Another week bites the dust.

Hey family and friends,

It's late on a Sunday evening, and Celeste and I are anxious to start a movie together (see, we get to celebrate tonight because we don't have school tomorrow thanks to Labor Day). But we can't start the movie until I finish this entry, so it's going to be short.

The bottom line is that all is well here in North Carolina. We just finished our second week of teaching, and have emerged relatively unscathed. We have manageable classes (for the most part), and the handful of kids that cause REAL problems get kicked out of our classes pretty quickly. The trick to being a good teacher (aside from knowing your stuff) is to just be tough, act like you own the world, and make darn sure the students know it. Raising your voice, kicking out troublemakers, making threats - all these are valuable arrows in the quiver of a successful teacher. But then you have to follow that ferocity up with some TLC - but not too much. See, cause students "don't care how much you know until they know how much you care". It's a delicate and fragile balance between passion and compassion, and that's what we're trying to find each day. So far, though, I'd say we're doing pretty well.

We are, of course, thrilled at the fact that we're in the middle of a long weekend. I remember as a student always loving the long weekends, but I never thought that my teachers loved them as much as I did - if not more. I now know that teachers LOVE long weekends, and we're taking advantage of every minute.

That about covers the week - oh, except for the fact that Celeste and I went on a date last night and found a surprisingly good Sushi restaurant in Henderson, which is the last place you'd expect to find good sushi. In any event, we're pretty stoked about our discovery.

Until next week, farewell!