Check Me Out

At the heart of much speculative fiction (and fiction in general) is a question. What if? On Tuesdays I like to throw one out there and see what you make of it. Do with it as you please. If a for-instance is not specified, feel free to interpret that instance as you wish. And if you find this becomes a novel-length answer, I'd appreciate a thank you in the acknowledgements. 😉

Have you heard of the Human Library? It's where you "check out" people instead of books. Interesting concept. Which leads me to...

What if you were the "book" in a human library? What would you talk about?

Where the Magic Happens

Last week at the day job took a lot out of me. So, when I got home, I didn't do much more than eat dinner, turn on the TV, and tune out. I didn't touch the octopus hat.

But then things changed over the weekend, and I was able to get a bit done Saturday night. (I'm writing this on Sunday.)

Last week, I had finished the main portion of the hat: 

Saturday night, I started connecting the outer tentacles to the inner suckers. It is done in such a way that the resulting "legs" curl: 

One and a half done. Six and a half more to go.

Missing the Obvious

Thursday afternoon. I was in the process of setting my seating charts for my Friday classes. 

I had let them sit where they wanted to as I was getting up to speed on what was going on with the classes. But, at a certain point, I want to assign seats. While some kiddos can sit next to their friends and concentrate on class when I need them to, mostly, they don't. Especially at that age. 

Because beginning of the school year, students have been added and dropped from all the classes, so as I was finalizing the chart, I wanted to make sure that no student who I was adding to the chart had been dropped. I opened up the attendance software just to make sure my printed list and the current list were the same. 

And that's when I saw the 8. 

Up until that moment, I thought I had all ninth grade classes. But no. I had one eighth grade class. 

And... 

I mean, suddenly the class made sense. I couldn't figure out why the kiddos were so much... more... than the other groups. 

I had to think back. I had been doing the same stuff with them as with the ninth graders. As it was first week stuff (getting to know them stuff), it wasn't too big of a blunder. But still. 

You'd think they'd have noticed or something. Apparently not. Or, they just didn't want to tell me. 

At least I hadn't passed out books or started them on any of the actual curriculum yet. I caught my error in time.

Rearranged

Tuesday, after school. Ms. D and I looked at the classroom, and we both agreed that we did not like the way the students' seats were situated. 

(The English class is co-taught for three periods. Fun fact: last year when I covered a vacant position, Ms. D was the teacher they hired. Now I get to work with her.) 

Well, we were the ones running the class now, so why not rearrange the desks? 

It didn't take us a half hour to move things around so that we could move around the room better. (We moved things into the configuration at the top of this post.) 

Wednesday. It was the fifth day of school. School hasn't even been in session for a full week. But you should have seen the kiddos when the walked in to find the room completely reconfigured. 

I mean, if we'd been in session for a month or more, I could see it. But five days? The room isn't even decorated yet. Of course things are going to change. 

The kiddos claimed they didn't like how we reconfigured things. Ah well. They'll get used to it. (Or we'll rearrange things again, just to throw them off ;)

Grumble Grumble

In last Friday's post I wrote: 

Things should settle in a week or two. The first couple weeks are always a bit like this. At least I haven't been stuck with a vacant class yet. I kind of want to avoid that this year if I can.

 I spoke too loudly...

via GIPHY

When I had a gig for the first day of school, I figured I was safe. Then I deliberately accepted an assignment on the second day of school for a class that had a teacher attached. And when I called that Friday for an assignment this past Monday, I took the class that was technically vacant, but they had hired a teacher who was due to start on Tuesday. 

I was safe. I thought... 

On Monday as I checked out, I was informed that the teacher they hired was for a different English class. Not the one I was covering. The class I was due to cover for just Monday and Tuesday was vacant, and was going to be vacant for a bit. 

via GIPHY

(They were supposedly conducting interviews that day. As of this writing, they have not hired someone.)

I mean... Really? Crap! 

Now, I could have just walked away. I could have. Perhaps I should. But, it's like I ended up there for a reason. Maybe? 

So, fine. I called the sub caller to say that I would remain in the vacant English class until they hire someone (or until my 30 days are up). 

via GIPHY

Just when I thought I was out, I got pulled back in.

via GIPHY

Caught

At the heart of much speculative fiction (and fiction in general) is a question. What if? On Tuesdays I like to throw one out there and see what you make of it. Do with it as you please. If a for-instance is not specified, feel free to interpret that instance as you wish. And if you find this becomes a novel-length answer, I'd appreciate a thank you in the acknowledgements. 😉

What if the one thing you were trying to avoid ended up figuratively falling into your lap?

Four More Suckers

Last week... Well, let's just say I spoke too loudly in Friday's post, and last week was a bit much. I got home from work and had no energy to do much on the octopus hat. 

I went from this (last Monday's post): 

To this: 

The "suckers" are done. Now it's just a matter of attaching them to the "tentacles". This is something I hope to have time for this week, but who knows? 

I hope you all had a great weekend.