And the kids are not here yet!

The horror of three hours stuck in a room listening to a psychologist was slightly modified by the suggestion of Toni that I use the morning to get my replacement card from the bank.  The bank which doesn’t actually open at a time at which I can get to it.

Even using the risibly “early” end to the school days that we have without the kids it still doesn’t give me enough time to get to a bank and collect a card: I have to take time off work – and what better time to take off than that devoted to meetings!

I drove to school in driving rain to tell the powers that be that I needed to take time off to replace the cancelled card.  The head of secondary pleaded with me to ensure that I returned for at least the last hour of the talk.

Driving back to Castelldefels I passed a RTA with a truly horrific tailback which looked as though it would take hours to clear.  I resolved not to take that cursed road.

The bank, to my astonishment, was open and I was seen and my replacement card duly issued.  It worked and I was out of the bank within minutes and ready to return.  A quick call into the house to general astonishment that I was there at all and I felt that I had to set off on my way back.

Within seconds of joining the other main road I noticed that the signs on the overhead gantries were urging me to slow down – a sure sign of an accident.  Within a couple of minutes I had come to a complete stop and for next few kilometres we inched our way forward.

The delay was not caused by an accident.  The delay was not caused by road works.  The delay was not caused by an act of god.  No.  The delay was caused by a police car parked diagonally across one lane with an officious officer having the gall to urge the terminally frustrated drivers through the narrowed gap with an illuminated wand.  Nothing there to indicate why the road should have been narrowed.  Nothing!

I tend to think that it was sympathetic action so that we could join our colleagues on the other motorway and share their pain.  Just because we didn’t have an accident of our own the police provided us with a similar sort of delay.  How kind!

I did work out, however, that stuck in a car listening to my latest CDs was infinitely preferable to sitting in an classroom and pretending interest in a talk which was not likely to have the slightest effect on my teaching.

With a frightening sense of timing I joined my colleagues in durance vile just to be released for a tea break!

All in all I only had an hour of the talk – which was something of a result!

The other meeting was with Suzanne and with only two other members of the department and was severely practical and therefore more than acceptable!

I rushed home for the last menu del dia with The Boys and we decided to go into the centre of the beach area and have a meal with the Basque.  Stewart, with stories of his youth and sitting at the “Little Eaters” table in his primary school ringing in our ears, had a subdued meal of asparagus while the rest of us got stuck into the menu.

My meal of tortilla and Fideua (on separate plates!) was excellent and was not lessened by the bottle of rosé that Stewart and I shared – with my share of the liquid augmented by gaseosa!

Our guests are gone!  And the house feels strangely empty – especially as there are no further visits planned.

I am sure that the exigencies of education will take up the slack!

At the moment most of my colleagues are feeling stressed – and the kids are still six days away!

The reason for this is that things still seem up in the air.  We have not had lists of pupils.  We do not know where we are teaching.  Books may or may not have arrived yet.  New methods of teaching are being encouraged and we have days in which to write a course.  New computers have been bought for the new pupils and we have been told nothing about them – if they have been bought at all!  Project Based Teaching is the flavour of the month and we have to integrate it into our courses – which start, I might remind you, next Monday.  And we have meetings about vacuous elements of educational theory!  Nothing changes.

We have important work to do which is essential for the first week and we are bogged down with impractical verbiage. 

At least my two next meetings tomorrow will be directly related to what we are going to teach next week.  Plenty of time!  Count it up in seconds and then it sounds more than generous!  But it doesn’t make it longer.  Alas!