Running Away with the Circus

Today was the day our students have been anticipating, and teachers have been worried about.

Today was Circus Day.

We have been practicing all week for the circus. Too bad it was to be a part of it instead of just as an audience.

We practiced our fart noises ALL week. We practiced our MMA fighting skills in all sorts of inappropriate places like the bus, playground, restroom, etc... We even had a student practice his Houdini skills by getting himself locked into a locker.

Personally, I have been practicing my cat-herding skills all week long!

Oh, did I mention that I also lost my voice from yelling at all my future circus performers all week? (Ok, I also had a cold.)

My day started off with my alarm blaring at 4:30am. I got to school at 6:30 and had to wade through the crowd of kids who weren't supposed to be there until 6:45. I went into my classroom and attempted to shovel in my sub-par biscuits and gravy from Casey's before my students and their parents flooded into my room.

At 7:00, we loaded the bus to find that our driver was my absolute favorite 80 year-old driver who brakes for no red lights. Yay.

Fast forward two and a half hours of yelling at kids to keep their seats in their seats and to stay out of the aisle while cringing through a thousand rounds of Old McDonald.

We get to the circus and actually have AMAZING seats right up front. We see elephants, tigers, poodles, guys on stilts, ribbon dancers, clowns, belly dancers, camels, trapeze artists, and jugglers. We yelled until we couldn't yell any more. And we left filled with popcorn, pretzels, and cotton candy.

Every time I leave the circus, I leave convincing myself that I could totally become a circus performer. So, if I were to run off and join the circus, here would be my special talents:

• Hula Hooping - Sure, I would need practice at hula hooping with 20+ hula hoops, but that's what they do all day right? Just sit around and practice their tricks? I am already awesome at one hula hoop, so this is my #1 skill.

• Animal Trainer - I have no experience with camels, elephants, tigers, llamas, or even poodles, but I do have 5 dogs. And I was thinking of making an act that would be a combination of the tiger act and poodle act. Don't worry, it's not with tigers eating poodles. I would use my Redbones instead and part of the act would be that they would go in and let the audience pet them free of charge! It would be a hit!

 And I would totally rock that tiger trainer outfit!

• The Beautiful Assistant - From what I could tell, there are some girls whose job at the circus is simply to hand materials to the real act and point their hands. They get to wear lots of sparkly outfits and the only talent I really saw them using may have been variations of the basic ballerina poses. Even one of my students suggested this as one of my skills.