One of my students came into class on Thursday and said "are you a marine biologist?" I was like, um, no. And he said "well that's weird, because yesterday I googled your name and the first result was someone with your name who wrote a book about marine biology, and it's not like you have a common name".
I thought for a minute and then said "wait, that must be this anthology that's publishing a story I wrote about great whites". The student looked at me for a second and then said "so, you forgot you wrote a book?" I had to explain to him that I had just written one story and that the anthology wasn't published yet. He asked how I came to write a story about great whites and when I said it was a hobby he just shook his head.
That caused some interest in the class so I showed them some pictures of great whites. Now three of the students want to go on vacation with me.
Here's the link to the anthology. Oddly, if my student hadn't googled me I would have never known there was already information about the book out there.
In other news Rock & Ice turned down my gimps on rock story because they said that it "didn't have a point". I guess I could rewrite it to be an inspirational story about amputees that keep climbing despite their injuries. But, I'm not going to do that. I have too much respect for the amputees.
Saturday, August 20, 2011
Wednesday, August 17, 2011
I hope Agent Cooper is proud of me
The best manager I can think of is Agent Cooper from Twin Peaks. The guy has better people skills than I ever will, and I like his incorporation of his sixth sense in his work. Well, he was great until he was taken over by Bob.
Anyway, after an hour interview with the manager of security and then the director of security:
Director of Security: Can you confirm that the student who complained, er, had a, er, that there was a, er
Me: (no I did not check his pants) Um, ye...um, yeah, I can confirm the story is true
the offending security guard was moved off the front desk. My student was happy again (he thinks she was fired). Sure all the female admins are bitching about me. But, it keeps them from bitching about each other which is a lot more annoying. And despite major hardware problems with 10 of the 15 laptops my company provided for the class (my favorite laptop crashes every 20 minutes and I don't have a spare to replace it even though they are supposed to send 2 spares as a backup) my class is going well. Which is to say, the students aren't trying to kill me. And because of the let's just call it the "security snafu that caused my student to have an accident" we are getting breakfast and lunch brought in at the expense of my company tomorrow.
People get so excited about free food. I brought in a deli menu for people to look at so I could put in an order for lunch but everyone decided instead of individual sandwiches to get three dessert trays (which will contain, in total, 10 brownies, 30 cookies, 15 things called blondies what ever those are, 15 little cakes, 12 pastries with fruit, 30 marshmallows (????? they are strewn across the dessert tray - decoration?), and 12 "oreo crumbles" which are kind of like brownies with crushed oreos on the top and bottom with a cream cheese center). A woman from Vietnam in my class, who's finishing up her final round of ESL classes said "fuck sandwiches!" She then said she learned that from TV, not her ESL class.
I just need to survive tomorrow. I won't even go into the story about how the overhead projector mounted in the ceiling blew a bulb (literally blew, we had a power surge) this morning so on top of all the other issues I had to talk to slides and use the white board for 20 minutes while the "education coordinator" tried to find me a new projector. Two of my students took great pleasure in building a table to put the projector on since the room we're in comfortably fits only 10 people (and we're 16) and there was no place to put a non-ceiling mounted projector. They built the table out of cardboard boxes I pulled out of the trash, empty cans, some wads of white board paper and almost an entire roll of scotch tape. Sure, there was a replacement bulb for the projector but the "education coordinator" refused to give it to me since they had just replaced the bulb a few weeks ago and she thought it would be "a waste to put a new lightbulb in".
?!?!?!?!?!
I can't believe I have to teach this fucking class again, in the same building, in three weeks...
Anyway, after an hour interview with the manager of security and then the director of security:
Director of Security: Can you confirm that the student who complained, er, had a, er, that there was a, er
Me: (no I did not check his pants) Um, ye...um, yeah, I can confirm the story is true
the offending security guard was moved off the front desk. My student was happy again (he thinks she was fired). Sure all the female admins are bitching about me. But, it keeps them from bitching about each other which is a lot more annoying. And despite major hardware problems with 10 of the 15 laptops my company provided for the class (my favorite laptop crashes every 20 minutes and I don't have a spare to replace it even though they are supposed to send 2 spares as a backup) my class is going well. Which is to say, the students aren't trying to kill me. And because of the let's just call it the "security snafu that caused my student to have an accident" we are getting breakfast and lunch brought in at the expense of my company tomorrow.
People get so excited about free food. I brought in a deli menu for people to look at so I could put in an order for lunch but everyone decided instead of individual sandwiches to get three dessert trays (which will contain, in total, 10 brownies, 30 cookies, 15 things called blondies what ever those are, 15 little cakes, 12 pastries with fruit, 30 marshmallows (????? they are strewn across the dessert tray - decoration?), and 12 "oreo crumbles" which are kind of like brownies with crushed oreos on the top and bottom with a cream cheese center). A woman from Vietnam in my class, who's finishing up her final round of ESL classes said "fuck sandwiches!" She then said she learned that from TV, not her ESL class.
I just need to survive tomorrow. I won't even go into the story about how the overhead projector mounted in the ceiling blew a bulb (literally blew, we had a power surge) this morning so on top of all the other issues I had to talk to slides and use the white board for 20 minutes while the "education coordinator" tried to find me a new projector. Two of my students took great pleasure in building a table to put the projector on since the room we're in comfortably fits only 10 people (and we're 16) and there was no place to put a non-ceiling mounted projector. They built the table out of cardboard boxes I pulled out of the trash, empty cans, some wads of white board paper and almost an entire roll of scotch tape. Sure, there was a replacement bulb for the projector but the "education coordinator" refused to give it to me since they had just replaced the bulb a few weeks ago and she thought it would be "a waste to put a new lightbulb in".
?!?!?!?!?!
I can't believe I have to teach this fucking class again, in the same building, in three weeks...
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
what am I teaching - kindergarten???
This is a disturbing story. Maybe you shouldn't read it. Don't read it while you're eating.
Today I was teaching a huge class (15 students). They all had to go through building security which takes forever.
One student, who's had 2 classes with me, was at the end of the line and he had to poop. He's in his late 40s. Security wouldn't give him the combo for the bathroom til they checked him in. So, he pooped a little in his pants.
Luckily he had work out clothes in his car so he changed. No one needed to know. But he felt compelled to tell me in the hopes I might get the woman in security that wouldn't give him the code fired.
Ech. I don't get paid enough...
Today I was teaching a huge class (15 students). They all had to go through building security which takes forever.
One student, who's had 2 classes with me, was at the end of the line and he had to poop. He's in his late 40s. Security wouldn't give him the combo for the bathroom til they checked him in. So, he pooped a little in his pants.
Luckily he had work out clothes in his car so he changed. No one needed to know. But he felt compelled to tell me in the hopes I might get the woman in security that wouldn't give him the code fired.
Ech. I don't get paid enough...
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