It's a Hard Knock Life!

So, today has been interesting.

First off, I began my morning by dreaming happily of walking up to Effie, looking her dead in her empty eyes, and saying, "You are the most pathetic, incompetent, prejudiced, sorry excuse for a dodo bird it has ever been been my displeasure to meet. That's saying a lot, considering the sheer number of dolts that have crossed my path over the years." I'd smile sweetly and continue, "You should be very proud of yourself--it's quite a distinction to be such a categorical nincompoop that I'm quite certain I'll be telling stories about you for years, if not decades, to come."

Ah, dreams. They keep our sanity alive, when nothing else does.

In any case, the past three classes in Effie's World has been comprised of her splitting us up into groups, and then going over the homework questions together, then giving our answers to her yet again. I don't see how this helps us gain a clear idea of world civilizations, unless it is to offer us the perfect example of a despot. This exercise certainly doesn't do me any good, because I usually end up giving the answers for the entire group anyway.

I have gotten to know some of my classmates better, which has been nice. It's slowly even changing some of my views on jocks, despite the fact that they will probably always annoy me to a small degree. Still, I can understand their worldviews sightly better now that we're getting to know one another. Whenever we talk, though, I can tell that they view me as some sort of interesting specimen that would probably be better off in the cage of some zoo, providing the rest of the world with something interesting to study. "And here, ladies and gentlemen, is the very rare geekus nerdidium. This particular beauty is a female, meaning that she is either desperate for a date or hiding in the corner in fear. If we're very quiet, she might even favor us with a recitation of Longfellow. The male end of the species, please note, tend to prefer to give an exposition on the differences between computer companies." This theory of mine was exacerbated by the fact that I had to explain the concept of "blogging" to two softball girls today.

Sigh.

But back to the absurd group projects. So far as I can tell, Effie has us do this in order to waste time and give her a chance to grade papers. Everyone is running out patience with it--some of the softball girls even tried to walk out today when we realized that Effie intended us to do the same thing YET again. They were caught, though, by Effie's magical Lasso of Lassitude. I couldn't help but agree with the jocks. After all, we were being PUNISHED because we'd done our homework! Everyone that hadn't done their homework got to leave. Where is the justice? Rachel promptly declared that she was never doing her homework again after this. If I weren't such a chicken, I'd be tempted to join her.

When Effie divided us up into groups, though, Rachel and I were separated again. This, as you can imagine, did not please us. Dalton, however, was actually quite sweet to us both. Dalton's reputation precedes him on this blog--he was the one I, rather unkindly, verbally smashed on our first day when I got annoyed with him proclaiming to the entire class that his chest was swollen. Yes, that's him. Dalton offered to switch places with Rachel, so that we could stay together. He wasn't trying to hide from me and my acerbic mouth--he was really being a doll. Rachel and I thanked him gratefully, and then my group got started.

We were halfway through the assignment when Effie, sniffing the air suspiciously like a rat terrier, or just a regular old bubonic rat, came by our table. She pointed her bony finger accusingly at Rachel and said, "Weren't you supposed to be in another group?" Rachel said yes, but pointed out Dalton's kindness in switching places with her. Did we get extra cookies for being good little students and sharing? I beg to differ. Effie instead swelled up like a puffer fish, and said that that was unacceptable, and that Rachel should switch places with Dalton immediately. I barely, barely resisted the urge to salute and shout "Sieg Heil, Miss Brodie!"

I'll tell you this much--that table has probably never in all its life been given such an evil face as the one I gave it. I could have sworn that I saw some steam rising.

After class, Rachel, Jackie and I went to lunch and had a splendid time. I then came home, did all the laundry, straightened up the downstairs, and got some reading done before teaching two piano lessons. This meant, though, that by the time I was done teaching, I really had nothing left to do. It being such a beautiful day, I went outside and got on my bike. I've been slowly re-teaching myself (please don't quote that insipid little quote at me...I know very well that you can technically never forget, but my balance would sure be surprised to hear that) to ride my bike, but I haven't had time in the past few weeks to do any practicing. My turning skills were surpassing themselves today, though, so I boldly opened the gate and went down to the street, where, on sheer impulse, I pedaled my way around the block. Boy, I didn't know how tall some of those hills were! I was feeling inordinately proud of myself as I neared the driveway. After all, I told myself smugly, I'd gotten exercise and hadn't even fallen once!

I thought too soon. Let's just say that the driveway and I had a rather unlucky encounter, in which the driveway was the victor. I succeeded in saving myself from smashing flat on my face, but I did manage to skin my elbow and hand and twist my left wrist and ankle a bit. I looked around quickly, hoping that no one had witnessed this shameful failure of equilibrium on my part. Thankfully, there was only an old lady in her car just then turning on the street, so she probably missed most of my pratfall performance. I picked myself off the concrete, and walked the bike nonchalantly up the driveway...only to be met by Shelby, who said she'd seen two feet go flying up in the air as she'd passed by a window. She said--after she stopped laughing, of course--that she'd been concerned for my bodily condition, and so she came out to meet me.

Hrumph.

One forgets how difficult band-aids are to maneuver when one has not scraped an appendage in, oh, a decade....

Later, I was on the phone with mom when I looked out my bedroom window and saw Iris traipsing happily down the street, obviously having opened the gate with one of her impressive karate kid/sumo slams into the fence. I proceeded to rush down the stairs (as fast as I could, anyway. Bike riding had turned my legs into jelly) and then open the door, screaming down the street, "Iris, get your fat butt back here now!"

Why, oh, why did a very kind-looking, elderly gentleman have to be walking down the road that exact moment?

Whoever marries me (if/when) is going to have to have a sense of humor the size of Texas. Make that a sense of humor the size of Texas that is encased in titanium, it being more than likely that I'll either spill something on it or trip and drop it. Possibly off the side of the Grand Canyon.