Mike and I have gotten ourselves all talked up so we're back on the sofa, dissecting Partridge Family videos on YouTube, swearing to try (again) to sleep soon.
It's Friday, right? Who needs sleep? I'm giving tests all day anyway.
Mike and I are just sworn night people. We want to sleep. But the dark is so... quiet. Nice. Who wants to sleep through the part where the world feels so peaceful?
It is a bit like a slumber party, this marriage. There's a lot of giggling and playing "Can you imagine if?" to all hours, and let's not discuss some of the rude noises.
But I will sleep soon, so these will just be brain drops:
I'm the only person I know who shot in RAW for awhile but gave it up. I hope some other people chime in, because this "once one ascends to the higher plane of RAW..." business is annoying me. It's not for everyone. (Let me know if you are also indifferent about Cirque du Soleil, which supposedly "one either loves or dislikes.") Maybe it's just a sign that I should learn more about getting things right in the camera and not twiddling around with post-processing.
We gave the blueberry cake hideyhole to June, and Susan and Cricket now have the Krevlorne barrel. June and Terry had a visit. Not a visit-visit, ew, just a visit. Terry is very silver now. I wish I knew how old he is. June is the largest female we've ever had. She is going to start causing dents in the carpet when she naps.
Arthur and Sherman are still working the Milkbone rodeo circuit. Pepper, having made a life's work of convincing Edith to hide every seed (and eat as few as possible), no longer worries about transporting every seed as soon as it's poured. Instead, I see her rolling in the sand and napping while Edith frets around with covering up any seed that could be exposed to... the people that bring her the seeds.
And Snorre is still loving-yet-busy in his strange, emotionally challenged, incredibly spastic way. We think he's (long) blind and deaf. He's our little Helen Keller. (Mike didn't really know who HK was, so I reenacted the W-A-T-E-R scene at the pump for him. Yes, spelled it in his hand and everything. This is a quality wifely organization we're running here.)
(That's the first clip I found with HK speaking. Really amazing, still, unlike some of the other stuff I learned in grade school. I'm looking at you, Damon and Pythias.)
We've had Chipotle two days in a row. Thank you, Chipotle (Mike likes to say "Chih-pottle" over and over until it starts sounding distressingly right in my head), for those free burrito coupons. And thank you, apartment neighbours, for throwing yours away. I do love cilantro lime rice.
And lemon cilantro hummus from Fresh & Easy. Spread on their curry naan. With a glass of their organic apple juice. Not too cloying, not too parchy, and I'm fussy about (and often strangely ill from) apple juice.
When I ordered the old Far Side calendars off Half.com to decorate my room, I also got a good discount on Fierce Pajamas. But I haven't read it yet. It's like a Terry Pratchett-a-thon, this last month. But, reading the FP reviews, I suspect I'm missing out. Some pan it for being "head laughs" instead of "belly laughs," but I'm up for either.
My classes are getting bigger. (Must. Fight. Use. Of. Embiggening.) Honors is still under 30 in each section and the chemistry in those classes seems good, but the regular classes are busting and starting to fly their true hues. I had to take one girl into the hall Thursday, one I already called home about (to say nice things, because I had a feeling we'd be going downhill soon).
However, since I've been forcing the "No, really, this IS teaching" Kool-Aid down my gullet, I don't think I'm minding as much as last year.
I'm even providing pens and paper to the kiddos who don't come prepared. I apologize, America, I really do, for helping to further the creation of irresponsible young people with a sense of entitlement. I just can't take the whining or the excuses this year. I don't know how long it will last, with two classes of 40ish regular kids in each, but it's worth finding out.
One drama so far. So, it's first period, third day of school. I still don't know most of the names. I call roll. Everyone is here. I count the kids. In the back of my mind, it seems like there are more than I expected when I rearranged the chairs, but no - there are 37 names on the current roll and 37 in the room. (More have since been enrolled.) (Some of those were enrolled but didn't show up the first day or two of school so I had to disenroll then re-enroll them. One missed the first day of school because she was on vacation. And now another girl is going to be gone for a week for a wedding, starting next week. PARENTS! C'MON! Reveal the hidden camera already!)
So there's this kid, and he's a little obnoxious, but he keeps pulling it together, so I let it go at shushing and having others shush him. We're doing this activity - an icebreaker I made up (go me) - where each person writes a question on a piece of paper and everyone's paper is shuffled around the room. It's like a train of unpredictable questions stopping at each desk. (I love this technique and overuse it for all kinds of activities from peer editing to composing group sonnets.) The questions can't be yes/no or inappropriate.
Well, in the middle of class, this kid stands up, rips up the many pieces of paper he took from my "if you need it" tray, throws them in the air, and walks out of the room. I don't know his name. The kids don't know his name. They say they don't know him. (Never mind the two that were cutting up with him.)
I get on the intercom and say a student walked out and that said student was wearing a long white shirt with jeans and is of medium height, but, hey, that describes a lot of our kids. (I wish they'd ban long white shirts. Then again, it's nice to know who our thugs are. Or thuggabees.) I hesitate and decide not to mention in front of the other students that he's black. It's just a fact, but... you know.
Luckily, as each piece of paper was passed around, the students signed their name when they answered the question. This sophomore wrote his first name and middle initial. (Well, it could be an alias.) He also wrote a lot of F-bombs. Plus, his question was going around the room: "Do you own a woman?" Nice.
I start looking for the name on the roll. The kids want to continue the activity, so I'm having to get them to be patient, too. That's when one girl volunteers that "he isn't even in our class - he's a sophomore." And by now I've realized that I didn't update my "scratch" roll from the previous afternoon, when I got the notice that a student in this class transferred to another school. So, I counted 37, but there should've only (heh - "only") been 36.
Of course I'm pissed. The disruption, the mess, the rudeness, the loss of authority. Between classes, I email a discipline person with all the info, noting that I have handwriting samples with incriminating words, but I haven't had a response. I don't think I will. Shrug. That probably means, "Don't be such a dumbass and miscount your kids next time." Maybe I shouldn't have even admitted to the lapse of competence.
Maybe he came to the wrong class by mistake and was just embarrassed, so he saved face with a grand exit.
I think I'll look in last year's yearbook before giving this one a rest, though.
Speaking of rest...
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