If going to school can be designated “delightful” (which of course it can’t) then the journey this morning could well merit such an adjective. Traffic was still heavy, but nothing like a normal Monday morning. Obviously people have taken the Winter Week (or White Week, or Ski Week, or Fiasco Week) to their hearts and kept off the roads.
Parking was a dream. The staff room was empty. The head of department called away to another meeting and left the remnant of her department to do as they would.
With one of my colleagues we mapped out the next tranche of work for our problematic 3ESO who are going to be hysterical when they see what we expect them to learn for their next examination. Please excuse me as a hide a wry smile.
Most of the morning was taken up with the art teacher as we finally put together the booklet that is going to be the new basis for our Making Sense of Modern Art or MSOA as we have rather trendily decided to designate it, taking our inspiration from MOMA in New York. There are indeed no shallows in our pretention!
After all the effort to produce this booklet with running headings and page numbers and all sorts of professional details by doing it in Publisher we were reduced this morning to photocopy/cut/paste – a technique in which I excel.
I started to explain the mysteries of pagination and photocopying the final mock up, but the excitement of production had to be delayed as I suddenly realized that it was already five minutes past the magic hour at which we could leave.
And then there was a problem.
Yesterday was a precious day off and I used a different coat when we went to Sitges and I wore a different pair of jeans and what I am trying to say is that I was not fully prepared when I went to school this morning.
I had my trust case with me and The Machine but not everything.
Ever since The Great Separation my school keys have been on a different key ring to house and car keys. This is a good thing, as the Combined Keys needed their own form of transportation because of their number and weight. It does however mean that I can get to school with no problem having left my school keys behind.
As I did today.
Normally this is an irritation, but today it was a problem.
There were so few members of staff actually in school that spare keys were not to be had at a moments notice. And the metal exit door from Building 4 was locked. By the time that I had realized that I would not be able to get out, everyone had gone to lunch.
I could not face the humiliation of getting someone out of lunch to let me out so I walked to the other end of the campus and hoped that someone was in the other office to facilitate my egress. In fact, huffing and puffing as I had said that I would meet Toni for lunch, I found the top gate open, which makes me wonder that possibly the other gate might have been open too.
Anyway, rushing down the virtually vertical road which skirts the site I got into the car and found the return journey almost as painless at the journey to.
Rushing back home is not a good thing at any time, as we know that “Speed Kills” but in Spain at the moment there is the additional horror of a change in the speed limit.
At vast cost the local authority built a series of highly expensive gantries over the motorway with large illuminated signs that can change the speed limit at the whimsical push of a button; the power of the lights overriding any other static signs that might be in the vicinity.
The situation is further complicated by the fact that for the last couple of years roads near the city of Barcelona have been subject to a limit of 80kph. This was imposed because of the pollution in Barcelona and was a policy of the last government in the area. With a change of government came a change of opinion about the worth of this speed limit and we were informed that the old limit of 120kph would be restored.
And so it was for a short period of time, although the coast road seemed to have signs static and illuminated which changed every few hundred metres or so.
Then the national government decided that the national speed limit should be 110kps, so all signs (including the newly restored 120kph) had to be replaced by new ones.
The government informed us that not only should be ignore any signs that might indicate that a speed of 120kph was legal, but that also anyone going at the speed on the sign would be signally fined.
Were I sad enough I would count up the number of times the speed limit changes on my way to school; suffice to say it is legion.
But now important things: Barça is playing the Gunners to decide which team advances further in the Champions Cup and they are two one down. At least Barça are at home. To those who might say that I should be supporting a “British” team, I would ask where the British players in the team are! What is most disturbing is that I am aware of how many Catalan players there are in Barça and I also know that one, solitary Brit has taken to the field for the Gunners. Shame!
I look forward to a satisfactory result and a clear journey to school tomorrow.
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