Wednesday, January 18, 2012

A Game Of Digits

I am SO cold. Winter is here now. I am planning, in the future, to be more careful about what I wish for. This morning, the temperature in Hillmomba was 9 degrees. That's single digits, for all of you who are not mathematically inclined.

And speaking of digits...a student was absent today. Not that it's remarkable in itself. But the kids are always haranguing this dude for so many absences. Well, they would be, if they knew the meaning of haranguing. But they give him a hard time. "How can you miss so much school without being in trouble? I don't get it. I missed way less than you, and I can't miss another day or I get kicked out. You went home early yesterday. Why do they let you leave?" And on and on it goes. They turned to me. "How many hours HAS he missed?"

"I can't tell you anything about another student's attendance. But I'm having trouble remembering how many hours he's been gone. I ran out of fingers to count on. And toes. And fingers and toes on all of my other students.

Which may be a slight exaggeration. Or not.

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