no more school, no more books...

And the dirty looks, at long last, are done. For the next two months, anyhow.

Today's the day to clean up, grade, reminisce, and offer a goodbye, a hearty handshake, maybe even sign a yearbook or two. This has been a challenging schoolyear; I've had my areas of weakness pinpointed, my strengths underlined, and a few new tricks introduced. And no, I won't go into details. Suffice it to say: I'm going to miss this place for the next few weeks. I'll miss the students most of all--their foibles, their daily dramas, their brilliant ideas and insufferable inanities. And if I don't get hired back, I'll miss them even more.

Items left in my room:

playing cards (two decks, smiley-faced and rider-back)
miniature Canadian flag
Pez dispenser (Jack, of the -in-the-Box)
hand-crafted tea cup
ratty hooded sweatshirts (two)
green rubber "stress" ball
computer disks (five, varying colors, no labels)
recordable CD
gigantic papier-mache dragon

Okay, back to grading.