BAD TIME TO BE IN MY JOB

I don't know WHAT I was thinking ... going back to school and spending all that money on my education.  Honestly.  I mean, I love what I do.  I truly enjoy teaching, but the state and the feds have made teaching a terrible, horrible, awful, impossible thing to do.

I'm wondering (fantasizing, really) about retirement.  Right now my retirement plan is to die at my desk of old age so my kids can afford my funeral with the paltry life insurance pay-out they'll receive.  Unfortunately, the money I'm paying back in student loans for my continuing education and for my kids' education, I am stuck working or perhaps living in a state park somewhere.  My back-up plan to dying at my desk is living in a beat-up van in Wal-Mart parking lots around the country.  Honestly, that is looking more and more exotic every day.

Right now at the Christmas break, it's flipping nuts with parents emailing and parents calling and kids suddenly realizing their grades are falling and administrators running amok and field trips and tests and the list keeps going on.  Because taxes pay my salary, people seem to think they own me, that they personally pay me, and that I am supposed to be at their beck and call, as if I don't have 100 other students and two hundred (plus) parents insisting that they are the one and only priority in my life. 

Newsflash:  I'm a taxpayer, too; I pay my salary, too. 

It's a damn crazy time to be in this profession.  It's a damn good time to start thinking about my exit strategy. So please, Santa, for Christmas this year, bring me a winning lottery ticket.  Not just any ticket, either, but a true winner, a million dollar winner, a winner big enough for me to write that letter.  You know which letter I mean.  The letter that starts out:

Dear Superintendent, It is my greatest pleasure to announce that I will be retiring right ... this ... very ... second.

MY OLD KENTUCKY LINUS

I'm trying to rewrite the lyrics to My Old Kentucky Home to reflect my sentiments about the recent school play that was censored.  You know the one -- the play in which Linus's important speech about the origins of Christmas is cut completely out of A Charlie Brown Christmas. 

So, I do a little research and discover a song that has already gone through a required political rewrite for the use of derogatory racial terminology.

Hmmmm.  Seems appropriate now that I rewrite it yet again to include religion as offensive.  Here goes, folks.  Let's sing THIS version at the next Kentucky Derby.  Truthfully, though, what in the hell were you people thinking that a school play with a soliloquy about the birth of Jesus was going to fly? 

Here it is.  Sing it loud and sing it proud.

Oh, PC shines bright in the Old Kentucky Home.
'Tis Christmas, and we're putting on a play.
Sentiments are ripe and the principal's all gloom,
While the students recite lines that they will say.
The young folks roll on the stage and on the floor,
All aren't merry nor happy - they frown.
By 'n by PC police come a-knocking at the door,
From my Old Kentucky Home goes Charlie Brown !
Weep no more, libtards, oh! weep no more today!
Linus kicked out from the Old Kentucky Home,
For My Old Kentucky Home - No Christmas play.

LOCKED IN THE LOO (NOT ME THIS TIME)

Just when I start thinking I have kind of a sucky weekend with homework to do (I spend Saturday writing two papers and an Internet post on Blackboard for a class I'm taking) and exams to grade, I check out some of my friends' social media posts.  Two of my friends and my own daughter have all taken spills recently and injured their legs or feet.  Thankfully there is no snow nor ice on the ground right now, but it's still a shitty time of year to be on crutches.  Okay, any time of year is a shitty time to be on crutches.

So I'm thinking maybe my weekend doesn't suck so badly because at least my two feet seem to be in working order.  But still.  Crutches or not, they don't have to write those papers nor grade exams, and I do, so it still sucks.  Sucketty sucky mc-suckmasters.

Then ... I read about Gladys.

Gladys is an 80-something-year-old grandmother who was out shopping in England when she decided she had to go to the bathroom.  Badly.  Really badly.  As in "right this second" badly.  In order to find a bathroom, she did some exploring and found a lovely, brand new loo.  Popping inside to take a quick pee break, she promptly shut the door behind herself.

And got locked inside.

After peeing, because one should probably use the facilities anyway if one is locked in, she tried in vain to get someone's attention by banging on the door and walls to no avail.  She settled in for the evening, complete with her shopping that included yarn and other goodies and some mints.  She remained trapped inside the ladies room for four days, sleeping on her coat on the floor and using the hand dryer when she got cold.  After four days, a worker discovered her putting the final touches on a scarf she knitted while stuck there.

Having had my own adventure getting locked inside a school bathroom when the handle broke, I feel her pain.  The only problem for me was that the bathroom wasn't even close to large enough to sleep in, and it lacked a hand dryer for warmth.  (Luckily someone heard me and rescued me before I panicked too badly.)

Listen, if you're going to get locked inside a small cubicle, a bathroom isn't a bad place to be.  You'll have plenty of water to drink, and you never have to worry about being without necessary facilities.  I;m going to have to learn to plan better, though, just in case.  I might have to start carrying some puzzles and a deck of cards with me every time I go into the loo.

It all worked out for Gladys, though.  Since she had no phone at her house nor a cell phone at all, no one even missed her during her ordeal.  But, the family has now installed a home phone and gotten her hooked up with a cell.  Gladys decided it's time to get with the times.

Hm, I don't know.  Right now with the papers and the grading and the holidays and all hanging over my head, I'm not so sure total isolation for a few days would be so bad.

MINI POLITICAL RANT

I'm not going to make it.  Nope.  No way.

 I'm not going to make it to the 2016 presidential election because I am already completely and totally disgusted and fed up with every single fucking idiot in the presidential arena, and that includes the moron in the White House.

I don't like politics.  I don't understand people who want to rule and boss around other people, tell them how to live and what to buy and what to do and where to get medical attention and when to drink and when to go to war.  Right now every single freaking jackass in the ring is acting like a spoiled ten year old who was once bullied on the playground and now wants to punish everyone with his/her "I'll show THEM" bullshit.

There's no way any of these vile leeches is remotely interested in the good of this country or of the people in it.  Don't even try to convince me otherwise because not only would it be futile, you would be dead wrong.  If any of the people in office or running for office gave one shit about you or about me, they'd find a way to compromise and communicate and let go the stranglehold they have on the American people. 

And, if you were truly honest with yourself, deeply and passionately honest, you'd agree.

The pensions, the corporate perks, the insurance, the paid-for offices, the government owned housing market, this regulation, that regulation.  I doubt this is what the founders (and the Constitution) had in mind.

But, what do I know about unearned pensions paid out for life?  What do I know about free healthcare for life?  What do I know about getting paid to show up to work on rare occasions and pretend to vote?

The more important question should be: What do YOU know, and why would you tolerate this?

DUM-DUMS

I'm waiting for laundry to finish so I can wrap up my day.  I'm not going to lie -- I am exhausted.  On top of being so tired that I have been accidentally mini-napping at my desk and at the kitchen table, I am suddenly craving chocolate.  Thankfully, I don't have any in the house.

Still, though.  I need something.  Something sweet. All I can find are Dum-Dums.

You know what Dum-Dums are; they're those small, round, totally horrible lollipops that come in flavors like grape and pineapple and sour apple.  I remember that my favorite has always been the root beer flavored Dum-Dum. 

What a surprise!  There's a root beer flavored Dum-Dum right on the top of the pile!

I unwrap the lollipop and realize it's not as dark colored as I remember it.  Oh, well, it's still root beer flavored, right?  I taste it.

Oh, gawd, it's horrid.  Putrid.  What the hell.  

I attempt to finish the lollipop.  After all, Dum-Dums are small, itty-bitty versions of what a Tootsie pop would be if it were a miniature piece of crap and minus its chewy center.  I cannot finish it, though.  There seems to be a saccharine aftertaste that's actually nauseating me.

This is what I get; this is what I deserve.  If I am going to scour the kitchen in search of something sugary-sweet to quell what is truly a chocolate craving, then I deserve every agonizing taste of that Dum-Dum.   

Never again!  Never, ever again!!!!

Until I'm craving chocolate again with only Dum-Dums standing between me and my car, with which I will drive to the nearest 24-hour pharmacy and buy out every bag of holiday candy left on the shelves.  I'm far too exhausted to drive up the street and stand in line for anything at this point.  I look around one last time.  Oh, well.  All I can find are Dum-Dums.

Here we go again.

DIP ON A CHIP: IN MY OWN DEFENSE

I did it.  Also, I didn't do it.

I have nearly a ton of homework to accomplish for a class I am taking.  I start doing said homework this afternoon by meeting with a class compatriot for an hour and filling in paperwork.  Let me assure you, this is no easy task as the notebook containing information for the entire course weighs about twelve pounds.  Carrying this notebook around is akin to carrying a toddler on my hip.  The homework calls to me, taunts me, and screws with my blood pressure.

Alas; I do not do it.  I do not do my homework.

Sitting here at the kitchen table after finally losing the homework-no homework debate, I decide to mash up two avocados and add some fresh lime and salsa until I have the perfect guacamole.  I make some nachos to go with said guacamole, and I also decide that a gin and tonic is in order since the lime is already out and sliced.  I suspect that my son will come home later and wonder what has happened to those avocados.  Who ate those avocados, he will say to himself.

Alas, I do it.  I eat the avocados in a marvelous guacamole with some killer nachos.

Guilty as charged.  I did it (ate the avocados) and I didn't do it (my homework).  As I stare at eight nachos left on the plate along with a scoop of guac, I suppose I should feel a little bit like I'm being naughty.

Alas, I do a little tiny bit ... Oh, damnit, who am I kidding?  I don't feel the least bit guilty, naughty, nor remorseful.  Everyone is entitled to a little dip in work time and a little dip on a tortilla chip, right?

That's my defense, anyway, and I'm sticking to it.

MONSTERS AMONG US

Sometimes.
Sometimes there are monsters among us.
Sometimes we are bound by laws to keep silent.
Sometimes we protect "innocents" who are anything but.
Sometimes in our zeal to uphold the rights of minors, we become complicit in their crimes.
Sometimes a rotten apple really can be spotted from an early stage of degradation.
Sometimes we are frightened by soulless people around us, and
Sometimes those soulless monsters among us are mistaken for children.

Sometimes my heart is so heavy that if my feet didn't stop it,
Sometimes my heart would slip away beneath me from its own sadness.
Sometimes a jury gets it right.
Sometimes a light shines in the darkness.
Sometimes greater good follows unbearable horror, and
Sometimes heavenly hope follows hellish sorrow.
Sometimes words are not enough to heal, but they're all we have.
Sometimes there are monsters among us.
Sometimes.