Wednesday NightYou know what I hate about going back to school, besides everything? I hate it when the alarm goes off and it's still dark.
The FIL called before to see how my first day of school was, but I told him I don't start until Thursday, and the kids not until Monday. He was very surprised. He is my former boss; he was the superintendent of schools here in Bizarro Town for many years, including my first ten or so working in the district. He's always astonished by the shenanigans that are going on here. I don't even have to tell him that I know he would have done it better, and he doesn't say that to me. We both just know.
I'm as ready as I'm going to be. I'm going to watch Project Runway and then, with any luck, fall asleep. Poor little K isn't watching with me tonight, as he just got home after working a double shift today -- 8 am to 8 pm, with two hours off in the middle -- and she's on at 8 again tomorrow morning. Which means that we'll both be getting ready and leaving at the same time in the morning, something we have all carefully orchestrated our lives to avoid (one bathroom in the house), but it can't be helped. And she starts her first grad school class tomorrow night, too. Good news, though: she got the results today of her PRAXIS exam, which is the national teacher's test, and she passed. That's the exam I drove her to that Saturday morning last month where I started to feel sick while I was waiting for her to finish and then we came home and I had my appendix out that night.
Okay. No more computer tonight. Runway, then sleep.
Thursday morning
It's 6:30, about the time I'm usually getting out of the shower. But today I'm showered, dressed, and have had my coffee. All that's left is make-up and breakfast, and I don't have to leave the house until 7:45. Hmm. Well, I was awake at 5:15 again, and once the Hubs was out of the shower, I fit mine in before K was done with her breakfast. This is as weird as it gets here, where generally no one sees anyone else in the morning, and if we do, we are polite enough not to speak to each other. But K wide awake is much nicer than K just awake, and we have exchanged a few words here and there.
It's a lovely crisp morning; I had my coffee sitting outside on the front steps. I've got that sinus headache again, and a lovely huge red zit just about to bloom on my chin. How does my skin know it's the first day of school? With luck, I will look human before I leave the house, but really, I'm 53 years old! Can the acne stop now? Please?
9.30
I'm tapping this part out on the Palm; I'm stuck in the superintendent's meeting. Next to me, The Other Chai is reading Time magazine. I'll backtrack.
I stopped in at the high school on my way to the morning's meeting at the middle school. It's a freaking mess over there, but I did see the Colleague, and our media aide whom I love and the new-for-now library secretary. I got some tidbits of what's going on, and the promise of a walkthrough in the new library this afternoon.
The guest speaker is up there now. He has an accent, and the acoustics are terrible. It sounds like blah blah blah. What's everybody laughing at? He drops his voice at each punchline, and I'm not getting a word of it.
5:30, at home
Oy, what a day. Here's the back-to-the-high-school part in a nutshell.
- The principal spoke at our meeting and cancelled the rest of the agenda for today, so I didn't have to speak. He talked about going with the flow, working around all the construction, and made it clear that everyone was forbidden to walk around in the addition under construction. Bummer.
- When they opened the last storeroom in the old library and found all our old vinyl albums and all the bound National Geographics, they forgot that I had told them to discard it all and so they piled it all up in the computer lab, aka Library in Exile, instead.
- I went out to lunch with The Other Chai, which was okay, but we also went with the school nurse, who is chatty beyond all reason, and sometimes totally gets on my nerves.
- The SCM, who looks unkempt like a bum and whose skullet is now pulled back in a ponytail, caught me off guard in a crowd and gave me a welcome back hug and I wanted to go home and shower.
- I totally missed being with the Colleague all day and kept finding reasons to go visit her in her temporary office.
- My computer has been disconnected from the network and the hub it plugs into is gone.
- I talked to the principal, who apologized for not answering my email and answered my few questions and then gave me secret permission to go see the new library and to take the SCM with me. He immediately told everyone who crossed his path, because he is a yenta, and sometimes stupid.
- I'll reserve my judgment on the new library, but the pillars in there -- there are 8 of them, I counted -- are completely ridiculous. We found places where kids could stand and not be seen by either the SCM or by me. This is where they can inject their drugs in privacy.
- The construction/renovation in the original part of the school is often bizarre and is very disorienting. Remember, I have been connected to this school since 1968. I dont like seeing walls where there are supposed to be doors, and I don't like getting to a place where there are supposed to be stairs and the stairs are gone.
- I was pretty bummed all morning, but it wasn't bothering me in the afternoon.
That's the report. Tomorrow is an in-service day. There's a list of where all teachers are supposed to report, by department. Guess whose department isn't on the list? This wouldn't bother me so much if I didn't know that the administrator who made up the list used to be a librarian. You'd think that she of all people wouldn't have forgotten about us.
