Desperation

Not mine, the Education Department's.
The funniest things happen when you're looking the other way.

Viz:
Friday morning I was a captioner.
Friday lunchtime I got phoned by a school principal.
Friday afternoon I was offered a job.
Monday morning I accepted it, and in four weeks time I'll be an Italian teacher again!

I didn't go looking for it, it came looking for me, and, having heard the gates of EdenTM* slam shut behind me 2.5 years ago and thinking I'd never be able to prise them open again, that seems reason enough to really find out if I'm any good at the thing I spent five years training to be.

Have been outstandingly dignified about resigning from current,
very much beloved, work family.
Only cried:
When telling the boss.
When telling Boy Captioner (whose hens night I'm still organising : )
When telling Girl Captioners (3 separate occasions).
When telling my mum that I'd told the boss, Boy Captioner, Girl captioners...

And thank you to everyone who got phoned in a panic on Friday night, Saturday morning, Saturday lunchtime... You're always so supportive of my efforts to work out who the hell I am.

* Well, a sleep-deprived, paper-cut Eden inahbited by caffeine junkies with glue stuck to the ceiling...

Stand By

I think I may just have exceeded even the most generous estimate of how much hommus you can eat before it starts having unfortunate - hopefully not life-threatening, but possibly environmentally-unsound - consequences. This is what happens, boys and girls, when you're too lazy to pack a balanced lunch and too cheap to haul arse up to the NightOwl for an elderley carcinogenic chicken tikka confection. Eugh.

Can I take my head out of the microwave now, Mum?

Well, I don't know what blows your hair back, but for me, my absolute favourite part of just starting to feel better after having behaved like a yutz would have to be when your boss, who wasn't even there for the worst part, says,

"Yeah, I was feeling really sorry for you all the way home."

Wow.

THANKS, MATE.

(Incidentally, you, none of this is even remotely your fault : )

Night Terrors

A very disturbing night for sleep last night. I go to bed at 10:30 and wake suddenly an hour later to see a large spindly spider crawling up the doona towards my head. I let go one of those strangled, voiceless yelps (considerate of my sleeping flatmate even in terror) and fling the bedclothes onto the floor. For perhaps a quarter of an hour I lie in the unmade bed covered in my dressing-gown, giving the spider time to run away (like making lots of noise when you get home to give the burglars a chance to escape), and then gingerly replace my blankets. There is, I know, an excellent chance that I am dreaming, and so I talk to myself kindly, reassuring myself that even if it IS real, the nasty arachnid is long gone and I can now rest peacefully.

Back to sleep for another hour, and then my mobile phone goes off - two text messages from my aunt in England, one of which I don't get to read because in my befuddled state I hit the button one too many times and send it spiralling off into the ether. For some bizarre reason the second one contains the text of a message I composed to a friend during the week and never sent. This confuses me. I don't like where this night is going.

I put the phone under the bed for safekeeping (I can't bear to turn it off) and go back to sleep. Another hour and I am jerked awake again - the spider is back. Blankets onto the floor in a panic again, and this time I'm not mucking around. If the spider is real I don't want to see it, so I leave the lights off and go to the linen cupboard. I take out the spare doona and another blanket and wonder if I should sleep on the couch. This, I figure, will really confuse my flatmate in the morning, so I creep back to bed, stepping carefully over the tangle of bedclothes on the floor, and wrap myself up in the new set.

Of course, when I wake this morning, there's no sign of the thing.
Still feeling vaguely anxious. Don't think imaginary noctural spiders are all that common.