were more than 3 hours late from when we said we might be home. I learned later that one of the vehicles that had passed us earlier had my brother, Tim, Jonathan, and Nolan in it…they were also looking for us. Anyways, I pulled over and talked to my dad for a minute and told him things were fine but we were just late. So we continued on home and had a nice warm shower to clean off the excessive amounts of dirt that had accumulated on our bodies.

Not a bad story hey?

It was cool to see that so many people cared about us and were worried about us. Thanks everyone.

I'm a Professional

Well, I have been avoiding the question and giving vague answers all week...the question was "when is your drivers test for your bus license?"

I didn't say because I wasn't sure if I was going to pass and I didn't want a bunch of people calling me asking how I did and then I would have to tell them that I failed. After all, I did only take 4 hours worth of lessons when the driving school thought I should take 11. But, who cares now!

That's right...if you haven't already guessed...I got my license! That's right...my class 2...umhuh! I'm so happy to have it over with. It was a big stress for me and I'm so happy that I passed. I feel like patting myself on the back and saying "Andrew, you have what it takes!...Well done!" It's a great feeling to be able to follow through on something when you decide that it's important.

Anyways, that is my big triumph for today. I'm excited about the new Lost episode which is playing on TV as we speak (or as I type), but I'm not watching it because I am at work right now. I'll have to watch it later in the week.

Au revoir,
Andrew

What a long week…

Well, just when you think you’ve got things under control…the whole world falls apart in front of your eyes. I’ve put my head down and been running hard all week and I just can‘t seem to get ahead. Even when I finish assignments in record time, I still can’t get it all done. It’s been pretty frustrating. And now, here I am sitting at a desk at the end of a long week, and what am I doing?…I’m working. I’d like to think that soon it will be over, that soon I will have some free time and soon I will have a regular job with regular hours….but I don’t think it will happen. I have the uncanny ability to fill every moment of free time up with something. Why do I keep doing this to myself?

Anyways, I can at least look at things on a brighter side for right now. I’m sitting at work getting paid $10/hr to do nothing but wait for people to return equipment. This weekend will be a lot of fun…my cousin Saveria is getting married and a whole bunch of family is in town…it’s going to be one big party.

I’m going to go now because I’ve nothing interesting to say…maybe I’ll think of something later and add another post.

AJ

Busy...busy...busy

OK, so I haven't updated enought lately...I know. I've been pretty busy and I just haven't got around to typing.

For now, I have a good animation to post....I love it.

I'll try and post some more tomorrow.

Andrew

Back in the Game

Well, I’ve been thinking for a while about what I should write for a post, but nothing substantial has come to mind. At first I wanted to post a big message complaining about how busy I am and how crappy my school schedule is, but it seems like a waist of time to be thinking and typing about that. I think the problem is that I’ve been thinking about posting too much instead of just typing. Anyways, here is what’s happened lately.

School has started and I’ve already handed in an 8 page report on my observations at PGSS during the first week of high school. Don’t let the number of pages make you think that I put a lot of work in…my only real strength is that I can type really fast and I got good at writing my thoughts from my trip to Europe. My observation report was just a whole lot of things I noticed and then a quick story or reflection on what it meant to me. It’s was exactly what they wanted though.

It seems like I always take on too much. I’m getting my bus license, making a video for the hospital, going to school, working three nights a week, going to youth group, going to young adults group, and trying to stay in touch with friends who do not live in PG. Last week was crazy for me…I felt like everything was out of control and that I was just stuck on the ride. It’s kinda like those stupid ‘virtual adventure’ rides that you can go on…I hate those things mostly because I get so sick on them. You get inside, sit down, strap yourself in, and the attendant closes the door and you hear a big thud as the door is locked. And then you’re trapped for the duration of the ride. Some weeks feel like that for me. But, this week was a bit different. On Thursday I stayed home for most of the day and just sat at my computer or in a chair and read some books, replied to some emails and printed off some homework. It was a very relaxing day. Jane came over to borrow my internet connection for a while (so that she could download some Stargate episodes). It was interesting…we sat across the table from one another while working on various things and we didn’t say more than a few words to each other, but looking back I enjoyed having her company even though we didn’t really say anything….I don’t know…maybe it’s a guy thing. At any rate, I’m going to have to try and fit one of those ‘catch-up’ days into my schedule every week…it was very therapeutic.

The coming weeks should be pretty fun. I have some assignments for class that might be a bit interesting, but mostly I’m excited about making up a series of lessons for a unit in math 12 called Combinatorics. I’m hoping that I can find some good examples and real world applications of Combinatorics so that I can make my classes a little bit more interesting. I was thinking about why I want to work so hard at making it interesting…it’s not because I want to outdo the teacher that I’m taking over for…it’s because I want to outdo myself. Last February when I was teaching at Kelly Road I had a bunch of cool stories and real world applications that seemed to really help me to get the students to buy into what I was teaching…they actually though what I was teaching them might be useful. Anyways, I hope to give it my all for this unit and see what happens.

Well, that’s about enough for this post…I have turned over a new leaf and I plan to post a bit more often. My motto ‘Start slow and taper off ‘ is taking a back seat to my new motto ‘ Go BIG or go home ‘

Adios for now,
Andrew

PS: Here is the answer to a math question...keep in mind that the answer does not nessesarily reflect my views.

TA DA!

Hey everyone!

I just finished the WYD video, so I thought I'd post it for everyone to see. Pete got a preview of it the other day and he gave it the thumbs up. Speaking of Pete, man that guy is awesome at making flash animations. His photoweb is super cool!

Anyways, here is the link to the WYD Video
(I recommend that you right click and choose ‘Save Target As…’ and save it to your computer before playing it – it’s over 90MB so it might take a little while to download)

Adios!
Andrew

Grizly Den Video

Here is the link to the Grizly Den video. I think it's pretty good...

The quality isn't very high because I wanted to keep the file size small, but I have a high quality version on my laptop.

http://web.unbc.ca/~johnsona/LOTR_video.wmv

Enjoy and crank up the sound!

Hiking at Grizly Den

Well...I had a really good time Friday and Saturday. Rachael, Erin, Jane, and I went to the Grizly Den cabin for one night. It was a ton of fun! I have some pictures and video that I will post later. AND, we managed to miss the huge storm that hit Prince George as well. We would have been very miserable if that storm had hit us while we were hiking.

Anyways, just thought I'd post a short comment on my last adventure before school starts. The video that I'm making should be pretty funny...I'll be sure to post a link to it as soon as I get it done.

Bye for now,
Andrew

It's good to be home...sort of

It’s good to be home…sort of

Well, naturlich (of course) I’m home now and well rested. It’s nice to be home and sleeping in my own bed, but it’s also very sad that the adventure is over. I am having a hard time motivating myself to get ready to go back to school next week. I’m not looking forward to it. But, I guess I should just enjoy the remaining few days that I still have and be happy that I made so many friends and had so many good experiences. I have absolutely no regrets about the entire trip (except for the fact that I got on the plane to come home). I realized on the plane ride home that I could have stayed in Europe until about Christmas if I decided to take a year off before finishing getting my education degree. But, there is a part of me that wants to get it done. I hate having loose ends, and not finishing my degree on time would be a huge loose end. Anyways, I’m here now and will be ready to put in one more year of classes until I can finally get the piece of paper that I will have paid over $10,000 for.

I weighed myself when I came back and sadly I lost 2 pounds. To most people that would be a great thing…to lose weight, but I honestly wanted to gain a bit of weight while I was gone. I was hoping that all the trekking with my 80 pounds of luggage would have helped my bulk up a bit…and I definitely ate as much as I could. Oh, well…I guess there’s always next time.

That’s right! There will be a next time…and by then who knows…maybe I’ll have some new gadget that will let me post pictures and text without a laptop. I can see myself having a cool gadget like that around this time next year.

Anyways, I’ll leave it at that for now. There is talk of one more adventure before the school year starts…We’ll see how things shape up.

Andrew

World Youth Day Theme Song

I found the world youth day theme song.

http://web.unbc.ca/~johnsona/wjt05.mp3

Enjoy!

4:30 AM

Well, you never know what will happen at 4:30 in the morning...

I was just sitting here typing emails and looking for songs on the net when a Turkish family came and sat near me. After a few minutes of them discussing amongst themselves, they asked me where I was from. After a few minutes the were offering me food and telling me a bit about Turkey (the Turkish pizza that they had was really good). I remembered that I still had a postcard of the Canadian Rockies, so I pulled it out and gave it to them. I also showed them a few picture from world youth day because I told them I was here for it. The next thing I know we are exchanging emails and they leave for their flight. The seemed like really nice people. It was pretty cool.

When they left, they each grabbed a push cart with a bunch of bags on it, and the dad accidently took mine (without looking at which cart he was pushing). They all laughed pretty hard when I said "Hey....that's mine..."