DeadpanAnn (old blogger version)

Thursday I went up to my classroom to get things organized, and of course I discovered that half my stuff wasn't in my new room. The biggest thing that was missing, besides the white projection screen, was one of my bookshelves. There were two in my old room, and I had put my name on both of them, but only one got moved to the new room. To make it more complicated, a new teacher had already moved into the old room. I asked around to find out if another bookshelf was going to appear in my new room at some point, and was told to go get the old one. It was supposed to be moved during the summer anyway. I didn't want to take it from the new teacher, but damn, I have hundreds of books, and those shelves were ordered specifically for English teachers. Just before I decided to reclaim my bookshelf, I noticed the new teacher (who happens to be from the same district where I taught in the Delta, by the way) walking to her room with a projection screen. I asked her where she got it, and she told me she found it in an open classroom. The classroom belongs to my academic coach, who had promised it to ME. I told her that it was the AC's stuff, and she just kind of shrugged. The AC, who was in a training session on the other end of campus, told me to get the screen back from the new teacher. When I went down to her room to claim my bookshelf and projection screen, she was gone. Well, finally not being a new teacher paid off for me, and a pal with a master key let me into her room. I ganked my bookshelf and the projection screen. The bookshelf is in my new room now, and I put the projection screen back in the AC's room. I hope she still plans to give it to me, but I thought it would be safer in her room than in mine for now. Mine is connected to another teacher's room, so people can get access to it. The AC's office has one entrance, which is locked.

The rest of Thursday and then Friday , I witnessed numerous thefts. As my fellow teachers already know, we educators are known for ganking whatever we can get our hands on when it comes to equipment and supplies, but there's a limit to how much of this is acceptable. It's one thing to pick up a doorstop; stealing a projection screen from someone's wall or walking out with an office chair is a lot different.

Today I went back up there for a few hours. The teacher who is in the room that connects to mine is kind of ghetto fabulous, if you know what I mean. I always knew she was GF, but I didn't realize to what extent, and now I'm not real thrilled about the fact that our classrooms are connected. I don't trust her. Today when I got there, she had gone through my room to get into MY neighbor's room, and was standing in the dark pulling stuff out of his desk. I have no idea what she was taking, but she was pulling out handfuls of stuff and handing them to her daughter. It's possible that some of her stuff was left in the desk from last year, so maybe it wasn't so sinister. I'll find out what that was all about Monday when the desk's current owner is there, and if he's missing something from his desk I'll rat her ghetto ass out before he gets done asking what happened. I hate a damn thief.

Speaking of thieves, AT&T is basically refusing to refund the money for the phone I bought for Tim, even though we've waited ten days and we've been back up there to return it twice. Every time we go up there, they have a different excuse. Today's excuse? "Nobody in the store has enough money in their register to give you your money back." What's really funny about this is that Tim predicted it. Then the manager wanted us to give him the phone and the receipt and take his word that a check would come in the mail. I refused. This ain't my first rodeo. I got a little louder and more irate, and he finally said he'd take all cash payments on one register for the rest of the day and call me when they had enough to refund my purchase. It's $342.39, by the way. We agreed to that, and when we left Tim called 611 to complain about us getting the run around.

Two hours later, HIS phone was suddenly possessed. It was in his pocket and closed, and it suddenly started making noises like it was dialing. When he pulled it out it kept making the noise, but nothing was appearing on the screen. He turned it off, and it turned itself back on. Then he used it to dial our house phone to make sure it was working, and it cut itself off and refused to come back on when he hit the power button. Kinda funny that this started happening right after we called AT&T to bitch, so Tim called to find out what was going on. They said the battery needs to be replaced. Riiiiiight. As soon as we get our money back on this phone, we're both canceling our service.

I'm gonna do it with style, too. I think, "BLOW GOATS, MOTHERF*CKER!!!!!" should do as a final farewell, don't you?