27 Feb

I just set a new high score in Snake. I also found the fault in the
game. It only goes to level 25 so I just repeated level 25 about 15
times before I finally died. The distraction was a bunch of kids
finished their dinner and came in the library to watch over my
shoulder. I didn't say anything because they weren't hurting anything
until one knocked over the white board, another went to try to mess up
the freshly alphabetized fiction section and another smelled so bad I
could barely stay in my seat. I really thought I would be used to it
by now, but almost every day a kid stands next to me that smells so
bad I have to turn away. Its only the younger ones but wow.

Today I witnessed blatant corporal punishment for the first time. I'm
not going to go into the details of what happened, but needless to say
it was awkward. I was standing outside the classrooms talking to
another teacher with an entire class queued up outside a locked
teacherless room right beside us. A couple girls were messing around
in another classroom and they got more than a tongue lashing. The
hardest thing about the situation was that it happened so fast that I
was mostly in shock, yet trying not to let it show on my face in front
of the teacher and the queued class. The odd thing was that about an
hour later the teacher was explaining why what he did was ok to me and
the father of one of the girls, who is also a teacher at the school.

That was the strangest event of the day, but the whole day had a weird
feel to it. There were several kids not back from the out weekend and
some that were back had brought their parents because they were in
trouble with the school. Nothing felt right today.

Last week passed very quickly and had several high points. On Monday I
found sweet corn while I was grocery shopping so I enjoyed hamburgers
and corn on the cob. I also cooked up some brownies because I didn't
have any oats to make some oatmeal raisin cookies. When I didn't think
I was going to get a hike back home last weekend I started reading The
Color Purple, so I borrowed it and read it during last week as well. I
enjoyed the book, but am cautious to recommend it too widely. It was a
Pulitzer prize winner and made into a movie by Spielberg though. The
title comes up in the dialog several times. The most memorable goes
something like, "I think God gets pissed when you're walking in a
field somewhere and pass the color purple and don't notice." Its an
interesting novel that addresses sexism, racism, colonialism, religion
and other isms that I'm not remembering right now. I appreciated how
the book lambasted racism while it cast the problem as a human one,
not just a white/black issue. Nettie faces discrimination from whites
in America and from blacks in Africa. The Color Purple isn't for
everybody, but it will make you think. Maybe its not for everybody
because it will make you think.

I have to retract some of my previous statements about the impressive
performances on the track. The kid that ran the 1500 in 5:00 in the
under 13 ran again this weekend, 4:54 in the under 15 division. Still
pretty good but the same. The best from the track meet the last two
weekends will run this coming weekend in the regional meet. It is held
in the biggest town in the region which boasts a cinder track. I spoke
with the zonal sports coordinator and he told me the third tartan
track in the country is under construction right now, but none are
close to us. Its probably better though, considering the kids are used
to barefoot on sand, I can't imagine running a 3000 barefoot on a
tartan track and I don't know if there are any decent shoes for them
to wear. My school will be well represented at the regional meet. Our
boys turned in several quality performances the most notable I think
was a 56 second 400 in under 17 and a 2:22 800 meter in under 15. I
didn't see the times on most of the other races though because I was
in charge of discus. It was fun to run off an event. Unfortunately,
half the kids have decent set throw but without a cage no one even
attempts to teach the kids to spin. Maybe next year I'll work with the
field events more. We already dominate on the track.