The fall is without a doubt my favorite season, my birthday, Halloween and Thanksgiving, 3 of the best days of the year happen in the fall.  I love watching the leaves change color and the beginning of the school year ( yes, I know school starts in the season of summer) and the cooler autumn temperatures, especially at night.  Most of all I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE the flavors of fall.

Starting with apple picking, it has become a tradition and ends with the most delicious apple cider donuts, yum.  The I have fresh apples in my house that are just begging to be baked into pies, cakes and other yummy treats.  Apples are followed by pumpkins.  I love pumpkin spice everything from coffee to scones.  Yes, the various coffee places have yummy delights but I will take my K-cup and homemade scone any day.  Let us not forget pumpkin chocolate chip muffins and pumpkin bread.  This year I will be trying a recipe for a pasta with a pumpkin sauce.  Along with pumpkins I enjoy butternut squash, roasted with maple syrup or in a soup with apples, but my favorite is a gratin with leeks, mmm Thanksgiving.  Pumpkins are followed by cranberries, not just for cranberry sauce.  Cranberry nut bread and this year cranberry upside down cakes, oh boy.  And before the autumn ends we get a taste of gingerbread.  Maybe I love it cause it has some similar flavors as pumpkin spice, I don’t know but I do.  Gingerbread cookies or a gingerbread house complete my definition of the holidays, I love that crispy, spicy cookie with the sweet royal icing.   I better hide the bathroom scale, at least until New Year’s.

So I want to call for a shopping revolution.  Let’s not purchase gift cards this year.  We can send a message to the retailers that gift cards should not expire and we should get the cash value when there is less than$5 left on the card, heck I would be willing to get the cash value for under $1.

It is so frustrating to get a gift card and use most of it, leaving $0.24 on the card.  I will keep the card, I don’t want the retail store to keep that money, but I usually forget to use my card on subsequent shopping trips.  I have a bunch of cards in my wallet and glove box that have less than $2 on them, but I can’t get rid of them, at least not until they expire and that is another can of worms.  Why do gift cards expire?  Cash doesn’t expire and gift cards are like monopoly money, store specific monopoly money.  I have lost way too much money in expired gift cards.  I don’t give gift cards, they are impersonal and difficult to wrap.  I don’t like to receive gift cards either, cause unless the card is to one of the stores I go to every week, I won’t make a special trip to the store.

Legislation was passed to “protect consumers” but it is not enough, cards can still expire after 5 years.  Yes, 5 years is a long time but if I find a $5 dollar bill in a pocket 5 years from now, it didn’t expire, and neither should gift cards.  And please don’t get me started on fees, gift cards are supposed to be easy and convenient, I don’t think so.

So instead of giving gift cards this year think about an actual gift for your friends and family and include a gift receipt.  At least if your friend doesn’t bother returning the item, not that I know anyone guilty of that, the retailer doesn’t get the money.

Can I tell you how much I despise daylight savings time?  I am one of those people that doesn’t like having to adjust to the change in time.  I like my sleep, love it in fact, losing an hour of it for no good reason bothers me.  And really what is the point of daylight savings time?  Our society no longer has a need for changing the clocks.  If you want more time outside during the day get up an hour earlier and enjoy some daylight before heading to work.  In my house we don’t operate on daylight hours, my daughter gets up 10 hours or so after going to sleep.  We tried making her room darker to help her sleep later but it didn’t work she wakes up when she’s not tired any more.  As for me I can sleep when the sun is shining or there is a full moon.  And it is not very funny walking into work an hour early because you forgot to set the clocks, been there done that.

Daylight savings time is a convenience for schools and stores.  Schools want to hold there sporting events after school without having to light up fields.  Stores want you to be able to shop after work.  Me I want to be able to watch 4th of July fireworks before 10 pm.  Stores can adjust the times they are open during the summer just like they do before Christmas.  As for schools they should be adjusting their schedules any way.  According to research teenagers have a biological clock that is more alert later in the day while younger grade school children are alert earlier.  Just ask a mom of a teenager, their teen can stay up all night and sleep past noon, while the mom of a toddler is up when the sun comes out and is sleeping at 9pm.  Changing schools starting times will probably not happen anytime soon, but they should.

Back to my pet peeve, this year I will probably be up at the same time as always, but my clock will have a different time.  I will not gain an hour, I am a mom of a toddler and a newborn, they are like farmers they use the sun as their guide.

It has come to my attention that most people confuse the terms fair and equal.  I can see how one might confuse them, they are similar and yet very different.  As a special education teacher I was intimately aware of the difference and it was my responsibility to educate others, mostly other teachers, about the difference.

Equal is pretty straightforward.  Everyone gets the same.  Equal would be my 100 lb. German Shepherd Dog getting a cup of food and my 15 lb. Yorkie mix getting a cup of food.  Doesn’t make good sense, but it is equal.  In education equal would be to eliminate any accommodations that students with disabilities are afforded to level out the playing field.  Every student would have the same amount of time and the same number of questions, it wouldn’t be fair but it would be equal.

Fair is giving my 100 lb. shepherd 2 cups of food while my little Yorkie gets 1/2 cup.  Fair is giving students what they need in order to succeed.  Would one think of withholding insulin from a diabetic or an inhaler from an asthmatic? Never!  Giving a diabetic what they need is no different than giving a student with learning disabilities extra time for a test or help with reading.  Special education does not make it easier for a student with disabilities, it makes it equal, and that is fair.

I am so not a political person.  I follow politics like I follow the news, I don’t.  The news that I know about, I found out on Yahoo or someone else told me about.  I don’t subscribe to a newspaper and I don’t watch the news,  I stopped after 9/11.  I realized that so much of the news is negative.  Local news is about homicides and other crimes.  National news is about illegal acts by politicians or business men.  And world news is about fighting or bombings in some foreign country.  It’s not that this information isn’t important it is because we all live in this world together, but I don’t like to be bombarded by negativity.  No wonder so many people suffer from depression in this country.    Now even commercials have taken on a depressing tone.  There are more and more commercials asking for donations to help some poor children or helpless animals.  And don’t forget all the commercials reminding us that the economy is bad.

And yet with my care free attitude towards politics I was mesmerized by the inauguration on Tuesday.  I am one of the many people that has high expectations for our new president.  I think he has so much to offer.  And I wasn’t a fan of his.  I thought he lacked experience.  He may lack experience but his eloquence distracts from that.  I think our new president has a long road ahead of him and it will be a tough climb, but I think he can persevere.  President Obama I wish you luck!

A great man died last week, technically last year, but you probably have never heard of him. He wasn’t a TV star or famous author. He wasn’t a celebrity chef or singer. He never starred on his own reality show, nor did he write a blog. He probably didn’t know what a blog was. He was a teacher.
He was not your ordinary teacher by far. His methodology was unorthodox and could never be duplicated. He was truly passionate about his subject, math. He was even more passionate about the success of his students.  He would spend hours with students after school helping them to understand.  You could pretty much be guaranteed to find him in his classroom 5pm on a Friday afternoon, long after his colleagues had already left for the weekend.  There he would be at his desk, sometimes surrounded by a huddle of students other times just helping one, but he was there, for 42 years, he was there.

He was equally passionate about the theater.  A gifted choreographer for the high school musicals.  An avid fan of Broadway and off-Broadway productions.

He was a many of several passions.  I was fortunate to be his colleague.  I would have been privileged to be one of his students, one of the thousands.

His students were successful because of him, he was a success because of his students.

May he rest in peace.

Okay,  so it’s high time my blog lived up to it’s name “Pet Peeves…”  My biggest pet peeve, the one that bugs me more than any other, is bad drivers.  Why is it that totally normal and polite people act like complete and utter idiots in the comfort and semi-privacy of their automobiles?

Think about it, you would never think about cutting a line of people, or at least most people wouldn’t, but yet drivers will drive to the end of the merge lane and cut the line.  Why is it that people need to do that?  Don’t you realize that you’re slowing things down.  I hate merge lanes.  I hate when people drive to the end of a merge lane and then cut into traffic.  I find myself yelling at the drivers in front of me that allow them in.

Today, as my husband and I were driving in the snow, I thought of another driving pet peeve: blocking the box.  Now anyone who has driven through Manhattan know what blocking the box is, but for those less travelled individuals it means blocking an intersection.  Perhaps if the other cars didn’t block the intersection you wouldn’t feel the need to try and get through at the last second when there isn’t any room.  Don’t block the intersection!  If there isn’t room for you on the other side then stay on your side until there is room.  It may cost you a few minutes five at the most and if you’re running late you should have left earlier.

The moral of this rant is that people need to learn how to drive and to practice common courtesy while driving.  And how about not having the bass so loud that my car shakes as you drive by.

Nothing, no amount of advice or preparation, no book or magazine could fully prepare me for being a mommy. I fully enjoy this job more than any other I have had or dreamed of. I could not imagine how I would feel when I hold my daughter in my arms. If you asked me 10 years ago, 5 years ago, 1 year ago, 6 months ago, my answer would be the same I’m not sure if I want to be a mom. I wasn’t sure. I thought maybe I had made a mistake. What were my husband and I thinking? Our lives would forever be changed, never the same again. And it did change and I could never have imagined the wonderful way that it did. I have a new title, Momma. My daughter only has one, and I’m it. Yeah, I’m a mom to my dogs and I love them, but they’re dogs.

Being a mom has totally changed my life for the better. I am responsible for someone else. I can make her happy just by smiling at her and she returns the favor.  It has been an amazing process watching her grow and develop.  The teacher in me finds it fascinating, thinking about the way she is learning things.  She recognizes my face and smell and voice.  She’s learning to use her hands and she can get them into her mouth.  And she’s found her voice and loves to practice using it.  I find myself studying her every move.  The scientist in me can’t help it.  Her little brain is growing and learning.  She takes in the sights, sounds and smells of the environment and is already forming opinions, like she doesn’t like the smell of cigarette smoke.

I wonder what is to become of her.  I want her to have every opportunity.  I wonder what will become of me, will I be a good mommy?

Yes, it figures, I fianlly start my blog after thinking about it for months and I have a power outage.  The storm that hit the Northeast wiped out power to my home for 24 hours.  How annoying!

On the other hand, as my husband and I walked through the mall yesterday, because it was warm he had this revelation “Power outages are good for the economy!”  Yes, my husband is brilliant.  We can turn the recession around by simply having a power outage in certain parts of the country.  Think about it!  The hotels and motels in the Northeast were booked to capacity with families trying to stay warm.  The restaurants were full of hungry cold people who couldn’t cook without power.  The employees of the electric companies were hauling in the overtime and best of all retailers were raking in the dough.  Home Depot and Lowes were feeling good selling out of heaters, generators and flashlights.  The malls were happy too because like me many people went there seeking shelter and it’s kinda hard to be in the mall and not spend some money.  So forget Congress’ bailout plan, my bailout plan is to have a few more blackouts to improve the economy.  Now I just need a plan for the auto industry.

Can a person have too many passions? Is dividing your passions still passionate?

I am a person of many passions. It’s the reason why I haven’t obtained my Master’s degree and have 3 Bachelor’s degrees. I have been trying to decide on a Master’s for close to 8 years, I have even started a program twice, both times Educational Technology. Both times I left mid program, both times different reasons. I’ve considered finishing the program, but what then of my other passions?

I love teaching and learning.  I love to watch TV, especially police/ detective shows.  I love my family and my dogs.  I am truly passionate about cooking and getting better at baking.  I have considered starting my own business.  I’ve considered working with dogs or working with kids and I’ve tried both.  I’ve considered opening a restaurant/ cafe.  I have thought about studying more art or more science, but to what end.

If I was ever to win the lottery I would become a professional student.  I would take classes about computers and science.  I probably would try some culinary classes or pottery classes.  It would be hard to decide because I have too many passions.