I got a present for no reason last night, which is usually a wonderful thing. In this particular case, however, mine was a muted celebration, since the gift in question was a dead mouse (no, it was not pining for the fjords) from Heidi.
This is not the first time Heidi has generously shared her hunting trophies with me; thankfully, she only catches a mouse every 2 years, on average. This time, though, was extra special, because the mouse was stuck to the floor. I had to scrub mouse fur off my bedroom floor.
And it’s not even my birthday.

Red Letter Day

Today began a little too early, with a phone call from the school in Boucherville. I got to be the gym teacher! It’s always nice to work in sweats. I had a good day, a lot of good kids, and three of them told me I was beautiful.
Does it count as MILF status if the kids are too young to know what the F means?
I got home, made myself a nice cuppa, and went through my e-mail, which included a message from Elizabeth about a job posting she got. I read the post, decided it was something I was interested in, and sent in my CV around 3 p.m.
At 3:45, the phone rang – it was the woman doing the hiring, who wanted to meet me. Half an hour later I was in her office (please note, this means not only did I make it back across the bridge to Brossard in under 30 minutes, I also had time to change from Gym Teacher to Interviewee). She had one other candidate to talk to after I left.
She called me at 5:30 to say the job was mine.
So, starting Monday, I’ll be teaching an adult education course on the basics of Word, Excel and Powerpoint, two nights a week. Essentially, this is the same deal I almost got from the college in Ottawa, except that this one seems more likely to happen, and it’s not in freakin’ Ottawa.
Also in today’s email: an interview with a Web-based learning company to teach English, and another one with a corporate learning company to do the same. And I still had time to call and arrange a meeting with the school at which Colin will be registered. Next week, he’ll officially be part of the system.
To sweeten the already-scrumptious day, during the interview she gave me another job tip – apparently there’s an outlying French CEGEP that’s desperate for ESL teachers – and gave me names at Concordia and McGill in reference to a Certificate program in Adult Ed – in other words, I could do an abbreviated certificate, rather than the complete B.Ed., which would still make me more attractive to CEGEPs. Of course, according to my students, more attractive is not possible…
And now the hubby is on a Haagen-Daaz expedition. What more could a girl ask?

16 Days in Heaven

From the CNN web site: The space shuttle Columbia, with seven astronauts aboard, broke up as it descended over central Texas today before a planned landing at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. A Bush administration spokesman said the shuttle’s altitude — over 200,000 feet — made it “highly unlikely” that the shuttle fell victim to a terrorist act.
I find it almost as sad that CNN feels it necessary to address the terrorist connection in the second line of the lead paragraph. I remember the Challenger – in many ways, I feel that the Challenger disaster was a defining moment for my generation – and I don’t recall there being much talk of terrorist activities in connection with the disaster. In fact, I recently came across a terrifying essay on how the Challenger disaster was allowed to happen because no one wants to be the bearer of bad news; several levels of authority either hid, ignored, or spun test results that suggested the O-rings were unreliable in certain conditions, namely, the conditions of the Challenger launch.
Watching CNN this morning brought back many emotions from 1986. I guess the difference this time is that we know it can happen; in ’86, the shuttle was new and symbolic of technological advance and humanity’s progress, at least as seen through the eyes of a 16-year-old. I found it hard to be as affected this morning, especially with the “terrorist act” thing. Okay, I can see why current events would perhaps lead one to speculate, and the presence of Col. Ilan Ramon, the first Israeli astronaut, was cause enough for concern for NASA to provide extra security for the shuttle prior to launch.
Pehaps such speculation and concern is justifiable; but on one level I can’t help but feel that just the mention of it in this context is all part of the Wag the Dog scenario Bush et al are inhabiting.
Hubby made a very interesting, poignant point: the Challenger astronauts never had a chance; the Columbia crew got to have 16 days in heaven. Let’s hope that’s where they have returned, and may their souls forever soar.