It's been a boring couple of weeks. I've been subbing a lot, and it's been really cold. We had two snows in the last week, and it's snowing again today; I can't ever remember having such a rough, cold, snowy winter. As much as I've bemoaned the lack of seasons while at school the last seven years, this is kind of taking things too far.

For some reason, I have completely stalled on watching new movies. We didn't end up seeing There Will Be Blood, and it's been two months since I've been to the theater. Which is a really long time. Sigh.

And, to sum things up, I have the flu. Again. It's much nastier this time around, though, and I've pretty much been exhausted the last three days. It looks as though I won't be working this week; I don't think I'm up to it, and it's not that responsible to work around kids when one is potentially still contagious. (I'm not sure how it works. The old wives' tale is that if you don't have a fever, you're not contagious, but I'm not sure if that's true or not.)

For fun, I've been keeping a list of kids' names at school. I wonder about parents who misspell their child's name, or spell it in a weird, kre8tiv way, or use an ethnic name and then not know how to pronounce it. Some highlights: "Cierra", the new bastardized version of "Ciara", which should be pronounced like "Keira," but instead is pronounced like "Sierra." Even though I knew while taking role that the girl pronounced her name the latter way, I asked anyway. Because I think she has the right to know her parents are stupid. "Arek," instead of "Erik." "Alijah," which I said out loud as "Elijah," but was in fact pronounced like the singer "Aaliyah's" name. (Which isn't even a name to begin with, I don't think.) McKinley. For a girl. As a first name. Dominique. For a boy. Pronounced "Dominic."

My favorite? Kipchogue. ???