Here I Am Again

I'm back, writing at school. My days are very busy lately, for the most part, which is good, but sometimes I just need to dump a thought out of my head when I get it, so I have to start with the typing. Also, I tend to take a sort of semi-break during first lunch (when the SCM is off lunching), which is to say I am at my desk and available to kids and monitoring what they're doing, but I take a bit of time to read the news, answer email, and so forth. Every teacher is entitled to one full-period break a day (the "planning" period), but I have rarely taken that (although I did last year.) So that's what I'm doing.

Busy day. The computer network went down -- again, two days in a row -- and our first class came in before it was fixed, so we did things the old fashioned way. I was actually going to send them to the books first anyway, since we have a lot of book material on their topic (inventions and the Industrial Revolution), but this way, they couldn't even be tempted to go online. The only thing was that I had to be the living library catalog, since they couldn't look books up; they had to ask me for a topic and I took them to the shelves. They're coming back tomorrow for the electronic stuff, but really, I think they've already got all they need.

The computers came back, but I could not persuade the new health teacher to abandon his planned webquest with his class and go for the books. We have a tremendous amount of book stuff on drugs because so much of that information online is blocked by the filtering software. And then we got in a nice, big book shipment today (so this is Christmas for me), and even more nice new drug books. I'll have to get a list out to the health teachers in the next couple of days.

The saga of the Nintendo thingy appears to be over. The secretary at the elementary school called me this morning and said that the owner has been identified. I hope they really checked this out, because I would feel bad if the true owner isn't the one who's getting it. Anyway, I'll drop it off after school, which is before that school lets out, so s/he should get it back today.

In the meantime, I'm contemplating going to a yoga class tonight. I'm at the point where I need to renew my gym membership, change it to a different level, or cancel it. I haven't gone in months; I never went once all summer. But I checked their class schedule online, and it turns out they're finally offering the yoga class I always wanted at night. So maybe I'll go. And I made an appointment for a massage tomorrow, because everything I've got hurts. And then I guess I'll see. My membership should be up right around now, but it was extended because I put it on hold last year when I broke my leg, which I think is just about a year ago this weekend. (At the gym. Now I'm going back?) My membership officially expires December 1.

So now it's lunchtime, and Media Girl has scrounged up this adorable small bullhorn for me, which is parked under my desk and which I plan to use judiciously to control the insane mob of noisy freshmen who come in here every day. Except ... there's no one here. Huh? There's one quiet girl at a computer. Is it too early? I don't know, it always seems to me that there's a throng here ten minutes into the lunch period. Either way, this bullhorn is now mine, all mine; I'm going to lock it up in my desk and not even let it go back into the media store room. I may take a picture of it to share with you all. I may name it.

I have one more class this afternoon, which is the second day of a class I had in here yesterday of extremely low-functioning freshmen, six of them, with a teacher and an aide. Today we're looking for articles in magazines. They are sweet, but I'm willing to bet that at least one of them does not know what a magazine is.

And now the thundering horde begins to appear. Better get ready.

WATCHING SPONGEBOB SQUAREPANTS :: ENTRY #1607