I am deeply happy these days, I just realized. All the way down to my toes. Not new relationship happy or vacation happy or holiday happy. Just kinda like I'm in my prime and I love the life I've partly created and partly lucked into.

And I hope the same for you, dears.

(From my daily "writer's almanac":

It's the birthday of the first child born of English parents in what is now America: Virginia Dare, born on this day in 1587. She was born on Roanoke Island, off the coast of North Carolina, just a few days after settlers from England had arrived to establish the Roanoke Colony, the first English colony in the New World. An earlier group of men had set out for Roanoke, but their colony had failed. This expedition sent more than 100 men, women, and children to the New World. But the group before them had damaged relationships with the nearby Native Americans, and only one tribe, the Croatoans, who lived on a neighboring island, were friendly with them.

Virginia's grandfather, John White, was the governor of the colony. Less than a month after her birth, White went back to England to get more supplies. He agreed on a specific code with the rest of the colonists: If they had to move from Roanoke Island, they would carve their new location into a tree or post. And if they were moved by force, they would carve a Maltese cross as a distress signal.

But things went badly in England — the country was at war with Spain, and every single English ship was in use against the Spanish Armada. Then it took a long time for White to get enough support, and his benefactor handed over the project to someone else. So it was three years later that he finally returned.

He got to Roanoke Island on this same day in 1590, which would have been his granddaughter's third birthday. The colonists had vanished. But the word "Croatoan" was carved into a post, and "Cro" into a tree. Neither had crosses or other distress signals. White speculated that they had gone to the island where the Croatoans lived, which they all referred to as Croatoan Island. But there was bad weather, and the men leading his ship refused to go search. They were blown to the Azores Islands, and from there set sail for England, and neither John White nor anyone else ever discovered what happened to little Virginia Dare and the rest of the colonists — they never reappeared. To this day, Roanoke Colony is referred to as "The Lost Colony."

Today, on the culinary tour of Pike Place Market, the tour guide told us that the Bubbleator was the 1960 Seattle World's Fair's #1 attraction (and that the Bavarian Meats place was #2). I was intrigued.

I filed it into the burbling quagmire of ideas that is my brain right now. Let's just say, simply, that I'm making a list of weird things that should be on an ideal tour of Seattle. Please tell me everything you know, and I will cite you when I start my tour company. You can even bring your relatives on tours for free.

Who wants to go to MOHAI with me sometime very soon?

And who wants to go on a Champagne tour of Montlake on the 29th?

I am scheming.

Things I did for the first time this week:

1. Went to a wedding at mt. Rainier.
2. Had a massage at mt. R.
3. Coney island!!!
4. Put my feet in the Atlantic ocean! This is the biggest deal of all of my new things all summer!
5. Slept in Chelsea
6. Traversed the meatpacking district, including the High Line, which is not just a school district, as it turns out.
7. Checked into a dorm room at Columbia, which SUCKS, btw. The room, not the school.

It was a good week for new things!

I was running to get some last minute items for my silk road simulation and my iPhone jumped out of my pocket and committed suicide. I stepped on it and the glass shattered and now I am forlorn. I don't know if the warranty covers the phone being stepped on! If you want me, email me!

I made my 1st period feel VERY GUILTY this morning about my stolen USB drive, and then told them I was offering a reward for its return. Suddenly, a little hand was holding it out, saying "Is this it, Miss Tarvin?" How precious! I did NOT reward the thief, after all.

And, to redeem my faith in my career, I went to the track meet after school, where I sat, goofing around, in the middle of a crowd of my favorite students, past and present, who made me laugh a lot. They demanded that I meet their parents, who have never come to other school events. It made me feel all warm and squishy. So, all hope is not lost.

I'm excited for my train ride!

Matt just told me that he was on a research vessel one time (which is AWESOME in itself), and that the scientists were watching a feed from a high-def video camera that they had put on the bottom of the ocean, about 2 miles down. There was a robot down there, and an octopus attached itself to the robot and wouldn't let go. So the scientists started raising the robot very slowly, hoping the octopus would stop being so selfish and let go. Matt was watching this for a while, but went out of the room until he heard everyone screaming and ran back into the room. The scientists told him that the octopus had kept holding on as they had raised the robot, but that he was built for super-high-2-miles-deep pressure, so when he was brought into shallower water, HE EXPLODED!

It's kind of like the "hand caught in the cookie jar" parable for the new, robot and cephalopod-loving, millennium.

This is the grainy vimeo version of our promo movie! Matt Hodge is going to help me send the higher-quality version around soon. . .

Somebody left the teacher's lounge door unlocked, which meant that they left my CLASSROOM unlocked (because the rooms are adjacent), which allowed a student to come in here when I was gone and STEAL my iPod, $50, and MY PHONE. grrrrrrr.

The next period, my AVID kids swore they'd hunt down the thief and sic their gangsta relatives on the culprit. One girl said she'd give me her old razor phone tomorrow, so that's one problem almost solved. Except that I don't have a phone TODAY, and won't have any way to know when my dinner dates (former students from the crazy school) get to my apartment. I emailed them with directions to the Honey Hole, and I'm hoping they read their email. . .

On a brighter note, I won the outrageous pirate hat prize at the staff meeting today for being so wonderful all the time. Yay me.