A Big Day

This past Tuesday was a Big Day. Let's recap:

I started the day by chairing my first ever Professional Development/ School Improvement Plan Committee meeting. I've been a member of this committee for several years now, and the chairs are always teachers, and always men (at least since I've done it) and, always men who aspire to be a principal so none of them are actually around anymore. Last year, when yet another man took a job as an administrator and left us without a chair I marched myself into my Principal's office and let him know that it was time for a woman to take charge. A woman who is going to stick around for a few years and can keep some consistency going on the committee. Of course he agreed (mostly because no one else wanted to do it) and I became the new chair. Tuesday was our first meeting, and, if I do say so myself, it went really well. Thank you. Thank you very much.

The day continued pretty normally, except for the fact that I left an hour and a half early to head to my doctor's appointment. Note: when a doctor tells you a test is no big deal, don't believe him. My doctor claimed the HSG test would be a simple procedure, ten minutes tops, just a little cramping....folks, it HURT LIKE HELL. The kind of hurt that makes you get all hot and sweaty and feel like you are going to vomit. Anyway. The best part was, as I was laying there, half naked, exposed with tubes sticking out of me, sweating and trying to NOT be a baby, two men stroll in, stick their faces in mine and introduce themselves. Hi there. Sorry I can't shake your hand right now, I'm kinda hurting and concentrating on not puking and oh yeah, NAKED from the waist down. Never fear, they were the radiologists, and they were supposed to be there. The test ended, I sipped a cup of tea with my mother in law afterwards and then drove back to school. Because my day wasn't over.
(Wait, you want to know the test results? Well....they of course are not in officially, but at first glance everything looked OK. There was spillage, which means my tubes are open, but they also think they saw "adhesions" near the end of my tubes. My doctor should be calling soon to confirm, and tell me next steps which might involve some sort of laproscopic procedure.)

So, back to my day.....I drove back to school, threw up my schedule, passed out morning work, organized my desk, grabbed the homework and dashed out the door to shovel some food into my mouth before my first administrative class.
That's right, school has started. And oh boy, has it ever. Class runs from 7-10 on Tuesday nights (although the professor promised us she'd get us out by 9:30). The first class was what you'd expect- introductions, get to know you work, syllabus etc. She made us do math, but I guess I can't complain since it is a course on Assessment and Evaluation of Data. I was doing OK until she handed out the syllabus. That's when I started giggling. The kind of crazy, half-sleep-deprived-half-maniacal laugh that you can't stop? Yeah, that one. She is going to make us Work. To give you an idea: our first homework assignment is to read six chapters, complete a few 2-3 minute oral presentations on talking points she assigned and fill out a project proposal for the work that comprises most of our grade. The best part about this portion of my day is that I went and chatted with her because the second class (next week) falls on the same day as Open House. Now, I don't like to miss class, so I was already nervous about talking to her, but I felt reassured when she mentioned that if we can't come to class we should let her know, and she even mentioned Open House as a reason to miss class. So, I'm chatting with her and I let her know that I have Open House next week. She asks me when, I tell her 7, and then she says "OK, you can come to the earlier class that day. It runs from 4-7." Wait, what??? Yup. She's not excusing me. That means this Tuesday I have to teach a full day, run to class then run back to school to present to twenty four sets of parents. And then, (yes it gets better) she gives me EXTRA homework because the earlier class has so many people that there weren't enough oral talking points to go around, so she passed out articles to read and orally present on. So, lucky me, gets to read two articles in addition to all of the other work. It's a good thing I like being a student.

My day ended with a drive home and a fight with the online system of my new grad school. Forty five minutes later, I finally get into the system, see all of the course materials I need to and crawl tiredly into bed, with a full mind and a tired, slightly sore, body.