Yesterday was: the last straw...

At 2pm yesterday [25 minutes before dismissal], I walked calmly [amazingly enough, considering what was going on] to the phone in the classroom and called the librarian next door [the phone list next to the phone DIDN'T LIST THE # FOR THE MAIN OFFICE!] and said, "Um, I've lost control and I'm about to walk out. Could you come over here while I go to the office?"

The day started out alright - well, there were scarce patches of sunlight. I got to school early in the morning in order to get everything in place to facilitate the flow of the day, and I had decided that we would go "back to basics". Out on the playground where the students lined up in the morning I said [to apparently deaf ears], "We're going to walk inside and I expect you guys to stay in line and not talk. If you can't stay quiet, or stay in line, we'll come back out and try it again." Well, we got 1/3 of the way to the classroom and I had to say, "Ok, we're going back outside to do this again because you folks are talking and not staying in line like I asked." Really, this is what you are supposed to do with a new class, and it's what I took to heart on Day 4 of my Solo Week. [Which, ahem, I still need to post about...] I probably should've realized, though, that I'm not their regular teacher. I'm just a sub who should just make it through the day and leave. But, that wasn't me. [Oh, the lessons I'm learning...] We walked back outside and there I saw one of the kids, with her father, waiting outside one of the doors to the room that leads to a smaller playground. What this means is that I needed to get the kids into the room so that I could let this guy and his daugher in the room. I had the other kids line up outside again, but they just weren't having it. I, literally, had to grab each kid, tell them to stop talking, and position them so that they were in line and facing forward. Of course, the second I moved on to a new kid, the kid that I just repositioned started talking and getting out of line again. Fruitless. [Actually, it felt like I was one of those entertainers who spins plates on bendy sticks - the WHOLE DAY I felt like I was running from plate to plate, trying to keep everything from going to hell.] Honestly, though, if I had just taken over this class for the remainder of the year and not just for 3 days [well, TWO days...], we would've stood outside ALL DAY until they got it right. But, as it was, I didn't want to piss off a parent, so we went inside, SOMEWHAT in a line, and SOMEWHAT without chatter.

There was a list written down of all that we were going to do that day, and I thought that since kids like routine [it helps them, and me, feel safe] I would lay the day out for them. No one was listening. Ok, next tactic. I noticed on Wednesday that there was a TV and VCR in the room, so when I got to school yesterday morning I made sure that they both worked, testing them out with my VHS copy of The Rescuers [I remember going to see it in my pajamas, at the drive-in, with my family]. "Ok, yesterday wasn't so great," I began. "But, I KNOW that you guys can do a whole lot better today. AND, if we can get a double dose of Math done this afternoon, I'll let you watch a movie tomorrow after lunch." I had their attention, but one boy [who, ALL DAY yesterday I SWORE was a girl...] immediately shot back, "I don't want to watch a movie!" I walked up to him, got in his face, and said, "Well, then you can sit in the office while we are having fun watching a movie and eating popcorn!" I wrote "MOVIE" on the chalkboard, and put 5 tally marks next to the word. "For everything I notice that you guys are doing well, I'll add a tally mark. But everytime I think you guys aren't paying attention, or are misbehaving, I'll take a mark away. If, after lunch tomorrow, there are still marks next to the word 'MOVIE', we'll watch one." I WAS SO TRYING.

We moved to the TINY carpetted area of the room, where each kid was supposed to sit on their name written on tape on the rug. Naturally, since I didn't really know their names, I assume that no one was sitting in their proper places. And, what kind of moron sits the "bad" kids in back [I knew some of the names of the worst kids... it's always that way...], right next to the large bucket, and 3 shelves, full of building blocks?? There was SO much about the physical classroom setup that made no sense to me. Like, why would you give each student their own skinny, tall, TOP-HEAVY cup full of pencils and markers? First of all, you should have one container in the middle of each table to encourage teamwork and sharing. Second, why SKINNY, TALL, TOP-HEAVY cups that tip over and spill the contents across the table at the slightest hint of a slight breeze?!? Teacher, teacher, what are you THINKING?? Sure enough, one would tip over, contents strewn across the table and floor, one kid would laugh, and then half-a-dozen other cups across the room would mysteriously fall over. UGH. Spinning plates. Oh, and why give each student a small, reusable water bottle that they keep in the middle of their table and then make it abundantly clear in the lesson plans that "Students should only get water after recess and after lunch"??!!? After Wednesday, I got wise and put all of the water bottles up out of reach of the kids, bringing them down only after recess, and after lunch. But, I'm off on a tangent.

The morning rug routine [calendar, etc.] sucked - no one was listening. I moved into the Language Arts portion of the morning. The program they were using was the same one we used in my student teaching classroom, so I knew that they spent a lot of time segmenting words into their individual sounds. I pulled out of my hat a fun song that I got out of a book that Miles had [which he got me a copy of for Christmas]. I said to the kids, "So, who knows the song The Wheels on the Bus?" Immediately, everyone started singing the first verse - they were given a tally mark for the MOVIE for this. "Well, my song is to the same tune, but the words are a bit different," I said, and then launched into the variation. The kids were SILENT -

The sounds in the word go /k/ /a/ /t/
/k/ /a/ /t/
/k/ /a/ /t/
The sounds in the word go /k/ /a/ /t/
Can you tell me the word?

They really did like it, so I did it 7 or 8 times - hey, I was going to run with ANYTHING that got their attention. After that, I had some word cards, and I passed them out and had the kids stand up, in a line, to form sentences with the words. The first time we did it it went over really well, but, the second and third times some kids started yelling out where the kids up front should stand, and then actually tried to physically move each other around - i.e. SHOVE each other around. It started to get out of hand, so I moved on to the Read Aloud for the day - a "story" called Who Lives on a Farm?. I asked if any of the kids had ever been to a farm, and was surprised to see a number of raised hands. I know how much I don't get out of the city, and I am an able-bodied adult, so I didn't think that any of these kids would really have weekend trips out into the country. But, maybe their pre-school programs took them on a field trip or two because a couple of kids said that they had not only been to a farm, but had also milked a cow [well, one kid said it, and then a number of kids then played copycat and said, "Oh, yeah! Me too!"]. The story was quite innane [Who lives on a farm? Sheep live in the meadow on the farm. Baa baa baa.], and not very long, and I was happy to see that it was time to go out for morning recess.

It was cold outside, and it rained a bit for a few minutes, but there was NO WAY I was going to make these kids go back inside early. Actually, I should've let them play outside for an extra 15 minutes or so over the half hour the lesson plans alloted. One little guy [who has MAJOR anger management issues...] took off his jacket and told me that I should put it on because I looked cold. SWEET, eh? Well, this was the same kid who, just half an hour earlier REFUSED to do what I asked. While we were on the rug he said he was cold and asked to go get his jacket. I said he could. His jacket was 20 sizes too large, so the sleeves dangled a foot and a half past his hands. On the rug, he kept swinging his arms around so that the limp sleeves would slap against the kids around him. I walked over to him and said, "Ok, put the coat back in your cubbie. You aren't showing me that you can wear it without disturbing others." Of course, because it was the day from hell with the class from hell, he refused. So, I said, "I'm not joking around. You go put your coat away... NOW!" He refused. This is the kind of situation that I've dealt with a number of times, and I know that the right thing to do is to MAKE them do what you are asking so that they understand that you are really in charge, and, that is always my intention. BUT, there have been a couple of times where the kid just shuts down, and, aside from picking the kid up and physically forcing him/her to do what you want, there is really nothing to do except walk away, sure that every kid in the room is thinking, "I knew we could get away with whatever we wanted." You know, all day I wanted to send kids down to the office, or to the 3rd grade classroom where their regular teacher was, but there was no way that I could leave the room, and I wasn't going to trust any of those kids to find their own way to another part of the school. Just my luck, one of them would've wandered the halls all day, or, worse, left school grounds.

Out on the playground it was an endless parade of kids come up to me with tears in their eyes either saying that someone hit them, or that so-and-so wouldn't let them play with him/her. And, over and over I kept saying to kids, "Don't hit each other! That is one of the worst things you can do. If someone is bothering you, just walk away from them. Don't play with them! If someone hits you, instead of hitting them back, come and tell me." Did any of it sink in??

After recess, things started to get out of hand, and the kids quickly lost most of their "MOVIE" tally marks. Naturally, I wanted them to end up with at least ONE mark so that they could watch a movie on Friday, but BOY were they making it hard for me to not take away ALL of the tic marks. When it came time for lunch, I called kids on the rug who were sitting quietly to go line up. The "line" became a jumbled mess of kids pushing and crowding each other for the best postions. "It doesn't matter where you are in line! You're ALL going to get to eat!" No one listening. "ALRIGHT! EVERYONE SIT DOWN IN THEIR SEATS! IF YOU WANT TO GO TO LUNCH, I NEED IT TO BE SILENT IN HERE!" Still some talking going on. "APPARENTLY YOU GUYS DON'T WANT TO EAT! I'M WAITING FOR EVERYONE TO BE QUIET!" I noticed some kids eating out of little bags of chips so I walked over to them and said, "Oh, no! You will NOT eat that in here. Put it away - NOW." Time was wasting, and I was hungry and really needed some time away from these kids, so we eventually made it out into the hall... and... they were kind of quiet and staying in line. "You guys! This is great how you are so quiet! Keep it up, you're doing a great job!" Not for long...

I came back to the room [after eating my lunch] a few minutes before I had to go pick them up, and saw that the kids were all in the library next door drawing - apparently it was raining outside. Stupid rain. I went in there and said, "Ok, it's time to clean up. Put away the crayons so we can go back to the room." Many kids kept drawing. "Stop drawing! We're done here!" Still more drawing going on so I had to start prying crayons out of kids hands. Why wouldn't they listen to me? A couple of kids actually said, "We didn't get to go outside. When are we going to have recess?" Um, you just had it, kiddo...

When we got back into the room, the kids just couldn't get settled. One table was ready to start doing some Math, but the other 3 were loud and not listening to me at all. I looked over at one girl and saw that she had a green apple sucker that she was smacking on. I took it out of her hand and threw it into the trash - I was starting to boil.

I passed out the Math books, and started the lesson even though 75% of the kids weren't paying attention to me at all. But, I thought, You know what? I'm going to just plow through this whether anyone is paying attention or not. "Ok, so let's talk about the PARTS OF A CALENDAR. Who can tell me one thing that a calendar can tell us?" A couple of hands went up, and both said "numbers". "Ok, let's look at this calendar over here..." I went over the parts, and then started on the Math book page that everyone had to work on. "You have a calendar on the page in front of you. Circle the word 'April'." Four or five kids did as I asked, while those who hadn't been listening kind of "came to" and realized that we were doing something so they looked over and copied off of their neighbors paper. "Next, color all of the Sundays blue." Many kids just colored in the word "Sunday" blue, while others colored in only the first Sunday of the month - some of them even used RED. [Oh, and I should say that this WHOLE TIME, there was a constant loud chattering going on in the room. They just weren't listening to me, no matter how many times I said, "You guys are WAY too loud", or, "I appreciate that so-and-so is listening attentively and raising their hand". I even asked a kid, "How do you feel when you answer a question and no one is listening to you?" "Sad." "Hey, guys! Did you hear that!?! One of your fellow students just said that it makes him SAD when you DON'T LISTEN TO WHAT HE HAS TO SAY." Deaf, deaf ears...] Some of the loudest kids started coming up to me asking, "Is this right?", so I made a general announcement: "I'm getting a lot of questions about stuff that we JUST TALKED ABOUT! You guys are getting the wrong answers because YOU AREN'T LISTENING! You could all have the right answers if you would PAY ATTENTION."

Then, at 2pm, the constant chatter in the room suddenly got louder and LOUDER until a number of students were actually SCREAMING AT THE TOP OF THEIR LUNGS. Others joined in until pretty much everyone was wailing. Honestly. I'm not joking. All that I could do was pace around the room, shaking my head in disbelief. Three or four of the girls started crying because either their ears were hurting, or, I imagine, the yelling reminded them of something that they didn't want to remember. "FOLKS! SOME OF YOUR CLASSMATES ARE CRYING BECAUSE YOU ARE SCREAMING! FOR SOME PEOPLE, SCREAMING IS SOMETHING THAT MAKES THEM UPSET! YOU REALLY NEED TO STOP!" I got no response, so this is when I calmly walked over to the phone and called the librarian next door. My gut told me that I should just pass out some paper and crayons and let them color - that this would probably shut them up - but, I really didn't feel like REWARDING THEIR SHITTY BEHAVIOR BY LETTING THEM DO SOMETHING THAT THEY ENJOYED. This was thought process of the "teacher" in me, and I guess I should've just been the "substitute" that I was and passed out the freakin' paper. After all, when the librarian came in she grabbed a bunch of blank paper and had them draw. Uh-huh. As she got them to calm a bit, I started to clean up the room and pack up my stuff.

The instant that the last kid left the room, I went to the office and said, "I am SO sorry to tell you this, but I'm not going to be coming back tomorrow. Honestly, I feel REALLY bad. I'm SO not a quitter, and I had committed myself to being here for 3 days, but, I'm wiped out. I can't take it anymore. I'm done here." I was paralyzed with fear that this would somehow come back to bite me in the butt when I was trying to get more sub jobs, or, worse, a full-time teaching position. You know what the secretary said? "Oh, I don't blame you AT ALL. This school is horrible. In fact, this school is the model of how to make kids uneducable. And, the parents don't seem to care at all." WHOA... and UGH. Then, she gave me a chocolate bar that she had just purchased from some student that was selling them. "You need this more than I do. And, you deserve it for what you were put through..."

On the way home from school, I decided to stop into Bryant to see Miles. I walked into his room and said, "I just had a really shitty day and I need you to reassure me that I'm a good teacher and a good person." I told him everything and he said, "Well, yeah. Why did you pick that school in the first place? You knew what part of town it was in." Well, that was WHY I decided to take the assignment. These kids that are living in the neighborhood that is home to 75% of the homicides in the city need teachers that CARE and that will tell them that they are special and can be whatever they want to be. They need teachers that help foster a sense of community in class - a community that is a 100% safe environment where they can take risks without fear. Maybe I'm just not the person that can do that for them right now.

Today was: Oh, who cares? SUBBING SUCKS

Really, I HATE IT. IT BLOWS. The worst thing is that it REALLY makes me not want to be a teacher anymore. I have the Credential to show that I can be more than just a babysitter, but when kids won't listen AT ALL, and we can't get anything done during the day, then I feel like I have COMPLETELY FAILED. So far, NONE of my subbing experiences have been positive ones, but, rather, stress-filled hours of me barking at kids to sit down, shut up, and listen to eachother. Today was the longest 5 hours in recent memory - kids yelling, kids crying, kids not listening to a damn thing that I said. It's frustrating. It's upsetting. I hate it. Before I started the credential program here I thought, "I really don't think that I want to teach in the city." But, the experiences that I had in the program at a couple of schools in the city made me think that it wasn't as bad as I may have thought. Well, seeing the rundown, cold, uninviting schools that I've seen the past few weeks has somewhat made me think against the city again. I think that city kids are just forced to grow up WAY too fast, and have to deal with WAY too much horrible crap at an early age. The most upsetting thing that I've seen [and I've seen it everywhere that I've been] is how the kids treat each other. I've actually said to most of the classes, "Ok, it's one thing if you don't listen to me or show me any respect, but it's another if you don't listen to and respect each other. You are all teachers, and you have so much to learn from each other." Who knows, though, how many kids could actually hear my speech over the screaming and punching of their peers. I was in a Kindergarten today [where I will be tomorrow and Friday] and some of the girls were talking to [i.e. arguing with] each other like they were 30 year old women. "Shut up, you punk ass bitch, or I'll smash in your face." Nice, huh?

Oh, so I was under the impression that I was going to be in a Second Grade for these three days, but, when I got to the school this morning the secretary said, "Oh, no, it's a Third Grade. Yeah, the regular teacher was a crazy bitch [Yes, she used those words!] and left. Apparently she repeatedly called a couple of the students 'whores'..." Well, what ended up happening is the Kindergarten teacher took over the Third Grade class, and I was put in the Kindergarten. I guess the regular K teacher is PERMANTLY taking over the Third Grade, and they got a longterm sub for the K room, but she is on vacation right now. Lucky me.

To make the day even WORSE, I didn't get to eat most of my lunch today. I wolfed my sandwich down while looking over what we were going to be doing for Math time, and then started to go up to the Teacher's Lounge to get my macaroni & cheese, hard-boiled egg, and applesauce, when the school counselor brought the whole class into the room. Apparently they were so awful in the lunchroom that they didn't get to have recess, and, instead, were forced to sit in the room in their seats with their heads down on the table [which few of them did]. AARGGH! I was supposed to get dinner and a drink with my older brother's best friend [who's in town for a couple of days] tonight, but, when he called I mentioned that I was way to tired. Yeah, I should've gone anyway - if for no other reason than to force myself not to mull over the day - but, I've also got some planning to do for tomorrow. I brought home the Language Arts and Math books so that I can be better prepared for what we have to get done tomorrow. Showing that you are in control by knowing exactly what is going on academically is ONE way to gain some control in the room. If the kids sense that you don't know what you are supposed to be doing, it's a scent of blood in a pool of sharks.

Yes, yesterday was my first official sub job, but it didn't really count because I didn't really have to do anything all day. In the morning, before school, I asked the new student teacher if she wanted me disappear into the woodwork [so that I wouldn't overshadow her Solo Day - those kids LOVE ME!]. She told me that she actually wanted me to chime in whenever I saw anyone getting out of hand... and I kind of did that. Well, I was just torn - it was her Solo Day, and I really wanted her to get the full experience, so for most of the morning, I just kind of sat back and watched to see if she could handle everything on her own. There were a few times in the afternoon, though, where I had to step in. All in all, though, as expected, I just hung out with the kids and collected a paycheck. Naturally, the girl with autism was all over me anytime we were on the rug. At one point, she was pointing to my lips and then to her forehead when the Speech and Language therapist showed up to work with her. The therapist said to me, "Can I borrow your girlfriend for awhile?" SO, THE CRAZIEST THING is that the therapist came to get the girl with autism because there was a tape that she wanted to play for her. Last time I was in Miles' class [last Wednesday], the Speech & Language therapist came running up to me with a cassette tape in her hand. "Do you know what this is?" she asked. "This is a tape of [the girl with autism] SPEAKING!!" Now, I'm not sure if I've been clear enough on this point, but, the girl with autism HASN'T SPOKEN A SINGLE WORD in school. Not one syllable. She giggles from time to time, but has never uttered a lick of speech. I immediately said to the therapist, "I don't think that I want to hear it. It's just kind of weird. I mean, we've gone so long without hearing her voice that I'm not sure that I ever want to know what it sounds like - it would break the mystique." And I'm serious. It's a great unanswered question that I don't really want to have the answer to. Did I mention here that I had dreams last Fall that she would speak to me? And did I mention in these digital pages that I had a romantic notion that on my last day in Miles' class, before Christmas, the girl with autism would walk out of the room, then turn around and say, "Goodbye, Eric"?

Today was: Kind of hellacious

Today was quite crappy. I gotta tell you, I SO didn't think that I would be called this much for sub jobs so soon. I mean, their little automated phone system is calling us every evening [when the phone rings around 5:30pm, I know who it is] to offer me at least one job. I already have a 2 day assignment in a 3rd grade class at a school around the corner set up for Thursday and Friday next week. I'm going on a field trip with Miles' class tomorrow, so I had to call the sub system and tell them to STOP CALLING ME about jobs tomorrow. After the day I had today, I'd be LIVID if I got a call at 6am tomorrow morning.

So, I had to be out of the house at 6:45am this morning to make it to a school across town by 7:15am. Of course, I was WAY late - I rolled in there, SWEATY and flustered at 7:35am, ready to tackle a whole new Kindergarten class. Well, someone, EVERYONE, neglected to tell me that I was going to be subbing in a K/1/2 SPECIAL ED CLASSROOM. How do you not tell someone that they will be subbing in a SPECIAL ED CLASS?!? I got the key to the room from the office, went up to the room, and found NO LESSON PLANS. Ok, so now I've got to spend a day ON THE FLY in a SPECIAL ED class? How do I get out of this? Well, the regular classroom teacher came in the room just as I really started to panic and handed me what she called "lesson plans". I'm telling you, these were the sorriest excuse for Sub lesson plans that I have ever seen. ONE PAGE with some times down the left side, and single words like "LUNCH", "REST-TIME", and "COMPUTERS" down the other side. No mention of a discipline system, no mention of where the computer lab was, no mention of where I pick the kids up from, where I take them at the end of the day, where the lunchroom is, where the Teacher's Lounge or bathroom was located, etc. For Math she wrote, "Have the students do pages 55-65 in their mathbooks." What mathbooks?? Well, ok, I found some mathbooks, but it looks like there are at least 3 different mathbooks because you have students from grades K, 1, and 2, and not everyone is necessarily on pages 55-65. THANKFULLY, I saw on the SINGLE SHEET OF PAPER: "12:30 - 1:30 Charlie Brown VIDEO". Now, I watch TV more than anyone I know, but I think parking kids in front of the tube as a means of babysitting is HORRIBLE. [We were victims of the whole Echostar vs. Viacom debacle this week. The CEO of DishNetwork had a call-in show on the darkened CBS station and someone called to complain that since they weren't getting Nickelodeon they didn't know what they're kids were going to do. Um, how about you READ SOME BOOKS WITH YOUR CHILDREN! Or, I don't know, go out and take a walk with your kids! Play a board game! Go to a museum, the library, take a pottery class together, etc.!] That being said, though, I was SO RELIEVED to know that there would be at least one hour where the kids could just be parked somewhere and I wouldn't have to come up with something to do with them.

So, yeah, it was a SPECIAL ED class. 13 kids - 3 girls, 10 [TEN!] boys. It wasn't really a hardcore SPECIAL ED class, but, rather, a class of kids with, probably, mild to moderate learning disabilities. Sure, there were 2 or 3 students that you could look at and see that there was some genetic reason that they were there, but, it seemed like most of the kids were just the ones that the regular ed teachers just didn't know how to deal with. A sweet group of kids [on the whole], but there were defintely a couple of absolute hellions. One in particular, let's call him "Nate", was a real handful. I mean, this kid was a TERROR who could not sit still for more than 30 seconds. Plus, he VIOLENTLY hit, slapped, kicked and pinched other kids. He didn't listen to directions at all, either. His name was, by far, the most spoken throughout the day - and, as is usually the case, he's only one of 2 or 3 kids whose names I actually had a chance to learn. I'm not sure what sort of learning disabilites he had in order to get placed in special ed, besides, like I said, some teacher probably just couldn't handle him [WHO COULD??] so s/he dumped him in this class. I tried, wherever I could, to praise the little guy whenever he did the SLIGHTEST bit of good in the day, figuring that he must have MAJOR issues at home for his behavior to be this extreme. And, it was so sweet, when everyone was sitting quietly [the only quiet time of the day - I'm telling you, kids can really become zombies when put in front of the tube] watching the Charlie Brown movie, I looked over at Nate and he was smiling at me. Yeah, ok, it could've been a devilish, devious smile, but it seemed sincere. When he wasn't riffling through the teachers desk, running with big scissors, walking out of the room, screaming at the top of his lungs, or getting in an altercation with one of his peers, he hung on me and wanted to hang out with me. The kid CLEARLY just needs some attention...

I was supposed to read them a story called Farm Friends Clean Up. I read the first page and the phone rang - it was the office telling me that I'm supposed to take the kids down to a trailer in the schoolyard for a hearing screening. HUH!? Another thing that the skimpy, lousy, sucky sub "lesson plans" didn't mention. So, I round up the kids [Ok, at this point I should probably mention that there were 2 paraprofessionals in the class with me. They both kind of came and went, but were, for the most part, quite helpful, and I couldn't have made it through the day without them...], we walk downstairs to the yard, and I find out that another class had just jumped in front of us [because we were late - because no one told me about the screenings ahead of time]. We had to stand against a wall [well, actually, only a couple of the kids actually stood against the wall quietly the whole time - the rest were running around screaming and fighting with each other] for 20 minutes waiting for the other class to do their screenings. To add insult to injury, the hearing screening woman handed me a list which showed that only 5 of the 13 kids needed to be screened. Yeah, one of the paras could've just taken those 5 down and saved us all the headache.

At the end of the day, I saw the teacher in the office as I was leaving. "Be sure and leave us your request number if you want to come back!" she said. Yeah, right. For a couple of hours after leaving, I wasn't sure that I wanted to sub ANYWHERE ever again. I think I've convinced myself, though, that it was good that I had that experience today because if I can make it through that, I can probably handle any other classroom that is thrown my way. Hopefully, it's all about coasting from here until the end of the school year [sure... uh-huh...].

I am officially an official SUBSTITUTE TEACHER for San Francisco Unified School District!! Whoo hoo!

AND, my first job is Wednesday... subbing for MILES! He has another Student Teacher this semester [more on that later...], and it is going to be one of her Solo Days. SO, I can just sit back, let her teach, and pick up the paycheck. Not bad for my inaugural subbing experience [actually, I subbed back in Indiana a bunch of years ago...].

It is SO great that I got on the sub list - it is closed and they aren't accepting applications [plus, my unemployment just ran out last week...], but the Principal at Bryant wrote a letter specifically requesting that myself and some others get special permission so that we could sub at Bryant. It paid off, and it means that I have a toe in the door with SFUSD toward getting a full-time teaching job this coming Fall. No word on the whole "Miles-is-leaving-for-a-year-so-I-might-get-his-classroom" situation. He told me today that he got officially accepted at Stanford for next year, but didn't mention my taking his spot at Bryant for a year. I guess I need to step up and bring it up. I just get the impression from him, though, that it isn't really a probability anymore. It's just my perception, however, and I guess I should wait until I know for sure before jumping to conclusions. Wow, watching Starting Over is paying off...

Today isn't going so well so far.

I went to bed last night with a list of things to do this morning before I ran off to State for Yoga and other class. I got up this morning a little later than planned [the doorbell woke me up, but I didn't check to see who is was - it's usually for the apartment downstairs...], hopped in the shower, and just after sudsing my head with shampoo, suddenly the water stopped. The water stopped, and didn't come back on.

I dried myself off, my head still covered in shampoo, threw on some basic clothes, and braced myself for an argument with our landlord. I looked out the front window and saw that some guy was doing something in a small hole in the street in front of our building. I marched down the stairs [my hair still slathered with shampoo] and approached a woman in an orange vest that was clearly a co-worker of the guy with his head in the street. "Um, are you responsible for my not having any water right now?" I demanded. The woman said that she was. "Well, you could've given us some advance warning. I'm sure that you are probably legally obligated to give us 24 hours notice before shutting off our water - I know that that is what landlords are supposed to do." The guy with his head in the street looked up and said, "Well, I rang all of the doorbells." "Well, like I just said, giving us half an hour notice isn't really good enough." And do you know what the woman said? Do you know what she had the nerve to say?? "Well, ringing your doorbell was a courtesy." NO, ringing my doorbell isn't a COURTESY! It's what you are OBLIGATED to do because you are screwing with my WATER!!

So, I had to sit around our apartment [although, it gave me time to do one of the other things on my list] with shampoo probably PERMANTLY SCALDING my hair before the water came back on - and, even then, it was browny-yellowy and all icky. And, I had to condition my hair TWICE because leaving the shampoo in for so long turned my hair into straw. Stupid hole-in-the-street water people!

This setback meant that I didn't have time to VOTE this morning, and I'm not sure that I'll have time later this evening.

I rush off to school - to Yoga - only to find out that Yoga has been CANCELLED because the basement where our class is was flooded and all of the mats were waterlogged. So, now I've got to sit around down here at school for 4 hours until my next class starts. This sucks.

[I know that I still haven't posted about the last couple of days of my Solo Week [back in December]. I'm working on it. Plus, I'll have to do some other kind of "quick catch up" post to let you know what's been going on these past couple of months... But, not right now. Right now I'm very hungry...