Wednesday

Laura turns twelve tomorrow. I am making her a cake tonight. We ordered a cake at the store today for her slumber party. The store-bought cake will be shaped like a turtle. Laura loves turtles. One of her cousins sent her a Gilmore Girls poster for her birthday. It arrived today and Laura was thrilled.

Max beat me at chess twice this afternoon.

The term has begun in earnest. I will get papers tomorrow from one of my classes, and papers Friday from another class.

My advanced composition students are going to be reading "Against Cool" by Rick Moody. In preparation for that, last night I asked them to come up with a definition for the word "hip". Most of them came to the conclusion that something was hip if it was trendsetting or popular in a way that was socially acceptable. It was a fun discussion.

Christine Hume will have a poem in the new Caffeine Destiny. I am hoping the new issue will go up by the end of next month. I will call it "Spring 2006", in the hope that this will make spring arrive sooner.

I really cannot believe that as of 4:00 a.m. tomorrow morning I will have a twelve year old daughter.

On Laura's first birthday we gave her a big orange stuffed Elmo. On her fourth birthday we gave her Little House on the Prairie paper dolls. In kindergarten we gave her a desk. In first grade we gave her a Britney Spears CD, among other things that I can't recall.

It gos by fast.