Light at the End of the Tunnel

Hey kids.

This has been a long, rough school year. I've been doing this crap for nearly twenty years - which is crazy to think about - and this last year has been one of the most draining collection of students I've had since moving back to Michigan. Individually, they were all great, but nearly two-thirds of them were boys and they were all friends with one another, so having them all together in a class was an absolute nightmare. I've been looking forward to the end of the school year so that I could bid one, last farewell to these guys for a long, long time, and this month - FINALLY - we brought everything to a close.

Outside of school, May tends to be one of the busiest months of our year (it's right up there with December, if that says anything.) The girls have Orchestra concerts, exams, field trips, and all kinds of parties, get-togethers, open houses, and other such social obligations. 

The yard is in full-blown Resurrection Mode with the warming temperatures and budding vegetation, so I'm doing all kinds of mowing, edging, weed treating, insect-fighting, seed-planting, tree-trimming, and fertilizing whenever I have spare time on the weekend (which is hard to come by in a month as crazy as this one.) Kris usually has a ton of stuff going on with church, the girls' appointments, meeting up with her various mom groups, and other such wife crap.

And Yours Truly? Well shit, guys - you read this blog, you know the kind of crap I'm usually preoccupied with.

The first half of the month was slightly less crazy than the latter half (obviously), but still pretty nuts. I've posted a ton of other entries from this month, but we've had Prom, a Cancer Soiree at the Midland Country Club, Midland Blooms and MeatFest, two days in Cedar Point, Collierpalooza, and the Memorial Day Parade. 

That leaves all the random, weeknight crap to highlight this month. A smorgasbord of pictures and video for you to peruse at your leisure, but give yourself some time - this installment's going to be a loooooong one. . .

Seriously. I have no idea why these kids are playing with baby chicks in a math class. I was given no context with these pictures, I just took them off Abby's Google Photos account, as usual. I just assume this is the new normal in high school math these days. . .

Towards the beginning of the month, we finally went to war with our soon-to-be garden bed in the front yard (because we had long ago given up trying to grow grass around those Goddamn maple trees.) Kris ordered a truckload of mulch delivered to our house, and had it dumped right into the bed. She then spent a couple afternoons evening it out over the existing dirt hills we had created in the spring.

Pre-ordered the newest album by Pup this month, and in doing so was able to get it on a limited edition black/pink transparent splatter. Not my favorite album they've done, but I love the band.

Yes, we're to that point in our lives right now: Abby is learning how to drive. She took driver's training this month, and Kris took her out to one of those giant, mega-churches outside of town where there's a parking lot the size of a city block in order to get her acquainted with the basics. She's not as good of a driver as her sister, taking more after me with the quick accelerating, hairpin turns, etc.

Brace yourself for another month of Abby selfies, folks.

I'm well-liked by my students, as you know, but this year was the worst I've had since moving back to Michigan, as far as students go. Lot of behavior issues, it was a draining year to be sure.

Dear God, what's up with these frickin' chicks in a classroom?

Came home from the gym one night to see a couple of my roommates 'doing yoga' in front of the TV. I don't ask questions anymore.

This pic was actually from last month, following the Loons Opener I went out to with some of the guys. Bright and early the next morning, I was going through and whittling down/editing all the pics I had taken. Since I don't wear contacts early in the morning, I was wearing a pair of reading glasses over my normal glasses so I could see the fine details as I edited pics. Alayna thought I looked ridiculous, so she took a picture of me. THEN, a month, later, Abby decided to post a 'Teacher Appreciation' pic on Instagram. Well, a bunch of my students follow Abby on social media - she's well known in my school for being a 'baddie' (a hot girl) on another school's pom team, so this pic tore through my 8th grade like a brush fire, and all my students got to see it. So that was fun for me.

I'd criticize Abby for how she chooses to spend her time in class (when she's supposed to be, you know, learning and shit), but the girl pulls straight A's (rarely gets an A-), so I can't complain too much. If ain't broke, don't fix it.

The sort of pics we find on Abby's phone. . .

. . . .and the sort of pics we find on Alayna's phone.

Alayna and a bunch of friends - and Sebastian - went up to Great Lakes Ice Cream one evening.

The local school millage didn't pass during this month's election, as you can see here from the discarded sign in my neighbor's yard. Better luck next time, Board of Education.

Alayna, posing in an elevator with a wheelchair. Somewhere. For some reason.

Always with these two. . .

Steven was officially made a King of the Hill when Tom used AI to generate Steven's bio for the website.

The final orchestra concerts of the year were held this month, and both girls would be performing. Abby (of course) got a selfie on the drive over to Central Auditorium, where the concerts were being held.

Unfortunately no video this time around - being in high school and everything, the song selections are far too long to upload here - but Abby (being 1st Chair Cello) had a solo in one of the Concert Orchestra's songs, and knocked it out of the park.

Standing up for applause at the end of their performance.

(You can spot Ella, at front right, with her viola.)

Sebastian and the other Honors Orchestra kids donned powdered white wigs for their classical number. Alayna usually does Honors Orchestra but held off this year so that she could pick up shifts at Taco Bell.

Alayna and Sebastian (who's the Concermaster) performed next with the Symphony Orchestra, and after all the seniors were honored they performed one, last number and stood for a standing ovation.

Afterwards, we were able to get a few pics of the kids in the dressing room. Here's Alayna and Sebastian. . . .

Ella, Mrs. Mammassian, and Abby

And the Houghs.

And a weird pic of Abby, courtesy of her sister.

Kris has been super into plants this year, and they're starting to get out of control. . .

The Cannonball acquired a mini-fridge (for free) from a co-worker, so she proceeded to go to the store and drop $50 on pop and energy drinks to stock it. Girl's teeth are gonna rot out one of these days.

Dear God. It's official.

Driving to school one morning with that frickin' Johnson kid. . .

Alayna loves taking pictures of our dogs. Doing nothing.

My old high school buddy, Sean, is notorious for randomly sending people things in the mail. One day I received this handmade, silver dish featuring the Masonic Scottish Rite emblem. It now resides on the coffee table in The Study.

Kris recorded me applying sunscreen (and dancing to Yacht Rock) one morning before I set out for a couple hours of yard work. She's a bitch like that.

While I sweated and labored away in the yard like a field hand, and Kris tended our garden beds, the girls kept themselves busy by tanning (working on those base tans for next month's trip to Florida with the Johnsons.)

As the weather heats up, our dogs spend more and more time outside. It's hard getting them to come inside sometimes.

This is the time of year when we have tulips exploding everywhere. In a couple weeks they'll all be dead and the hostas will have taken over, but for now they're looking pretty good.

With the neighbors' privacy fence up, we have no need for the overgrown trees that spilled out over the walkway around the side of our house. So Kris got to work sawing them down and I made a bonfire to torch everything.

We also ripped out the remainder of the white fence that used to run along the back end of our backyard, which was obsolete after we put in our chain link fence.

The garden bed out front, starting to come in nicely.

Kris dislodged not one, but two, bird nests while taking down one of the trees. The birds were PISSED, squawking at her incessantly as she continued destroying their homes. Now we have a bunch of hobo birds hanging around our yard.

At the end of about five hours of yard work.

Later that evening, once we had showered off and gotten something to eat, we went over to the Johnson's for a low-key, driveway bonfire hangout. This spicy seltzer I came across was unbelievable - I will definitely be buying more of this in the future.

Dad sent out this pic of the current state of affairs up at Eight Point Lake. With the lake level so low, it's unlikely we'll be heading up to the lake at all this summer, which really, really sucks.

Watson stands vigilant over the backyard.

Watson, in case you were curious, is still obsessed with the hose.

A couple more pics of dogs, courtesy of the Cannonball, for your viewing pleasure. . .

And now some selfies. . . 

Abby and Alayna had a school night sleepover one night over at the Johnson's, which they were somehow cool with (maybe Erik was drunk, who knows.)

Getting ready for bed - and taking a shitload of pics in the process - in Ella's bathroom.

Drying Ella's hair is apparently a two-person job.

The Cannonball got to sleep on a blow-up mattress while Abby crammed into Ella's bed.

Go ahead, Watson - sit anywhere.

Abby was recently invited to begin cello lessons with some exclusive tutor in the area who was impressed by her performance at (ugh) CMU a couple months back, so she's been practicing a lot more lately.

This warning came on my car towards the beginning of the morning one day when I was backing out of the driveway, which freaked me out because dropping hundreds of dollars on stupid car repairs is the last thing I'd like to do. Fortunately, I Googled it and it was just my rear camera smudged up with dust - easy (and cheap) fix.

One evening while I was away at the gym, Kris found a turtle in the backyard along the back fence (she's thinking it got washed in when we got some torrential rains the last couple days.) You can imagine I was a little weirded out when I came home to an empty house and a frickin' turtle hanging out in this plastic, orange bucket on the stove.

(Shortly beforehand, while I was at the gym.)

I had Alayna and Abby - along with Maddie (driving here), who happened to pop in for one of her usual, unannounced, impromptu visits - ran the turtle over to Stratford Pond to release the poor dude back into the wild.

Abby was in charge of 'releasing it,' and apparently she just lobbed it like a rock into the water, where the poor thing remained floating upside at the surface. So, when the two older girls began frantically yelling at her to rescue it, she waded into the boggy-ass pond, retrieved the turtle, and placed it gently on the shore of the pond. You know, like she should have done the first time around.

God speed, turtle. Alayna had thrown a fit when I told her to release it back into the wild, she wanted to keep it as a pet. But that would obviously require a terrarium, a ton of turtle supplies (foods, vitamins, whatever the hell else you throw into a turtle tank), and since it was 9pm on a school night when all this went down, obviously none of that stuff was going to happen. She got over it immediately - she's impulsive when it comes to pets like this, so if you just push through her initial obstinence, she eventually forgets about it.

The next night, around 11:30pm - just as everyone was falling asleep, everyone's phones started blaring the emergency alarms. That shocked us all awake, and immediately after that we began hearing the city's tornado sirens blaring. Kris woke up Abby and I woke up Alayna, and together with the dogs we all stumbled down into the basement and began monitoring the storm progress on our phones. Not the ideal way to spend a school night (when you have to wke up at 5:30am), but fortunately we weren't down there long. Tornadoes were indeed spotted in the area, but our neck of the woods didn't get hit, and the next morning our yard looked totally normal - no knocked down branches, no damage to the cars, etc. We were upstairs and back in bed by 1am. Again, not ideal, but it could have been a hell of a lot worse.

Alayna took this pic of Samson, lounging in the yard with a trusty bone, when she got home from school Friday afternoon.

Then it was off to Taco Bell for her usual Friday shift. Hard at work, as you can see. . .

The next day, while Yours Truly was over at the Bos residence for MeatFest '25, Abby had a birthday sleepover over at Kiersten's with a bunch of their friends.

I assume they had a good time, all the pics and video that we pulled off her Google Photos account were group pics and rehearsed TikTok videos . . .

This generation will someday rule the world. We're so screwed.

(Your guess is as good as mine.)

Left to Right: Emily, Ella, Kiersten, Abby, some girl I don't know, and some other girl I don't know.

I was told later that yes, the outfits were coordinated.

More selfies.

. . . . and whatever the hell this is.

Later on that night, hanging out indoors now - Abby, Ella, and Kiersten.

The next morning, while having some coffee, the dogs began going nuts by the backdoor. Moreso than they would if there was like a bird or squirrel in the yard. When I looked out back, I had to do a double-take - one of our neighbors' dogs, Hercules, was just randomly hanging out in our backyard. All of the side gates were all shut and locked, so we're not even sure how he managed to escape their back yard and somehow get into ours. Kris managed to chase/herd the dog - she couldn't catch him to scoop him up - up the the Angelotti's front door, where Dave snatched him up. Dave seemed to think Herc somehow squeezed under their side gate, but still no clue as to how he got into our yard. 

My roommates enjoy talking selfies. In case you weren't aware.

Steven went for a run/walk one afternoon and shared a Google Map of the Chestnut Hill neighborhood with us, where he had placed crowns where each of the The Kings live. See the two middle ones all the way to the right? I'm the upper one of those.

The third week of the month, Alayna and Sebastian attended the MHS Drama Banquet (both of them are in the Pit Orchestra, not like actors or anything like that.)

Maddie has popped over to our house a couple times lately to do the girls' nails for next month's vacation to Florida (I assume.) Kris isn't convinced they'll last that long, but I personally don't give a shit what they choose to spend their disposable income on as long as I'm not paying for it.

Working on Abby's nails in her room.

(I've never had my nails done. Fun fact.)

So I found some weird pics on Abby's phone. She evidently went on some kinda field trip. . . to a river. . . for some reason. 

With Ella. Of course.

Maddie, Ella and the Cannonball at school.

There were a shit-load of pics off Abby's phone of Abby doing this pose with her new nails. I spared you from most of them. 

Tearing through Observing the Craft - an analysis of symbolism in Masonry - that Erik lent me, while waiting for Abby to finish her therapy appointment in Mt. Pleasant.

There were a lot of pics like this on Abby's phone, too - I included one and omitted, like, twenty.

Scenes from High School Orchestra class. . .

I'm moving classrooms at the end of this school year, after five years being cramped into this somewhat smaller room. The ELA teacher on my team, Rachel, is retiring and I'm inheriting her much larger classroom. Totally stoked for a change of scenery.

So as I am moving my crap out of this classroom, our Science teacher - Shelly - is moving her crap into my room. She's switching subjects from Science to ELA (and we'll be getting a new Science teacher), so there was just a ton of crap sitting around my room the last week or two of the school year. Fortunately, there's no more educating the last two weeks of school - what with all the field trips, recognition ceremonies, etc. - so kids just sat around the amassed clutter screwing around on their phones all day. I'm making a difference.

Kris picked up a bunch of fancy cupcakes for Abby's birthday from some upscale cupcake joint in town. I didn't have any of 'em.

For her birthday dinner, Abby insisted we go out to Olive Garden. . . again. We offered to take her to a nicer Italian restaurant, like D'Allesandro's or something like that, but she was adamant abut Olive Garden. She got a plate of whatever, but the rest of us just stuck to salad, soup and breadsticks. I hate Italian food.

Look, another Nails pic. . .

Opening up gifts after dinner. She got her hair dyed and blown out, and an ear piercing already - and we told her we were giving her a bunch of money for next month's Disney vacation - so this was just opening up gift cards and crap like that from relatives.

15 years old.

Seriously getting funned out with the Nails pics.

Abby went out to eat one weeknight with the Johnsons one night, and this is how Ella apparently rides in her dad's truck.

(Not sure where this was.)

Zero chance that sombrero has lice in it.

Ella, driving them all home afterwards.

Another shift at Taco Bell.

My dad used to run marathons back in the late 80s/early 90s, and amassed a collection of brand new (back then) running shoes, all of them unused with tags still on them and still in the original boxes. I used to get shoes from him all the time back in college - old 80s Saucony shoes with velcro straps, etc. - since him and I wear the same size shoe. He still had a pair of Brooks running shoes down in the basement, and gave them to me a year ago.

They've sat unused in my closet for a year or so, but I decided to break them out for this year's Collierpalooza (pairing them with a pair of old school, nearly-knee-high striped socks he still had.) I took a couple side-by-side pics of these 35 year old Brooks alongside the brand new pair of Glycerine Stealthfit 21's that I just bought online for next month's Florida trip.

And no, they don't make the Chariot model anymore.

The garden bed, starting to spread out.

Dogs, not being helpful at all while trying to fold laundry.

(Samson doesn't like his paws being grabbed.)

An end-of-the-year selfie at school.

Alayna found some AI program that came up with generated images of what our dogs would look like if they were real humans. This is Watson (eerily accurate, if you ask me.)

And here's Samson.

The last week of school, at long last.

Alayna's there, so I'm not really sure what class this is.

I employed child (student) labor to start hauling over all my crap into my new classroom, once Rachel had moved out all her stuff. It's going to take a LOT of work to get this set up in August.

All those boxes are filled with books, files, and other crap I have to sort through. Not looking forward to the process, but it'll be awesome once it's done.

Gonna have to buy some fabric to cover up those nasty-ass, 1960's walls. . . .

Wanna get some LED smart strips for my new room, too - funned out messing with Christmas light bulbs dying over and over again.

One of my students drew this on my whiteboard. I don't think I look that much like a crackhead, but whatever.

A group pic of Abby and a bunch of her friends the last day or two of school.

Driving back from school in Alayna's car.

Meanwhile, back in Saginaw, still plugging away at settling into the new room.

Gonna have to play around with where to place all my furniture, now that I have way more room for everything.

Once kids had graduated and left for the summer - around noon on the last day of school (that Thursday), I set about emptying out all these frickin' boxes. 

I purged a ton of crap that I've moved from classroom to classroom over the last 19 years of teaching, crap I've owned for years but never touched. Times are changing and half the stuff I own isn't feasible in today's learning environment anymore.

Kris' irises (I think they're irises) are exploding in the back garden beds.

Samson rarely comes inside anymore. He'll sit out here in the backyard like this for hours and not want to come inside.

End of the year celebratory bourbon. Went with my favorite, which is definitely a treat 'cause this shit's expensive.

We teachers had to go in that Friday for a 'work day' (without students), which we've never had to do before, and I used the day to finish unpacking my room as best I could. After said 'work day,' a bunch of us teachers met up at Hill's Tavern (in Shields) for Rachel's retirement send-off. 

Meanwhile, back at home, the girls enjoyed some Dairy Queen on the back patio. . . with the dogs.

That's what we need. More dog pics.

Me, Carrie, Benkert, Shelly, and Rachel, doing one, last round of shots to close out the school year. Bring on the Summer.

Alayna had a bonfire over at the Johnson's house with Ella that night, while Kris and Abby drove up to Gaylord for Kyan's graduation ceremony. 

This pic of Marcy playing with balloons with Vic's son, Julian, is the only pic either of them managed to take during their three hours in Gaylord. I would have taken more, but whatever.

So there you, gang - the end of the school year. At long last. Now comes the Glory that is SUMMER.

- Brian