90%

I woke up this morning late because a power surge in the night shorted and destroyed my phone. To compound this, there was no running water available in our building - so forget a shower.

There is a poem taped to my refrigerator at home that is easily as old as I am. The poem is entitled Attitude. Life is 90% attitude, the poem says. I shrugged these two problems off and my day turned out to be great. Despite waking up late I was still able to catch the tail end of breakfast, and I patiently spent a good 5 minutes blotting the oil off a delicious omelet with a ton of vegetables in it.

At work I finished planning math lessons for the rest of the semester. Dinner featured a very spicy panang curry and a great fish dish. After dinner I saw Mary (the AP English teacher who is in her late 50's) and helped her carry in all the stuff she had bought during the teacher's day trip to the mall. She was grateful and gave me a bag of homemade cookies she bought at a local market which I later gave to all my homestay kids. She and her husband David (who's math class I'm taking over) invited me in for tea and a little tart which was amazing. They put on music, turned on their cool Thai lamps and we just sat and talked for a good half hour. It was so nice, just sipping tea and enoying eachother's company.

At study hall I prepared a number of math questions and instructions for N'John, a kid in my math class who is very very far behind. After 3 days of trying to break him of faulty habbits I think he finally understands regrouping for subtraction. It was one of the most satisfying moments I can remember. I had him do 5 or so problems, and he got them all, I was so happy!

Life is what you make of it.