Faking It

I want to be good at the things my Mom is good at. I've never had the problem some of my friends have like hating their parents or wishing they wouldn't turn out like them. Spoiler alert, we all end up being our parents to a certain extent. But I've always actually wanted to be just like my parents. And why not?! My Mom is an amazing woman and I have so many of her qualities, good and bad, but I want to be able to do the things she can do and do them as good. I am, however, destined to always live in her shadow just as she tells me she lives in her Mom's shadow. She says that my Nana was perfect at things like baking and knitting and that after all these years of practice and experience and getting it wrong and getting it right, she's still not her Mom. But we'll spend our lives trying I guess. And my Mom is good at so many things that I am just absolute crap at. My mother is a great cook. Put me in the kitchen and I know you're a gambler. She can cook so we...

This year AP-LS fell over Spring Break which was kind of a bummer because I would have loved the excuse to not teach for one night. But it actually worked out really well! This year the conference was in San Juan, Puerto Rico and it was an excellent Spring Break destination. Best place to hold a conference? That's debatable. I ditched a couple of talks in favor of sitting on the beach, but in my defense there weren't any at the time that I really wanted to hear which means they weren't on a topic I was familiar with/interested in. It was a much different experience this year than it was last year. True, I've been before, and my life has changed dramatically in that time, but I was still looking forward to it and it didn't disappoint. We stayed in the conference hotel this year. Last year we went cheap and stayed a few miles away but it was a hassle getting up, getting dressed, getting a cab, paying for the cabs, and then being trapped at the conference hotel with no...