Movie Observation

I was watching To Sir with Love yesterday and had an interesting realization. Don't get me wrong, it is a great movie (and I REALLY love the theme song), but I started thinking that all the movies out there about "teachers" that come in a make a huge impression on the kids' lives are all about people who never wanted to be teachers in the first place and the people in these movies who are teachers and set out to be teachers are shown to be almost buffoonish. I mean, think about it:

To Sir with Love - He was an out of work Engineer.

Stand and Deliver - Again, not his first choice.

Dangerous Minds - Former marine. Teaching was kinda something she came into.

Mr. Holland's Opus - Wanted to be a composer and not a teacher.

Freedom Writers - Okay, so she wanted to be a teach.

School of Rock - Yeah, this is sort of a joke, but the main character fell into being a teacher when he really wanted to be a rocker.

So, here's my question, with my mom and sister both being teachers, is the educational system so screwed up that the only way the movie industry thinks it can be fixed is by bringing in people from outside who never even wanted to be teachers? Maybe, just maybe we should think about diverting some of the huge expense that goes into the making of movies into our education system and maybe actually pay teachers for teaching our children and actually ALLOWING them to teach them and not just pandering to some test that they have to get their students to pass in order to get some funding. Okay, now I'm ranting...

Leo Update

I know I talk about my dog a lot, but I can't help it, I love him. Here is the latest...

As you know, I got him 6 months ago and since day one he has had the sniffles and a cough. It has gotten to the point that I'm considering changing his name to Booger because he has soooo much snot coming out of his nose. He has also been on multiple rounds of antibiotics.

I took him to a new vet between Christmas and New Years. The new vet did a full blood screen and chest x-ray and put him on another round. We have gone through that round and went back the past week. They did another x-ray and it seems that the mass on his right lung has decreased, but he is sneezing more, but that might be due to allergies, and his coughing seems to be decreasing some, although he still is wheezing. This last time they also chose to do a culture on his nose mucus to see if they can narrow down what antibiotics will work. They said that it could take another six to eight weeks before he will have it all cleared up, maybe longer since he has had this infection for at least 6 months and probably longer since he came to me in this manner.

The good thing, he is eating and drinking and has lots of energy still and doesn't seem to have anything else impacting him. He is a year old this month and I'd like to think that at least half his life so far has been good.

I know that he has made an incredible impact on my life.