No Work Tuesday!

 Well, it's the fifth and final day off of the Easter break so I feel I ought to post something. The Easter break has been, somewhat needless to say, fantastic. Holidays are wonderful. They almost make working something I would do for little or no money* as the contrast between a work day and a holiday really makes you appreciate any days you get off work.

I like sleeping in**. I like having breakfast and drinking morning coffee in a slow leisurely way rather than quaffing cereal and gulping caffeine as part of my frantic running-late morning routine.

Giffy and Beau came over last night and much fun was had with the food, drink and eye-toy. I was going to say that Giffy was still asleep but she came in which belies the whole still sleeping theory.

Now if I can just count on gnomes*** having snuck in overnight and having done all my marking for me, the Easter would be perfect. I'd happily give them a saucer-o-milk or Easter Egg to do my marking, if they'd proof-read my reports as well, I'd throw in a Hot Cross Bun.

* This is, of course, a complete lie.

** The cat also appreciates this and this morning curled up under the covers snuggled my back purring contently. Awww.

*** Or elves or pixies. I'm not fussy.

Yay for impending Easter Holidays!

 Only one more lesson to go and then...

FIVE DAYS OFF!!!

Hehe heh.

I have already eaten too many Easter Eggs (some other teachers gave me some plus I gobbled a couple out of the big bag I bought for my students today). I am obviously out of the habit of chocolate eating* because I'm already feeling a little of that weird half-quesy, half-hyper too much chocolate thing.

Pom Poko was extremely cute and very funny in places. I had a lot of fun seeing it last night but Matt has beaten me to it in terms of bloggage, so read his blog entry and imagine I wrote it.

Looking forward to celebrating the birthday of a Giffy tonight. A great way to commence the holiday goodness.

My class with my year 12s today was fun but strange. I booked the computer room and had a series of electronic activities and resources on Lord of the Flies available. They worked through them pretty well but some ignored the warnings about plot spoilers on some activities but there were devastated cries of "What the...?! Piggy dies!!!".

For the last five minutes I told the students they could then 'play' games or on the internet provided I thought that what they were doing was fun enough.

A bunch of boys were just googling images of their first names. I said that were too lame and made them choose to go to either Homestarrunner or I Love Egg. They went to I love egg and were (as are we all) immediately enraptured. They starting to proposing to me?! They claim they are going to bring a ring next week - I have strange students. But apparently they REALLY like the I love Egg website.

* OK, gorging would be more accurate.

By request of a Matt...

 Yay for commenty goodness. Lots of comments yesterday (OK, so 3 of them were the same comment but nonetheless I am encouraged).

Matt has requested that my next blog post be in the style of a Nigerian Spammer. I must confess to not being an expert in the genre as most of my spam seems to be US in origin and i generally do not read spam in depth. I shall, however, try.

Nigerian Spam Blog Post

Dear Reader


You limited opportunity have to access ONE MILLION UNCLAIMED BLOG POSTS! I have across many UNCLAIMED BLOG POSTS come but have not the bank account for him.


YOU can share in these ONE MILLION UNCLAIMED BLOG POSTS without to be doing nothing.


To get rich on these ONE MILLION UNCLAIMED BLOG POSTS simply email to me with your bank account details or credit card number and I will be sending you the link and instructions for how you can access the ONE MILLION BLOG POSTS.


ACT NOW before someone else steals the opportunity to claim these ONE MILLION BLOC POSTS today.

In the style of...

 Dear reader

I have decided the this blog entry will be in the style of Katherine Mansfield. I hope it shall amuse those of you familiar with her works - particularly Miss Brill and Her First Ball. Otherwise, it may just seem random and strange.

Miss Deborah or Her First Lunch

Exactly when lunch began Deborah* would have found it hard to say. Perhaps it had started back during interval when she had started eating her leftover pasta. It did not matter that the lunch bell had not sounded, nor that the clock had not yet reached the lofty hour of noon. No, she had been hungry and began her lunch all the same.

How delicately the fork had glided to her mouth, each mouthful of reheated sustenance another white-gloved partner on her dance card. Her hand had rested on the Tupperware container lightly - it had felt like the sleeve of an unknown young man’s suit.

Now she sat in the empty office of the English department, wistful at the memory of the dance. It had even panged her to see the remnants of cold pasta washed down the sink, the dashing fork closed away in the dishwasher. She would have like to kept those wisps as a keepsake, as a remembrance of her first mouthfuls of lunch.

She pulled out her dear old pig pencil-case, gave it a quick stroke as though rubbing life back into its plastic eyes.

“What has been happening to me?” said the piggy’s eyes. “Are you going to take out your red pen and start marking the year 10’s creative writing?”

Deborah laughed at the thought and playfully pinched the piggy’s pink snout.

“Little rogue!” she admonished the pencil case.

Marking? On a day like this? When out the window she could see the day was bright; the branches of the trees swayed with moving fan-like leaves, on the ground pieces of litter seemed to float through the air; and chippie wrappers seemed to chase each other in the breeze like playful birds.

How hard it was to be indifferent to these distractions like others and continue with her work!

Still the dark beady eyes of the pig pencil case stared on, regarding her, judging her. Little rogue! Yes, she really felt like that. She could have taken it off the desk and laid it on her lap and spanked it for its impertinence.

Sighing to herself, she pushed the pig behind her laptop screen so that it could not be seen any longer. She eagerly clicked on the ‘internet’ icon and smiled as quivering jets of colour and light danced across the screen.

Somewhere in the distance, she thought she heard something crying.

* 'Deborah' shall be used because Katherine Mansfield would hardly use a character called 'Debbie' I feel.

Monday... The Horror!*

 I must confess to feeling a little bit shell-shocked this morning. The weekend was very enjoyable but crazy busy, a whirlwind of runnning around (well technically driving around) and many people (and horses) were visited.

There is nothing quite like starting a new week completely exhausted. However, the exhaustion one has from being busy doing fun things is at least preferable to the lethargy induced by work-type business.

I am attempting to reduce my caffeine intake at work... we shall have to see how that goes.

I saw Massey University's Summer Shakespeare production of Twelfth Night on Saturday. Most enjoyable, a lively production. However, the chill of air after the sun went and determined sandflies reminded me of why most theatre in performed indoors. It was still a chance to visit my sister and brother-in-law, which was nice, and eat Thai food and play board games. I won won Puerto Rico (I do the happy dance of victory). Yay for the factory/harbour combo. I was beaten to the wharf goodness (it is best to have the harbour/wharf combo - then you become a shipping machine!)

* I read a bit of Edgar Allan Poe this morning (Year 12's did Tell Tale Heart as a reading log). My writing may become increasingly and overwhelmingly purple and will be shockingly and violently littered with ...'s as though they were the brutual stab wounds of punctuation on a maliciously executed, nay! murdered..., body of prose. But, you! Reader, will think me mad... And I ask inquiringly of you, could a madman... Nay, a writer dispossessed of all their mental faculties, hammer out, merciless and unceasing!, footnotes of such extraordinary length and excessive punctuation...?!