April 2, 2022

 I thought perhaps it was time for a new header photo, so I turned and took a picture of Murphy stretched out, upside down on the bed beside me. 

What have I been up to? Yesterday I finished my sixth day of supply teaching in a row. I was filling in for a sweet previous co-worker who was away for six days, so I worked Friday to Friday in her grade 4/5 class. 

I am completely wiped. I was going to do a blog post on the destruction of innocence where I was going to bemoan the need of cell phones for ten-year-olds, sexualization of young girls with their midriff baring tops, and complete and utter lack of respect toward adults. I was going to write about entitlement and the need to always question and negotiate. I was going to write about the lack of wanting to please, or take pride or even be present. 

I realized that that would only be focusing on some of the students, but I would be leaving out the good ones, the sweet ones, the funny ones, the ones who are self-conscious or shy or kind or confident. Those kids still exist, but honestly are becoming the minority. None of the previous issues mentioned is any fault of the regular teacher. This group has always been like this. I know, I've seen them go through the grades over the past six years or so (kindergarten and up).

My messages to the world would be these: Parents, please stop dragging your children into your adult problems.   Parents, please be their parents and not their friends.    And finally, parents, "no" is a perfectly acceptable answer and you do not have to cave after any amount of sulking or whining or temper tantrums.

On a completely different note, if you ever notice the unmistakable and ever growing smell of decomposing mouse in your house and it is in an area where you have a chest freezer, there is a good possibility that a mouse has crawled into the recess at the back of the freezer where the motor is housed and where there is a small vent at the side and you will need to use a long grabber tool to extract said mouse whilst trying hard not to gag on the stench and at the same time cursing putting in a cat flap. Just saying.

Because one must discuss weather, we have had everything from warm sun, to dangerously high winds, to snow flurries, to diagonal rain, to freezing rain in the past week. Half expected to wake up to either hail or a double rainbow this morning.

Finally, this weekend I do not have lofty goals. I will change out the chicken water (still using their heated water bucket just in case), I will read, and I really have a hankering for fish and chips because Joanne wrote about eating it in her blog and that planted the idea in my head. I will add to this if this happens this weekend.