Living in Limbo...

Well school started back this week and I am shocked...absolutely shocked at how many students returned. We had alot of Burnet kiddos...they are being bused from all over some as far as Texas City and La Marque (which is across the causeway on the mainland). Our host school(s) Parker and Oppe are seeing less students return because their children feed out of the west end which received much more damage than the middle of the island which is where Burnet students are. Yesterday was tearful...but anytime one of their little faces saw me, or Mrs. Bacon, or another Burnet teacher that they knew, they just lit up and smiled and waved and hugged. It made us all feel better to see one another. Today I saw a rough count of our attendance (Burnet only, we are doing separate attendance for now so we will know how many from each campus are here) and it was hovering around 300 for us. When we left for Hurricane Ike our ADA was about 530. So, roughly 60% of our kiddos are back! Yay!

In other news...read the article entitled, "UTMB avoids massive round of layoffs" here: http://galvestondailynews.com/story.lasso?ewcd=4c2d61ba4eec5c48 . This worries me. It sounds very ambiguous about if the med school will return?! We could end up in Austin. Time will tell I guess...it sounds like the director is supportive of keeping the school here, but unless they find a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow and some patients to start rounding on...who knows? Warren is still hearing that they will more than likely start back in January after December break, which is what we had been thinking all along.

There is a rumor that can neither be confirmed nor denied by Warren's UTMB director-man of a 30 ft. alligator running around in UTMB. Eek!

Our landlords are making progress on housing renovations, they got out the flooring and are getting new sub-flooring in already as well as making other little changes too. We'll see. Apparently plumbing is too much to add the W/D inside the house, but building a walkway and carport to have a covered walking area isn't. She is also looking at enclosing the deck, putting in darker wood (or some type of wood-like, pet friendly flooring), putting french doors in the dining room and closing off the kitchen door and putting the fridge there w/ more cabinetry, and an island. Cool! I hope all that pans out :-) Maybe we can move back in over Thanksgiving. Anyone wanna bring down their turkey fryer and some blow-up matresses?! We can have a moving in party for Thanksgiving! lol