Daily Diatribes

Tomorrow I have a job interview. I have always known that this “back-to-school” nonsense would eventually lead to gainful employment. My husband, somewhat unreasonably, thinks that if you spend $15,000 to get a degree you should seek gainful employment upon graduation. Myself, I think I could do with another five or six years in school before I get a job. I like taking classes!!

Although I am actually not slated to graduate for another year, I have now taken enough classes to be interesting to certain people. And so, when I heard that several English teachers at the local high school would be going on maternity leave in the fall, I contacted the assistant principal and advertised my availability. She knows me, and yet despite that, she agreed to see me anyway. And suddenly I am faced with my first real interview for my first real professional job. I tend to get really nervous during interviews and blurt out classics like “that hit-list thing at my last job was a big misunderstanding….” I am praying I can control myself. Here is a list of things I hope NOT to say during the interview:

Principal: Why are you interested in this job?
Me: My parole officer refuses to pay me child support, so I need to do something to make the bills.

Principal: How will you reach the English Language Learners in your classroom?
Me: I WILL TALK REALLY LOUD AND REALLY SLOW….

Principal: What if a student attempts to push the boundaries to develop an inappropriate relationship with you?
Me: Well, naturally we will only meet for drinks after school hours. And I promise not to post any pictures of us on Facebook.

Principal: How do you feel about “Team Teaching”?
Me: Will I be teaching the football team or the baseball team? Personally, I like the wrestlers because they’re big and dumb, but I’ll teach whichever team you want me to.

Principal: How will you handle discipline in your classroom?
Me: I know public flogging has fallen out of favor these days, but the federal government is prepared to cut me a sweet deal on some used waterboards….

Principal: What if a student asked you to attend a party after school hours?
Me: Dude!! Party?? I’m SO in!!! Will there be “BROWNIES”?? Just kidding man….

Principal: How will you differentiate instruction to reach learners with IEP’s (Individualized Education Plan…or something like that!!!)
Me: Naturally I will keep a supply of crayons and coloring books on hand for those kids that ride the….ahem….short bus!!

Principal: How do you feel about group learning?
Me: About the same way I feel about group sex…the more the merrier dude!!!

Principal: What about your syllabus?
Me: Well, it’s actually in remission right now, but I have antibiotics to take if it flares up again. How did you know about that??

Principal: What if a student talks back to you? How will you handle it?
Me: I have this chokehold I saw Hulk Hogan do once and I think it will work really well. Otherwise, just well-placed smack upside the head.

Principal: How will you handle a parental complaint?
Me: I will meet be glad to meet with parents anytime. I will happily explain to them that little Johnny cannot read because he is a horny, little crackhead and if he’d spend more time reading Shakespeare and less time looking at Hustler, he wouldn’t have so much acne.

Principal: How will you handle bullying in your classroom?
Me: I will personally beat the hell out of anybody that bullies another student.

Principal: Do you have references we can call?
Me: Yes, this one is my favorite guard from the prison and this one? She was the BEST nurse on the psych unit!

Right, so hopefully none of these things will come out of my mouth. Although I really like my syllabus question; close your eyes and imagine the dawning look of horror on the interviewer’s face as the meaning sinks in. Priceless!!

This morning I was sitting here at my computer when, unbidden by me, the song “I’ve Never Been To Me” popped into my head, fully formed, begging to be sung. If only I lived in Japan, where surely there would be a karaoke bar open at 10:00 a.m. on a Sunday morning, then I would be able to share the song with the world!! If ever a song was created for karaoke, it was this one hit classic from Charlene. Charlene who was so fabulous she only need the one name and the one hit to be remembered forever!! Alas, I live in Alabama, not in the Land of the Rising Sun (is that right?) and there are no karaoke bars open for heathen women who are skipping church and to engage in the devil’s play of karaoke. Since it is the millennium, however, I did the next best thing to karaoke. I found it on YouTube.

I found a wonderful version of the original that I fondly remember playing on the radio for many, many weeks on American Top 40! Someone (probably someone from Japan based on the comments below the video in Oriental script) created a powerpoint display of wistful looking women, looking off into the distance to accompany the song as it played. And they kindly included the lyrics! Thank goodness!! Because when I was in 8th grade, which is when the song came out, I was convinced that she was a “RICH AND MENTAL” wife. That’s actually not too far off the mark. Ok, fine, so the real lyric is “regimented” but I think I can make a case for “RICH AND MENTAL”! And is the lyric REALLY “subtle whoring” because I thought the whoring was actually pretty overt! I mean, the chick gets it on with a preacher man AND a king! She gets around, know what I mean?? Please notice as you watch the stanza that contains “THE ISLE OF NIECE”….even back in the day I knew it was “NICE”, pronounced “NEECE” to rhyme with GREECE!! Definitely a non-English speaker, or at least someone who can’t spell!!

I have spent the morning dancing around the house in my pajamas, gloriously alone, belting out the lyrics at the top of my lungs. I cordially invite you to do the same!! I haven’t been to paradise or to me, but I do know how to have a good time!!

I received this today….OH NO!!! MY ACCOUNT AS BEEN LOCK!!! Who in the Hell sent this??? Pepe LePew???? I’m wondering if I should click the link and let the Nigerians have their way with me!

!! Your Account As Been lock !! Update Your Account Now !!!!!!!! Chase Bank to you (bcc) - 13 min ago More Details Add to: To Do, Calendar
Access To Your Account Is Not Fraud Protected

Dear Customer,

Your account is not yet protected from fraud and identity theft .

Please click the link below to protect your account access.

CLICK HERE TO PROTECT ACCOUNT

Thank you for banking with us.

Security Advisor
© 2009 Chase Bank .

I have nothing to say. Less than nothing. My mind is actually a Void of nothingness, devoid of anything inspirational or funny, full of absolutely NOTHING!! But I’ll try. For you, my faithful, the last handful of pilgrims who still trek through the dust of the internet, who forgo surfing porn or reading TMZ just to get to my blog, I’ll try and think of something.

Wow. That was it. There doesn’t appear to be anything else to say. I’m racking my brains for something, but it’s just not there. Gonna try and think some more. Hold on.

Hmmmm….still nothing. This is bad. Embarrassing actually. I never have nothing to say. Usually I have so much to say that people run the other direction when they see me. No one wants to hear me pontificate for hours. And yet, faced with a blank page just BEGGING to be filled with my pontifications, I find I am pontification-less. I feel so empty and ashamed. Yet strangely exhilirated. How the HELL do you spell exhililrarted???? Fine, I’m enthusiastic!! Expressive!! Emotional!! Exemplified!! Exonerated!! Forget about exhillirated.

I am reading William Faulkner right now and the first section of “The Sound and the Fury” is a ’stream of consciousness’ narrative. It worked well for him. He’s a literary giant. I bet I can do it too!! I’m good at stuff like that. I can do SOC. So here I go. Streaming. It’s like a live feed, straight from my brain on a Sunday morning. I am just going to spew for a few minutes like the BP oil well beneath the sea, polluting your minds with my oily thoughts.

Actually, reading back over this, it’s really stupid. But I’m probably going to publish it anyway. I have to publish something or I’ll lose everyone to that Pioneer Woman. Ok, fine, she can cook. I can’t cook. Her husband looks like the Marlboro Man. Mine looks like Jed Clampett….actually, I always thought Jed was hot. There’s something about the rakish angle of his hat that suggests a latent sexuality just begging to be coaxed to the surface like…well…oil. Hmmm, I sense a theme here. Isn’t this how real writers write? Just babble until a theme emerges? I’m gonna go with it.

Not much going on in my world lately. School. Kids. School. Soccer. Kids. It all kind of runs together. I do have a wart on my foot. It’s the plantar kind and I have been battling it for three months. I was going to write a post about it and call it “I Lost the Wart but Won the Battle” only I can’t get rid of the damn wart, thereby nullifying the effect of my title. The wart started out as a tiny black speck. I thought it was a splinter, so I grabbed my trusty splinter removal kit (straight pin, lighter, tweezer, peroxide and vodka) and went t work. I dug around for a good ten minutes, but never could get the splinter, leading me to think that perhaps it might not be a splinter. This was confirmed a few weeks later when a large, ugly wart erupted on the sole of my foot.

And that sucker hurts!! Thus began the cycle of home treatments. I froze it, then applied wart pads, then applied duct tape, then pumiced it, then froze it again, then more wart pads and the BASTARD WILL NOT BUDGE!!! Even my husband, who deplores every medical copay I make, said “GO TO THE DAMN DOCTOR AND GET IT TAKEN CARE OF!!” Because, rightly so, he has accused me of spending twice as much on home remedies as the copay for a licensed physician. But it’s a matter of pride. I can kill this wart. I know I can. It’s just taking a little longer than I thought it would.

Yesterday, MA and I were at the Wal-Green’s, where I toyed with buying yet ANOTHER round of wart pads (at ten dollars a box, this being box three…yep, that would’ve been a copay!!). I picked up the store brand and read the directions, to see if it was effective for Plantar Warts. It didn’t say, but it did helpfully inform me not to use the product on “warts with hair growing out of them.” This struck us as deliciously hysterical!!! Warts with HAIR!! So funny!! No disrespect to any of you readers who have a wart with hair growing out of it, but come on….WARTS WITH HAIR!! Hilarious!!! I think if you have a wart with hair it’s a lot like having a furry little pet that lives on your body and is with you all the time. Definitely, if you have a WART WITH HAIR, you should give it a name. Like June. Or Marvin. And you should ‘love it and hug it and kiss it and cuddle it’!!!!

Right. This is the sum of my existence: Wart War. Nothing else going on here. I hope you’re not sorry you stopped. I’ll try to fall down again this week. Or at least have an amusing exchange with one of my children. I promise you won’t be subjected to another SOC blog again. I promise. Although I am going to hold a seance tonight and contact William Faulkner’s literary agent to see if he thinks I might have a future with this genre. Who knows, I may make into a Norton Anthology with my riveting Wart Sequence!!