Friday, March 30, 2007

I Fuckin Hate Being Right All The Time

We need to distract Americans from the dirty tricks we're pulling in order to set off a new war.

I know, let's kill some of their pets.

What do you mean?

We can put different kinds of poison into the hoppers at the one manufacturing plant that serves all of the premium brands of foods. That way we can be sure of killing the pets of important people. You know the kind of people who spend more then ten cents on their pets meals each day. Rich people. Important people.

OK so what then?

Well one lab will find one kind of poison and then another lab will find a different one. Everyone will squabble over what's gone wrong. No one will notice that we're massing our troops at the Iranian boarder.

Isn't that mean to animals.

Oh come on, it's not like we didn't kill a bunch of New Yorkers six years ago.

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Thursday, March 29, 2007

How's Work Dean?


No I don't have the kid who blinded himself with science. I do have the kid who gave him the pool cleaner and alcohol. I did not give them the idea. I have however used this as an opportunity to educate my kids that you don't do dumbfuck things and when I tell you to put on eye protection you better well do it.

Afterall, why teach your kids responsibility. Why not just be their party buddy and let the schools teach them morality, respect and how to be a good person. Just don't complain when you find out my values are different from yours. And while I'm raising your fucked up brat take away any meaningful avenue of discipline and leave me totally vulnerable to the slightest false allegation of misconduct.


Editors update: I just saw Fox25 broadcast a story about this. It turns out I had two of the kids involved in class. Every god damned day one of them comes into science class and asks "can we blow something up?" I know what I'm going to ask him tomorrow.

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When Did I Become A Screaming Drama Queen?


Barney came home yesterday. It turns out he had a bladder infection from mineral crystals in his regular food. His kidneys are fine and the vet doesn't think it's from the poisonous petfoods at this time. He's on 3 medicines twice a day for a month and has prescription catfood. We have to make sure he pees every day but so far that's not a problem.

We were giving him the best foods we could and spoiling him rotten. He was getting treats. He had a fresh litter box every time he went into it thanks to the robot claw. He had everything he ever wanted (well, except for some kitty lovin with that white cat.)

Since we weren't emptying the litter box every day we didn't really notice he wasn't tinklin properly.

So thanks to the petfood recall, we were hyper vigilant of Barney's health and mistook the early symptoms of a bladder infection for exposure to deadly poison and wisked him off to the vet weeks before we would have noticed otherwise.

He was very relieved to see us when we went to pick him up. So relieved that he forgave us for bringing him to that horrible place. He's not happy about the new food but he's eating it. I think he thinks he's being punished because we can't give him his usual treats. Cat's hate change.

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Tuesday, March 27, 2007

Premium Brand Poison

Barney is spending the night at the veterinarians office. He has crystals in his tinkle. The vet thinks we got him attention in time. We don't know how his blood tests are yet.

He probably remembers all the time he spent in the shelter and thinks we've thrown him away too now. I just want to go there and spend the night with him so he's not scared.

I want to make someone pay for this. I want to beat the crap out of whatever asshole decided to put poison into the food. I really want to smash a hammer into the kidneys of the bastards who knew about the problem but delayed the recall.

The real irony is that if we didn't feed Barney what the shelter recommended as the best food and bought him cheap crap food he wouldn't be sleeping tonight in a cage that other animals have died in.

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Saturday, March 24, 2007

Cheers

I'm taking the day off. It's after 1PM and I'm still in bed. Last night I chaperoned the sophomore semi-formal dance at the Nahant Country Club. 5 alcohol free hours but they did serve us rubbery chicken.

It occured to me that the reason why I am so comfortable teaching is that I'm in very familiar surroundings. I teach science in a typical science classroom. There is a big long lecture bench along the edge of the room. There are tables in the middle of the room. I stand on one side of the bench which is surrounded by people trying to get my attention. It's exactly like bartending. It's probably why I've been dying for a cigarette since labor day.

And when did they stop letting teachers drink? I remember chaperones during every prom sneaking into the bar for a quick one. They went in shifts. Some of them even came back into the ballroom rocks glass in hand.

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Wednesday, March 21, 2007

When Did My Blog Become Whiner Central?


Not that my life could suck anymore but we've been feeding Barney a heaping helping of kidney failure. So far he appears unharmed but we only just found out Nutro is among the recalled petfoods. It's funny too, last week we fed him a pouch of the recalled food and he refused to eat it. Lisa thought it looked runny and not right. We got a pouch that looked like that a year ago and just threw it out.

In place of his wet foods covered in toxic gravy, Barney gets fresh shrimp and crab meat. Somewhere in the Middle East a child is trying to decide if that yellow package in the dirt is a UN food drop or a cluster bomb. My cat is healthy though.

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Monday, March 19, 2007

Corporal Punishment Would Make My Job Easier

The admininstraion is supporting me in my detention policy. My student gets an hour office detention in place of a 5 minute talk with me about why I care about her safety. I want to say it's because of my newfound political power but it's probably because I'm a good teacher and this early in my career I'm a fucking bargain. They'd be fools to let me go.

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Sunday, March 18, 2007

Everything Sucks

My week sucks. Lisa and I got bad news about the last round of IVF. We won't be parents this time.

I gave a student a detention for sitting on the lab tables 5 minutes after I asked her not to sit on the lab tables. She didn't show up because "she had something she needed to do" but didn't tell me what it was so I gave her an office refferal. She complained to her father who is on the school committee who is ordering the office to release her from punishment. In the mean time, I'm getting a pinkslip as a "formality" but am assured that I will be rehired in June. I don't think I want to wait until June.

I don't care about the housing bubble anymore.

I'm more worried about the bees.

More.

No really, this is a serious problem.

I think this has a lot to do with why.

Tuesday, March 13, 2007

BZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzz

Could it be from genetically modified crops?

Remember, this is a republican noticing this. So consider the canary long dead and the mineshaft collapsing.

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Monday, March 12, 2007

Cite Your Fucking Source (linky fixed, c-word left in)

This cunt claims english teachers are teaching advanced algebra. That may have been true in 1983 and Kansas but it's not happening here now.

I do like his idea of paying science teachers more then those lazy uneducated english teachers.

What do you mean they have masters degrees and more MCAS pressure on them? Oh. Then they deserve every penny.

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I Love A Bargain

Ford is selling Aston Martin for what it would cost to purchase 2423 Vantages.

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Friday, March 09, 2007

Suckit DEA

You mean you aren't really protecting me from marauding gangs of chinks and coloreds? Then what the fuck are you protecting me from? Oh, you're protecting your budget. Well then carry-on.

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Thursday, March 08, 2007

That Was Fast

A day after we dropped him off at assisted living, Nuno decided he hated it and came home. No kegger with the parents out of town for us. At least I got to listen to loud music after 6pm once this year.

Then Clearly We Need To Lower The Drinking Age To 16

"Look, this is one of the things that just strikes me as another anachronistic holdover, that you can make a decision to drop out at 16, but you can't make a decision to have a drink at 16 or to enlist in the armed forces or to vote," Patrick said later in the day.

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Wednesday, March 07, 2007

I Am Smiling Right Now

Monday morning
Eighteen years of dawning
I say how long
You say how long

It was one dull morning
Woke the world with bawling
I was so sad (so sad)
It was so bad

I was of a feeling it was out of control
I had the opinion it was out of control

Boys and Girls
Go to the school and girls
They make children
Not like this one

I was of a feeling it was out of control
I had the opinion it was out of control

I was of a feeling it was out of control
I had the opinion it was out of control

(Out of control)

I fought fate
There's blood on the garden gate
The man said childhood
It's in his childhood

One day I'll die
The choice will not be mine
Will it be too late
You can't fight it

I was of a feeling it was out of control
I had the opinion it was out of control

Tuesday, March 06, 2007

short update and then back to the blogging vacation that i promise will end soon

Lisa has two embryos in her belly. We won't know if they're babies or not for another two weeks. Between taking care of her grandfather who has checked himself into an assisted living home for a couple weeks to see if he likes it and writing sub-plans because the babies weren't ready to be concieved when I was off for Feb vacation, I have had zero time to myself.

Like I said, Lisa has two fertalized embryos in her belly. She's doing much better then she did back in August when we had to freeze our embryos for a month. We feel good about the latest round but also a little bit guilty about feeling so good. Other peers of ours are not having so much luck. Lisa and I love you all. Trust me when I say we're not doing that much better then you. For all our success, we're far from danger right now. That being said, I am about to pop from anticipation. I don't mind the process so much as I hate the moment where we have to wait to see if we'll be more then temporary parents. That's where I live right now.

As for Nuno, he's having a rough patch because of a bout with bronchitis a couple weeks ago. When he felt the first signs of illness he quit cigars because "they just don't taste right." So every time he gets a craving for nicotine which often includes a racing pulse and bout of flop sweat he thinks it's a heart attack and has a panic attack about dieing. We got him on a nicotine patch but he just could not settle down and decided he wanted to go "to that place that Nana went that time." The good news is that they didn't want him because he's not sick. He ended up looking at a place behind the Beverly Hospital where he can stay for two weeks for half price to see if he likes it. He checked in this afternoon. Our first report is that he hates it already.

Making my life even more interesting is the fact that today I was told that I will probably be recieving a pink slip in May because my district is 1.8million dollars short for this year. I'm not too worried because the district is so small that rumors fly around faster then conspiracy theories on "Tha Internets." I hear that parents are harassing guidance over getting their honors students into my 512 class.

I need to explain that last statement a little, 512 is the lowest level science class offered to freshmen or those who didn't pass freshmen science last year. You're in my class because your parents, the district and even you yourself have given up on you ever surviving a traditional science class. I didn't realize when I walked into class last September the fucking mess I was handed. I had kids with behavior problems lumped in with kids who had profound learning disabilities piled on top of kids who just didn't understand enough math to take a higher level class then the lowest we offered. The district had no curriculum for these two sections. Other problems had left 512 in the unique situation of being a warehouse for problems to be solved later.

I take my job seriously. I am prepared for my junior level chemistry class every day. That's an easy one. I am a pretty good chemistry teacher. My upper level freshmen science class is beginning to suffer. If I'm cutting any corners, I admit it's with them but that's about to change. I spent the last 5/4 semester planning upper level science and lower level science so that I can swap over at some point. The prep is mostly all done now and I can just extend 511 and 512 to each other.

It's a good thing I have more time now because I'm losing the G&T kids. I wrote what I thought was an easy test and the class average was a 59 with a median of 63. We fought for the whole class today about why I do not scale. The principal came in during part of it. I ended up writing a college level question on the black board. I gave them 20 minutes to see if any one in the room could answer it. If one student could answer it I would give the class 10 points. They worked like they never worked before. They got it wrong. They tried again and again. Finally, one girl working alone got it.

Wow, I really do have ADD worse then the kids do.

512 has become my pet project and the place I try things out. I am bullet proof in there. The district doesn't expect anything out of these kids. Almost every parent I meet admits their kid is a knucklehead during the meeting. I gave these kids homework once and one kid threw his microwave oven while still on fire through his kitchen window and another girl had the fire department respond to her house.

Veteran teachers call me crazy for keeping pet scorpions around these kids but the kids love them and they don't screw around with them because they're scorpions and the kids aren't stupid. Veteran teachers call me crazy for handing some of these kids soldering irons but no one burned themselves. In fact, in 5 minutes I taught 50 kids to make clean solder joints. Industrial Arts give them 6 weeks to learn the same skill.

I know most of my students aren't going to pass the MCAS but they wouldn't pass MCAS if I did anything differently anyway. They wouldn't pass MCAS if any other teacher was standing in front of them. But I can tell you at least one thing I have taught for every one of my students that they will own and recall for the rest of their life. Some learned how to solder. Some learned forces. Some learned about energy. Some will learn classical mechanics.

To finish up the year, my 512 kids are building cardboard walking robots and rockets out of paper towel tubes while the "smart kids" are taking MCAS prep courses. (Big thanks go to Didi and Lee for collecting paper towel tubes for me!)

Next year, if my contract is renewed and I am pretty sure they'll pink slip me in May and rehire me in June, I won't have the freedom I do whatever I want to do like this year. For all the work I've put into reaching these kids and all the prep I put into Freshmen Physics I won't be teaching it. I'll probably be taking Seniors who are even more academically challenged through applied chemistry. I think I'll show them how easy it is to make TNT. It's just nitric acid and toluene.

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