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Jul. 17th, 2008 12:50 amA man who recently divorced his wife of more than 20 years shot and killed her before killing himself in a mall fairly near where I was working at the time. All the news reports tell us that the motive has not been determined.
Let's take a look at the first part of that sentence again. Divorced after 20 years of marriage. Safe to say that they were having some relationship issues, no? Motive.
More random miniupdate stuff. New job is pretty cool (though OMG the heat! I've got to work outside recess every day after lunch, plus some days we go outside for activities for the class, plus I got volunteered to do the after-care program, where we get bitched at if we don't take them outside no matter how hellaciously hot it is--I'm spending more time outside in one day than I do for entire months usually!) in that though most of the kids are annoying as hell, you get the choice few that are really excellent. Yesterday, I spent more than an hour having a conversation with one of them about Judaism. A five year old. Seriously. Turns out he's the son of a rabbi from one of the cool liberal temples around town. And he was totally able to hold up his end of a fairly high-level conversation (read: interrogation) about temple and shul and keeping kosher and such. Of course, and then you have the one that came up to Mike (one of the other after-care people) and demanded that he show him his armpit hair, and others of that ilk. But still. There's a huge difference overall from the nose-wiping of the gym kids and the gifted kids I'm now working with. Not to say that there aren't the same number of behavioral issues (it feels like more, in fact, because I'm with them for longer and it's a consistent group that I can count on coming every day and pulling the same crap, while at the gym it was more varied), but it's a different feel because the gifted kids have different behavioral quirks.
I also like the teacher I'm working with. She treats me almost like a co-teacher more than a TA, which is really cool. I do a little bit more of the scut work (paper passing out, copying, etc.) in exchange for not having to do lesson plans which is a fine trade off for me. Though today was a bit of an exception, as she just gave me the reins on the entire orienteering activity, the beginning of which was kinda plan-y--I had to plot out a couple of courses for them (outside, fail) while she was doing another activity, and then she figured that I might as well then teach them all how to navigate it when we got to it, so I did that and then led half the kids through the two courses to make sure they got all the markers and didn't. . . run into the street or sommat. Plotting the course and taking the complete lead on the teaching were the only things that weren't really typical of what she has me do, though, as usually she's got that stuff done ahead of time/naturally does the majority of the teaching. So maybe that's pretty typical TA stuff, but I think I really feel it in her attitude towards me; there's no condescension or anything that you might expect of somebody shunting scut work off on you. Plus, her partner brought in their twins today during our break, and they're pretty darn adorable.
Things that I don't like.
- Boss keeping giving me hints about how to work with the kids. Umm, seriously. Do you think I've never been around kids before? Do you think I've never been into a classroom? I did, you know, go through school, so I've got a bit of experience knowing the tricks that teachers can use to keep kids interested/in line. Plus, my parents, just a bit of knowledge coming from being around them.
- The heat, obviously. And having to be outside.
- Not anticipating liking having to walk around the city (the class is about the history of St. Louis) on our field trip all day on my birthday.
- And this is the killer. The fact that the commute is even worse because of the hours I'm driving. It should be about a 26 minute drive, so says Googlemaps. It's only slightly more than that usually in the morning (I leave around 8), which is good. But in the evening? For example. I left at 5:20pm today. Got home at 6:15. WTF. It feels like I'm spending my entire day working when I'm only getting paid for 8 hours, simply because I'm getting so little time at home.
Finally got myself back to the gym today after two weeks of vacation, and then getting home and having injured my calves the day before whilst hiking in the mountains of Vermont, knocking me out for Sunday and Monday, and then oversleeping during a nap and waking up too late on Tuesday (though it was the residual fatigue rather than the time that really prevented me--I could have gone, though it would have been killerlate, but I just didn't have the energy). Aforementioned energy is back, though. I really feel the difference that the workout gives me. Though not perhaps a good thing when it's almost 1 am now and said energy is still more or less here.
Let's take a look at the first part of that sentence again. Divorced after 20 years of marriage. Safe to say that they were having some relationship issues, no? Motive.
More random miniupdate stuff. New job is pretty cool (though OMG the heat! I've got to work outside recess every day after lunch, plus some days we go outside for activities for the class, plus I got volunteered to do the after-care program, where we get bitched at if we don't take them outside no matter how hellaciously hot it is--I'm spending more time outside in one day than I do for entire months usually!) in that though most of the kids are annoying as hell, you get the choice few that are really excellent. Yesterday, I spent more than an hour having a conversation with one of them about Judaism. A five year old. Seriously. Turns out he's the son of a rabbi from one of the cool liberal temples around town. And he was totally able to hold up his end of a fairly high-level conversation (read: interrogation) about temple and shul and keeping kosher and such. Of course, and then you have the one that came up to Mike (one of the other after-care people) and demanded that he show him his armpit hair, and others of that ilk. But still. There's a huge difference overall from the nose-wiping of the gym kids and the gifted kids I'm now working with. Not to say that there aren't the same number of behavioral issues (it feels like more, in fact, because I'm with them for longer and it's a consistent group that I can count on coming every day and pulling the same crap, while at the gym it was more varied), but it's a different feel because the gifted kids have different behavioral quirks.
I also like the teacher I'm working with. She treats me almost like a co-teacher more than a TA, which is really cool. I do a little bit more of the scut work (paper passing out, copying, etc.) in exchange for not having to do lesson plans which is a fine trade off for me. Though today was a bit of an exception, as she just gave me the reins on the entire orienteering activity, the beginning of which was kinda plan-y--I had to plot out a couple of courses for them (outside, fail) while she was doing another activity, and then she figured that I might as well then teach them all how to navigate it when we got to it, so I did that and then led half the kids through the two courses to make sure they got all the markers and didn't. . . run into the street or sommat. Plotting the course and taking the complete lead on the teaching were the only things that weren't really typical of what she has me do, though, as usually she's got that stuff done ahead of time/naturally does the majority of the teaching. So maybe that's pretty typical TA stuff, but I think I really feel it in her attitude towards me; there's no condescension or anything that you might expect of somebody shunting scut work off on you. Plus, her partner brought in their twins today during our break, and they're pretty darn adorable.
Things that I don't like.
- Boss keeping giving me hints about how to work with the kids. Umm, seriously. Do you think I've never been around kids before? Do you think I've never been into a classroom? I did, you know, go through school, so I've got a bit of experience knowing the tricks that teachers can use to keep kids interested/in line. Plus, my parents, just a bit of knowledge coming from being around them.
- The heat, obviously. And having to be outside.
- Not anticipating liking having to walk around the city (the class is about the history of St. Louis) on our field trip all day on my birthday.
- And this is the killer. The fact that the commute is even worse because of the hours I'm driving. It should be about a 26 minute drive, so says Googlemaps. It's only slightly more than that usually in the morning (I leave around 8), which is good. But in the evening? For example. I left at 5:20pm today. Got home at 6:15. WTF. It feels like I'm spending my entire day working when I'm only getting paid for 8 hours, simply because I'm getting so little time at home.
Finally got myself back to the gym today after two weeks of vacation, and then getting home and having injured my calves the day before whilst hiking in the mountains of Vermont, knocking me out for Sunday and Monday, and then oversleeping during a nap and waking up too late on Tuesday (though it was the residual fatigue rather than the time that really prevented me--I could have gone, though it would have been killerlate, but I just didn't have the energy). Aforementioned energy is back, though. I really feel the difference that the workout gives me. Though not perhaps a good thing when it's almost 1 am now and said energy is still more or less here.
