It's only a day that will pass!

I am in school in body though not entirely present in health.  I thought long and hard before I left home this morning as I was not entirely well after the misery of lying in bed during a glorious day of sunshine.

The moral blackmail which our school uses with complete unprofessionalism determined that I did not take the doctor’s appointment which was available for 3.20 pm today as my absence would have created chaos. 

We are already working with one person fewer because the head of department is in Canada collecting the kids who have been on exchange and we did not get a replacement for the days that she is going to be off.  There is my Making Sense of Modern Art which basically needs me to be there to teach it and . . . but you get the idea.  Because the school does not even try to get supply teachers the burden of absence is placed squarely on the department responsible, as if it is our fault that a colleague is absent!

My customary griping is made more pointed today as I teach five periods; do a lunchtime duty and have a collapsed class at the end of the day.  I am not, emphatically not, being paid anything like enough for this imposition – and I don’t feel well as well!

Hopefully I will scramble my way out of the Slough of Despond when the teaching starts – I always seem to get something of a boost when I do the job for which I am paid, though there is also the inevitable let down when you stop!

Lo and behold, when I get into school I find out that another member of the English Department is off sick with a bad back.  It was with total fury that I understood that the powers that be were trying to make me do a substitution on a day I was doing five etc etc.  Their crass incompetence had not noticed that I was actually teaching a class when they wanted me to do another.  Then they attempted to make me take two classes together when these classes are at different points in their reading.  I refused.

I am now, while still feeling like shit, in a towering rage and I will know exactly what to do when I get another doctor’s appointment in school time.  It is with weary resignation that I point out to my colleagues that management doesn’t give a hoot for any of their jolly hockey sticks approaches to saving money – they will take what you give and then demand more.

That gives a very biased view of our school which is filled with decent people doing devoted work – and being taken advantage of every single day that they stay in the place!

In a time of crisis and with unemployment running at over 20%, we should remember that every “saving” that we make and every extra lesson that we teach is taking away paid employment from a colleague.

The evening I have a visit to the hospital with Toni to look forward to as he goes to find out if the minor surgery he had six months ago has been successful.

I have existed today on a diet of cold water, as the idea of eating anything has not filled me with delight.  You can imagine how pleased I was that Monday is my duty day for the dining hall.  I had to stand there, watching hundreds of children much their way through things that my gorge rose at – so to speak.

The last effort of the day is in taking the collapsed class of 3ESO who are going to have the delights of a whole range of vocabulary forced at them.  There should be three classes, but with the absence of the head of department that have been collapsed to two.  One other member of the department is absent so I will be the only English teacher taking them.  At least the handouts have been prepared (with answers) and are ready for distribution.  Ironically given my present situation, the vocabulary is all about the body and medicine.  O Joy!

The kids, having started their day at 8.15 am, were not in the most receptive of moods and the behaviour was vile – but they actually did the work, which makes them rather different from their British counterparts.

As you can imagine, after a foul day in an uncaring school I was in no mood whatsoever to interact with human kind – it was just as well that no bloody drivers got in my way.

An excellent trip to hospital for Toni – who has now been fully discharged, was followed by a meal in a Basque restaurant.  I was allowed to eat a “steak” which was waver thin and fairly tough.  The potatoes were fine, but I still can’t pretend it was a satisfying meal.  And it was washed down with agua con gas.  Dear god, what have I come to!

Tomorrow is, however, another day and I trust that I will be back to what passes for normal for me!

Though tomorrow I have six periods to teach rather than the measly five I taught today! 

This is all going to end in tears.