my new job
for those of you that know me... you know that i'm not the corporate type. well... i've decided to not go the office route again and dive directly into teaching. i found out about a place that is a private school/gym. they have classes in the morning and then do sports in the afternoon. the sports part is the coolest part. in the summertime they go biking, hiking, ect. in the wintertime they stay indoors and do gymnastics; they have their own, full size gym ... and... a ROCK WALL. how freakin' cool is that? i get to teach the kids gymnastics (what the hell do i know about gymnastics???) and teach them how to climb. i can't wait.
the other teacher was telling me today that they push the kids pretty hard and get pretty good results. all the kindergardners can already read. i was pretty impressed. and the guy that i've become friends with (the one that told me about the place) told me that he gets he preschool kids to go on all-day 10/15 mile bike rides. PRESCHOOL!!! that means 3 and 4 year olds. when i asked him how the hell he pulls that off he just explained that he breaks it up. a couple of miles here, a couple of miles there, ect. at the end they have biked 15 miles and don't even know it.
anyways... i can't wait. here is the place if you are curious. http://anchorage-gymnastics.com/index.html
madeleine also got a job within days of being here. she walked into the biggest and most popular (read trendy... where rich people go to spend lots of loot) flower shop and got a job doing designing. she is in heaven. she got to go to the local hospital and decorate all the xmas trees today and after that went to a rich ladies house and set up her xmas decos and tree. for mad it doesn't get much better than getting paid to decorate xmas stuff.
i'll be starting school in the spring to get my masters in teaching. that way i can go teach at a school and have a few more options than preschool and kindergarden. (not that i'm complaining... in fact my boss asked me today if i would be willing to teach the kids german... very cool)
oh... holy crap. joe and i found the USGS STORE today. i thought that i had died and gone to map heaven. there were probably about 5,000 maps for just alaska. it was incredible. i have never seen so many maps in one spot at once. and CHEAP!! i got a six foot by six foot map of alaska for $15 and a four foot by four foot of north america for 7 DOLLARS!!! i think that i may have found a new favorite store.
i have also come to find out that people who actually have to deal with extreme cold DON'T wear name brand crap. i was wondering since you always hear people talk about north face and marmot and crap like that... nope... people on the north slopes (where they do oil drilling in the arctic) wear carhartt. you can get arctic carhartt stuff for less than 80 bucks. and that stuff will keep you warm. you couldn't hike in it, but if you were at a ski resort all day with wind and stuff... nothing better.
i have become a pretty good driver in slippery conditions quite quickly. they don't use salt up here.... at all. so when it snows they just push it out of the way. but there is of course still some on the road. and when it gets compacted it turns to slippery, slippery stuff. everyone up here has studded tires. they don't help much, but they do help a little. once we are a little more secure with dough we might get some. they cost $350/car (ouch).
we went to walmart and splurged on a couple of pairs of ice skates. there are two lagoons right in front of our house and the parks & rec clears and maintains one of them. i saw the thing today that they use and it is like a make shift zambonie. pretty cool really. they turn pond ice into ice rink quality. alaskans take winter seriously. in fact, as i was walking out of a resteraunt the other day the lady behind the counter was making small talk and said, "man, it sure would be cool if it snowed." and we all agreed. when was the last time you heard someone in michigan wish for snow. everyone up here is in agreeance that the more snow the better. these people love the winter. skiing, snow machining, ice skating, x-country skiing, skate skiing, biathalon, ... you name it... people up here do it. i even saw x-country high school teams practicing the other day while joe and i were playing disc golf.
yes... i said that we were playing disc golf in the snow. seriously. it rocks. just wear a thin glove on the right hand and a thick one on the left. no big deal.
hmm... the only thing left to talk about is nature i guess. i have seen 20x more stuff in four weeks than the whole rest of my life combined. i was within 10 feet of two eagles the other day. (there will be pictures soon. joe still refuses to bring them over so i can put them up on the web) i have seen 6 or 7 moose (two almost ran over our car the other day in homer). and ... the northern lights. we were in homer for thanksgiving (one of the most beautiful places i've been) and had a place with a hottub that overlooked the ocean and the alaska range mountains and the homer spit (if you want to google it). so... here we were in an AMAZING place, eating amazing food (i covered the turkey in a pound of bacon while it baked.... holy crap is right... why don't i cover everything in a pound of bacon is the real question) and then we go outside in 0 degree weather and sit in a hot tub and watch the northern lights. that will definetely be one of the days that i recall with a smile on my face right before i kick the bucket.
other than that? don't know. hope that everyone had a great turkey day. hope to talk to you all soon as well. take care.
the other teacher was telling me today that they push the kids pretty hard and get pretty good results. all the kindergardners can already read. i was pretty impressed. and the guy that i've become friends with (the one that told me about the place) told me that he gets he preschool kids to go on all-day 10/15 mile bike rides. PRESCHOOL!!! that means 3 and 4 year olds. when i asked him how the hell he pulls that off he just explained that he breaks it up. a couple of miles here, a couple of miles there, ect. at the end they have biked 15 miles and don't even know it.
anyways... i can't wait. here is the place if you are curious. http://anchorage-gymnastics.com/index.html
madeleine also got a job within days of being here. she walked into the biggest and most popular (read trendy... where rich people go to spend lots of loot) flower shop and got a job doing designing. she is in heaven. she got to go to the local hospital and decorate all the xmas trees today and after that went to a rich ladies house and set up her xmas decos and tree. for mad it doesn't get much better than getting paid to decorate xmas stuff.
i'll be starting school in the spring to get my masters in teaching. that way i can go teach at a school and have a few more options than preschool and kindergarden. (not that i'm complaining... in fact my boss asked me today if i would be willing to teach the kids german... very cool)
oh... holy crap. joe and i found the USGS STORE today. i thought that i had died and gone to map heaven. there were probably about 5,000 maps for just alaska. it was incredible. i have never seen so many maps in one spot at once. and CHEAP!! i got a six foot by six foot map of alaska for $15 and a four foot by four foot of north america for 7 DOLLARS!!! i think that i may have found a new favorite store.
i have also come to find out that people who actually have to deal with extreme cold DON'T wear name brand crap. i was wondering since you always hear people talk about north face and marmot and crap like that... nope... people on the north slopes (where they do oil drilling in the arctic) wear carhartt. you can get arctic carhartt stuff for less than 80 bucks. and that stuff will keep you warm. you couldn't hike in it, but if you were at a ski resort all day with wind and stuff... nothing better.
i have become a pretty good driver in slippery conditions quite quickly. they don't use salt up here.... at all. so when it snows they just push it out of the way. but there is of course still some on the road. and when it gets compacted it turns to slippery, slippery stuff. everyone up here has studded tires. they don't help much, but they do help a little. once we are a little more secure with dough we might get some. they cost $350/car (ouch).
we went to walmart and splurged on a couple of pairs of ice skates. there are two lagoons right in front of our house and the parks & rec clears and maintains one of them. i saw the thing today that they use and it is like a make shift zambonie. pretty cool really. they turn pond ice into ice rink quality. alaskans take winter seriously. in fact, as i was walking out of a resteraunt the other day the lady behind the counter was making small talk and said, "man, it sure would be cool if it snowed." and we all agreed. when was the last time you heard someone in michigan wish for snow. everyone up here is in agreeance that the more snow the better. these people love the winter. skiing, snow machining, ice skating, x-country skiing, skate skiing, biathalon, ... you name it... people up here do it. i even saw x-country high school teams practicing the other day while joe and i were playing disc golf.
yes... i said that we were playing disc golf in the snow. seriously. it rocks. just wear a thin glove on the right hand and a thick one on the left. no big deal.
hmm... the only thing left to talk about is nature i guess. i have seen 20x more stuff in four weeks than the whole rest of my life combined. i was within 10 feet of two eagles the other day. (there will be pictures soon. joe still refuses to bring them over so i can put them up on the web) i have seen 6 or 7 moose (two almost ran over our car the other day in homer). and ... the northern lights. we were in homer for thanksgiving (one of the most beautiful places i've been) and had a place with a hottub that overlooked the ocean and the alaska range mountains and the homer spit (if you want to google it). so... here we were in an AMAZING place, eating amazing food (i covered the turkey in a pound of bacon while it baked.... holy crap is right... why don't i cover everything in a pound of bacon is the real question) and then we go outside in 0 degree weather and sit in a hot tub and watch the northern lights. that will definetely be one of the days that i recall with a smile on my face right before i kick the bucket.
other than that? don't know. hope that everyone had a great turkey day. hope to talk to you all soon as well. take care.
posted by Nick Gillespie | 9:18 PM
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