End of yet another era!

Today I told the head of department that I would not be teaching in the school during the next academic year.  She had the good grace to look as though someone had put a bullet through her forehead!

She had, as I would have expected, the good grace also to sympathize with the demands of my questionable health and agree that it was more important to be healthy than soldier on and gradually subside into coughing absence.

The school hasn’t quite agreed (I think) to one of my perfectly reasonable requests for a gentle financial decline from fully paid employment, but I remain optimistic (I think.)

The reaction of my colleagues was one of shock and disbelief – which was touching – but it was also noticeable that the breaking news of the morning had given way to disinterested acceptance by the afternoon.  A school is a very good place to learn the transitory nature of things; generations change with bewildering speed in normal school life and there is always something new to replace the recently interesting.

It will be revealing to see how long it takes the kids to find out that I am going; which of the teachers reveals information that the kids do not need to know – and of course the reaction of the kids.

I do feel different having said irrevocable words to the Powers That Be, though perhaps not quite as different as I thought I would have felt.  Still, as one of my colleagues pointed out to me, I am now “untouchable” and it is up to me to work out how to use this illusory power!

Toni and I went out to collect my Amazon goodies which, of course, have not been delivered by our local non-delivery delivery service. I have discovered that I have ordered two copies of Peter Watson’s “Ideas – A history from fire to Freud” well, one of the copies will be an excellent present for Suzanne.  Lucky girl!

The rest of the Amazon order is CDs of various sorts to harmonize the journey to school each day.  I have added to my already incomparable (at least to my knowledge) collection of Carl Nielsen.  I think that my recordings of that Great Dane now outnumber the recordings of my first Scandinavian love, Sibelius!  Though possibly not quite.

Celebrations of this auspicious day were held in La Fusta, our tapa restaurant of choice.  We have decided that their patatas bravas and ensallida rusa are the best in Castelldefels and we had a chilled bottle of Cava.

I did want to buy a summer watch to commemorate the day but the model that I had seen and wanted had been sold and I had to order another one which I will have in a week or so.  It will be rather different from the other watches that I have worn recently – but perhaps it is time for a change.

Yesterday was one of those days for which a new word for the concept of “tiredness” needed to be invented.

As well as frantic marking of the odd examination papers that were sat late, a full time table, preparation for my epic day today when I have six periods to teach, a two hour meeting after school and a trip into the centre of Barcelona to go to an opera which did not finish until 11.30 pm, the worry about the non-arrival of stuff from Amazon thanks to the idiot incompetence of the delivery people at this end, my inability to learn French quickly enough for a holiday in July, the economic situation in Greece, finding somewhere prominent to fly my second CCOO flag in the garden, being in school when the sun is shining provocatively outside – there is also the problem of life in general.

There is going to be another strike and I have been talking to those activists (or “normal” people as I like to call them) who took action last time and we have been discussing the almost pathological, eyes-closed rejection of action to the disastrous situation which is unfolding around them.  For Christ’s sake, their bloody pay has been cut and they do nothing, nothing at all.  They fear to take further (ha!) action from the absolutely nothing that they have done in spite of the fact that they are in a situation that demands their active demonstration of rejection!

The Opera was Adriana Lecouvreur by Francesco Cilea based on an 1849 play and first performed in 1902.  I must admit that I had not heard of either the composer of the opera and I must further admit that I have done not a single second of listening to get to know the music of the production and I don’t even know the libretto – even after watching the opera I am not convinced that I fully understand what went on.

The thing that strikes one about the production is the sizzling animosity between the two lead female singers.  I was irresistibly reminded of “Dynasty” or was it the other one where two of the major female stars ended up in one episode wrestling in a lily pond – not quite mud wrestling but near enough.

The music was odd and reminded me of Delibes and at times was vulgar beyond belief and sounded like the most sensationalist musical type production.  The storyline was risible – poisoned violets forsooth – but the magnificent set and the powerful singing made the evening one which kept me awake in spite of my almost overwhelming tiredness

That was the last of the operas this season and I look forward to the next year in rather more relaxed times!

We shall see who has just found out about my departure tomorrow.

More of the same!

Life certainly does have a way of interfering with the civilized pursuit of writing, especially if you happen to be involved in the specific type of education that seems to be staple fare in our place: chaos.

As usual, the examinations are to blame – as when are they not?

The timetable for the writing, sitting and marking of these odious intrusions into the life of the kids and staff have been (as they were last year, and the year before that, and the year before than and . . . well, you get the idea) timed so that there is not enough time between their sitting, marking and meeting.

The meeting to discuss all the results is on Monday.  The last examination was on Wednesday.  The deadline for getting results, comments and class descriptions into the computer system was Friday.  Oh yes, and we have a more than full timetable to teach as well!

Why not, I hear you ask, mark during the examination time of another class?  Alas, our kids are so finely attuned to all the different forms of cheating (good and bad kids alike) that eagle-eyed invigilation merely keeps the cheating down to acceptable proportions, it does not eliminate it.  No time then to mark.  And of course one of the examinations was held last period on Wednesday, which was also Toni’s birthday during which The Family came down to celebrate and arrived before I had had a shower after returning from work.

Thursday was, therefore, a day of frantic marking as was Thursday evening so that I could have the marks ready to put in to the computer system on Friday in the “free” periods that we have in our absurdly long day.

But that, of course was not possible because the lists which were in the computer system did not relate to the actual classes that we were teaching this term.  In spite of the fact that the “changeover” dates have been known since the start of year, nothing had been done.  As I was the one making a fuss about this and trying to get the groups changed it also followed that I was the only teacher of these groups who was trying to put the marks into the system - ah hem!  So, out of all my classes, I could only put in two sets of results on Friday when I had a "free" period.

I personally and physically took sheets of paper with teachers’ names and pupils’ names to the secretary to get the system updated, traipsing uphill on the infinity of steps which links our vertical campus.

As Friday is my “early” finish (at only ten to four in the afternoon) I left school with the entry of marks having been impossible.  My mood was not subdued in any way by listening to La Stupenda shrieking her way through The Girl of the Golden West, so it was only when I found the usual note from our local Non-Delivery-Delivery service that Amazon uses that my mood lightened.

Skipping back into the car I drove into town and parked audaciously in a Blue Zone to get my parcel from the harassed little man who looks as though he is doing compulsory Car in the Community work in the office.  Anyway, clutching my suspiciously light parcel I rushed back home and ripped it open.

“Simple French”, 100 Classical something or others and Messian – The Collector’s Edition (13 CDs!) was the varied fare inside.  The Classical Thingies are for the car, the French is for my trip in July and Messian is for indulgence – so putting on the first disk of the Messian which was, unsurprisingly The Turangalila Symphony I settled back prepared to be swamped by the music.  And I was until the fifth movement when the bloody thing stuck.  I cleaned and tried again and again it stuck.  I tried it in the computer and there was no problem, so it must be Toni’s music system.  I hope!

However the mood had been broken so I turned to the French book and was mildly gratified to discover that many of the words were at least familiar, even if their exact meaning was sometimes elusive!  I do, after all, have an O Level in French – even if, as I now realize, it was sat more than 45 years ago!  How is this possible?

The charm of French soon fading I turned, resentfully, to the school work that I was unable to complete in school and found that the list had been changed at last and so I was able to put in the marks.  Then I thought I would have a little lie down - and you can guess the rest.

So, on Saturday morning, Saturday morning mark you (I can hear the cadences of Neil Kinnock ringing in my ears) I settled down to write the class descriptions that we had been told by management had to be completed by Saturday afternoon!

I am still trembling with anger at the grotesque assumption of management that they can commandeer our weekends by their own incompetence in not getting groups changed while, at the same time, reducing our wages.  And I am the only teacher who seems to be furious about it all.  I despair!  I really do!

And another thing.  The Classical Thingies is ear rottingly awful.  I had expected a few disks of all the favourites to hum along with but this grotesquery includes “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” and Sarah Brightman, as classical!  And Our Bryn (may god forgive him) singing some sort of Benedictus whose syrupy vulgarity makes the theme music of “Muffin the Mule” seem like High Art.  I have already skipped forwards over a whole range of tracks and I think that the whole nonsense will have to be given away or repackaged as a present for somebody – anybody.  I wonder if Messian is suitable car journey music?

Mu schoolwork had to be done quite quickly as I was called to Terrassa to celebrate Toni’s mum’s birthday.  I did leave in good time to get there for 2.00 pm but I had not counted on – what is the collective noun for magpies, or rather for magpies with dysentery? – because my car was covered in bird shit and pollen.  One window was quite odured over with the stuff.  And I couldn’t park anywhere near the bank to get money to pay my share of the present, so I admitted defeat, came back home, hosed off the car so that it looked a little less like a medieval night-soil collecting cart and started on my journey.

Which was relatively uneventful, even if I did start off on the wrong motorway.  In Spain, or at least in Catalonia, they like their motorway links: why travel on one when you can pop over to another and sample the delights of another road.  This is useful if you have made mistakes in your navigation because you never need to retrace your steps there will always be a portal to another universe to bring you back to the straight and narrow.

The disadvantage of these links however is that they have obviously been designed in an office by someone who doesn’t drive.  If you want to experience the reality of Yeats' “Second Coming” then I suggest using a Spanish motorway link road.  You will find yourself “turning and turning in a widening gyre” and unless you are driving very carefully the whole of history will flash before your eyes as you tackle yet another eye-wateringly tight bend on a spiral going who-knows-where.

Lunch was delightful and the present (a red Casio touch-screen camera) was received with delight.

Back in Castelldefels I returned to the French book and have now ploughed my way through some sixty pages desperately hoping that at least some of it will stick and even hoping, hope against hope, that it might activate some lost memories of the language so I can stagger my way along in a non English speaking environment – as I am assured I will meet in the remote part of northern France that we are going to visit.

Today I am on the Third Floor.  In spite of some flimsy cloud I am confident that it is warm enough to lie out.  Which I intend to do.

Tomorrow: school, meeting and opera.  A varied day.

Frantic fun!

What a way to start the day! 

To be greeted with the information that the examinations which have yet to be sat by the pupils will all have to be marked, ready for assessment with class and individual commentaries all ready and in the computer by Saturday afternoon “at the latest” so that things are ready for the interminable and pointless meeting on Monday – which also coincides with the last opera that I am supposed to see in the Liceu. 

This is going to cause a real problem.  Not that I ever say anything of any importance whatsoever in these meetings (during which I am in something of a protective coma brought about by almost terminal tedium) but presence is regarded as the sine qua non of professionalism in a display that the school (as opposed to other sentient beings like myself) thinks is the culmination of educational excellence.  It is, of course, nothing of the sort – but try telling meeting-hungry talkers that!

I think that this is going to be a major irritation.  I have no intention of missing my opera (not at the price of the seat that I have paid for!) but am prepared to compromise with the meeting by attending part of it.  I am going to leave at 7 pm and that gives me an hour to get into the centre of Barcelona. 

An hour of tension and worry that will be brought about by every (and I mean every) traffic light being against me and the Diagonal lateral being forced into one lane by illegally parked cars, vans and busses and, the central horror, sudden road works forcing time heavy diversions into unknown parts of the city infuriatingly, tantalizingly and constantly adjacent to where I want to go. 

I will leave those concerns for the day itself and concentrate on getting through the next few tension-filled days of celebration, examination and frustration.

Days are getting a little over-filled at the moment with all sorts of events getting squeezed into less than a week.  By Wednesday of next week things should be a great deal clearer – one way or another!

It is Toni’s Mum’s birthday on Saturday and yesterday (just 3 days before the event) Toni informed me that he has no idea whatsoever about what to buy her.  The default present is perfume by Rocha but his mother has very pointedly told her offspring that she is well stocked with that particular liquid and they would have to do some out of the box thinking.  Three days before.

The only suggestion I have made, my suggestions having been sharpened by the yearly struggle to find presents for my own mother fresh in my mind, which has found partial favour is a camera.  This purchase however, is one which needs the active and financial participation of all the children to make it come to fruition and that, dear reader, is a task in itself.  And not one that I am particularly eager to undertake.

The Birthday Party has come and gone with my participation spasmodically active from my cataleptic state of exhaustion – even the Cava (decent Cava I might add) failed to raise me above the semi-somnolent.  The start of the Europa Cup added a fatigued horror as I assumed that the “party” (with Toni acting like the Ghost of Christmas Past as he had a dickey tummy and could eat and drink nothing but Coke and ham) was going on until the end of the match.  Luckily, at half time The Family decamped and I went thankfully to bed.

This morning brought a round of frantic marking as I have worked out that it is unlikely that I can get everything done by the deadline of Saturday afternoon (sic!) by which time everything has to be marked, the marks entered into the computer system; comments given for each child and a group description given to class teachers.  Ha bloody ha!

It is now late at night days after the date of the opening sentence to this entry and both sets of examination papers have been marked and I am readyish to start the comments during what free time I have in the absurdly long day that our school imposes on us.

By way of relaxation I called in to our local Lidl shop to get bread and ended up buying bed linen: that, surely is the beauty of shopping.  And I didn’t get bread in the end either.

Ever since my shock of finding out the cost of a single down and feather pillow in El Corte Ingles I have been resting my head resentfully on the plastic apology for a pillow that I now possess.  You can imagine my glee when I say that Lidl had its own pillows and my glee converted to near hysteria when I realized that they actually had real feathers in them!  The fact that they cost almost twenty (sic) times less than the pillows in the aforementioned shop might also have had something to do with my heightened emotion.

The bed now has a riot of floral motifs and two elongated feather filled pillows and I will find out now if such natural artifice is conducive to more restful sleep than I have failed to get used to in the near past.  I do hope so, because I need to be refreshed and finger ready to start punching information into our computer system.

If I can’t get it done tomorrow then it will not be done at all because I am treating with contempt the instruction from On High that all information must be in the system by Saturday afternoon.  How dare they presume to hijack part of our weekend when they are actually paying us less!  Bloody cheek!

But, mindful of the ravelled sleeve of care and all that I will repair to my bed and hope that the gentle fingers of Morpheus will work their magic and make me fighting fit for the fray on the morrow.

One can but hope!

Closing eyes!

Guiltily cheered by the awful weather in Britain I am able to face what are going to be fairly stressful days ahead.

Not only is my knee playing up at the start of a day when I do little else but traipse from one building to another lesson after lesson up and down innumerable steps, but also I have to buy Toni’s birthday present; get stuff for the meal for The Family who are descending on Wednesday for the celebrations; start marking the pointless examinations – oh yes, and teach!

At some point I am going to have to make an appointment for the doctor so that he can read the auguries from the red stuff taken yesterday and, by contrast, I am supposed to be doing “something cultural” with Suzanne.  A full and satisfying week which should result in complete prostration by Friday.  At best.

Of course I have no idea about what to buy Toni for his birthday so, as long as I remember on my way home, I will call into MediaMarkt and hope that electronic inspiration hits me - and the impact is not too costly!

The only thing that I need to buy for myself is windscreen washer.  This is the season of pollen and when you live in an area which is covered in pine trees then pollen takes on a completely different meaning.  Given the sheer quantity of pollen that a single pine tree makes it is astonishing to me that the entire world is not covered in coniferous forests.  I remember last year that Carmen kicked her son’s football into the branches of a pine tree in the park and thick clouds of pollen floated from the branches in a totally unconvincing sort of way.  It looked as though boys had been paid to sit up a tree and when a flying object hit any branch they had to open their sacks of powder in gleeful abandon.  All the cars in our area look as though they have been to one of those Indian festivals where the main occupation is throwing pigment around.

Most of the pollen in our area seems to have settled on my car and no matter the speed at which I travel it does not go off to do its stuff elsewhere.  I can’t help feeling sorry for the tenacious pollen trying its damndest to do its reproductive stuff on the unyielding surface of a motorcar – but full marks for trying.  And that’s another thing I have to do – get the car washed before the pollen becomes an integral part of the decoration.

Toni’s presents have been bought and, more importantly wrapped.  The card has been written.  The food has been amassed and Toni can set it out tomorrow.  The Cava is cooling in the fridge and I am beyond tired.

We had a disastrous meal after doing the shopping.  Torradeta in Centre Comercial L’Anec Blau was the perpetrator of the gastronomic crime against food.  Perhaps stupidly I chose the offer of three tapas for €6.90.  On the surface they sounded OK.  On the surface.

The meal was not helped by my participation in a cliché before I had eaten a thing.  The ketchup bottle was one of those commercial squeeze things filled with watered down liquid which had coagulated in the narrow nozzle.  A little pressure and soon one of the dishes was explosively filled with ketchup.  And Toni’s shirt had interesting red stains, as had the table and various condiments.

My meal was taken away but alas, when it returned nothing was new.  The three tapas had merely been cleaned up a bit and reheated so that they had the texture and taste of ancient cardboard.  Disgusting.  And expensive for what it was.  Never again.

Tomorrow the first and second of the examinations I will have to mark and then the bloody, bloody meetings.  One of which is still scheduled for a Saturday morning.

Think not of such things.  That way madness lies!

Blood and everything

You really know where you place in the pecking order of health is when you go to the free-for-all which is our bloodletting session at the local health centre.

In theory everyone has a printed-paper which details exactly how much and for what the blood is going to be drawn but as I was summoned by mobile phone message for this session I was paperless.

By the time I had worked out that I should probably go to the reception desk and get some sort of official permission to join in the fun they had called out the names and a rough order of people had been set.  The pathetic bleats of my name were greeted with the stern instruction that I came under the heading of “anyone else” and I should go to the back of the queue.

Given the collection of shuffling misfits who probably regarded this session as a major social event, I imagine that the nurse was used to the hard of hearing and the almost dead not quite getting it together well enough to leap to attention at the mention of their name and snap smartly into line.  If most of the aged persons waiting to give the red stuff had even made a partial attempt to get into place in time to the hastily read list of order of seeing, I suspect that only thing about them that would have snapped would have been their bones.

Having resigned myself to an almost last position I promptly sat down and took out my trust phone and continued reading the sci-fi novel which is almost completely incomprehensible but addictive at the same time.

A quick extraction and I was on my way – but on the wrong motorway and was duly held up in St Boi but not enough to miss anything more than part of the first lesson.  Ah well, better than nothing.

The kids have started counting down to the end of term.  We teachers have been doing this for some time, but been too appalled at the number of days left to admit it!

In the second half of this week we start yet another season of examinations; if they weren’t so revolting to set and mark the frequency of these pointless impositions would be amusing.  But they are and it isn’t.

Tomorrow six periods.  Sigh.

A day of two halves

An overcast day giving that traditional Sunday feel of indecisiveness; a day waiting for some better day to take its place.  Although Sundays also have a spaciousness that other days do not have there is always the Evening Dread where any teacher worth his salt worries about whether he is prepared for the morrow!

I have been thinking about the smallness of the demonstration yesterday.  The sector of education that was represented in that expression of unease is probably one of the most vulnerable in the country.  The people taking part were teachers in the private sector of education whose futures (as I know from The School That Sacked Me) are most prone to the whims of often ill-qualified owners.

Speaking with colleagues who have taught elsewhere I have found that my experience of owner-run private education has been matched, though not topped by other horror stories of what can only be described as bullies with money directing the professional lives of people much higher qualified than the moneyed boors prowling corridors seeking prey!

The Family descended for lunch and Toni and I had to pay a visit to our local restaurant to book a table for eight.  It was obvious that they were fully booked but as we are more than decent customers the owner made space for us so that we could enjoy the more than decent meal that our local always provides.

So good food and duty done to various mothers I noticed that our dutifulness had been noticed and the impenetrable cloud cover had disappeared and bright sunshine was bathing the beach and the good old Med.

I am still capable of being surprised at what in Britain would be cloud cover for at least the week being dissipated in hours and the sun showing itself again here in Catalonia.

I spent the rest of the afternoon (after the obligatory walk which I was tricked into joining) sitting in the sun and listening to two bickering boys and watching the weariness of their parents!

Tomorrow I start the day with a blood test and then continue it by trying to find a parking space somewhere near the school because I will be arriving after my normal time and it will be cars all the way!

I am building up to my last opera of this year which will be on the 14^th of this month.  As far as I can understand the impenetrable instructions for next year, I think that I already have my seat from last year (this year) reserved for next year.  The only thing I need to do is try and get tickets for any other events not covered by my season ticket.  And that is not even remotely easy.  Believe me.

Bed is calling me as this weekend has not been very restful and there is nothing worse than taking a sleep debt from the weekend into the working week.

To bed!

Days pass

This is how a day should end, not with a bang but a long drawn out suspiration of anticipation leading up to the time of escape.

It is always a

And that was where I finished typing the day before yesterday!  There is a bone weary emptiness of fatigue that only a teacher knows!  And that was me at the end of the day yesterday.  I didn’t even manage to drink a reviving cup of tea before the siren call of my bed was too alluring and I succumbed.

As is usual in a fractured week (we came back on Wednesday) the tiredness quotient is much higher than in a normal week.  I must emphasise that does not mean that I want fewer days’ holiday to ensure a Monday start, but it is a fact of scholastic life that a mid-week start means more than a week’s worth of fatigue waiting for you by the weekend!

This weekend I have a demonstration and a birthday party – both on the same day and so I am going to have to juggle things if the day is to work out satisfactorily for all concerned!

To lighten my mood I have sent away for a box of goodies from Amazon.  The CDs are there to fuel the cultural element in my daily treks to school and the books because they are books and I am not suddenly going to start rejecting the drug of choice that I have been taking all my life!  If I could find an effective hand-held dog barking repellent it would be the final detail which would make my life more complete and more importantly tranquil.

On the anti-animal front I shocked The Family by purchasing a power water pistol for use against the marauding cats who whip up our local dogs to frenzies of unbearable noise.  As many of our local canine pests are of rattish derivation the noises they make range from recognizable barks to other worldly creaks and squeaks so it is therefore imperative for these animals to have a relaxing environment so that they do not feel the need to use their vocal chords to signify to their uncaring owners that they have sighted a canine intruder – or whatever it is that produces the sounds by the inbred grotesques by which we are surrounded.

I have tested my new weapon, and from the kitchen window the kill-zone reaches to the furthest limits of our demesne.  I think that another loaded water pistol by the gate will allow me to soak the moggies if they ever (as they do) dare get into the back garden.  And cats, having grossly inflated ideas of their own significance, are quite prepared to move only a humiliatingly small distance away from a gesticulating owner and then sit and wash their paws.  When I have finished with them they will look as though the have been washing a bloody sight more than their paws!

And that was where I finished typing yesterday.

Today has dawned sunny with only the creak of some rat-dog to spoil the beauty of the sun.

Barcelona for the demonstration and then Terrassa for a birthday celebration.  Never a dull day for me!  Though tiring – always!

The meeting point for the demonstration was unknown to my GPS and so I had to guess my way there.  Driving down the Diagonal is always frustrating at the best of times but is especially intolerable when you are pressed for time.  I made a unilateral decision that the Jardins de Gracia where at the junction with the Diagonal and looked for a parking place near there. 

Amazingly the place I found, or rather waited for when I saw a driver leaving his place, was near a Gaudi house and therefore not something which one would have expected to have found.  It was very tight, but I made it (under pressure) with relative ease.  And even the parking charges were not excessive.

I asked a very helpful lady who walked me through the steps to getting my parking ticket to point me in the direction of the Jardins and after a couple of minutes walk I was there!

Our demonstration was relatively small and very middle class.  We were all teachers and their familiars and very select too.  I met Steve who was arranging the whole demo and he gave me a rakish red cap to wear.

When, eventually we were ready to set off I collected a red CCOO flag and was good to go.  When we were about to start I was ordered by Steve to hold the banner at the front of the march so, with red hat, red flag and red whistle I could well be on the news this evening looking mildly uncomfortable by resolutely holding my share of our Union banner!

We marched to the offices of the regulatory body and dumped symbolic sacks of the worry that anybody working in the educational sector has as a normal part of their professional life.

While the sacks were piled up against the entrance to the doors and during the speeches that were being made, in the best traditions of slapstick a charlady appeared and started throwing the sacks away while haranguing the organizers no doubt bringing up concepts of Health & Safety and things of that sort.  It added just that touch of farce to an otherwise important situation!

Toni has wrapped his sister’s birthday present and even bought his Mother’s Day flowers which were wrapped in the garden centre.  We are now ready to go to Terrassa and Toni is of course packing the portable computer which he uses to watch pay-for-view Barça games for free.

How I am going to stay awake for the next few hours I do not know and I will have to rely on the car’s memory of the way back to get me home!

And to top everything the Chief Scumbag has been seen next door.  This is disastrous as it means that the whole Family Scumbag must be getting ready for their intolerable summer stay. 

Horrible thought!

Let me push that to the back of my mind and look forward to the birthday party!