Lot's going on here. Wish I could post it all. If you want the story about Tom and Mary and Carmen "going to see a man about a dog" you'll have to email me for it and I'll send it to you.

Tom had borrowed Maretta's snow machine to do the errand above. He came to school to pick me up after the dirty deed was done. We went out the front door of the school to get on the snow machine. Tom tried to start it except it wouldn't start.
So, I said, "Let me get off so you have more room to manuever." Well, he did not like that - said it wasn't me - didn't know why it wouldn't start, etc. He kept trying. Then Leo drives by on his souped up snow machine - it is huge, and passes us but backs up to help. Leo is our school maintenance man. He does all sorts of things but mainly he fixes things. He hopped off, did a couple of things to the machine then started it for us without a word. Okay, Leo drives off. We proceeded to hop on the machine and take off. Tom drove off, took a sharp turn back toward housing. We rounded the curve,missed the distircit office building by about 12 inches, hit the huge snow bank, careened off the side and promptly rolled over in the street in front of the school builidng. I was spread down flat face down in the snow, up ahead of me Tom was stuck between the snow machine and another bank of snow. The snow machine had plowed into the wooded barrier in front of the school - or rather we had plowed the snow machine into the barrier. I stayed real still for about three seconds wondering if anything was broken. Then I came to my senses and realized we were in front of the school and kids might come by and see us any minute, even though it was after 6 p.m. I hopped up - honestly, I hopped up. Tom was up by this time and had already asked me three times "Are you oaky? Ann, are you hurt?" On the other hand all I could think of was the damaged snow machine. It was Maretta's. And how were we going to get it righted up again? And of course the first words out of my mouth were, "You took that curve too fast!" Just what Tom wanted to hear. We tried to right it, there was no one in sight to help us and this was really good because it mean that no one had seen us flying through the air from the snow machine. It was impossible for us to right it up because, well, I have to watch my back and I am not about to strain. After a few tries we just stood there looking at each other. Then who should drive by again but Leo. Thank you Lord. Leo didn't say a word - just had sort of a half smile, hopped off his machine and proceeded to help Tom right the machine. For a little guy, Leo is pretty darn strong. He then backed it up and away out from the barrier, started it up again, looked at the engine and pronounced it ready to go. Or rather, "She's ready!" Up until now he had not said a word - and I will admit that he is person of few words. He then drove his snow machine off at a high rate of speed. Tom drove home. I walked. I just felt a bit queasy after flying through the air like that. We were a little embarrassed at first - but then the humor of it all set in and by the time we got home we couldn't stop laughing. I have this picture in my mind of me spread eagle on the snow and Tom pinned under the machine and no one in sight. I would have died if any students had seen us - but then it just got funnier and funnier. And now I wish I had taken photos of it all. Why I did not get that camera out, I don't know. Of couse we feel awful about the bumper - but it can be easily fixed - just a bar that screws in. Of couse we could have been hurt, but we weren't . We could have gotten upset and been miserable but we have a different outlook on life here and we try to look on the bright side. What a day - with the dog thing and then the snow machine accident, and there's other stuff going on. I'm a bit overwhelmed.

We are still getting a snow machine next fall.

Our book fair was successful. Those kids and their parents and the teachers at school bought more than $2200 worth of 1/2 price books. The two winners of the red hot guestimation were thrilled. We sold books for three days straight, had door prizes for each class and awarded a Valentine's Day Cake to the highest purchasing class which ended up being Heidi's 6th hour reading class. What was unusual about this fair was that teachers helped me out. Carmen, Mary from 3rd grade, Parker from 1st grade, Stewart from 2nd grade and Maretta from 2nd grade all came down after school and stayed through my open house. Actually I don't think I have ever, in almost 30 years of books fairs, had teachers to come in and help set up, take down, and work after school to help me. I think it says a little about this wonderful faculty! Hope I can post some photos - but am having a bit of trouble getting them to upload.
Several ball teams flew in or snow machined in yesterday. There's a big basketball tounament this week. The boys from Marshall spent the day in the library reading and computing. They may not have a library there. There was an impromtu dance planned after the ball games ended Friday night, so I called Deanne, the sponsor, to offer our Valentine's Day decorations for the dance. The girls ran down to get the beautiful decorations we had made and were really excited about dressing up the cafeteria. It is so different here. In Stone Mountain a couple of students would just run down to Party City and buy stuff ready made!
Saw a wonderful Robson Green movie, Me and Mrs. Jones. Tom even liked it. This weekend I am going to try my best to get this Alaska class finished. I have to take it to get my permanent certification. The weather has been great this week, cold but no high winds. The days have been quite bright and sunny - just beautiful. I am really looking forward to the long daylight this summer.

The weather has calmed a bit. We got a good bit of snow last night but now it is just very cold. I took this snow photo on the way to school this morning.

My book fair is in full swing. The library just looks beautiful with valentine's hanging everywhere. Of course the books are so colorful too. The kids came in today and behaved very well. This is so special for them - especially at half price. Oh, Wednesday I have invited the 20 top readers (high circulation) in middle and high school to come in for a private breakfast snack and then they will get to choose a free book. I think they'll feel pretty special.

Saturday Maretta loaned us her snow machine. She had asked Tom several times if he would like to take it one afternoon and learn to drive it. So, finally he said yes. You just worry about borrowing these things and her machine is a really nice one - heated handles, etc. Well, Tom rode with her to the dump to empty her trash and then drove it back with Maretta on back. So that apparently was all it took to learn how to drive a snow machine. Then he picked me up and we went to the dump to empty trash ourselves. I've only been out that way a couple of times. There were hundreds of black Ravens out looking for food amongst the trash bags. I had Tom stop by the cemetary on the way back (see photo). We made our way back to teacher housing and then Carmen saw us and wanted us to go pick up her mail. So there we went again. Everyone was admiring our "new" snow machine and we had to tell the story of Maretta loaning it to us several times. We finally made our way out of town. What fun! When everything is snow covered you can just drive in any direction! It was really cold with the wind hitting us - but we loved it. After about an hour of running around in all directions, we headed home for a break - which lasted long enough to get warm and redress. This time I tapped Tom on the shoulder and told him I was ready to drive. He didn't think I could. But I could, and I did, and he was really pleased Ann could drive this thing. Remember it is very hard to drive - takes a long time to learn! (Not really there's just a press thing for going and a press thing for stopping except you don't even need that to stop. It stops by itself as soon as you stop pressing the go thing.) It was loads of fun scooting over the snow. We were out for a long time. When we finally got back home, we were exhausted and had to rest. I think we will for sure get a snow machine next year.
Last week we had the Public Safety Coloring Contest winners in for lunch in the library. We invited the principal and the supt. and the security officers from the Public Safety office. I had beautiful table cloths, made flowers for the tables and the cafeteria made us a beautiful cake.
The certificates I made for them had a view of Chevak in the background - one of my "across the lake photos". It was pretty special. I am posting several photos of our snow machine trip.