Awww...

I just rescued this kitten from the second-floor awning in my building. Not in the way i'd have hoped to though. The intention was to use a ladder to climb onto the awning (about three metres high), pick the kitten up, and bring it down to safety. Instead, once i got onto the awning, it decided that leaping off the ledge, something that it had hesitated to do in the four or so hours since i first found it there, was still preferable to ending up in my clutches. So off it went. Hope it was light enough to not cause itself any harm by doing so...

time to spare

Things have suddenly become a whole lot slacker ever since practicum came to an end. It certainly feels so weird to have (close to) nothing to do after weeks after weeks of almost never seeing daylight out of school (ok so that's a big exaggeration).

Of course, this state of affairs is all too fleeting, and a part of me is thinking i should just sit back and enjoy it while it lasts. And it's not as if i actually have nothing to do. There still is nie to deal with, though i can still tolerate it because 1) i don't have to wake up at 5am anymore; 2) i don't have to at work for almost twelve hours every weekday anymore; 3) i don't have to wear work shirts and long pants anymore - all of these summed up in the fact that i can slack off, somewhat.

Not totally though, as there is still some token work to do. Also, not surprisingly moe/nie never fails to find new ways to unecessarily add to the number of things that eat into this precious free time. I don't care if they save us $300. I'd much rather save $6 and a good portion of my sanity and not have to trundle down there for some test. A test of my patience, that's what it is.

Other things that i want to do while i have the opportunity include buying a bike, since i realize that it's now been more than a year since my last one was stolen. Furthermore, i've been eating too much (like practically a whole cow last fri) and exercising too little lately and actually have time to do something about it for a change.

And as usual, still thinking about a (flying) holiday. Unfortunately, the H1N1 virus generally seems to have the same preferences in places to visit as i have and while i'm not too worried about catching it per se (though the chances are slim and the fatality rate is like 0.16 apparently), untimely (and methinks unnecessary) quarantines i can do without. Hmm..

imbalance

In the close-to-a-month since i last rambled here a lot has happened - excellent lesson observations, unacceptable lesson observations, lots of resetting and retyping, the death of Bingo, gaining a wee bit of street cred through being in the second-place team in the school sports day staff/parents race, getting burnt at the aforementioned sports day, taking a quick overseas trip with friends over the recent long weekend, coming back to school and having to fill that trip in an H1N1-related travel declaration.

Gah - so many things eh. Sian to type out so much. I think the reason why i've been absent from here for so long is that i finally got as close as i'll be getting during this soon-to-end (woohoo) practicum to a full teacher's workload. Which included having to forget about stoning over the weekend but instead planning lessons and marking piles upon piles of students' work [of which i've about four or so more sets which i've absolutely zero chance of returning to the class before their exam (in two days' time)]. If i'm to be honest i was quite impressed with myself (or rather, God working in me) that that much managed to be done.

But even if so much actually was done, it sure is not the brightest of signs for the years to come. While i've successfully kept to the 12-hour rule (sign out less than 12 hours after signing in), it's happened just barely a couple of times, and really the only thing keeping me from breaking that rule in the future is that they normally turn off the a/c by 6:30. The concept of a work-life balance is an illusory one, or at least on weekdays it certainly is. The scale may inched ever so slightly back over the past weekend, but it's poised to revert back sooner or later.

Of course, there is all of three days left of practicum, after which it's back to nie (which strangely enough i'm looking forward to just that little bit, if only cos even with the thrice as long travelling time and transport costs, it still will take up less of my day). And I don't care what viruses stand in my way, i'm going to find some place to take another (as long as possible) trip out of here before things get back into full swing once again. So maybe there is still some more hope in the life part of the equation...