ifbrunowashere

i

2011-03-08T12:47:00.001-05:00

2011-03-04T13:14:00.001-05:00

"She passed the MCAS. All she needs to do is her classwork and graduate."

It doesn't concern him that this student hasn't been attending classes in two months. How can she pass?

Social Graduation

2011-03-04T13:07:00.001-05:00

INTROTHEATER A

F-

F+

4. Irregular attendance

TECH LIT 1

C-

8. Not working to capacity

COLL ENG 9 A/B

F-

B-

US HISTORY 1

F-

4. Irregular attendance

CHINESE 1

F-

8. Not working to capacity

ALGEBRA 1

F-

4. Irregular attendance

PHYSICS 1

F-

C-

8. Not working to capacity

Who?

2008-07-10T19:58:00.000-04:00

What?
Where?

Death

2007-12-29T23:56:00.000-05:00

Doesn't become me

Cuz he wasn't here for a while

2007-04-12T19:51:00.001-04:00

Gee.
I'm sorry.
I got three jobby jobs, mon.

Why don't you go look at the other places I write.
arrrgh, this be the place

Did you ever...

2007-01-27T20:41:00.000-05:00

Totally!
All of it.

Oh Yeah!

2007-01-24T21:20:00.000-05:00

Don't forget...
War is awesome (sarcasm, duh!)
http://www.unitedforpeace.org/

23 days until Tucson

2007-01-24T21:09:00.000-05:00

Blooming in January

2007-01-24T21:03:00.000-05:00

The weather has ben so strange.
Well not really. It has always beeen like this in January in New England.
Everyone just seems to forget it every year.
Anyhoo...our Hibiscus was blooming during the heat wave.

New Year's

2007-01-24T20:55:00.000-05:00

Booba's First Snow

2007-01-24T20:46:00.000-05:00

NEW YEAR'S EVE

2007-01-24T20:41:00.000-05:00

http://youtube.com/watch?v=kayvlFRLKc4

Nationals

2007-01-24T20:08:00.000-05:00

I was doing really well in the 35 plus (top 5 and moving up)
Then...Bam!!!
Finsihed 12th I think

Big Bikes

2006-11-27T18:51:00.000-05:00

Big Bikes
Yes.
I'm still Dead.
What's that silvery thing with two wheels.
fletch photo

953 is faster than a calnago

Thomp isn't.

A Weekend in the Hamptons

2006-10-06T17:23:00.000-04:00

Don't tell my physical therapist, but I went to the Hamptons this past weekend. What's wrong with that you ask? Well it wasn't all jacuzzispa and sh@#. Although I did get to spend the night in a pool house that was much larger than anything I remember from Fast Times at Ridgemont High.
Yowzers
Dating TIps

I went down to Whitmore Cyclocross races, put on by Myles Romanov. This guy is awesome.
I want to be like him when I grow up. A house husband with too much time and money.

I rode down with Mo and Matt.

I raced in the Master's race cuz my back is f'd up (Hence the PT)
and pitted for Mo and Harlan. I didn't race hard, I assure you.

We ate dinner at Myles' wifes' restaurant:
Wild Thyme Restaurant
129 Noyac Road (by the North Sea Fire Station)
Southampton NY 11968
631-204-0007

The food was splendid and the atmosphere was hoity toity.

Myles also had this one of a kind IF (see above about the money)

Mo placed third both days in a star studded field.

Harlan placed in the 20's and completed our quest of his not getting pulled. He was lapped 2/3 of the way through the last lap. A great job, for his first cross races. Kudoos.

YO, Shut up!

2006-10-06T17:17:00.000-04:00

Listen.
Please stop emailing me and calling my cell at all ours of the day and night.
I've been busy. I teach four classes and have a ton of Special Education work I need to get done. I'll update the Blog ASAP. No sooner!! Or I'll send my crew over to f u up.

????

2006-09-16T08:01:00.000-04:00

Jacuzzispa, jacuzzispa, jacuzzispa

Moving

2006-08-29T18:14:00.000-04:00

Into this:

Too busy for this crap

Burnout?

2006-08-24T09:52:00.000-04:00

No, I don't mean that kind of burnout!!
It seems that every year about this time many cyclists burnout and take time off. Many of my teamates are deep into burnout and off time, hoping to revive something for the remainder and 'cross. I however am not burnt out but have planned on a little break/vacation. When on a break it is important to rest, drink plenty of fluids, stretch, and massage. Emilie and I planned a great family oriented vacation that would allow me to sit doing nearly nothing for up to ten hours a day. All I had to do was push my right leg on the accelerator for hours, creating sharp pains and serious imbalances in my body. I like driving but I hate what it does to my body.

We drove to Montreal then to Atlanta visiting family and friends along the way.

Mary was nice enough to bless our trip.

They aren't French but they sure to look it.

Whatever you do, don't open a can in Montreal. Not even a can of whoop-ass.

What is up with that guy in the park??

????Iron Diarrhea????

More fun with rebar

BreakDancing Crews we say at UnderPressure

This kid had the best seat in the house

Put that rock in your pipe and smoke it!

The Best Breakfast ever, courtesy of Choo Choo. Emilie's step-mom in Maryland.

I got crabs at the Farmer's Market in Atlanta

TOONA

2006-08-02T08:55:00.000-04:00

So we decided to take a little vacation in the coal mining hills of Pennsylvania.

Dave and I drove my car.

Stan, Tommy, and Brad (Stan's brother and our fabulous feeder) drove in Stan's car.

Brad loves driving.

We arrived Sunday evening and went to the Olive Garden, a virginal experience for all of us. Salad and breadsticks dissappeared like Guatemalan Union Organizers. Dave thouroughly embarrased the waitress but paid for it all.

Monday we rode around with the CCB boys and Keith, our guest rider, to warm up for and check out the TT course. The racing started at 6pm that evening.

This is the lovely apartment we rented. The girls upstairs partied until 6 AM.

We all TT'd poorly and Monday's stage was fast but not too furious. One rider down and one more feeder.

It was a hot week.

The feed zones are where all the action is at.

The Groovey Goolies signify the forthcoming of the Peleton.

Then it's back to the action.

Luke lets the air out of Stan's tires before the stage in Hollidaysburg.

I took the sprint for 97th.

The Ladies loved us.

I forgot to bring the charger for my camera so the pictures end there. It was a extraordinarrily hard race with 40% of the field dropping out after the 6th day. Keith and I made the cut for the final stage, but we decided to skip the short crit and head home early.

We had so much fun that our stomachs hurt from laughter. I'll miss the trips to sheets, whatching Stanimal knock down two Schmonsters, hanging in the "fort," and drunken wiffleball. Oh yeah, the racing was fun too. The organizers put on a good show and take good care of the racers. I would recomend this race to all who are capable of following the top Pro teams around at an average of 27 miles and hour for 700 miles.

Thanks to our sponsors and of course Brad. We couldn't have done it with out you.

I love that movie Poison Ivy

2006-08-02T08:38:00.000-04:00

The week before the Elite Team went to the International Tour de Toona we went 3 hours west to the hilly Hudson River Valley to race at UnionVale. The long car ride was made tollerable by Bicycling Magazine on tape. Well...Greg read the Landis/Zabriski article to us. If you haven' had a chance to read it, you must go out and find a copy now. It is probably the only good article ever in a bike magazine.

So, anywhoo...The race was really hard, the air was hot and the field was small, making the race even harder. I was at the front for most of the race, gettin in one last day of hard training before toona. Tom Hopper was doing a great job in the feed zone for us but alas, I got all tingly from dehydrationa and had to ease up on the last lap. I stopped at the car for a coke and refill bottles and rode up the final, 2 mile climb with Greg to watch the finish. Dave was the only IF rider to finish of the 20 or so finishers. While we were waiting, I sat on some poison Ivy. DOUGHT!

2006-07-18T12:23:00.000-04:00

I was hit by a limo last night...and they offered to give me a lift home.
I don't remember much after I got into the limo.

TOONA

2006-07-18T12:19:00.000-04:00

Toona is coming up in less than a week
I will be updating as often every day, so you can all read how the race is going.

Yeah, right...like that'll happen.

did I ever tell you about the time...

2006-07-06T22:08:00.000-04:00

I went to my hometown on the 4th.
Chilled with the parental units and raced my bike in small circles past places I hung as a kid. We traveled at 30+ mph past:

1. What used to be $1 movie theatre I frequented for 20 years.
2. The long gone army/navy store that I hung out in nearly every day waiting for the - perfect combat boots to show up.
3. "Jakes," the late night and breakfast joint were I have been drunk, sober, asleep, in love, heartbroken, confused, completely out of my mind, and never more sure of myself.
4. The old bank where "Dan Tanner",a resident of the now defunct State Hospital, used to stand on the corner with his transistor radio, shirtless, all year.
5. The bust of Calvin Coolidge in the courtyard of the Old Courthouse that I traveled back to from Cleveland, to fight a speeding ticket, and won. Boo Yaaaah!
6. The convenience store previously known as "Grampy's" were I would wax philosophic with the clerk at 3 AM while in various states of being.
7. The building that used to house "Friendly's" where we would have lunch with my great-grandmother.
8. "Peoples Institute," where I first went to summer day camp and fell in love at the ripe old age of 4.
9. The Hotel Northampton. Still there. Still the same.
10. "Lizotte's" The tobacconist where I used to buy cool cigarettes and Chesterfield Kings.

Most things are gone, but so am I.

Thomas Wolfe said it best, "You Can't Go Home Again"

the months keep flying by

2006-07-03T15:33:00.000-04:00

So..Like..I'm a bike racer ya know, right!?
So...like I raced my bike for the past four days and will do it again tomorrow.
and like if I told you all about it, it would probably bore you to death. Unless your the type of dork that reads other peoples' blogs all day and lives vicariously through them.

Are you that type?

Do you want to know what happened?

We __________ the race. (fill in the blank)

That's all you need to know. There are many more important things you should be reading and educating yourself about and not reading this.
Like...Darfur, Iraq, World Cup, TdF, that idiotic embargo of Cuba, Afghanistan, Guantanimo illegal tribunals (thanks Supreme Court,) Gubenatorial elections...

The list goes on and on forever. There is no end to it.

BTW, There was a huge crash in the road race at Fitchburg and this photo show just a portion of the aftermath.

"There were snow guns everywhere. There was no way to turn," one victim was believed to have said as he ran down the gravel path wearing nothing but a sock.

A WHOLE MONTH

2006-06-15T21:20:00.000-04:00

Not much has happened.
Went to the Prom.

That Classy Model UN

2006-05-16T22:06:00.000-04:00

This past week I rented an Ark to navigate around the streets and I didn't ride my bike to work on the first day of "Bike to Work Week." Damn, I hate the bus. Thanks to Joy Division pumping out of my ipod it was tolerable. It rained so hard for so long I felt I may just pull my own Ian move. Thankfully they were numerous obortunities to "wash" the flood away and "the feel like you wouldn't believe" even played at a house party. Vodka helps me listen to Matt.

Saturday day was fun. 9 hours of class and a sprint across the Northeastern Campus to the Model UN conference for which I am an advisor. All day Friday and Saturday, high school students from New England and beyond argued, discussed, wrote position papers, and voted on critical global issues. Conflict Diamonds, Immigration, Genocide, Arab-Isreali conflict. You now, stuff Bush doesn't know anything about. Kids were waging World Peace cuz we all know our government isn't going to do it.

Anyhoo. We didn't win any awards this time but we hooked a few bright freshmen.

Vive le revolucion

Working

2006-05-08T22:30:00.000-04:00

I find it much easier to continue on when you are riding for someone else.
With 40 miles to go in 90 I knew I had nothing for the end but I kept pushing and made sure my teamates were in position coming into the last time up the hill. I buried myself a few times in the last 10 miles, working, knowing I would just roll off the back when we hit the climb. It felt good. Reminded me of working for Phil. If we can only teach these kids how to finish like we taught him, we'll be set.

And they will be stolen from us and turn PRO.
C'est la vie

Cranky

2006-05-01T17:55:00.000-04:00

I should be cranky, but I'm not.
Racing this weekend was both fun and a promissing start to the season.
Saturday in Sturbridge we rode well and I tried to get away twice. Once it almost worked.
I even had a great plan for the finish as it was going to be a field sprint, but the break finished a few seconds ahead. I realized my crank had come loose after the race.
I inspected it and found no apparent problems....
Sunday, 40 miles into 80 I felt it was getting loose again. I waited for a slow down on the flats and got off to inspect. It was loose. Todd jumped out of the sram car and tightened that sucker up. I chased back alone but never made it as the pace in the pack was too high from constant attacking. I TT'd for 25 miles and rode in. We didn't get any results to speak of but we were all happy with our fitness. July is two months away.

OH CANADA

2006-04-23T19:55:00.000-04:00

Went to Montreal to visit in-laws etc. over their Orthadox Easter weekend.
Greek church at midnight...what a party.
Saw some truly hillarious canadian television.
It was like "The Daily Show" but funnier and much harsher.
Canadians have the ability to laugh at themselves, even the politicians.
I haven't laughed so hard in a while.

Back home, wishing Canada wasn't so cold or I'd expatriate and get my citizenship there. I married a Canadian so it'd be easy.

Twice is nice

2006-04-17T23:27:00.000-04:00

Happy Anniversary to my love and me.

ADHD and Riding Outside

2006-04-12T20:17:00.001-04:00

It's the lack of ability to inhibit impulse reaction to stimuli, not the inability to filter stimuli.
Duh!
I need to inhibit the impulse to: yell, laugh, joke, snicker, snear at my students
Rode outside today for the first time since the crash. It was nice, but now my body is all off from limping. I need a massage and beer, and another beer, and another beer.

April vacation starts tomorrow. The first thing I'm doing is buying a keg of Duvel.

ADHD and Riding Outside

2006-04-12T20:17:00.000-04:00

Crashy Crashy

2006-04-04T19:50:00.000-04:00

One day I had my hand in my shorts and the next I was on the pavement.
Thanks rookies.

DRAINED

2006-03-27T22:41:00.000-05:00

This weekend was fun.
Friends, Parties, Dancing, Riding/Racing, Recovering from all.

Today I worked 14 hours straight.
8 at school
2 at IF
4 at home, on IF clothing

Then a cat appeared out of the drain

Bouncy

2006-03-21T17:23:00.000-05:00

Rode a lot
Worked even more
Blah...blah...blah...

HOLY SCHNIKEES

2006-03-13T19:25:00.000-05:00

It has been a month since last entry.
What have I done?

Let's compare #'s

# hours on the bike v. beers consumed: 66/80

# days in class, teaching v. glasses of wine: 15/20

# warning notices given to students v. days sleeping on floors: 7/7

# ties worn v. tyres changed: 5/1

# new japanese phrases learned v. times i have "forced it" according to students: 6/837

# japanese prases remembered when sober v. hours sitting at the IF booth at the lamest bike show in history: 1/6

SIDEWAYS!

2006-02-11T17:53:00.000-05:00

Damn,
I have been sick for seven days. Suffering from sinus trouble all winter, I looked for a cause. Being a lifelong sufferer of allergies, they seemed the most likely culprit.
My allergies have been worsening an new ones have developed in the last two years. Two major life changes have also occured at the same time.

I started eating meat 2 1/2 years ago after 10 years of being a vegitarian. I never preparing it at home and at first just started not refusing it when served at someone elses home or at a function. In the last year I have been eating it more and more when out.
Cause? I don't know.

The other change was that I became a high school teacher 2 years ago. After messengering in Cleveland and Nantucket (owned/operated the only bike messenger service on the Island)each for a year each, and 9 years in Boston I hung up my delivery wheels. I had finaly finished my BA and sought a job in acedemia. Being shut in a building with 400 teenagers and 50 adults is not as healthy as riding outside 8 hours a day, even if it is in the city.
This, environmental reason seems most likely.

But seeing as I don't plan on changing my profession, I stopped eating meat again.

I caught the flu last week and finaly made it to a doctor on Thursday after forcing myself to work only to fade out by the end of the day and sleep all afternoon and night. I went to the doc with the expressed interest of seeing an Allergist and resuming a course of allergy shots I had suspended 12 years ago when I dropped out of college and no longer had insurance.

The doctor wanted me to first try drugs. Go figure!?! I told him I didn't like the side effects (e.g., sleepyness, irritability, dehydration) but he insisted we try this before a referal to an allergist. I relented and now I'm a psycho bitch on a tear. Don't fuckin mess with me or I'll freak on you or cry. I hate taking drugs nearly as much as I hate our president and other liars in our government over the last 280 years.

So now I have to deal with this crap for a couple of weeks before I can get that referal. Or I can change doctorss, which I tried to do on Thursday, but the one I wanted wouldn't take any new patients for 2 weeks. I hope good will come tto those who wait.

This whole "having health care" thing is pretty new and at times harder than just willing sickness away.

SICK!!!

2006-02-06T13:17:00.000-05:00

I've been sick since Saturday evening.
I came to school only because I had to hand in my grades.
I tried leave early but I was denied. Too many teachers called in sick today so I had to stay. Everyone, teachers and kids, keep saying I look like shit.
Cool.

results

2006-01-26T19:22:00.000-05:00

I am, so far, getting some good results out of my American Foreign Policy students.
We have entered an editorial essay contest offered by the US Holocaust Memorial Museum.
The contest is on the Genocide in Darfur, Sudan. If you don't know anything about the situation in Darfur go to this link:

US Holocaust Memorial Museum

Otherwise, my back hurts, I'm training everyday, the weather's ok, and I hate you.

This is DD, the Haitian Wonder Mechanic

wow

2006-01-20T17:26:00.000-05:00

Wow, what a week.
I rode too hard and I hurt.
I didn't kill anyone, so the week wasn't that bad.

When my students ask me why I don't have kids I reply,
"I have 60 kids, why do I need any more."

The week:
MLK, snow, rain, 10 degrees, 60 mile-per-hour winds, ambulances, ladder trucks (that's a type of firetruck,) cops, sleet, death, manhattans, birth, 60 degrees, bull cock.

It is unfortunately still true today.

2006-01-16T13:04:00.000-05:00

Protesting The War
Meanwhile we in the churches and synagogues have a continuing task while we urge our government to disengage itself from a disgraceful commitment. We must continue to raise our voices if our nation persists in its perverse ways in Vietnam. We must be prepared to match actions with words by seeking out every creative means of protest possible.

As we counsel young men concerning military service we must clarify for them our nation's role in Vietnam and challenge them with the alternative of conscientious objection. I am pleased to say that this is the path now being chosen by more than seventy students at my own alma mater, Morehouse College, and I recommend it to all who find the American course in Vietnam a dishonorable and unjust one. Moreover I would encourage all ministers of draft age to give up their ministerial exemptions and seek status as conscientious objectors. These are the times for real choices and not false ones. We are at the moment when our lives must be placed on the line if our nation is to survive its own folly. Every man of humane convictions must decide on the protest that best suits his convictions, but we must all protest.
There is something seductively tempting about stopping there and sending us all off on what in some circles has become a popular crusade against the war in Vietnam. I say we must enter the struggle, but I wish to go on now to say something even more disturbing. The war in Vietnam is but a symptom of a far deeper malady within the American spirit, and if we ignore this sobering reality we will find ourselves organizing clergy- and laymen-concerned committees for the next generation. They will be concerned about Guatemala and Peru. They will be concerned about Thailand and Cambodia. They will be concerned about Mozambique and South Africa. We will be marching for these and a dozen other names and attending rallies without end unless there is a significant and profound change in American life and policy. Such thoughts take us beyond Vietnam, but not beyond our calling as sons of the living God.

In 1957 a sensitive American official overseas said that it seemed to him that our nation was on the wrong side of a world revolution. During the past ten years we have seen emerge a pattern of suppression which now has justified the presence of U.S. military "advisors" in Venezuela. This need to maintain social stability for our investments accounts for the counter-revolutionary action of American forces in Guatemala. It tells why American helicopters are being used against guerrillas in Colombia and why American napalm and green beret forces have already been active against rebels in Peru. It is with such activity in mind that the words of the late John F. Kennedy come back to haunt us. Five years ago he said, "Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable."

Increasingly, by choice or by accident, this is the role our nation has taken -- the role of those who make peaceful revolution impossible by refusing to give up the privileges and the pleasures that come from the immense profits of overseas investment.

Dr. Martin Luther King, April 4, 1967, at a meeting of Clergy and Laity Concerned at Riverside Church in New York City

1 year before he was murdered. hmmmmmmm.

Here is a mp3 of the speech:

MLKVietnam

AHHH!!

2006-01-13T19:24:00.000-05:00

Friday means a bunch of the teachers have a "meeting" after school.
We had a few refreshments, discussed and assigned duties for creating a scholarship in Joe's name, and blew off some tension from a week teaching pulic high-school in Boston.
(Joe is a colleague who died after a short battle with cancer last year. He was a major influence in our school)

Seth and I went to the boys basketball game to watch them fold just after we arrived. I guess we are bad luck.
I better test that theory next week. Go Cougars!!

Now I sit here catching up on the afternoon, preparing for the night. Tomorrow my rents are visiting and we are taking them out to the Helmand, an amazing afghani restaurant in East Cambridge, tomorrow for their anniversary. Emilie is making cheese-cake for dessert. I'm sure it will be great. Have I mentioned yet that she is an amazing cook. Who'da thunk it?

I'm Electric

2006-01-12T20:08:00.000-05:00

I was walking the cat in the hallway and just as I stepped on the industrial scale the power went out.

Man, I must be fat.

Half-day

2006-01-12T19:54:00.000-05:00

Today was a half-day at school. Well actually it was an "early release" day. I guess all those years of snotty kids complaining about "half-days" not actually being half-days, because a school day is 7 hours and a "half-day" is 4 hours, has finally made an impact on administrations. I was one of those kids over 15 years ago. I wonder how many teachers can remember what its like to be a kid? I think I still am a kid.

Usually I stay after school to finish up things and give kids extra help, but on half days we have meetings until 2 and there are no kids around and I leave earlier than usual. Early Release days are nice. So, I rode my bike for over 2 hours, stopped by IF to check on paper work, get files for the new kit design, talk to Joe about opening an account for the Elite Team and trying not to drink a beer before I rode home to Southie.

Wow I'm boring. But not as boring as you

Blogityblogblog

2006-01-10T21:23:00.000-05:00

Blogityblogblog
POPCORN

First day training

2006-01-08T11:17:00.000-05:00

It's snowing.
My Lorenzo just returned from Italy and called to see if we wanted to go out to breakfast.
"Do they have bloody marys?"
Training can start tomorrow.