Of course, the real reason is that I am doing this pretty much solo, and I have had a lot on my plate. But there was also a lot of conflict with conference week, Katrina efforts, and the all-new Spirit Week. In fact, we were subjected to a Pep Rally Friday during 5th period. Yikes! Thank God, I had a pair of ear plugs - it blunted the edges of the coaches' whistles and piercing screams.

So, the first announcement aired Friday morning - we have a student news team that broadcasts every morning during first period. On Monday, we have a Teacher Work Day, and the next announcement will be on Tuesday - all about the Hispanic Heritage Poster Contest I need to finish writing the rules for. I plan on having my students circulate around the school, putting up posters and handing out Mexican lollipops (with chiles!) to the teachers. I have a lot of plans like that!

Another teacher encouraged me to coordinate an ethnic foods dinner club. When I first got married, I would Evite a bunch of friends to join us at a restaurant, and we would sample the foods of a different country. I got a little burnt out on the coordination efforts (turnout would be big one month and almost non-existent the next), but I think it is time to try again. I picked up a copy of Creative Loafing's Best of 2005, and I will target my restaurants.

Last Monday, we DID have the teachers bring in Latino dishes. This is a monthly thing where we sell plates of food for $5.00. The proceeds go to funding deserving students on field trips. Most of the dishes were fairly generic, but my Brazilian colleague made feijoada, the national dish of Brazil. I made mini burritos out of fajita tortillas. The fillings were pork and tomatillos in mole verde, and beef tongue and nopales in mole verde. No, I did not tell the faculty it was tongue. I just said it was beef.

Yesterday, my husband took the first step to setting up a whole new website and Yahoo! store for my Maison Celeste business. There is going to be a lot of work involved in that - I hope it is worth it!!! I worked on Guadalupe shrines, and plan on putting up a bunch of auctions today.

I took two weeks off, and vowed not to put up any more auctions until I completed the transactions from last month. That is now done, and I am working on a bunch of Day of the Dead things I want to put up. I will probably put up some Blue Dog and Guadalupe shrines, but the goal is to actually have the item MADE before I put it up for auction!!!