The horrible reality

We have had two weeks in school - and it feels like an eternity.  The timetable that I have to work this year is much more demanding that last and it makes any rational consideration of the endless year ahead difficult to the point of impossibility.


I suppose it is normal at this time of year for teachers to look ahead with dread and wonder how the hell they are going to survive until Christmas, let alone the almost out of sight pale light which marks the end of June!


For the first time in my life my birthday is looking like a disaster area.  Not only are examinations (and therefore extra marking) planned for that auspicious day, but also we have one of our eat-your-own-arm-rather-than-listen meetings which will stretch endlessly after school into the precious time of my natal day.


In the more refined surroundings of a British school my birthday (as befits the foresight of two parental teachers) was always in half term.  Here in the barbaric surroundings of semi-private education even this most sacred of significant days can be treated with cavalier contempt.  Things have reached a pretty pass if even a part of he celebrations have to be held in the totally uncongenial surroundings of an educational establishment!


The Scumbags' car has now been discovered not in their driveway, but rather in the space under the house.  This is a good thing.  It is a good thing because the car being here (wherever it is parked) suggests that they really have gone until next summer  This means that, in the immediate future, I can stop looking around for somewhere else to live.  Living next door to such noxious neighbours is not to be tolerated for any period more than a couple of months!


I am getting better at leaving school during the last period on Friday when it is my right to leave.  My getting the students to leave my lesson is becoming weekly more strident and I urge them to get out so that I can get away.  I arrive in school early so that I am able to park the car directly in front of the door through which I will be rushing at the end of my day.