Amanda Takes Off...

Yesterday Good Man and I went hiking at Riverbend Park using the directions at Hiking Upward.

Riverbend Park Hike

There's a full album in the gallery, but I also wanted to post some of my favorite shots.

The hike started along the Potomac River. This section was rather busy, which wasn't surprising since it was a holiday weekend. We went hiking around noon and it was warm but a little cloudy. It was nice weather.

Panorama of the Potomac

Tree in the Potomac

Once we turned off of the Potomac and into the more wooded section of the trail, the number of people we saw dramatically fell.

Stream Panorama

Fungus on a Tree

I don't know if we got off the trail at one point or if the map we had wasn't great, or if a trail was renamed. But we ended up near a pond, where we needed to be. The pond was the only place we found another person in the wooded part of the trail.

The pond was covered in what I think is duckweed and it was filled with croaking frogs. I looked at Good Man and he had a huge grin on his face. The croaking was delightful and I got quite a few frog photos.

Duckweed

Ribbit

Good Man Imitates a Frog

Neon

Blue-Eyed Grass

We continued along the trail and saw, well, nobody else. The trail was fairly easy to follow once your got past "the rat maze," as Good Man called it, near the nature center (which was closed, do I don't know what it was for). We followed the Upland Trail, which is supposed to sport deer and turkeys. We only saw deer tracks, and near the point where the trail met the river, we saw a teenager who was acting like a turkey.

Still a Frog

Happy Hiking

We got back on the Potomac Heritage Trail for the last bit, and it got busy and crowded again. I did catch sight of what I'm pretty sure was an Eastern Tiger Swallowtail butterfly. I like that the butterfly is moving—I think it makes for a rather dynamic image.

Flying

All in all, a nice, pleasant hike that (according to the above site) was about 3 miles. I suspect we'll be back.

I am not a cute teacher. Even though I've shifted from sixth grade to third, I don't do cute things. I give my students a $4 book pick from book club for their birthdays, I read books they adore, but that's about the limit of my cuteness. My room is not decorated in monkeys or tigers. At the beginning of the year, my class list is not a poster made up of die cuts, but a print out by my door. We don't have classroom spirit colors, and I don't bribe my students with candy, cookies, or stickers.

I do get to know my students, we build our classroom together, we joke, we have fun. But with my personality, my students are used to homework every Monday through Thursday, a "strict but funny" teacher (so they say) and few surprises—or at least few cute surprises.

My students have been taking the state tests for the first time. The entire testing time (even days they didn't test), they've had no homework. That was enough to confuse them, but they embraced it.

They finished their four tests (taking five days total) yesterday. So as a team, the third grade teachers decided to surprise them with pizza.

We came in from recess and my students said, "Why does it smell like pizza in here?"

Then they spotted the pizzas on the back table and looked at me. I nodded at them. "If you're wearing mostly black shoes, go wash your hands. I need someone to hand out napkins."

One of my students turned and looked at me in shock. "Is this our end-of-the-year party?"

"No. You have done so well dealing with the state tests that all of the third grade teachers decided to order pizza as a surprise for you."

Her whole body started to buzz. She ran to me and socked me with a huge hug. "Ohhhh, Ms S! Pizza! Pizza!" She looked up at me, while squeezing me really hard, "And no homework, cause it's Friday, right?"

"Right, no homework. White shoes, go wash your hands."

Another student screeched, "Will you read Knight's Castle while we eat?"

"Sure."

One of my boys stole a line from the book. "'By my halidom!' Today is awesome!"

How in the world did (nearly) two years pass since we got Good Man's green card?

Now it's time to reapply for his green card. I forgot how much "fun" it is collecting all of this paperwork. Ugh.

So far I've discovered that VA tax returns don't have room for two last names, so apparently Good Man has taken my name. Oh joy, that's not going in the packet.

"Amanda! How are you?"

"Mother, do you know 'flash mob?'"

"What? I don't know that. What is that?"

I started belly dancing courses nearly four weeks ago and the owner of Saffron Studio organized a flash mob specifically designed to be easy enough for us new dancers to participate in.

I have been taking the classes with my coworker, and as soon as we heard about it, we nodded at each other. Of course we had to join in!

Waiting "Casually"

So today we had our flash mob. It was awesome! I will probably never a) participate in another flash mob or b) perform belly dancing in public, but it was totally worth it.

It was especially fun because my coworker was there and Mark's old roommate was there, too. Turns out she did the Groupon crash course months ago and then joined the studio.

The Start of the Mob

Entering the Line

Double Hip Left

Closing the Car Door (Hip Accent)

Choo-Chooing to the Center and Then...

Throwing a Kiss

This is the official video. Unfortunately, I was far off to the right, so the best time to see me is at the very end, when I was crossing the street with Good Man. But there are other videos on YouTube where you can see me better.

I would love to take some more classes this summer, but because of Korea, I won't be able to. However, I do intend to continue belly dancing. It's such a great activity, so welcoming of women of all sizes and physiques. And walking around in a hip scarf just lifts your spirits.

Tonight we had our last week of bowling league, which means we found out our ranking and received our payout and special awards.*

Good Man earned a magnet for a 150+ game. I earned magnets for a 150+ game and a 400+ series.

I also won the award for the Most Improved Average (Female). I increased my average by 16 pins, which was the most of anyone on the league. That award came with a magnet and a small cash prize.

(Side: My true average is 115.19. Good Man's is 115.69. I caught up!)

Our league has ten teams. As a team, Team Hanmi ranked eighth for our highest handicap game score. We scored dead last for team scratch game, scratch series, and handicap series. With those rankings you might expect we'd be lucky to break into the top five for points.

Well, we took second place!

팀 한미 화이팅!!

I was shocked. I thought we'd take third, but not second. We were close, though, because we were only ahead of third place by a half a point.

After we got our awards and cash payout, we played a fun no-tap game. In a no-tap game, if you get nine pins on the first ball, it counts as a strike. We were playing so that if your average was 140 or under, eight or nine pins counted as a strike. If your average was over 140, nine pins counted as a strike.

We were playing in a friendly competition for top two individual prizes. Neither Good Man nor I did well enough for either, but his high score was 222 and my high score was 274. We were bowling against a strong bowler who scored three perfect games in a row with the no-tap scoring. It was a lot of fun to play that way, and a nice way to end the season.

I'm really glad we joined a bowling league, and I wish I could join one this summer. Alas, it looks like I won't be joining another league until next year's Ball and Chain league returns!

*A note about terms for non-bowlers: a game is pretty self-explanatory. A series is your total score of three games. Scratch is your raw score, and handicapped is the score after they add your handicap.

At league, awards can be earned for highest average, most improved, if you score over a certain game or series, etc. Many of these awards depend on your average. For example, someone with a 200 average would not get an award for scoring 150, because that's just not impressive. As far as I know, the United States Bowling Congress sets the criteria for the awards.