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Archive for the 'The Coal Mine' Category

Sick days are wasted on the sick

I get sick two weeks away from the students. As punishment, my body decides to become ill.

My wife says that I get sick because I miss my students. I think she’s joking because if any student reads this they’re probably getting excited about the prospect of a substitute teacher the day they return from vacation.

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I demand a recount!

Yesterday afternoon, before we leave work, our Assistant Principal makes the following announcement:

All after-school activities are canceled. Please check the website before you call or come in to school tomorrow.

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You been working out?

Nope.

And muscles don’t secretly work out on their own, either. So when a coworker asks if you’ve been working out when you’ve actually been doing the opposite (slacking out), then what can you possibly say in return?

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Power outage ensemble

Today I am wearing a dark collared shirt with brown corduroy pants. They do not go together. It’s not just that they’re not from the same species or branch of animal, but it’s rather like they’re from completely different trees.

How do I reach this state? Wind. Wind and trees and power lines.
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wtfever days

To quote the Holy Grail, I’m not dead yet, but I’m not perfectly well. Pain in the back and my voice feels like it’s going somewhere that my larynx can’t reach. It scratches.

However, I don’t want to use a sick day.
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My new desktop

My co-worker D– stops me in the hall. I don’t know how you function, Felix, she says.

I don’t know what she means, and then I see her looking at the thing a student confused with a pizza box. You got pizza? he kept asking me.

It’s my new desktop! I say, with everything I usually leave on my desk.

It’s made out of the boxtops used to hold reams of paper, so there’s a ready source of re-usable boxtops in the building. Everything that I normally stack and stuff into the confines of some kind of bag I now shuffle into assorted piles and– well, I pile them.

The result is a wonder to behold. If you’re me. For some reason, I don’t think it’s going to catch on.

The Great Debate

It’s 70-80 degrees out. I don’t have to go to work. It’s a beautiful day.

Time for a great debate. For great debates, I turn to Facebook.

Status update: Felix is debating between painting toy soldiers and doing actual work.

The next time I check Facebook, there is already a rebuttal.

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The pinata saboteur

My wife works with children. Specifically, she works with children in the library.

Today she gets to hold the pinata over their heads and help them tear its skin apart so that they can gorge themselves on its candy organs.
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Delicious defeat

It’s the end of the day, and I’ve escaped International Night practice with a shred of dignity still intact. The building is warm and my sweat makes it feel warmer with the lack of a breeze, so I’m ready to go.

I stop at my mailbox to see what items need to be ignored until tomorrow. Instead of a random assortment of unfiled papers, I find delicious looking brownies wrapped onto a paper plate.

Who put this here, I think, and what do they think I did to deserve it?
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The best laid plans

My plan is as perfect as it’s convoluted. Work, stay after work, travel northeast to game, travel southeast to pickup my wife, go home and sleep at 11-12.

This way, my students get to rehearse and makeup exams, I get to play Necromunda with some new fellas, and my wife gets a ride home instead of riding the trains for 24 miles.

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