Flux!

It comes to something when I can’t be bothered to walk down a couple of flights of stairs to get a computer on which there is typing which I have completed today and prefer to retype so that I don’t have to move more than my fingers.  This is not good, and does not bode well for my future physical condition!

However I have much on which to ponder (and I seem to be over using the “on which” construction today) on an eventful day in which (see, I can vary my style if I choose) the two most significant events were arrival and non-arrival!

The arrival was a boxed set (yet another) of 60 CDs produced by Sony under the Vivarte label.  The book which accompanies the set is one of the best produced and most exhaustively informative I have ever come across; it makes me feel toweringly ignorant just holding the damn thing!  My favourite disc so far, I am indeed downloading it to the ever empty hard disc of my computer, is entitled “Utopia Triumphanes” – The Triumphs of the Renaissance: this opens with Spem in Alium the forty-part motet and ends with Ecce Beatam Lucem another forty-part non-liturgical motet, taking in a mere six-part motet “Laudate Dominum” by Machincourt.  The first is by Tallis and the second by that name-to-conjure-with, Striggio.  I am sure that I am displaying woeful ignorance in my lack of ability to whistle Striggio tunes, but there it is – I am, after all, only a poor student trudging my weary way along the road of knowledge.  And who the hell is Machincourt – apart of course from the well-known composer of a famous six-part motet!

The non-arrival [can your mind actually remember as far back as the beginning of the last paragraph to make that opening valid?] is arguably the more interesting.

As I have been highlighting for the past few days, today was the day of The Meeting.

The day started on a low note as I had done nothing to put the results of the examinations on the new-fangled computer platform whose complexity makes the other two platforms that we have used look like writing figures on a piece of paper.  O halcyon days when that was all we had to do!

The present platform needs a password to get in which is generated anew each time you try and access the program.  This password is sent to your email account and you have to paste it into the  . . . well, you get the idea.  Simple?  No.

So the morning was one of increasing hysteria as I constantly failed to get into the system.  Now it must be admitted that if I had been just a little more pro-active I might have achieved more – but I would have enjoyed my weekend less!

So with colleagues on each hand and elbow I was guided through the mysteries of data input in about eight minutes.  My hapless colleagues have spent some four hours being “instructed” on the various delights of the system and if the essentials can be conveyed in such a short time it does make one wonder about the usefulness of the instruction and the eating into the spare time of colleagues.  But that was them, this was me and eight minutes seemed to be pushing the limit of my interest.

Hysteria eventually gave way to normal chaos and the work that I had to do was done.  I also typed out some comments to go with the results and I sat back and saw that it was good.  I photocopied the sheets, but them in a nice folder and planned the next step of my campaign.

Which was simply to leave before the meeting started.

Tomorrow my absence will be put down to, “Well, that was Stephen and we all know that he doesn’t like these meetings and he did take the place of that teacher who left us in the lurch so what can we say?” or “Who the hell does he think he is!”  I am easy with either as long as I don’t have to go to the meetings.  I can take opprobrium, but not two hours of mind-rotting tedium.  Or indeed four hours counting tomorrow.  Or six counting Thursday.  You wouldn’t believe it unless you see it!

So, anyway, I didn’t go.  And I am looking forward to the morrow to see the reaction of my colleagues.  I did say, “See you tomorrow!” to one as he disappeared down stairs to go to the last lesson of the day, and he didn’t bat an eyelid.  We will see.

The school is going through a cataclysm in which the classes of regimented learners have been cut loose and are indulging in an orgy of project-based learning.  The kids always respond well to this way of learning and it is hard not to see the obvious questions that should then be asked about the way that the school teaches normally – but let it pass, let it pass!

There are four more teaching days to the end of term and we are all counting.

I have just listened to Spem in Alium, and delicious it was too, it is quite late and so I couldn’t play it as loudly as I would have liked but it was loud enough, and the recording is clear enough for the layers of music to enfold the listener.  It sometimes seems almost indecent that I can have music like this at the click of a button and that I can choose from something like 600 albums of music in my library.  So far!  And those albums are not taking up 10% of the storage space available on my computer!  I still find that breathtakingly amazing.  Not surprising for someone whose first computer had a memory of 28K!

Before the end of the week The Revision must start.  And I am sure that everyone who has been too tired to post thoughts on the subject related threads on the Internet, will flock back to voice their fears about what The Examination will hold in store!

Although I am quite jocose about the even on the 22^nd April, I am sure that even my equipoise will be somewhat shaky by the actual date, when I am waiting outside a room in the British Council clutching my brace of blue disposable fountain pens and a highlighter!  Though I also have to admit that a masochistic part of me is actually looking forward to the experience!

Meanwhile an early bed to prepare myself for what incriminations and imprecations tomorrow might fling in my direction.  Who knows, sacked by Easter is a very real possibility.

Out of the way!

It is finished! 

It sounds a bit blasphemous, but I do understand the sense of completion.  The Essay has been sent off.  As usual the most annoying part was the writing of the bibliography; but I did use an idea passed on to me by Paul 1 who said that the easiest thing to do was to write the titles of the books etc. on Excel in a single cell per book and then simply ‘sort’ to get the alphabetic order so beloved of the pernickety - and copy and paste!

I will have to ask Paul how he got the lines of information to fit on an A4 page – knowing such things is the difference between serenity and mindless panic at the end of an assignment!

I am now “free” as far as TMSs are concerned until the middle of June, when the next course will have started up and enough will have been done for the first of the three TMAs to be sent in.  Though, thinking about it, that will be before the end of term – if I am still in the school.  Which looks less likely the more the “Meetings” loom large!  Long before that I will have to sit the exam for this course, of course.  Now when did I last sit an exam?

I feel that my revision will have to be a little more directed than it has been in the past and, given the way the OU approaches these first level course examinations, I will be guided pretty comprehensively towards what I need to study.  I must take heed of the help and abide by the advice!  That, in itself, is going to be difficult!

The Family has descended for lunch – but bringing with them calçots and various forms of meat that they have barbecued and served – and excellent it was too.

I am a little disturbed because the work I had to do this weekend has been done.  Not, admittedly the work that I have to complete for school and the dreaded meetings on Monday and Tuesday, but the work for the OU course has been done.  Done.  Done.  Done.  Thinking about it – when did I last do revision?  Dear god, talk about reviving old, well-lost abilities!

As long as I can get through this last week next week, then there is a holiday until the 5^th of next month.  That is a much more acceptable way of putting it because as sure as god made little fishes, we do not have the clear fortnight which is a god-given right in the UK.  Best not to think about it too closely because that way lies madness!

Having failed to find free app which allows me to watch British television, I had to listen to Radio Wales and let out various whoops and hand claps as Wales trounced England and denied them The Triple Crown and the Grand Slam and the Championship.  Sweet!

We must make the most of this excellent win against England because we know that our moments of delight are going to be tempered by bitter loss in the future and we have to have these frustratingly irritating (from the English point of view) victories to relish in memory!

And Scotland are not doing too well in their job of forcing France to accept the wooden spoon in so far as they don’t appear to have as many points as the French.  One doesn’t want to disparage our northern neighbours but the Old Alliance seems to be coming into play!

Well, Scotland may have lost but we won - and that is the important thing.

Only a long week to go!

After a gloriously sunny afternoon there was a tit for tat payment in terms of the weather when it became appreciably colder.  A casual look at the future weather forecasts were not inspiring and there is a positive indication of what can only be described as rain threatened of r a considerable part of next week.  I remain firm in the faith that Castelldefels has a micro-climate of its own and that the rains will say well away on the hills which surround us on one side, or out to sea on the other!

After some cosmetic work on The Essay last night in which I painstakingly added the specific references I can honestly say that it looks in worse condition than when I started tinkering with it!  My damning comments I wrote after reading through The Essay as teacher rather than pupil still stand; which is depressing.  But come what may, this weekend is going to see it sent off – in any one of the multitude of meanings of that phrasal verb!

My first cup of “individual” tea was a great success and my body is still reeling from its first ingestion of tea-derived caffeine for months: my eyes are wide and I am ready for anything.  The mixture I created works well, but as the quantities of each of the teas that I painstakingly put into the tea bags was approximate, each cup is going to be slightly different – as it should be.  To hell with mechanistic standardization!

I have now used up my supply of the most expensive Earl Grey Tea in the world as purchased from the most expensive tea shop in the world, staffed – if you are very unlucky – by the idiot child, who seems to have no idea of the stock that he has or the price of anything!  Yesterday he was nowhere in sight and I was therefore served with efficiency and accuracy.  Ah, if only all shopping experiences were as good!  And as often.

Meanwhile reality is beginning to rear its ugly head in terms of the electronic platform for the writing of results.  Into which I cannot get.  Which is fine by me, but I fear that the System will demand some form of electronic input and delay as much as I like, I will eventually have to put finger to key and do something.  Well, I have phoned the administrator and I now await further instructions.  More I really cannot do.

But more I have been asked to do.  I have been given a password which is a file which has to be kept on a memory stick and used each time access to the program is required!  I have never heard of this before, but . . .

After over twenty minutes trying to gain access to the program with and without files on computers and memory sticks, using passwords in every conceivable combination, with growing desperation, I finally managed to get in to the system which then confounded me with its mindless complexity.  Eventually I gave in and asked a colleague for help, only to find that only one set of my classes has been put on the system.  Stymied (a word I have been using fairly frequently this morning) again.  And finally.  Enough.  They will have to make do with a list.  And be grateful for it!

Our pupils are doing projects as part of our commitment to Project Based Learning.  Some commitment!  Some learning!  The truly sobering thought is that after the free for all of computer based time wasting I will have to pull all this together and teach a section of the pupils who are going to be as high as kites and certainly not wanting to do drama at the end of his lesson.  Ah well, at least it is a “short” day - which is getting longer by the second!

One advantage of leaving in June at the end of the academic year is that I will not have the pleasure of seeing some of these kids being a year older and more sophisticated in the way that they avoid work.  I wish my colleagues luck and they have my sympathy!

The weekend cannot come too quickly!  Or go too slowly!

The System has defeated me.  So be it.  I will give up with dignity and relief and let the powers that be in the school work out what I am supposed to do!

Let the weekend begin!

Tea's the word!

A cold start, but it has brightened up considerably and the sun is now shining satisfactorily – if frustratingly - as I am inside and the sunshine is, at it were, outside.

There was a moment of pure horror at break time when I was informed, in an insultingly casual way, that I was “down” to work with a 2ESO class last period today.  A class, I might add, that I do not teach.  As this is a “short” day you can appreciate my concern!  Luckily, with a straightforwardness that is totally refreshing, the head of department told me to ignore it.  That is the sort of authoritative advice that I like to hear!

I did nothing about The Essay last night, but I did have a siesta before dinner and I think that was more beneficial.  However, I have decided that enough is enough and today is the day when The Essay is going to be sorted out and sent off - with any luck.  I can then concentrate on revision for the exam, which is now beginning to loom large in my imagination - and in the calendar!

There are now seven teaching days left until the end of term and just to make that ending a little more exciting, the school has arranged meetings after school for three of the five last days of term!  A 60% misery rating!  And as each meeting is going to be a minimum of two hours long, that is equivalent to an extra day’s teaching.  In the last week.  Such timing!  Such consideration! 

This is going to be a real test of my disengaged way of operating in the school, because my lack of presence will be thoroughly noted in these meetings.  Whatever happens, I am sure that I can get out of one meeting and of the other two I can fail to go to the first before anyone has time to work out what I should be doing!

My problem is one that is self-imposed.  Some of the meetings that I have cut have had, buried deep within the tedium and irrelevance of the greater part of their length, one or two reasonably interesting points.  One of these pieces of information was how to enter results on the new electronic platform.

I have just asked one of my colleagues how to do this and he started asking questions to which all the answers where in the negative from me and this caused him to shake his head in a way which brought the phrase “weary resignation” to mind, and his further statement that “it would take hours” has made me decide to submit a list and hope for the best.  I cannot be doing with a complex way of doing something which should be simple, especially as this is going to be one of the only two times that I will have to face The System!

I have now managed to penetrate the system (small letters) in an attempt to get to The System (large letters) but have failed miserably.  Well, I tried and now I am more than prepared to give up.  As I said previously, I am more than prepared to fabricate some sort of list but really, without some sort of password that I assuredly have not been sent – what can I do?

Now on to more important things. 

I have come to the end of my tether with the caffeine-free tea bags that I have been ostentatiously using.  They are, I have finally had to admit, relatively tasteless.  I am going back to full strength and buying some decent tea caddies for school as well to celebrate my return to the full-strength fold.

I have been trying and failing to get DIY tea bags.  The sort I want are the herbal ones – little muslin bags with a tie-string so that I can put my own mixture in each.  I think that would be the high point of pretention in my school, so it has to be done!

A quick visit to the most expensive tea shop in the world here in Castelldefels and I now have 100 self-fill, empty tea bags.  They are not the ones I really want, but these are the ones that are readily available so they will have to do.  I have put a pinch of each of my three loose teas in each one so that I now have custom made tea bags.  As I am ever prone to WASP denial and delayed gratification I am prepared to wait until tomorrow morning in school before I try them out.

Crac or Crack or whatever it is called (the Catalan equivalent of the ubiquitous Chinese shop) provided me with two hinged lid tins so with Ty-Phoo tea bags and my homemade variety I am now fully prepared to face my long and short days in school knowing that I can be fortified by conspicuous caffeine concoctions!

And it’s almost the weekend and the last week of term!