Monday, January 05, 2004
Like skydiving without a parachute...
So in about half an hour I'll be out the door and back in the trenches.
My break is done.
I'm not feeling particularly happy to go back...I wonder if anyone is. The students certainly won't be. (I can only imagine how excited they'll be to have to do work in a few hours.) My fellow teachers would also likely prefer to have more time to themselves to plan/sleep/etc. Maybe the administrators are looking forward to it. There was one disciplinarian who shortly before break who lamented having to be away from the students for so long. I only wonder if he was joking.
Last night I finished typing up lesson plans and outlines for the week. It's a remarkable bit of planning compared to what I normally do. I'm hoping this will help me fulfill a New Year's resolution to get more sleep.
Now all of this would be well and good, but of course, problems arose. You see as part of that "be prepared" kick, I decided to put all my stuff in the car the night before! Makes sense as I think about it rationally now. But the problem, as it turned out, was that when I took all that material out to the car last night, I accidentally locked myself out. (Grabbed the wrong keys!)
And my roommate had just gone to bed.
And it was raining.
And right about then...at 10:00 at night, "The Mayor" (see two posts ago) decided to say hi.
And so, there I am without a coat...6 quarters in my pocket (for laundry), a key to my car but no key to my apartment and no way to get in! "The Mayor" offers to jimmy open the lock, and even went and got the tool to do it. This...freaked me out. I talked him down and went over to the payphone across the street and, putting my pride on the line, started yelling as loudly as I could into the receiver when the answering machine picked up. The first call did nothing...but by the time I was halfway through the second call, my yelling and "the Mayor"'s doorbell ringing had its effect...and my groggy roommate had opened the front door.
Phew.
(Ironic twist: the mp3 playing on my computer as I got back inside? "Wake me up, before you go go" by Wham!)
When asked yesterday how I'm feeling as I go back to the classroom, I compared it to skydiving without a parachute. It's not the fall that'll kill you. It's the sudden stop at the end.
Well then...the cargo bay doors are open. Time to make the jump.
See you on the other side!
So in about half an hour I'll be out the door and back in the trenches.
My break is done.
I'm not feeling particularly happy to go back...I wonder if anyone is. The students certainly won't be. (I can only imagine how excited they'll be to have to do work in a few hours.) My fellow teachers would also likely prefer to have more time to themselves to plan/sleep/etc. Maybe the administrators are looking forward to it. There was one disciplinarian who shortly before break who lamented having to be away from the students for so long. I only wonder if he was joking.
Last night I finished typing up lesson plans and outlines for the week. It's a remarkable bit of planning compared to what I normally do. I'm hoping this will help me fulfill a New Year's resolution to get more sleep.
Now all of this would be well and good, but of course, problems arose. You see as part of that "be prepared" kick, I decided to put all my stuff in the car the night before! Makes sense as I think about it rationally now. But the problem, as it turned out, was that when I took all that material out to the car last night, I accidentally locked myself out. (Grabbed the wrong keys!)
And my roommate had just gone to bed.
And it was raining.
And right about then...at 10:00 at night, "The Mayor" (see two posts ago) decided to say hi.
And so, there I am without a coat...6 quarters in my pocket (for laundry), a key to my car but no key to my apartment and no way to get in! "The Mayor" offers to jimmy open the lock, and even went and got the tool to do it. This...freaked me out. I talked him down and went over to the payphone across the street and, putting my pride on the line, started yelling as loudly as I could into the receiver when the answering machine picked up. The first call did nothing...but by the time I was halfway through the second call, my yelling and "the Mayor"'s doorbell ringing had its effect...and my groggy roommate had opened the front door.
Phew.
(Ironic twist: the mp3 playing on my computer as I got back inside? "Wake me up, before you go go" by Wham!)
When asked yesterday how I'm feeling as I go back to the classroom, I compared it to skydiving without a parachute. It's not the fall that'll kill you. It's the sudden stop at the end.
Well then...the cargo bay doors are open. Time to make the jump.
See you on the other side!
