J.P. Prezzavento - The Bits and Bytes of Education:

For a few months, my wife Kim and I have been discussing adopting a dog.  After a lot of careful thought and reflection we decided to adopt Molly a 3 year old puggle.  Between the time we decided to adopt Molly and when we brought her home, I did a lot of reading about how to welcome a new dog into our home.  While reading information from the web and talking to employees at the Open Door Animal Sanctuary I realized that bringing Molly home for the first time wouldn't be all that different from starting the school year with a new group of students. Here are five ways that adopting Molly has helped me prepare for the upcoming school year...and vice versa: 1.  Each day will not go as planned.  After we got home from the animal shelter, we decided to take Molly for a walk.  We tried to put her new harness on her, but no matter how hard we tried, Molly wouldn't put on her harness.  After about 20 minutes of trying to put on her harness and...

Yesterday I went to see a new doctor about a stress fracture I got while training for the Go! St. Louis Half Marathon.  I am proud to say that while my time wasn't record breaking by any means, I accomplished a goal that I had set for myself several years ago, to run a half marathon before turning 30.  This doctor wanted to get another x-ray of my leg, so I followed the technician down a long hallway to the x-ray room.  While we walked, well, she walked and I crutched, the technician made small talk.  As we were entering the x-ray room, she complimented me on my watch, noticed my shirt and tie, and said, "you must work in business, huh."  It was more of a statement than a question.  She was more than a little surprised to learn that I am actually not a businessman or investment banker but a high school English teacher. After seeing the surprise on the technician's face I felt the need to explain why I dress the way I do for my job as a high school English...