Tag Archives: Tyler Tarver

Blogoversary Winners Announced

Click on picture to see original photo by alibree at flickr.com

Whew! It’s been one heckuva month!

There are now 21 days until my son’s bar mitzvah.

Can you hear me sing, “Awwwww. Freak out?”

Anyway, thank you all for playing with me in May and allowing me to give back some of the good stuff that you give me!

What?

You just want me to tell you the winners?

Okay.

The winner of The Write-Brain Book is: Cupcake @VivaAmaRisastall

The winner of Kasey MathewsPreemie is: BaseKamp

The winner of Elena Aitken’s Sugar Crash is: Annie from Six Ring Circus

The winner of Tyler Tarver’s Letters To Famous People is: Brown Road Chronicles

The winner of HotDog Yoga’s Rollpack is: JM Randolph

The winner of Tingo & Other Extraordinary Words is: Astrea Baldwin

The winners of handwritten cards from me are: Julie Davidoski, Kimberly Moore & Amber West.

I need your addresses. Please send them to me here.

Congratulations to all the winners.

{But, of course, you are all winners in my book.}

{But then again, I haven’t finished writing my book, so what does that really mean?}

Seriously though, winners should contact me via email, so I can collect the information necessary to stalk you forever deliver these goods to you.

*collapses on the floor*

And now, back to your regularly scheduled program.

Saturday Surprise Featuring Two Hot Guys

For all of you who are like: Whaaat? She never writes on Saturdays.

You. Are. So Right.

But my buddy Clay Morgan has killed his blog, EduClaytion.

Which is sad because so many of us just love him.

Anyway, he made me a wee video to celebrate my blogoversary before he up and went.

This just shows the kind of person (I mean zombie) I mean person Clay is.

And you wanna know who else is hot like a freshly tarred driveway?

Tyler Tarver.

Yup.

Because he is offering up a free download of his e-book Letters to Famous People.

If you don’t know Tyler, you need to know Tyler:

If you’d like a copy of Tyler’s book…

Tell me what famous person you’d like to write a letter to. What would be your opening line?

Other blogoversary giveaways you can enter to win:

The Write-Brain Book

Elena Aitken’s ebook Sugar Crash

A handwritten card from me

 All blogoversary winners will be revealed on June 2nd – once I figure everything out.

February Mashup Of Awesomeness

Love was in the air this month and lots of people wrote lots of posts about Valentine’s Day. And chocolate-covered love. And wine-coma love. And 13 things they love most about their lovers. And love is awesome. Don’t get me wrong. These posts are slightly less lovey-dovey.

From the English Department

Trish Loye has 10 Ways to Know You’re A Writer.

From the Math Department

Annie from Six Ring Circus writes “I Need To Learn To Count to Four.”

From the Science Department

Jenny Hansen gives us the down and dirty on having babies later in life in her piece “When the Conception Journey is a Rock Filled Canyon.”

From the History Department

I find the situation in the Middle East very confusing. Piper Bayard’s partner Holmes has been writing a multi-part piece on Iran that is a must read. There are several parts. Start at the beginning and don’t stop.

From the Language Department

From The Home Economics Department

August McLaughlin gives us “Foods For a Beautiful Brain.” Good to know I eat most of these. Except flaxseed. I’ll have to get on that.

From The Technology Department

Leanne Shirtliffe tells us about The Best iPhone App for Writers.

From the Art & Health Departments

When Elena Aitken wrote 8,000 words in a 2 day period, she posted “Writers Wrist and Other Afflictions.” To go along with it, she posted a must-watch Elmo video. Everyone will love “I Make Art.”

From the Music & Psychology Departments

Rivki Silver does a Cool Music Experiment that shows what happens when you take the same piece of film and pair it with 3 different types of music. Really neat way to understand the power of music!

Christian Emmett wrote a lovely tribute to his band teacher in From Music to Life.

From the Physical Education Department

I’ve got nothing. If you have a post about somebody shaking his or her groove thing. Share it. Otherwise, you can watch this video of me dancing.

Whaaat? I got excited when it finally snowed!

From the Awesome Sauce Department

Elizabeth from The Writer Revived wrote a great piece called “Lessons From Barbie.” Y’all know I’m big on lessons, and I think that Elizabeth is spot on here.

From the Snark Department

25 Things I Want To Say To “Aspiring” Writers by Chuck Wendig.

From the Faculty Lounge

Math teacher Tyler Tarver makes me laugh out loud. I watched his hilarious video “St*$ff High School Students Say” at least 4.7 times. I was really mad when my son interrupted me that last time.

Yo tengo el gato los pantelones! Guest Post by Tyler Tarver

Hola! Tyler Tarver is my guest blogger today!

I am so lucky to have Tyler Tarver as a guest blogger today. Tyler’s awesome blog is called chaos meets capitalization. I wish I thought of that, but that would imply my brain would work like Tyler’s and Tyler’s brain does not work like mine. In fact, Tyler Tarver’s brain does not work like anyone else’s brain. Which might be why I like him so much. He thinks in metaphors. And colors. And he raps. And he teaches. And he has published books! These are all qualities that I admire. Plus, did I mention he is wicked funny. Wait, do I sound like I have a little crush on Tyler Tarver? It might sound like that, but really I just wish my brain worked like his. Like a little bit. Like on weekends. Or even once a month would be fine. It would be cool to see an MRI of what is going on in Tyler’s head. Because his synapses fire. Seriously. Can we make that happen, T?  Enjoy Tyler’s memory of his Spanish teacher then follow him at @TylerTarver. (He digs stalkers.) Also he wrote an awesome book that he is selling here.

• • •

Yo tengo el gato los pantelones.

That’s literally all I know after two years of high school Spanish. I’m not even certain it’s correct and I learned it from Blue Streak starring Martin Lawrence. I’m fairly certain it means “I have a cat in my pants.”

So you know where I stand, this is not a story about how much I learned in Mrs. Harris’ class, but how much freaking fun it was and the kinda crap we got away with like DB Cooper (huge crap stealer).

First, how’d I get a Hall Pass to Mrs. Harris’ heart? Easy, I took up for her when the class tool was bashing her about grading something wrong. My spider-senses started tingling and I knew she was about to cry, so I tell the kid to shut his face, she said she’d fix it. Boom, I’m more her favorite than The Notebook.

I think Professor Jacobson wanted me to talk about someone that made a difference or made me who I am, but I was forged in the fires of Mt. Doom, so no credit due to anyone.*

*mostly bull crap, except for parts based in fact.

So, here’s some stuff we did to make Mrs. Harris laugh, make some memories, and mostly make her distracted so I didn’t have to learn a useful subject like la Espanola.

  • Scotch taped my binder, pencils, and book to my desk. Along with her stapler, tape dispenser, picture frame, and flower vase with flower. Why? Just in case we lost gravity but I still wanted to el learna the wordsa of la Spanishas.
  • Made her authentic Spanish puppet dirty dance with her sweet tea (one hand on da butt and one in da drink, like da playas do).
  • Make that authentic Spanish puppet do the same with the side of Mrs. Harris’ head.
  • When she left the room, we turned off the lights and adjusted the overhead light with a sidewalk outline of a person wearing a crown. So when she walked in, we flipped the light on her and blasted the radio up and everyone in the class started singing “HERE SHE COMES MISS AMERICA…”
  • Reenacted a story about a momma dinosaur who wanted to make in on her own in New York city via shadow puppets.
  • Squirted Arby Sauce in a compartment of her desk and drank it out with a straw.
  • Proceed to throw up the aforementioned Arby sauce plus previously consumed school biscuits and gravy into the trash can in front of the class.

My personal favorite prank I got to perform needs some setup.

Our school burnt down my 10th grade year, so classrooms took place in these real classy trailers that smelled like moist feet with hair. Hobbit feet I guess would be a visual, moist Hobbit feet in an older buttered croissant roll. So, we would have to walk outside from class to class. Okay, that’s all the setup I got, I might have been wearing blue. No, it was yellow. Classy yellow.

Regardless of shirt pigment (maybe black, it brings out my eyes, the center part), I leave from my class and head straight to Harris’ and place an official looking piece of paper on her door stating, “Mrs. Harris’ class needs to go to the library.”

(We didn’t.)

After sitting in her class by herself for about 10 minutes, she walks outside to see what’s up.

Let’s just say our class enjoyed our 10 minutes of free-time playing Minesweeper in the library.

Sorry, no big punch line or hook. Except that after I graduated, Mrs. Harris because Miss Harris and now she’s Mrs. Tarver.

I made that very last part up.

But I’m sure she’s still cool.

The End.

So what teacher did you crush over and what did he/she do to make you love him/her?

• • •

If you have writing chops and are interested in submitting a memory about a teacher you had and can explain how that person helped you (or really screwed things up for you), as well as the life lesson you took away from the interaction, I’d love to hear from you! Contact Me. Essays should be around 700-800 words.

If you write for me, I’ll put your name on my page of favorite bloggers!