Month: December 2012


  • The Daily News
    1   Whoops!

    2   I made the fatal mistake of being lured into a false sense of security yesterday.

    3   I somehow survived TWO meetings.

    4   Evidently, the last meetings during the Christmas season seem to be bereft of issues.

    5   Hmmmm.

    6   Both seemed to me to be relatively short and issueless.

    7    Evidently Seasons' Greetings can make their way into areas of life that are usually construed as essential. 

    8   Suddenly the people in charge of causing stress realize that THEY need a break.

    9   Well all fine and cool, I suppose.

    10  Two meetings, and I emerged relatively unscathed. 

    11   The trouble with dodging two bullets in the same day is that one gets lured into a false sense of security. 

    12  The world then stealthily moves in.

    13   Last night I had the audacity to relax and not think about things too deeply. The meetings were short and relatively unstressful. 

    14   I ate healthily and then went to bed quite early. 
    15   I put the entire world on hold. 

    16   <basketball buzzer>

    17    I enjoyed a marvelously serene sleep, and woke up to now.

    18   In my peace, the DN was already written. 

    19   In my reality, I am now awake and facing certain doom. 

    20   Yesterday was TOO good a day.

    21   We had a minimum day so as to make time for the critical meetings. 

    22   Here's a bit of advice: Never volunteer for anything. 

    23   Just kidding. 

    24    Sort of.

    25    Certain doom.

    26    Yesterday I worked a ten hour day, and that doesn't include the terror of traveling on the roads with all the idiots. 

    27   Today I will work a 14-hour day, because I am going to do a relatively simple light design for our winter concert, which I was told last night by our guitar teacher, will be lonnnnnnnng. 

    28   I don't really mind, because I have always loved school concerts.

    29   It's just the fourth in a continuum of long hours, long weeks, and extremely stressful weekends. 

    30   I simply don't have the hours.

    31   I'm writing this in haste because I had to throw up my arms last night and crash early. 

    32   But I'm awake now, for the count. 

    33   Yesterday I didn't stop. I lectured every single period, had around five seconds to ponder, and then had meetings until I went home, somehow assembled a brief shopping trip, somehow got some food down, and crashed. 

    34   I'm still standing. 

    35   I'm at the end of my rope, but dude. 

    36   I can't keep working sixty to seventy-hour weeks. 

    37   I'm staring down a Thursday filled with lectures and papers. 

    38   As we speak. 

    39   I love it. 

    40   I hate it. 

    41   That conversation took place between me and our yearbook advisor last night at yet another meeting. 

    42   We stood red-eyed and exhausted afterward, but we both insisted that we are in the greatest profession in the world. 

    43   In many ways, it is true. 

    44   It is also one of the most exhausting professions on the planet, and nobody on the planet, even other teachers, gets it. 

    45  I'm awake. 

    46  Like you, I have a thousand issues surrounding me. 

    47   I have little time to deal with them because I must commit myself to teaching.

    48   If you are a teacher, you get it. You have to engage students into learning every single day of the school year. 

    49   You can't call in sick for a hangnail. 

    50   You lose a day, you give yourself three days more of work. 

    51   You have always to be upbeat and on it. 

    52   I made the mistake yesterday of thinking I could actually relax. 

    53   I crashed early and am now facing chaos if I don't spend the early part of the day scrambling for a dynamic lesson plan. 

    54   I will succeed. 

    55   I always do. 

    56   I will survive. 

    57    But right now I am hustling. I am staring down the gun barrel of a fourteen-hour day. 

    58   I will love my life at around ten p.m. when I arrive home after the Winter Concert.

    59   That's what we do. 

    60   A cop is a cop. A lawyer is a lawyer. A gardener is a gardener. 

    61   You are you. Nobody on the planet gets what you go through each day. 

    62   And they never will. 

    63   I'm just bitching about my own world here. All apologies. 

    64   I appreciate that you give your all to your own job. 

    65   I am just exhausted. Jobs do that. All jobs do that. This includes motherhood, by the way. That just may be the toughest job on the planet. But I digress. 

    66  I have to stop now and get ready to go in. 

    67   I hope to have a great day despite all. 

    68   You have a great day too.

    69   Thank you for all you do, and I know you all do a lot. I'm just scramblin' today. Hope your day works out well. I gottago. 

    70   Peace. 

    ~H~


    www.xanga.com/bharrington

  • The Daily News
    1  Since we put the tree in the living room, my office has been dispatched to our sun room, which looks out on our back yard. The wonderful part is that the windows in two rooms now reflect the lights when the sun goes down.  I feel like I'm somehow in downtown Manhattan during the holiday rush. 
     
    2   It's a wonderful view, and I see the sky, the trees, and the clouds each day when I'm on the computer.
     
    3   The challenge begins when I get into the 1 a.m. to write this.
     
    4   I like to snooze a few hours before embarking so that I am rested and don't wind up sounding like the village idiot.
     
    5   Our sun room morphs into a sort of fish tank in the middle of the night.
     
    6   It is scary, I'm not gonna lie.
     
    7   Sidebar: <that expression!> Doesn't that mean that while I usually lie, I'm not gonna lie this time?
     
    8  I loves me some goofing on Newspeak.
     
    9  That was a cheap allusion to...
     
    10  <JAY-zuss I'm getting old.> <thought pops into head, vanishes.>
     
    11   I'm on item eleven and the wheels have already come off.


     
    12   Sun room. Fish tank. Scary. Middle-of-the night. Scary. Creepy. Scary.
     
    13   I keep waiting to see the face in the window.
     
    14   I want to pull my metaphorical blanket over my head.
     
    15   I tell my students that pulling a blanket over your head keeps you safe from everything. Hiding under the metaphorical covers will protect you from anything. 
     
    16  Stoned guys usually lift their heads and utter, "For reals?"
     
    17   Yeah dude, for reals. So if there's an earthquake, a brick chimney won't hurt you.
     
    18   Have a Darwin Award.
     
    19   For reals.
     
    20   <peeking out from under the covers.> <anybody there?>
     
    21   All clear.
     
    22   No face.
     
    23   It's creepy that people can see me but that I can't see them.
     
    24    It's dark out there.
     
    25    I'm lit up like a Vegas casino. Manhattan to Vegas in a heartbeat. 
     
    26    Ah, whatevs. At least tonight it isn't freezing.
     
    27    <looking around.>
     
    28    I read somewhere that it is impossible for our minds ever to shut up.
     
    29    That means our mind is an irritating, incessant talker, and that we do lots of listening.
     
    30    I can think of when our minds possibly shut up.
     
    31    When that real brick chimney crashes through those metaphorical covers. For reals.

     
    32    Moving on, Part the First: Is anyone else tired of the Niners' quarterback controversy?
     
    33   Bleh.
     
    34   Good challenge to have.
     
    35    "But they might not win the Super Bowl with Colin Kaepernick!"
     
    36    Dude. Horrors.
     
    37    Ninety-nine percent of the teams that play professional football are not going to the win the Super Bowl.
     
    38   Did I do that right? Is that Chicago-Manually correct?
     
    39   Thirteen three-and-outs. That's the number one thing to me. Getting the ball down the field. Period.
     
    40   With all due respect to Smith fans, converting first downs is an important skill in the game of professional football. It is safe to say that thirteen misses doesn't bode well. 
     
    41   It's more important than not making mistakes, which IS important and which the Niners have done a lot of this year.
     
    42   So I am definitely a Kaepernick guy, despite Smith's winning record. When it came down to it, his inability to convert was a major challenge, and one that he was unable to overcome at critical times last year. Fortunately we had a kicker who got great because he had about a seven-thousand reps.
     
    43  End the conversations. Worry about something relevant, like safe driving, for instance.

    44   Moving On, Part the Second: I love the hypocrite in myself sometimes, because in many ways we are all hypocrites, and frequent hypocrites. For example, I just got done talking about how tired I am of listening to that stuff about Kaepernick and Smith, but whose fault is that? First, I can change the radio station. Second, I can turn off the teevee. Third, I could stop arguing at length about it on the DN.

    45   As for safe driving, I caught myself not signaling three times yesterday when I was in quieter neighborhoods. On the freeway I am vigilant about signaling, but for some reason, when I am merging to the right on Quimby Road, I am less vigilant.

    46   Don't get me wrong. I am careful. I do use mirrors. But I caught myself not signaling in a no-traffic situation, and then heard my babbling mind scream at me, "You hypocrite! You should signal every time you intend to move over!"

    47   I even heard some talk show guy talk the other day about how he got a ticket for not having his turn-signal on when he was in a turning lane. I think talk-show hosts don't know when to push their minds' mute buttons. Anway a cop pulled him over for not signaling while he was already in a turning lane. 

    48  In a way I'm glad that cops do that. It keeps us from being unsafe idiots. I just don't want them to give me one. So I'll be more careful. I'll keep my eye out for cops. 

    49   Moving on, Part the Thoid: Yesterday I was at Fed Ex running some materials for school today when this little white car, noisy beyond its stature, zoomed past the window at around 40 mph. It disappeared in an alley behind the store at an unbelievable speed. 

    50   I take that route whenever I go to Fed Ex because I avoid the business of the parking lot. I am overly cautious because there are blind curves and trucks that use that area for loading, but in general, I avoid the mish-mash of a busy parking lot, especially early evening.  


    51   The guy came speeding back out, twice as fast now, flew past me and into the parking lot. Pure lunacy. 

    52   He was gone before I could see him. I thought about running after him and thumping on his hood.

    53   Then my incessantly yammering head had THIS to say to me: "Ninety-nine percent of the people out there can beat you up. And yes, you did the Chicago Manually correct thing, since you write out the percentage if it is at the beginning of the sentence."

    54   Pedant. 

    55   So I decided not to go out and thump the guy's car. I wouldn't have had time anyway.

    56   A bit of it is similar to teaching: better I just take a huge broom to the beach and try to rid the shores of sand.

    57    At least I would avoid the metaphorical brick chimney going through the metaphorical covers and breaking my metaphorical head.

    58   Time to leave. This head of mind will never shut up.

    59   You have a GREAT day.

    60   See you again.

    61   Peace.

    ~H~


    www.xanga.com/bharrington


  •  

    The Daily News
    1   Two students were hit by cars Friday in front of our school.

    2   Both are okay, but with broken bones and trauma to the head.

    3   One was a hit-and-run.

    4   We have over 2500 students who arrive between 7 and 8:15 in the morning every single day. 

    5   Faculty members immediately became active in thinking of ways to stop this, including getting crossing guards, PTSA volunteers, and other means of creating safety. 

    6   I'm proud that they became proactive immediately. 

    7   Cars are simply not looking for students to pop out in front of them. Each day I am a tad terrified if I'm a little late, because the students don't always use crosswalks, in general. The parents drop them off in areas with signs that clearly say no stopping. 

    8   I pray for those kids who got hit. One was the brother of one of my own students. That hurts. 

    9   Sometimes the job can give a tremendous pause. 

    10   I didn't see the emails about this until yesterday. 

    11   My prayers go out to those students and to their families. 

    12   Moving On, Part the First: Is it just me or has driving become terrifying in the past few years?

    13   I used to enjoy going for rides, but with all the texting and use of cell phones in the car, I'm finding myself really scared when I'm out on the roads. 

    14   I was particularly scared the other day when there were flood warnings. 

    15   The roads were pretty slick. I listened to KGO for traffic reports and it seemed that there was some sort of accident every five minutes. 

    16   Scary stuff. Big rigs going over. People spinning out. People changing lanes without signaling or looking. It's really frightening.

    17   Moving on, Part the Second: I don't know about any of you, but has this been an exhausting couple of months?

    18   It seemed that October took about twelve years off my life. 

    19   Long stretch. 

    20   November flew by in an instant. 

    21   How can  the same basic amount of days and hours seem so dramatically different?

     


    22


    23   It has a lot to do with the holidays too. I do like them so.

    24   Even yesterday felt like a holiday. 

    25   I got outta school and home within a half hour. I then threw a blanket over me and put on old movies. 

    26   I decided to take a break from all the stress of work and everything else. I caught up with all my grading, which is a minor miracle. I watched the original 1924 version of Captain January, with Baby Peggy as the Cap'n. Awesome silent.

    27   Keeping up on the grading won't last, but I did enjoy taking a little time for myself. 

    28   December is already flying by. 

    29   I don't mind one bit. 

    30   I keep putting Christmas stuff out there. It's fun. My daughter Nicoley bought some candy cane lights that are really fun. 

    31   I even took a day off decorating, but that has been nice therapy, the entire Christmas thing. 

    32   I even got politically incorrect and played some Christmas carols while my students did some desk work, which I will be grading tonight. 

    33  I know we're technically not supposed to do that, but it just felt nice. I realize that some people are not into Christmas at all, and I do respect different beliefs. 

    34   But come on. 

    35   Tell that to the stores. 

    36   It's been a rather difficult year for me. I have spent many weekends visiting people in hospitals, and doing lots of praying. 

    37   I used to be a Christmas scrooge. 

    38   I have turned that one around a bit and have seen that I have blessings everywhere around me. 

    39   I am also wise beyond my years. 

    40   Not bad for an Old Brown Shoe. 

    41   I worry. 

    42   I worry about everything these days. 

    43   I also appreciate everything much more than I used to. 

    44   And I am thankful that I have so many beautiful people in my life. 

    45   I take nothing for granted anymore. 

    46   And I enjoy aging. 

    47    Thank you all for being in my life. 

    48    I love you all, everything. 

    49    Okay, I'm getting too sentimental. And that's a bit too ridiculous for me.

    50    I think it's about time to say bye bye.

    51    I hope you all have a wonderful day, and that you stay safe. 

    52    See you again. 

    53    Peace. 

    ~H~



    www.xanga.com/bharrington



    Baby Peggy in the 1924 classic
     Captain January.


  • The Daily News
    1   Okay, so it's five a.m. and I've no coffee. 

    2   I awakened to realizing I had not written this.

    3   I must needs have some coffee.

    4   My entire weekend was taken from me.

    5   And now I must needs go into a classroom for six or seven or eight hours. 

    6   I must avoid what I delicately refer to as "scramblers."

    7   They are the ones who wish to steal one's time with things that are important to themselves.

    8   They are massive and many, and they take away your life.

    9   I already have enough of my own life taken away.

    10  Sound familiar?

    11  Yesterday morning awakened at five a.m. and finished grading all my papers and planning all my week's lessons. Yes, I was in the five a.m. so that I could have somewhat of a life.

    12  The second I finished, a news flash hit the teevee telling me that there was a definite threat of flooding about two scissors' steps from my living room. 

    13   I have been through a real evacuation just once in my life, but had to plead with family to leave.

    14   Of course I looked like an alarmist, but when I finally got everyone into the car and drove down the threatened highway, I got us all safely home. It was on a New Year's Day, and  it was ridiculous trying to convince people that when the teevee tells you to evacuate, that you should do so.

    15   We did get home safely, and later that evening the news showed film of flooding in the very area in which we drove. It had film of cows standing atop barns, and areas that looked normal with rivers covering front doors.

    16   When the Emergency Broadcast System tells you to evacuate, it doesn't mean somebody else. 

    17   Yes, you might look stupid evacuating, but you also save your family and pets. 

    18   Yesterday was scary to me. 

    19   I'm sorry. 

    20   I'm still scared. 

    21   I packed all the stuff I would need to survive and wound up going to a church up in the hills. I couldn't care less about the Niners or their idiotic game against the Rams. 

    22   I realized how few things I really cared about. All I cared about was my family, my pets, and blankets and water. 

    23   And I thought enough to warn people on Facebook. 

    24   Fortunately, the rains lightened and all turned out okay.

    25   I sort of gave an "all clear" on Facebook, but was astounded at how many people remained in denial. 

    26   I wound up watching some extremely bad football and decorating for Christmas. It was swell, and my house looks lovely, and not at all flooded.

    27   I naturally went to sleep early, and subsequently found myself up early and writing this in the freezing cold of the morning. 

    28   The computer naturally decided it would screw around and change font sizes and other things. 

    29   Good old computers. 

    30   So my fingers are frozen, the room decidedly different for decorations, and I am up for the day. 

    31   I'm glad that I am frozen and in a decorated room, and not in slosh. 

    32   I could have spent the night in that church.

    33   Thank God for tomfoolery and inaccurate reporting. 

    34   Life is normal, and that is good. 

    35   I guess we sort of ducked the storm. 

    36   I'm safe.

    37   My family is safe.

    38   My pets are safe.

    39   My Facebook peeps are safe. 

    40   Dude.

    41   Next time listen.

    42   See you again.

    43   Stay safe, and stop living in a dream world.

    44  Peace.

    ~H~



    www.xanga.com/bharrington











bharrington

Recent Posts

Recent Comments

Categories