What a day!

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I know I haven't really been writing much about school lately. I've been jotting things down to share, and I promise to do that soon. Unfortunately, my computer completely bit the dust, which is part of the reason I haven't been writing much. However, my darling brother bought me a new laptop last night, so I hope to be back on track soon. (He owes me some money, and as luck would have it, he won a $1,000 in some raffle last week. He decided that he would split it 50/50 with me, since he also has been shopping for a laptop for himself, and took it upon himself to go computer shopping for us. He's a hell of a guy, right?) I have no idea what kind of computer he bought, or any details about it. I probably won't even get it from him for several days, and I'll probably have to drive out to his place to get it. I'm not really that excited about it yet, but I'm sure once I get it, I'll be like a kid on Christmas morning.

There was some drama at the Hell-Hole today (involving one of my TN's brothers), that brought the police there, and ended with a student and a parent being taken out in cuffs. And, surprise, surprise, one had nothing to do with the other! I'll come back later with the scary/hilarious details. but for now, Grey's Anatomy is calling my name.

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What a day...

This morning, before school started, the older sister of one of my little girls came to my room and said, "AP won't be here today because she went with her dad."

OK, she wasn't here yesterday, either. I was feeling really annoyed, especially because I just told her mom, less than a week ago at report card pick-up, that her daughter has missed far too many days of school (15 out of 36 days!!) and she MUST be here everyday. She's drastically behind in every area.

Well, a few minutes later, the mom came to my room, and proceeded to explain to me that AP's dad picked her and her siblings up on Saturday, and has yet to bring them home. WTF? She started getting upset as she told me about how she has no phone number for him, nor an address. THEN she tells me that the dad is ON PAROLE!! Seriously, WTF?! I didn't ask what for, but does it really matter? She said she talked to his mother, who said, "Now, I told him to bring those kids to school on Monday!" She said that he had been threatening to take her to court for some kind of "fathers' rights" thing, so she got scared and let the kids go with him. Now she's wishing she never had.

By now, she was getting teary eyed. I asked if she had called the police, and she said she called them this morning, and that they were on their way to the school. I put my arms around her, and tried to comfort her, but all that seemed to do was make her cry harder. I told her that chances are, being that he's on parole, he has a parole officer, and the PO must know his address and phone number. Unless of course, the guy's a total assbag, and decides to do something really stupid. Good Lord, let's hope that's not the case.

Ms. H. (my wonderful assistant) happened to be around when the police came. She told me that one of the officers was someone who comes to our school a lot and that he was an absolute jerk to the mom. He was yelling at her and telling her she was stupid for letting her kids go with this guy and not getting his phone number and address. And, the worst part is, he was doing this in the middle of the hall, with other parents, as well as staff members, standing there. What an assbag! I hate to sound like a bitch, but a woman who has children with a criminal is probably not the brightest bulb in the chandelier to begin with, so what's the point of humiliating her like that in front of other people? How 'bout you just take the information, tell her you'll do what you can, and shut the hell up? ASSBAG!

Later in the morning, I saw my friend/neighbor Mrs. J., who told me that our friend BJ passed away last night. I just pray that she has a peaceful passing. Mrs. J. said that her family was donating her brain to science, apparently so they can study the effects of Mad Cow (it's actually vCJD) on the human brain.

Maybe tonight, when you say your prayers, you can say a couple extra for AP and for BJ. Thanks.

Thanks, Former UN!

I miss my former upstairs neighbor very much, but luckily for me, she still checks in here once in a while. You must (or as the Big Cheese would say, muss) go to yesterday's post and read her comment. She made me laugh out loud, as usual! I miss you, Former UN!! BTW, I'm so happy to see you are no longer unemployed. Please fill me in via email!

So, as I was driving here to the bar this afternoon, I saw that the crack in my windshield has already started to spread. Oh, joy! Big Cheese better be ready to endure my wrath on Monday morning! Like I said, he was already gone Thursday when it happened, but I saw him Friday morning in the parking lot, and told him what happened. I asked him what the Board was going to do about it, and his answer was, "I have no idea." Shocking, right? So I told him, "You need to find out, because not ONE cent is coming out of MY pocket to fix this, and it WILL be fixed." He pretty much hid from me the rest of the day, which is even funnier because his office is across from my room. Dork! [On a side note, I called the central office before I called the police on Thursday, and after being on hold a total of 20 minutes, and being transferred no less than three times, I was basically told "Tough luck." They are not responsible for the actions of the students. If my car had been damaged by CPS property, they would fix it. I reassured them my car was parked on CPS property, but they said that's not enough. So, maybe if those little shits had thrown, say, a desk from their classroom at my windshield, THEN the board would pay for it to be replaced. See how that works? Good, now explain it to me!!]

My dad did call a friend of his in the business to get me an estimate, and it could be worse, I suppose. His friend said he would fix it for me at cost, which would be about $275. But, when I mentioned that I was going to try and get school to pay for it, he said they'd have to pay full price, which made me laugh a little. A couple of women at work asked me at the end of the day what Big Cheese told me about it, and I told them "nothing." They were in agreement with me about how I shouldn't have to pay anything. They think Big Cheese should figure something out, and of course I agreed. One said that maybe he would pay for it himself. Ha! Or, that maybe he would offer to split it with me. I told them, "I don't care if y'all take up a collection for me, I'm not paying for this!" (sometimes my Englewood comes out :) )

The woman who said that is actually our security guard (and I use that term VERY loosely!) and she feels really bad, since she's the one who eventually shagged the kids out of the lot. But, she can't be everywhere at once, so I don't hold her the least bit responsible. In the morning, her post is the front of the school, not the back where the lot is. We obviously need more than one person doing security. And, no offense to Mrs. T., but someone else who isn't a middle-aged, slightly overweight woman in her sixties! She's said herself, a million times, "I ain't chasin' after no kids. Let 'em run!" God forbid a fight breaks out on the third floor, cuz she ain't goin'! I know it sounds like I'm picking on Mrs. T., but I'm really not. I really love her as a person. As a security guard, not so much. Unless a security guard is supposed to sit and do word searches all day. Then it would be my bad!

On a different subject, I finally took the plunge and assigned my babies their numbers yesterday. I tried to hold off because I figured I'd be getting a few more kids, but hell, it's three weeks in to the school year. Maybe this is it? Anyway, some of them already remember their number, which is huge for me! I use their numbers for everything!! First and foremost, it makes putting their papers and things in alphabetical order without any effort, because I just do in numerical order. Easy peasy! I have them write their numbers on everything, as well, because it helps me identify who the things belong to a lot easier. Most can write one or two digits, even if they can't write their name yet. We use our numbers for lining up, picking centers, raffles, jobs, you name it. I keep a can with numbered craft sticks in it, with the number down in the can, so I can't see it. Then I can randomly draw numbers for jobs or whatever. Then, that stick goes in the used can, so everyone gets a turn, before switching cans and starting over. I love that I can remove myself from the process completely in their eyes ("I didn't pick him, the sticks did.") even though sometimes, I will say a number that is different from what is on the stick. Yes, I know I'm a cheater, but sometimes I need a specific child for something. Naturally, because I assigned numbers, I will be getting at least one new student next week. Oh, well...

Oh, another funny/cute thing I wanted to share from my DIBELing last week. One of the boys from the other room was with me, and I could see in a matter of moments that this little one was very bright. The first page of pictures for the phoneme test has a tomato, a cub (that is a freakin' bear up in tree!) a plate (even though everyone else would call it a dish!) and a picture of a criminal in an old-fashioned black and white striped prison suit, complete with the hat, but we tell the kids it's "jail." (I can't tell you how many of them, upon being told "this picture is jail," say, "Oh, my daddy/uncle/mommy is in jail." So, so sad...) Anyway, as I was trying to give this boy the test, he wanted to just keep talking to me about the pictures, which would have been great, if I wasn't trying to administer this ridiculous test which is TIMED! So, everytime he tried to tell me something, I had to cut him off. I felt terrible. Well, the last of the 4 questions for each page requires the child to tell you what sound a certain picture begins with. For this page, the last question is, "What sound does plate start with?" He correctly told me "/p/", but then points to the picture and says "Cymbal starts with /s/" At first I was thinking "WTF?" but then I looked at the stupid drawing of the plate, and it does indeed look like a cymbal. It's even almost gold in color. What a little smarty pants!

I wish I didn't have this pounding migraine, which is now on Day 7, because the bar is empty, and I have lots of time to bore you with Hell-Hole stories, but I really need to stop looking at this computer screen because it isn't helping my head. Time for some caffeine, I think. Have a great weekend everyone!

In the first place God made idiots; that was for practice; then he made school boards. ---Mark Twain

Oo, one last thing. (Man, do I have ADD or what?) Last week, I added a ticker to this blog to count down the school year. It's at the bottom, though, so I bet none of you have even noticed it. I'm working on fitting it in somewhere else, but for now, if you're the least bit curious, scroll allllll the way down to the bottom. :)

Random-ness...

There are a bunch of things I've wanted to post, but somehow always forget once I get home. I have a couple of minutes, so I thought I'd better do it right now.

This f-ed up sign was taped to the microwave in the teachers' lounge last week. Keep in mind, it was written by our "business manager." This woman is in charge of ALL OUR MONEY!!!

Who are interested looking at this next picture need to keep reading. This is the bulletin board in our main hallway, right outside the office. It faces the front door, so it's literally the first thing you would see if you walked in our front door.

First, why the hell is attendance in quotes? Second, what the hell is the message supposed to be?! As we say in Englewood, I'm gonna juss le'it go...

This REALLY is just random stupidness. I took a picture of my "color birds" one day because it was sooo flipping humid (and hot!) that they curled up on the wall. They are usually flat.

One last thing for tonight. When I came out to leave yesterday, I was very unpleasantly surprised by this:

You can't begin to know how pissed off I am about this. Apparently there were some kids outside throwing rocks in the teacher parking lot, and this is the result. I did manage to file a police report, but nothing else has really been done about this yet. I really don't want to get my blood boiling again, so once again, I'm gonna juss le'it go!

I'm off for a much-needed, looonnnnggg awaited, Girls' Night with my sister and my brother's girlfriend. Maybe tomorrow I'll come back and actually tell you something about the babies.

Calvin: You know, Hobbes, some days even my lucky rocketship underpants don't help. ---Bill Watterson, It's a Magical World

This is for you, Smileygirl...

Here's the Readers' Digest Condensed Version about the police academy. In a nutshell, I took the test, passed (with flying colors, of course! haha!) had the background check, the psych testing, drug testing, the whole shebang. Like I said, I trained that whole summer (with two of my cousins who are cops) to do the physical part, and had it down without a problem. Best shape of my life, I tell ya! The night before I was supposed to start the academy, I made the last-minute decision to not do it because I gave in to the "Mommy guilt." My son sobbed and sobbed, asking me not to do it. His reasoning, which was quite valid for a 6 year-old, was, "If you become a police officer, I'll never see you, just like I never see Daddy!" You may recall that the CSJ was a Chicago cop. He used to work afternoons, so he didn't see his dad very much (which was just FINE with me, quite frankly!)

A funny side note about this whole thing - I made a friend of mine take the test with me just to keep me company at the "open testing." We both passed, and then did all the next steps, but I dropped out and he went on to become an officer. Until I asked him to keep me company that day, he never once thought about becoming a police officer. We women can be pretty persuasive, can't we? ;-)

I don't know if I ever mentioned that many members of my family are police officers, and subsequently, many, many of my friends are police officers. My uncle, who is a captain in the department, bugged me all the time to take the test. I always joke about how I already completed the academy at least 4 times because I helped him through it when he was there (nearly 25 years ago!) by doing ALL of his assignments, typing ALL of his papers, making his code books (as well as about 20 more for all his friends) and keeping his uniforms in order. Keep in mind that I was 16 years old at the time. Then, obviously, I helped CSJ, too. I used to hold a study group at our apartment every Sunday, and 8-12 of the people in his class would come over to study. I would read the books during the week, make notes, etc., and then hold class. That's when I started thinking about a career in the department. I decided it might be fun to teach at the academy. After my ex graduated, two of my cousins went through the academy, and naturally I helped them, as well. So, like I said, I've been through it at least 4 times!

My plan was to graduate, do my time on the streets (probably 2 years) then have my uncle use his pull to get me a job at the academy. He actually worked at the academy for a number of years before he became a captain, so I figured it wouldn't be too difficult for him to set things up for me. And, if that didn't work, I figured I would just work for him. Captains get to have their own "assistants" and drivers, who are officers, but only work for the captain. How sweet would that have been?

But, alas, I threw it all away because of my son's tears. Now I could kick myself for not just doing it, because I'd have 8 years on already. Even if I was working on the streets in the ghetto, I'd be better off than I am now, since I work in the ghetto everyday, without the comforts of a badge, vest or gun! More than likely, I'd be working some cushy desk job (don't hate, I'm just being honest!) definitely making more money, with better benefits, etc. Oh well... As my uncle keeps reminding me, it's not too late. There have been many tests given since I took the last one, and EVERY SINGLE TIME, he calls and tells me to take the test again! The age limit has been changed several times for the test, and at one point, I was too old to take it again, but now they've raised the cut-off to 40. So, if I took the test in the next 8 months, I'd still be ok. I've been seriously thinking about it lately, given how much I love my job these days. I'll keep you posted if anything develops...

And, just for the record, Smiley, they do just as extensive a background check for Chicago Public Schools as they do for the police academy!! Smart ass!