141
I just
opened my mailbox and it has 141 messages in it. Ugh. Mail
is supposed to be a good thing, right? It's supposed to
make you feel loved and welcome and thought-of. Like that
cheesy chick-flick (which I happened to like, by the
way) You've Got Mail. But getting home from a
hard day's work (all right, so work wasn't so hard)
and trying to get settled, you've got to have some warning
about this overflow. I would totally buy a program which
monitored your email inbox and as soon as you logged onto
your computer (but before you opened your mail inbox),
it'd say stuff like, "You've got mail!", in a
nice, cheerful voice if you've got like five messages. If
you've got 40, it'd say, "You've got a ton of mail".
If you had 70 it'd say, "Damn, boooeeyy. You got hella
mail!". If you have over 120 it'd say, "Shit,
Jeff!! Get yo ass offa somma these goddam mailing lists!"
I was
late to school today. You're probably not shocked about
that, but I was really late this time. I'm
talking two hours. (Is that bad?) I was only going
to be a half hour late, but I missed my "#1 Late Train"
by one minute and had to wait a frickin hour for the next
one. It was Sports Test Day, so I had no classes. Sports
Test Day is exactly what it sounds like: the students are
tested for athletic ability. They don't fail or anything
if they suck, but... I think it's supposed to be some kind
of embarrasment, but no one really pays attention anymore.
If you can't throw the volleyball farther than a five year
old, "oh well", You know what I mean? It probably
meant a great deal about 20 years ago, but now it's just
an excuse not to have class. I didn't throw the volleyball
or long jump, but I did do a 100m dash (or was it a 50?
I'm terrible with distances). I raced two girls; one
I beat, the other I didn't. Damn. They were fast.
True, I hadn't actually really run in years, but
I thought I should have been able to beat them by tons.
No matter how hard I strained, I just couldn't catch up
to the one girl. After the race, though, I was able to save
a little face because I was able to give the appearance
of not panting like they were. I also discovered that the
girl who beat me was on the track and field team. Arrghh.
Cheaters!
Two
girls came to my desk and had strange requests. One wanted
to be a geisha, but in America, and wanted to know what
she had to do to accomplish this feat. I sadly told her
that I had absolutley no idea what was involved. It was
her dream, she said, but I don't think she was willing to
spend the time that she needed to become fluent in English.
To her credit, though, she is one of the people I can understand
without her actually speaking in English.
For some reason I understand 90% of her Japanese and I don't
know that much.
The other
girl wanted her socks back. Ummm... socks? Yes, socks.
Apparently, on Saturday there was a "sock raid".
All the girls with non-regulation (is that a word? or
can I say "un-regulation"?? Or is it de-regulation???
Damn, I'm losing my English)... anyway, all the girls
whose socks don't fit the dress code get rounded up like
cattle and stripped of their precious large, legwarmer-type
socks. Then they get these small, very girly-girl type wussy
socks that being forced to wear can only be punishment for
their stylistic transgressions. Their oversized socks are
then either hoarded somewhere or thrown out. Her request
was that I discreetly get her socks back without the other
teachers knowing. I had no idea where they were and told
her so. She seemed disappointed in my apparent lack of power.
She is one of the girls who thinks that there is a room
in the school with trash bags upon trash bags filled with
loose socks. There may be such a room in the school, I don't
know. I don't go poking around much, but maybe I should.
