I'm Baltic Avenue! - 10/28/06

So, you may or may not have noticed the fund raiser information on the left of our blog. So far we have had two events to raise funds for the senior trip to the cayes. The first was an incredibly successful community movie night, where we projected the movie “Robots” onto the side of a truck and served dinner to the whole community. Last night, we had a talent show/auction that was wildly successful.

Each student going on the trip and any volunteering community member had to perform a talent, with Melissa and myself acting as emcees for the event. Maria worked concessions with some other students. Between each talent segment, a couple students would be auctioned off to the highest bidder for 8 hours of work on one of the next two Saturdays. Melissa, Maria, and I were also up for bid. I was so worried that my students would wise up and pool their cash, buy me, and make me their slave for a whole Saturday.

Then, the day before the auction, they also figured that out. One of my students said to me in class, “I’m going to buy you and make you spend 8 hours building fence at our farm, then you can finally see how hard our cowboys work!!”
“Um, I never said your cowboys didn’t work hard, Mr. Defensive. I didn’t even know you had cowboys. Calm down.” That whole day my students tried to come up with money and ideas for the work they could have me do. I never prayed so hard…

I was one of the first two people to be auctioned off. The minimum bid was $30 – a pretty good deal for 8 hours worth of labor on any project. I went for $60. Not bad! I went for double the minimum bid! The student auctioned off before me went for $65, purchased by her boss who will make her work anyway. One of my students’ fathers bought me. He owns a farm. I don’t know what I’ll be doing – tutoring their son or kickin’ cow pies all day. I tried to emphasize my talents before the bidding began – I told them I could herd Junior High students and, if you need me to, I can hunt for you with my two guns – at which point I flexed both biceps and kissed them gently. I still only went for $60. I think I need to work out more.

As the night wore on, the bids got higher and higher – the opposite of what I expected. The second to last girl was auctioned off for more than $400. The very last senior girl was auctioned off for $825. Are you kidding? $825? If this were monopoly, those two girls would have been Boardwalk and Park Place. I was one of the lowest bids. I WAS BALTIC AVENUE! Dear Lord, I’m Baltic Avenue! Melissa broke the $200 mark, so she’s one of the high-end yellow properties on the board or maybe one of the green ones. I’m the purple pit stop past Go…

The highlight of the evening was that we probably won't have to run another fundraiser. With the profits from concessions (which was 100% profit since everything was donated) and what we made from the auction, the grand total was $3,780.75. God is so cool! The lowlight of the evening was when two of my students, bless 'em, decided to tell blonde jokes from the internet as their talent. "Why wouldn't a blonde make a good cowboy? Because she can't keep two calves together!" Seriously? Is that my student? I tried my hardest not to react so the crowd wouldn't catch on to how inappropriate the joke was.

It was so much fun though, and the crowd loved it. I had so many students’ parents come up to me and say, “I should have bid on you!” One mom wanted to buy me and give me the day off. She was going to have me ride horses with her son all day. That would have been cool. And it would have increased my final sale price…