Huffing And Puffing

Did you ever have one of those days? Where it just seems like everybody's gettin' on your case? From your teacher all the way down to your best girlfriend? Oops! That was Brownsville Station. Not me. I'm not gonna get caught smokin' in the boys' room. Everybody knows that smokin' ain't allowed in school. And the boys PEE ON THE FLOOR in there!

My one of those days started this morning after three hours of sleep. I was up until 2:00 typing a practice EOC test to give my students for their final. Not that I can count the actual scores. It's stuff they have not covered yet. A mid-year pre-test, if you will. But data needs to be gathered. For later compiling, to see if students learn in my class over the course of the year, of if I am some tricked-out blob of dark matter in human form, sucking knowledge from their very noggins. I gave one first quarter, but need three more. Who knew that there are four quarters in one year?

It's a pain to compile a test for the DESE strands. Sure, I could have done it sooner. But that would mean that Mrs. Hillbilly Mom has turned in her procrastination card. I DID make a 60-question test last week for one course. But this one has been giving me fits. And you surely didn't expect me to used my weekend time for job work, did you? Weekends are for Mansion work. Chex Mix baking. Shopping. Laundry. Online gift ordering. Fudge eating. And chair napping.

So...I arrived at Newmentia with this test that was supposed to be taken 5th hour. Perfectly doable. I had 30 questions done. Correlated to the strands. All I needed were 25 more. I figured I could work on it for 40 minutes before first bell. And during the video I was showing my first class, who does not take their already-printed and copied final until tomorrow. Then I would have 50 minutes of plan time. More video time for another class that has their test tomorrow. Put the finishing touches on my answer sheet while 4th hour took their final. And BOOM! All done. Ready to go at the time I needed it.

Mrs. Hillbilly Mom plans. The denizens of Newmentia laugh. The #1 son popped in for a bottle of water. Of all the days for him to want to maintain proper hydration! I forgot that my already-copied tests had not been stapled, because that function makes Kyocera  move slower than a government worker in a public-employee standoff. So I stapled them to be ready for 4th hour. Put in my flash drive and opened my file, which, THANK THE GUMMI MARY, was NOT corrupted like it was last time I tried to open it, resulting in retyping from the lone hard copy I had printed in a fit of disaster-preparedness.

I did a short review with my class before pacifying them with a video. Got ten questions done. Patted myself on the back. Made a call to a resource room for a heads-up on the test. Agreed to bring copies at beginning of 2nd hour. Made a call to my duty-reliever and arranged payment for her service in my stead at tonight's athletic contest. Supervised the hall. Took a copy of the newly-minted answer sheet to Kyocera, only to find that traitor canoodling with another, another whose plan time is way later in the day, but insists on dashing in to monopolize the copier during my scheduled time. Started into the bathroom but was beaten by another. And another. Finally gained access to the facility, only to step out and find the door out of the teacher workroom blocked by a conversationalist conversing with my teaching buddy, Mabel, who wanted me to look up a document from October and email it to her as soon as I got back to my room. Even though my time was spoken for. And who also wanted another word for humility, like I am a walking talking thesaurus.

Back in my room, I commenced to formulating and typing, only to be visited by Mr. P, who brought a ballot for Student of the Month. I rushed through those questions. Stole five from my other test, about the scientific method. Printed the first four pages, collated, so I did not have to hike back to see if Kyocera was available. Greeted my 3rd hour at the bell. Videoed them into submission. Found an error that required me to hand-write a phrase on the test pages already printed. Stacked and stapled.

The bell rang for lunch, so I heated my sandwich, plopped it on the cafeteria table as a place holder, dropped off my SotM ballot in the office, took some ISS work down the hall to a teacher who acts as courier, paid the bounty to my reliever, and still made it back in time to sit down and enjoy the ambiance of the freshman lunch shift.

Fourth hour was interrupted by the #1 son, who came bearing gifts to himself in the form of a giant gift bag of candy. No wonder he needed more water. I barely looked up from my finish stapling. When fifth hour students entered the room, I handed out their test like it had been cooling its papery heels in my out box for weeks. That's the way a master does it.

Seventh hour, I mistakenly handed The Pony a biology test instead of his rightful physics test. A minor detail he did not notice until he ran out of questions at 52, leaving a gap in his 60-blank answer sheet. The bad news is that I had to give him another test to start all over again. The good news is that he scored a 93% on a test for which he had not received instruction, and had not read the book.

Sittin' in the classroom. Thinkin' it's a drag. Taking double tests just ain't The Pony's bag.

I hope he knows that smokin' ain't allowed in school.