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Jun 07, 2008 09:58

This has to ranks somewhere near the top of the craziest weeks of my life.  And it is all because of the last two days.

Let me count them for you:
Thursday was normal:  Wake up, rush the morning routine, out of the house at 6:30, biking like mad, teach like mad, relax for a bit, bike home.  That is where my day almost ended.  Biking home gave me not 1, not 2, but 3 brushes with being thrown from my bike onto the ground.  The first instance was on Main when some idiot decided that he'd speed up to make a quick right turn directly in front of me.  He missed me or I missed him, take your pick, by about 6 inches.  My gut reaction was brake as hard as possible which somehow caught my middle finger between the brake lever and my handle bars, causing some nice deep tissue bruising.
Event 2 happened in Alton Baker park, close by Autzen Stadium.  I generally assume that this is a nice peaceful part of my ride, but for some reason the squirrels there decided that it'd be fun to run as close to my tires as possible and try and make me crash.  Little asses.  I hated them before, but I loathe them now.
Event 3 comes from a pair of ducks, as in Alton Baker.  They tried to clip my head as I was biking by the little pond, water area in the park.  At this point I figured I might as well just paint a huge bullseye on my head, torso and wheels and go stand in the middle of the road and get it over with.

Friday.  Ah a day that should be carefree and easy, leading up to the last weekend before school's out.  But no, the school gods couldn't let me rest.
I had heard rumor for a while that a prank was to be pulled on me that somehow involved my bike.  I was told that no matter what that I needed to ride it on Friday.  Well, I'm not one to be a kill joy so I rode in on Friday.  What really amazes me about what was going to happen is that the administration of my school gave this prank their official sanction.  They helped my students pull it off!  Ah the love.

At any rate that prank didn't happen until 6th period (last for those that don't know), and before that, oh about 40 minutes I had a true crisis on my hands.  I don't remember, nor do I care to look and see if I've written about this, but about 2 months ago a former student of my high school committed suicide by placing shot gun barrel in his mouth and pulling the trigger.  A group of students (current and former) were the first on the scene, as in minutes if not seconds after it happened.  Needless to say this can and does send people into some crazy places in their minds.  A current student of mine was extremely close to this kid and came into my office yesterday to talk and completely broke down.  My unofficial, completely uneducated hypothesis is that she is suffering from PTSD.  I don't really feel like reliving the whole conversation I had with her, but suffice it to say, she's been operating in a complete and utter daze for the last 2 months.

Then the prank happened while I was teacher/proctoring my last exam before my students' final.  A couple of students barged in with dart guns trying to tag me with them, and this same group got into my office, took my bike, and:




Viola!  My bike made it onto the roof of my office.  Great.  And all in all, I'm pretty flattered that they wanted to pull this on me.  But oh, the fun of Friday didn't stop there, no sir!

After school is done, prank is pulled, bike is thankfully returned to its happy owner, I have a 2nd student come in to my office to have a break down.  This girl in the last two months has had the following happen:
a. little brother dies in hospital waiting for heart transplant
b. father blames her for kid's death cause she didn't offer up her heart for the transplant (same blood type and really WTF?!?!)
c. mother commits suicide over loss of son
d. brother gets shipped out to Iraq for second tour as a ground grunt
e. starts cutting
f. moves in with other brother, sisters move in with someone else who turns into a raging alcoholic
g. really do I need to add more?

Ugh.  I have to say that I am extremely happy that it is Saturday, that Sasquatch is on for this afternoon, that I don't have to go back to school until Monday.  I love teaching, love my students, love my school (for the most part), but man there are things that they never, never tell you about when going through the teacher training program.  I wish I could end this all smarmy and witty, but I can't.

pranks, school, death

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