Lost It

I lost my temper yesterday.

I mean really.  I could feel the veins throbbing on my temples, the slightly engorged and bulging eyeballs, the tightening of the chest and upper arm muscles,the throaty snarl of defiance.

But it was where and when I lost it that surprised me.
It might surprise you.

I didn't lose it when I found that some clean-minded person had wiped off all the details of the relief cover I had written on the staffroom whiteboard.

I didn't lose it when I was told, just as school was starting, that a teacher would not be available for that day, nor the rest of the week, and to find and get a relief teacher in.  In 15 minutes.

Juggling can be fun

I didn't lose it when I was told just as I was leaving to teach my first class that two teachers who were supposed to be going on a training course would no longer be going, and I had to juggle the relievers around, and phone two more, telling them that their services would not be required that day.

I didn't even lose it when I was given some relief material for a relieving teacher that didn't contain any student rolls or photos.

I didn't lose it when as I was teaching (and in the middle of quite a complex explanation on the IF function formula creation and use)  my academic Year 11 class, and I was given 3 troublesome kids from the class next door to look after and settle down.

Not naughty like these silly young ladies

Or even like this silly young thing

More like this disturbed young man

I didn't lose it when one of my previously lovely Year 11 girls referred disparagingly to the 3 "naughty" students as discards and retards; but I came close.

I didn't lose it when one of my female colleagues started gushing on and on about one of the Royal Parasites arriving in NZ, and then she started on the Royal Wedding.  I didn't lose it, but I did feel very sick.

I didn't lose it when one of my colleagues, male this time, whined to me that he couldn't get his reports to print.  I left my own work to help him out.  Then I discovered the reason he couldn't print was that he had "borrowed" another teachers logon.  He was using a school computer, on our network, with another person's logon to our network.  And he couldn't understand why "things looked different" and why he "Can't print as normal", and why when he swiped his ID card to release the printing it didn't offer him the choice of his department.  He looked like he blamed me for not "fixing" it when I explained (patiently I thought) that in Windows based computers, printing is controlled by the Operating System, and it really does matter which logon is being used.  I could tell that he really didn't believe me, and that it really wasn't his fault, and that I should have "fixed" it by now.  I might just have snarled a tiny bit at this point, and immediately felt guilty as he looked at me like a newly kicked dog.

I didn't lose it when colleagues asked me to change their computer systems so they could enter some report comments.  4 hours before the bloody deadline.

I lost it when I discovered that many of my colleagues had disregarded my instructions on how to enter their comments for their form classes.  They had typed them into the wrong text box in our system.  Doesn't sound like much, but I'll be damned if I'll give up more of my already short spare time to fix their bloody mistake. 

Very, very ANGRY

They can fix it themselves