Tidbits

Time is going very quickly! This is Week 4 of the 8-week summer term and I have to get mid-term grades submitted at the end of this week. So far this week my poor students have had two quizzes in my class and an exam in one of their other classes, and they will have a listening exam and a reading exam in my class before the week is done. Needless to say, they're a little overwhelmed. I just remind them that there's a reason this program is called the Intensive English Language Institute!

One of my students today referred to a rhinoceros as a "unicorn". :P This same student also said that people who don't have enough food to eat are "depraved" (instead of "deprived", I presume)! Sometimes I just have to laugh at them!

When we were on our drive from Colorado Springs to Denton last month, we witnessed a few, um, interesting things, things that made me shake my head and say, "Only in TX! (I hope!!)":

• Trinidad, CO, is located just a few miles north of the CO/NM border, an absolutely beautiful area of the country. Just off I-25, the main thoroughfare through town, is the Budget Summit Motel. In my experience, most motels have a "vacancy/no vacancy" sign, which - when there is vacancy - displays the word "vacancy". Pretty standard, I believe. Yet the Budget Summit Motel is unique. Instead of doing what is plenty good enough for all the other motels out there, their vacancy sign just says: YES. Not "YES Vacancy" - just YES. In all capital letters, too. In May, I was fortunate enough to drive past this gem of a motel 5 times, and every time I saw that sign it made me giggle. In my warped little mind, the "YES" of the vacancy sign was always vocalized in an enthusiastic shout and accompanied by an energetic fist pump. :P
  


• We drove by a town called Electra, TX. On the outskirts of town there was a billboard that advertised the "23rd Annual Goat Barbeque!!!" Goat barbeque? Goat?? I'm familiar with the concept of a pig or cow roast, but really...goat?!? Amazingly, they even have a website.
  


• In Chillicothe, TX, one can find the perfect Christmas or birthday gift for every member of the family - at the Cowboy boot factory outlet. Yeehaw!
  


• Apparently the people of Clarendon, TX, are honest to a fault. As we drove through town we passed a little motel named: "It'll do!" motel. We didn't stop there for the night. I can't imagine why....
  


• Also in Clarendon is a church that advertises "Cowboy services every Saturday night." I didn't know they still made cowboys! I'm half tempted to drive back there some Saturday, just to see if clouds of dust rise from the parched earth as the thunderous pounding of hooves foretells the impending arrival of the rugged cowboys and their vast herds of cattle. What do they do with their horses and cows during the service? Are there cattle pens for the cows out back and hitchin' posts for the horses out front? Do the cowboys wear chaps over their bluejeans and bandanas around their necks? Are their belt-buckles the size of TX? I want to know!
  


• Here in TX I expected to see cattle, including - especially! - Texas Longhorns. Being a horse fan, I also expected to see lots of horses. After all, this is "horse country". But when we drove past Iowa Park, TX, it wasn't cattle or horses, or sheep or goats, or even llamas that we saw. Nope. Here in lush, green TX, we saw a herd of camels.
  
  According to RailPictures: "In the mid-1800s, the US Army experimented with using camels as pack animals in the desert. The experiment failed for numerous reasons, and one account of the tale ended with these words: The Texas herd was auctioned off in 1865, but some were released into the desert.... Many Arabian camels roamed through Texas, California, and Arizona. The last authenticated sightings of camels in the wild occurred in the early 1900s. [The camels here in TX] are running wild in an enclosed area.... They are there apparently to keep mesquite trees in check which they do a good job of. They are not wild in the true sense of the word...but they have been elusive." So there you have it! Camels in TX. :)

One week down...

I completed a whole week of work! It went very well and my students are all great (except one, who is a pain). There are twelve students in each class, and they hail from countries such as Azerbaijan, Turkey, Ukraine, Taiwan, Kazakhstan, East Timor, S. Korea, Chile, Cambodia, Belgium (though originally from Dem Rep of Congo), Thailand, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait. This term is eight weeks long, although the final week is just that - finals!

The classes are both held nearly two hours each day (8:30a - 10:15a, 10:30a - 12:15p), so I teach about twenty hours per week. I am required to hold two office hours per week when the students can come see me for additional help. Other than that, I do not need to be on site. Of course, there are papers to grade, lesson plans to develop, activities to create, and so on. I could bring those home in the afternoon and do them here, but I prefer to finish my work at work.

Gus's brother is here for the week, keeping him occupied while I'm gone during the day. Hopefully that'll help ease Gus's transition from both of us being home 24/7 to him being home without me and being responsible for the housework. :)

The only other news is that there hasn't been a drop of rain in the four weeks we've been down here, and the daytime highs haven't been below 95 since June 3rd (the nighttime lows have been right around 70, which is pretty nice - too bad I sleep at night). In the next seven days the highs are only going to be below 100 on one day, when the high is supposed to be 98. That's ok, though. There will only be another 3 months of this heat before it starts to cool down again! :P