Bad day, no biscuit
Warning - whining ahead.
1) This morning it was snowing. In April. I had to wear my winter coat, hat, and gloves. In April.
2) I knew it was going to be the first of several very long days, since I have to sub for someone who is out.
3) I am a course coordinator. Elementary and Intermediate language courses at my university have the same syllabi and exams. The instructors know that they cannot change said syllabi or exams. So what did I discover upon arriving to work? One of my instructors had changed the content of the exam she was giving a week after the rest of us had given our exams because she hadn't gotten around to teaching the required material on the syllabus. When confronted (politely - this is me, after all), she said she didn't think it was that big a deal. I finally get *headdesk*.
4) Today was imperfect subjunctive day in class. It was disturbing that my students' heads exploded.
5) Because I was busy trying to put out departmental fires, I did not have the time I'd planned on to grade quizzes. Students with exploded heads do not like it when their teacher does not have the graded quizzes she'd promised.
6) I had, however, graded their compositions. But when I went to hand those back, I realized they were in a different folder. Graded quiz and/or examless-students with exploded heads really don't like not getting their compositions back.
7) To distract myself, I decided to go read my yahoo groups. Oh, look. The Marcon schedule is up. That should be fun. Then I realized that I wasn't on it. I'd been disqualified as a panelist! (As it turns out, they hadn't scheduled the literary track yet. I still don't know if I'll be allowed to be a panelist or not, but at least I haven't yet been automatically disqualified.)
8) Remember when I said that I would be subbing this week? These are evening classes. Classes at this university are locked with individualized key cards to prevent students from entering unless permitted by the university security guard-um-I mean professors. Tonight's class wasn't a problem because I teach in that classroom, so my keycard lets me in. Tomorrow's class is a bit trickier, since I don't have access to that classroom. Normally, I'd go to the main office and ask to borrow the master keycard; however, the office closes at 5:00. So I went to the secretary to explain my predicament. "She should give you her keycard." "She can't. She's in the hospital." "Well, she should have made arrangements to get her keycard to you before she went to the hospital." "It was emergency hospitalization. She wasn't planning on it." "This is the problem with you teachers who want to sub in the evening after the office closes." I remained polite. "You can show up and hope the previous teacher forgets to shut the door." I thanked her and went to go for a much needed walk. (Later, she did offer to lend me her master keycard for tomorrow, so it should work out.)
9) I just noticed a scary looking bug on my curtain. Probably trying to get away from the snow. In April.
10) When I could finally leave after 8:00 p.m., I had to brush the snow off my car. Then I needed to scrape the ice off my car. In April.
11) I knew that as tired as I was, I wouldn't cook myself a decent meal, so I decided to stop by the new sub place on my way home. I ordered a grilled vegetarian sub, hand-cut french fries, and lemonade. As I was waiting for my order, I noticed that the french fries were fried in 100% peanut oil. I canceled my order of fries.
12) When I got home, I spilled the lemonade on me while entering my building.
13) I got inside, and noticed that I had a phone message. Was a friend calling me? Maybe my day would get better. It turned out to be from my insurance company, who needed my address since their mail to me was being returned. Ironically, I received my new insurance cards from them in the mail that very day, but I didn't realize that at the time because I had forgotten to check my mail when I got home.
14) I remembered that I had forgotten to get my mail so I went back out to fetch it. Along with my new proof of insurance cards, I received an official looking letter from Bank of America. That's right. My rates are going up- from 7 to 16% (variable.) I had never been in debt before cancer, when I was unemployed and started dumping my medical bills onto my credit card, since I couldn't pay any other way. I was so proud last month when I finally got my debt down to four digits. As it it, I spend half my monthly salary to pay down debt, and live on the other half.
15) It's supposed to snow three inches tomorrow. In April.
16) I just noticed that I stayed up past my bedtime to write this post.
1) This morning it was snowing. In April. I had to wear my winter coat, hat, and gloves. In April.
2) I knew it was going to be the first of several very long days, since I have to sub for someone who is out.
3) I am a course coordinator. Elementary and Intermediate language courses at my university have the same syllabi and exams. The instructors know that they cannot change said syllabi or exams. So what did I discover upon arriving to work? One of my instructors had changed the content of the exam she was giving a week after the rest of us had given our exams because she hadn't gotten around to teaching the required material on the syllabus. When confronted (politely - this is me, after all), she said she didn't think it was that big a deal. I finally get *headdesk*.
4) Today was imperfect subjunctive day in class. It was disturbing that my students' heads exploded.
5) Because I was busy trying to put out departmental fires, I did not have the time I'd planned on to grade quizzes. Students with exploded heads do not like it when their teacher does not have the graded quizzes she'd promised.
6) I had, however, graded their compositions. But when I went to hand those back, I realized they were in a different folder. Graded quiz and/or examless-students with exploded heads really don't like not getting their compositions back.
7) To distract myself, I decided to go read my yahoo groups. Oh, look. The Marcon schedule is up. That should be fun. Then I realized that I wasn't on it. I'd been disqualified as a panelist! (As it turns out, they hadn't scheduled the literary track yet. I still don't know if I'll be allowed to be a panelist or not, but at least I haven't yet been automatically disqualified.)
8) Remember when I said that I would be subbing this week? These are evening classes. Classes at this university are locked with individualized key cards to prevent students from entering unless permitted by the university security guard-um-I mean professors. Tonight's class wasn't a problem because I teach in that classroom, so my keycard lets me in. Tomorrow's class is a bit trickier, since I don't have access to that classroom. Normally, I'd go to the main office and ask to borrow the master keycard; however, the office closes at 5:00. So I went to the secretary to explain my predicament. "She should give you her keycard." "She can't. She's in the hospital." "Well, she should have made arrangements to get her keycard to you before she went to the hospital." "It was emergency hospitalization. She wasn't planning on it." "This is the problem with you teachers who want to sub in the evening after the office closes." I remained polite. "You can show up and hope the previous teacher forgets to shut the door." I thanked her and went to go for a much needed walk. (Later, she did offer to lend me her master keycard for tomorrow, so it should work out.)
9) I just noticed a scary looking bug on my curtain. Probably trying to get away from the snow. In April.
10) When I could finally leave after 8:00 p.m., I had to brush the snow off my car. Then I needed to scrape the ice off my car. In April.
11) I knew that as tired as I was, I wouldn't cook myself a decent meal, so I decided to stop by the new sub place on my way home. I ordered a grilled vegetarian sub, hand-cut french fries, and lemonade. As I was waiting for my order, I noticed that the french fries were fried in 100% peanut oil. I canceled my order of fries.
12) When I got home, I spilled the lemonade on me while entering my building.
13) I got inside, and noticed that I had a phone message. Was a friend calling me? Maybe my day would get better. It turned out to be from my insurance company, who needed my address since their mail to me was being returned. Ironically, I received my new insurance cards from them in the mail that very day, but I didn't realize that at the time because I had forgotten to check my mail when I got home.
14) I remembered that I had forgotten to get my mail so I went back out to fetch it. Along with my new proof of insurance cards, I received an official looking letter from Bank of America. That's right. My rates are going up- from 7 to 16% (variable.) I had never been in debt before cancer, when I was unemployed and started dumping my medical bills onto my credit card, since I couldn't pay any other way. I was so proud last month when I finally got my debt down to four digits. As it it, I spend half my monthly salary to pay down debt, and live on the other half.
15) It's supposed to snow three inches tomorrow. In April.
16) I just noticed that I stayed up past my bedtime to write this post.