Weekend passed so quickly, I really can't believe it. On the other hand, last week seemed to pass pretty quickly as well. Friday night went out to local bars with a bunch of TFAistas, then up to a dorm lounge to drink cheap sangria out of 3 oz. cups. The freshman-year-of-college vibe here on weekends is so incredibly odd, especially when there are a lot of people (my roomate, for instance) who've been out of college for 3 or 4 years. On a Friday night it's really hard to believe that we're all teachers, or to take ourselves seriously at all...

Yesterday I went w/ my roomate JZ to Manhattan for the day, after an interminable district meeting where I ended up far more confused about the policies of the Los Angeles Unified School District than I was before I started. I'm really hoping to get into Cal State TEACH for my credentialing program, even though it's a bit more expensive than Long Beach or LA, because it's an entirely online-based, which means I wouldn't have to trek down to Long Beach 2 nights a week for the next couple years. Anyway, we went to the Guggenheim, which was really a trip. Along with a great collection of "name-brand" art like Cezanne, Degas, Picasso, etc., they had an exhibit called "Moving Pictures" which was mostly really odd photographs and video art (think my class with Terry Cuddy). All in all, very interesting, especially the works by Gregory Crewdson and Jeff Koons. After that, took the 4 down to SoHo and window shopped for a while- oddly entranced by the sweet Steve Madden shoes but unfortunately nothing there within budget. Had dinner at a cool little sidwalk cafe- nice to get dinner + tax/tip for under $10, even if my ravioli w/ pink sauce wasn't all that fantastic. Met up later w/ my advisor CR and the three of us checked out Times Square, which was as flashy as i'd imagined. I was struck by the idea that all of us tourists who were there are basically lining up to gawk at large advertisements. If somebody could find a way to charge us to get in, even a couple of bucks, it would be Madison Avenue's greatest triumph anywhere- an advertising theme park.

On a side note: further evidence of my district's utter, utter incompetence. We'd been told for 3 weeks that my elementary school was called the Max Schoenfeld School, named after the first principal. That's the name that's on all the official stationary and school letterhead. However, a plaque was discovered on Friday dedicating the school to Max Schoenberg, not Schoenfeld. The damn place doesn't even know what it's called... unbelievable.