If we are placed together when we're assigned to new mentors, he is not going to survive

*Mr K has spent the morning yawning, rubbing at his face, making congested snorting noises, and scratching at his head*

Me: "You're grosser than usual today."
*Mr K removes his overshirt, exposing a wifebeater, and flops down onto the floor, perhaps intending to do pushups. I am attacked by a waft of near-tangible colognesmell as his overshirt hits the chair beside me*

Me: "WTF"
Matt: *shrug*
*I take Kainoa's wallet, which he has left on the table near my right elbow, and dig through it. Two IDs and some cash. After a moment's thought, I start throwing dollar bills at him. He looks up, bemused, and then of course gets thrilled that I am treating him like a stripper.*

Hot Girl on Other Side of Classroom: *grinning* "Can we go upstairs? Wren is throwing money over there and it is really distracting me."
Me: "Sorry!" *Hurls Mr. K's wallet after the money, hitting him smack in the ear. He realizes it was his own money and crumples.*

*Later, in next class*

Mr. K: *Sits down next to me* "Blah blah blah blah?"
Me: "Sorry, what?"
Mr. K: "Blah blah blah blah?"
Me: "K, it's loud in here. What was that?"
Mr. K: ""Blah blah--"
Me: "I lied. I don't care."
Mr. K: ... ...
Mr. K: "YOU ARE HEINOUS."
Me: "Good word!"
Mr. K: "I have never been dissed as hard as you dissed me just then. I cannot believe I just repeated myself back to you three times!"
Me: "Never? Oh, K. You are in for a lot of emotional pain if you keep sitting next to me."
Mr K: "Dude, I sit down next to you willingly every day. I find your spot!"
Me: "Trust me, I know."

My claws are coming back

*Teacher takes a copy of a chapter and lays it about the perimeter of a room. Sciency kids cluster around and start inspecting the layout of the book*

Me: "I'll start down here if Mr. K will scoot a little."
Mr K: *runs into me with his shoulder*
Me: "I will elbow you in the kidney, so help me."
Mr K: "Make me pee blood?"
Me: "It will be a growing experience."
Mr K: "A groin experience. Pardon the pun."

*pause*
Me: "That's not a pun."
Mr K: "No! See, it's wordplay. "Elbow you in the kidney, growing experience, but it's a groin experience, too. Growing, groin? See?"
Me: "I love how you just repeated back to me everything we just said. The instant replay is amazing, but that's still not a pun."
Mr K: "Wow."
Me: "Wow?"
Mr K: "I'm not talking to you anymore." *takes a few steps away*
Me: "Finally."

Hah.

Mr. K: "Hey Wren, can you work my Thursday swing for me?"
Matt: "He has a date to go see Phantom."
Mr. K: "I am willing to trade sexual favors."
Me: *thumbs up* "Excellent. But, that seems like a bad idea if you're going on a date, K."
Mr. K: *face falls* "Oh, right. That's a good point."
Mr. K: "I'll let you know if I make it to second base."
Me: "You do that."

Very few people seem to believe me when I tell them I am going to go cry in a corner.

All right, it is time to do something I haven't done in several months (at least, as far as I can tell). I need to rant. Consider this your warning if you are one of those who reads this for the funny and not for the drama. I take no offense, since I generally write this for the funny. Drama posts are not fun to compose, believe me. But I'll do us both a favor and intersperse some pictures.

As you all know by now, my favorite rat died on Sunday. (I'm sorry, Jae, but he was.)

Not only that, but he is now in the freezer beside ST, whom we have not yet been able to find time to bury. Granted, several of us are full-time students with part-time jobs, others of us have full-time jobs and live several cities away, or were out of town for the entirety of the summer. So this isn't something born from laziness, but it still makes me feel like a terrible mom. Which means that now every time I open the freezer all I can think about is how much it still hurts that ST is dead, and how hard it was for me to hold Basil in my hands and do everything I could to keep him warm and comfortable while he died. Frame of reference, folks-- it took 45 minutes.

But time doesn't slow down, does it? None of my teachers care that I was crying too hard to do my homework that night. He was just a rat. It doesn't matter that he was the sweetest rat on the planet, or that he was still a baby, because he is a rodent, and thus too small to be worked up about.

Fuck that. He was a pet. I may not cry when one of my fish die, but I know people that have, and I have been able to understand why they were upset. I'm sick of people looking at me like I'm a freak when I tell them I'm depressed because my rat had a stroke.

But you know what? I'm an adult now, right, so life has been going on despite all this. Or would have been had I been able to sleep at all this week. Sunday night I drugged myself up on insomnia medication so that I could get up Monday and do my homework. Unfortunately, that didn't work on Monday night. Or Tuesday night. So I have had to go through my final week of observations at my middle school and my normal classes with a severely sleep-deprived, grieving brain. But last night I slept. And this morning I thought to myself "hey, the week is finally shaping up."

I was wrong. Today started out well, especially because I have new hair and treated myself to a manicure last night in the hopes that it would make me feel better. I put on my most ridiculous shirt that makes me feel like a pirate, sensible heels, and went in for my last day of observation, finally prepared to say goodbye to my students. Our teacher had a surprise for us; he let us go out with a bang. We got to teach his first two classes.

A short break here for photos of new hair and ridiculous shirt:

Because this expression and this shirt were meant for one another.
(Are you happy now, Kate? :D)

3/4 profile, with drama cranked to 11. Oh yeah. (I have a nose meant for 20s cinema.)


And the back. Rowr!

Sadly, the red highlights don't show up so well in the dark. I'll get another round of photos for you when it is sunny and I haven't been crying. A short anecdote about the shirt: I bought it because the ruffles are a) fucking awesome, and b) they cover the cleavage button-bend I tend to get in button-downs. But! It is now on the no-list, because Felipe and Terrin spent the entire hour with their eyes glued to my chest. Those ruffles have a panel behind them, but apparently they can't tell, so the shirt was promising cleavage they knew it was there somewhere. Oh well. At least they were paying attention and asking a lot of questions during group work. (-.-)

Okay. Back to DRAMA. Teaching the class was the highlight of my day. Everyone listened, everyone paid attention, we got to joke around, and I learned a great deal from them. I'd like to think that some of them are even going to miss me. I head off to class on the tailcoats of a teaching high, actually feeling relatively perky.

Then class ruined everything. The same nine students always meet four times a week to rehash the same problems over and over again, but no progress is ever made. At this point I can sit down with the topic before class, decide which points would be made by what students, guess which students will talk the most, which will get angry first, and which will bore me until my eyes cross. And I am never wrong. But today, they were doing it with a lesson plan that four science students had to think up and present together. One of us is a chemist, two of us are biologists, and the fourth one is an idiotic frat boy whom I've referred to here as Mr. K. Can you see how hard it was to 1) agree on anything, and 2) agree on their comments? FOUR TEACHERS SHOULD NOT TEACH.

To make matters worse, Mr. K decided to end the day by grabbing my face in his hands, leaning in, and licking my cheek.

He licked. My cheek. In front of the entire class.

Then the annoying girl who I caught gossiping about me in the bathroom looks over and shouts "oh my God, are you two making out?"

Yes. Now allow me to demonstrate what it looks like when my elbow makes out with his kidneys.

So I go home, intending to take care of the rats, eat a little lunch, and work on some way to improve my mood. I know! I'll finish off the chicken korma, have some tea, and work out for an hour to blow off some steam.

Cue uncle. Now, I asked for his help back in June because I knew that he would be able to find me an attorney to help represent me regarding the stupid girl who hit me and the idiotic cop who wrote me the ticket for it. I have been sending him reminder e-mails, and I assumed that he was actually working on it. To his credit, he was, but he forgot to the most important part: tell me to e-mail the attorney two weeks ago.

My court date is in four days. Unless the course of the world changes drastically over the weekend, it looks like I'm going to be representing myself. And the way I feel emotionally right now, that means I will walk up, look the judge in the eyes, and burst into tears. How convincing.

Now, I've been alive long enough and been blogging long enough to realize that my life goes in horrible circles. Everything goes right, and then everything goes wrong. I am clearly currently stuck in the downward portion of a cycle. That's fine. I know my life, and I know things are going to start going eerily right again eventually. And, had I managed to stick to my medication schedule, I would probably be strong enough emotionally to handle all the badness now. But I'm an idiot who hasn't been taking the right dosage for two weeks now.

So! If you'll excuse me, I'm going to go have a lie down.

How to end up in the dog house

Me: "Oh, did I tell you Mr. K proposed to me?"
The Boy: *aghast* "No!"
Me: "Yeah. We're supposed to get married."
The Boy: "Was he serious?"
Me: "Oh my God, of course not!"
The Boy: "Well, I mean, he is kind of an idiot."

He's lucky I decided that was funny.

Dear Celebrated Mr. K:

I despise everything you stand for. I know you're a nice guy, but you're also a dangerous guy, because you are very aware that you are also an attractive guy.

Despite that, I am willing to share a "ha, ha...harassment seminar" joke with you. Yes, you may step in a little too close and grab my arm. I grabbed yours right back. The eyes were fine. I gave you the hazy smile in return. Reaching down and stroking my cheek with the back of your hand in a slow, lecherous fashion while giving me said eyes, however, infuriated me. I know you were trying to make me blush.

I'm still giggling at how taken aback you were when I went "Dude, no!" and pulled away.

No love,
(I also considered reaching around and grabbing your ass.)

I love these people.

While at the National Science Teacher's Association convention:

*Room 204 has run out of chairs, but there is still half a lecture hall of space free. Some teachers begin sitting on the floor. Other, more enterprising individuals, invade the next room, where there is a plethora of chairs but a dearth of attendees. Soon, there is a steady stream of people looping from one room to the other, chairs in hand*

Woman with wild hair: "I feel like an ant."
Tall man: *stops cold* "You know, I was just thinking that!"
Me: "Yeah, me too."
*chorus of agreement from the crowd*
Woman with wild hair: *Laughs* "You can tell we're all science people!"
Me: "No we're not, we're leafcutter ants!"
*chorus of agreement from the crowd*
Mr K: "Wait, what's up?"

For reference, we're talking about these guys: