Because I have about 5 minutes to spare

Ahh... Elton John & Billy Joel concert tickets are being given away on the radio... Sigh.

Yesterday, I went home exhausted. A couple of years ago, I was incredibly interested in the bird flu H5N1 and became the Subject Matter Expert (SME) on our account. Well, now this swine flu has come along and all of my days are full of swine flu news and data and statistics and planning and prevention and... and... and... I don't get to turn it off though when I've had enough because I have to be on top of it as much as possible. So it is all flu all day. I suspect that today, I will go home exhausted as well.

Meanwhile, the school district is closing schools and making decisions that don't seem to go along with the community's focus nor that seem to make fiscal sense. The school that the boy goes to and we were intending sending Itty Bitty to is on the list of closing schools. They are closing down the newer school that is appropriate for elementary kids and is smaller... and reopening it (same teachers, still elementary) in a older, middle school location. The 'new' location is an old building that looks like a prison. It is huge and currently has no playground. It is not appropriate for an elementary school. They are going to have to spend a good deal of money to make this building feel right for little kids. It is just beyond me. I hear that this bigger building though brings in outside revenue from renting out space to a theater group and several different intermural community sports.

Minneapolis, like most cities, has many neighborhoods that each have an individual feel to them. I like to think that ours has a sort of laid back, young family, environmentally conscious feel to it. There is a good deal of focus on shopping locally, urban environmentalism, usage of the community centers, etc. It's a fairly safe part of the city without being in the upper middle or upper class sections.

The school board says that it wants to create community schools. I like this idea. I like the idea of my kids going to school with their neighbors and getting to know them. Let's face it -- we adults don't often do a good job of meeting and getting to know our neighbors. But the kids do! They don't really care who they are as long as they find a playmate.

However they are removing the urban enviromental focus. They are putting the kids in a big school. The school is not elementary age ready.



And now... my five minutes are up... Back to Flu, flu, flu