nfinitefreetime

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In which I cannot be trusted with adult money

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BLeurgh

That capital L was originally a typo, but I’m keeping it because it feels appropriate. Tomorrow is my son’s fourteenth birthday, meaning that I left a building where I had been teaching 8th graders all day and came home to a house with four extra 8th graders in it. Tomorrow we are going to a local Renaissance festival, at his request. I have officially had one of the best first weeks of school…

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On motorcycle-type things

I have had the idea for several years now that in the unlikely event that I were to decide to become a Motorcycle Person, I would quite likely become a boring Motorcycle Person. I’d end up in one of those oversized, three-wheeled jobs with an oversized windshield and lots of places for storage– I think the technical term for them is “baggers.” The type, frankly, that if I spot on the road are…

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What the hell, Indiana

It has been hot and gross for a couple of weeks now, and the humidity has been grotesque enough that I have genuinely had some trouble breathing while outside recently. Yesterday was supposed to be in the low eighties; it didn’t really appear to make any difference and everything was still horrid. Today the high was supposed to be 77 degrees; I took a risk and wore my usual jeans. I have not…

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So tired I might already be dead

… and taking the night off.

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I'll stop talking about school soon, I promise

I was rudely tricked into doing classroom coverage today, when I made the mistake of walking past a classroom that did not have a teacher because she had gone home with a sudden illness. Apparently the office had not sent anyone to the room yet. I guess I’m not the type to just walk off when a kid comes out into the hallway and tells me there’s no adult in the room. I’m sure it would have been…

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Sunday/Not Sunday

I’m pleased to announce that the sense of impending dread that most teachers associate with Sundays is not currently afflicting me. I’ve been sickish all day again, as has been typical of Sundays for a while now, but beyond that, we’re prepped for class tomorrow and we’re all good. I actually got a major (sort of) task done today; our mailbox has only been tenuously attached to its base since we…

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This has been a weird day

I got plenty of sleep last night but it feels like it didn’t count for some reason, my wife and I went out shopping for a while in the afternoon, the heat got to me way more than it should have, and now I’m staring out the window waiting to see if apocalypse storm is going to hit us or not. My brother is in the north Chicago suburbs and sent me video of the ridiculous hailstorm that hit his…

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On the first 1/90th of the school year

No complaints. Seriously. I walked into this year with a bad attitude and my kids are swiftly turning me around. Hopefully the era of good feelings lasts at least a couple of weeks. That said, I’m gonna chill and finish a book tonight, so y’all behave yourselves.

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One down, 179 to go

My 23rd first day of school is in the history books. One of the better ones, I think. My 5th hour is probably going to develop into an issue but 5th hour is always an issue for some reason and there were some external reasons they might have been more nuts than usual today that I’m not going to get into. Actually, hell, I might as well: we changed vendors for our school lunches this year, and to…

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God, people, at least try

So I’ve taken on an informal building tech nerd role this year, and in doing so I made a slight miscalculation: we have a lot of new staff this year, and on top of that there was a whole-building renovation over the summer. As it turns out, some of our contractors were not tremendously diligent about making sure that everything was connected properly, especially wiring in the wall that I can’t…

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As promised

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As per your previous request

I was asked after posting about my boneless sofa to remember to post a video next time. Today is next time! I now have a boneless sofa and a boneless chair in my classroom for my kids to sit in while they read. They don’t read, mind you, but whatever. I’m an optimist, dammit. Also, I’m not entirely sure why iMovie decided to change the aspect ratio of the video, but I’m not concerned enough…

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And we're backish, 2025 edition

Pictured: a fuzzlewumpywuggins, because they always make everything better. Tomorrow is the first teacher day back. Morning rah-rah nonsense until 10, then some classroom time, lunch and our first staff meeting. I could do without the rah-rah meeting, but whatever. Tuesday I have training for the new curriculum (as far as I know, we still don’t have textbooks, and we’ve been instructed to bring…

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Oh goody

The first sentence of this post was going to refer to “nameless dread” initially, but nah, work starts on Monday and I know perfectly well what the name of this dread is, along with its home phone number, address and probably the motherfucker’s social security number if I look through my files. One way or another I’ve been in a mood all day and I’m taking tonight off. Go be nice to somebody.

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#REVIEW: London: The Biography, by Peter Ackroyd

I’m going to review this book by writing a bunch of sentences that will all, individually, be true. “But wait,” you might be thinking to yourself. “Isn’t that how reviewing things usually works? You don’t often tell lies in reviews.” True! However, in this case, what you need to understand is that some of those sentences are going to contradict other sentences. As it works out, this is quite…

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In which I am temporarily ahead

My classroom is completely ready to go other than a single piece of furniture, which needs to be delivered, removed from its box, and placed in its appointed location. I still don’t have any goddamn textbooks or anything like that, mind you, but the room is ready. I’ll probably go in tomorrow anyway just to see what kind of trouble I can get myself into. In the “good news/bad news” department,…