Five on Friday

Just like I have for the past several Fridays, today I am linking up with The Good Life Blog, Hello! Happiness, Carolina Charm, and A. Liz Adventures for "Five on Friday."

  

Please don't forget to join me and Aly for our link-up: Three Thanks! We love the gratitude that we've seen and read so far!

And, please don't forget to enter my giveaway: today is the absolute last day to enter! Good luck to y'all!

As always, here are some random musings:

~~ONE~~

I had to cut my fingernails for the first time in probably 25 years yesterday. 

I have always, for as long as I can remember, been a nail-biter. And it's not necessarily that I've been a nail-biter so much as a nail-picker. I think it stems from my obsessive tendencies: I really, really like everything to be equal, to look the exact same way. So if one of my nails broke, I wanted them all to break to be that short. That obsessiveness caused me to basically bite/pick my nails down to nothing.

But, I've finally stopped biting and picking, and yesterday I actually had to cut them. 

I'm pretty proud of myself -- prouder more of kicking this habit than I am of completing Whole30, believe it or not.

~~TWO~~

My students are currently reading the book Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson, and this week we took a break from reading the novel to read a short story and watch a music video.

I had my kids read A Simple Gesture by John Schlatter, and we discussed how seemingly meaningless words or actions can have such a significant impact on others' lives.

We then watched the music video to Mark Wills' Don't Laugh at Me.

After the kids got over the late-90s style, we had a great discussion of how we cannot judge others because we do not know their stories, how we should always treat people with nothing but compassion and kindness.

I then had students write about their responses to a few questions: how others' actions have positively or negatively impacted them, how they could have acted differently to more positively affect someone else, and how they believe they acted in a manner to help another human being.

While some students did not take the assignment seriously and others were uncomfortable answering such personal questions, the majority of the students really took the assignment to heart and were honest and reflective in their responses. I only hope they truly take it to heart and treat their peers with love and kindness.

~~THREE~~

I'm really looking forward to a weekend to do nothing. I was gone two weekends ago in Omaha and last weekend in St. Louis. I'll be gone half of next weekend (until Saturday) in Atlanta, the weekend after that in Omaha/Lincoln for my half marathon, and half of the next weekend (Saturday) on the Market-to-Market Relay.

I'm hoping to get a lot of Netflix-watching done tomorrow and Sunday.

Source

Oh, and I'll get a ten-mile run in there somewhere.

~~FOUR~~

You know what else I should do this weekend? Clean my apartment.

I'm getting pretty disgusted with the state of my bathroom, the ickiness of my kitchen floor, and the litter that my cats think is necessary to kick all over the floor of their little closet. The dust on my ceiling fans is not going anywhere, and I'm pretty sure I need to vacuum all of my floors at least twice to get up all of the gunk.

I just need a good deep clean.

I don't know anyone who is this happy scrubbing floors.
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But I really, really, really do not want to do it.

I think I need to hire someone.

~~FIVE~~

On the way to St. Louis last weekend, Mindy and Katie and I bought our tickets for 80/35, Des Moines' two-day music festival.

(Side note: Mindy and I logged on immediately at 10:00 a.m. to buy the early-bird two-day tickets for $39. Katie logged in thirty seconds later, and the tickets were sold out! She had to pay an extra ten bucks. Crazy!)

I have gone to 80/35 a couple of years, and I'm super pumped for this year's festival already. A few of the acts have been announced thus far, and they look awesome. I'm especially pumped for Conor Oberst (of Bright Eyes, one of my favorite indie bands who was up-and-coming when I was in high school and all over everything Saddle Creek Records), Ziggy Marley (I love me some reggae), Brother Trucker (a great local band), and Bonne Finken (always a fun show).

I can't wait for them to announce the Saturday headliner. Any guesses?

Also, I would love to see Delta Rae, Trapper Schoepp & the Shades, and Mat Kearney again sometime soon. If the 80/35 organizers are reading this amazing blog, please make that happen. K thanks. :)

I hope you all have a fabulous Friday!

What is the best concert you have ever been to? What is the next show I should binge-watch on Netflix? What has been your hardest habit to break?