God Bless Us, Every One!

Of course, in the midst of the cooking whirl (standing rib roast, roasted potatoes, yorkshire pudding - all courtesy The Goddess Nigella - creamed spinach, parker house rolls, and for dessert homemade butterscotch and hot fudge sauces with vanilla ice cream - courtesy of smittenkitchen.com, thanks Deb!) I remembered that I wanted to post about our finishing up A Christmas Carol on the last day before break.

I've been reading it to the Criminals for about a week and a half (it's not very long) in abridged version and showing them the old Mr. Magoo movie of it bit by bit (each chapter before we read it aloud. It's new on my list this year, so of course I had that hesitation. Will they get it? I'm of the opinion that if you teach it right, they'll get it most of the time. Hence my decision to show the movie in installments, even though in general I shy away from showing movies. This one, though, was for academic reasons, so I went with it.

I was considering whether or not to continue on the third day, when I got the signal I needed. I finished reading the portion for the day and heard the "AUGH!" of frustration from the class - they wanted to hear more. So we proceeded on.

On Wednesday we saw the end of the movie - from the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come to Tiny Tim's "God bless us, every one!" As the credits rolled one of the Criminals said to another, "BEST Christmas movie EVER!"

Then we began reading, and halfway through the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come part, I put the book down and - taking a chance - said, "Who is this, this spirit?"

Adam raised his hand first, and when I called on him, said soberly..."It's..the Grim Reaper." I squee-ed inside and said, "And..who's that?"

He looked almost stricken with concern and nodded seriously at me. "It's Death, Ms. Victoria, Death's coming."

God DAMN I freaking LOVE smart kids.

God bless us, every one!