I'm not sure if I ever told you this, as it seemed a vague prediction at the time, and the time was months and months ago. Background: Betty & I were hired to replace two well-loved English teachers who we'll call Soup A & Soup B. Soup A was working toward higher degrees as he taught, and once he graduated he moved on. That same spring, Soup B got a job at a private school and took off for richer pastures...hence the need for Betty & myself. The vague prediction had to do with my course assignments for this year; Theresa had postulated that my relative abundance of low-level courses represented the new department head Grace's desire to see Soup B (who got along famously with low-level kids) replace me when I went on maternity leave. This idea filled me with resentment - why did I have to suffer through 10 weeks just so they could play with their old buddy?

A few days ago Grace wandered into the office, upset that the principal had decided authoritatively not to hire Soup B for my mat leave. I felt bad about this (I really don't know why) and on Thursday I suggested that Grace simply stall until the administration had no choice but to hire Soup B. A passing teacher heard this and was incredulous. "Did you hear how he lost his job?" he said.

(Now what follows is telling tales out of school (literally in this case). I rationalize it with the following excuse: if you know Soup B's real identity from the story, then you probably can identify me and I'll have bigger problems than telling unflattering stories about Soup B. I think.)

We were told that Soup B had spent his entire year in the private school goofing off, and when exam time came, he'd taken the one set by his course partner and given it to the students to use as a study aid. As this was a private school, word got out pretty quickly, and not only was Soup B fired ignominiously, but the principal called our principal to rang her out for endorsing Soup B in the first place. So our principal naturally wants no truck with Soup B.

Then Samuel started telling stories of Soup B's past performances at Hogsboro High. Apparently his laziness was legendary, but everyone in the English department had just assumed that this was his way of rebelling against C. Thomas Flood & the administration. Samuel had naïvely thought that Soup B, newly employed in the same private school his own children attend, was finally ready to really start teaching. Turns out not.

As awful as it sounds, I'm a little relieved. Do you know how hard it is to teach low-level students - who already have a grudge against you for making them do anything at all - when you're sandwiched between a beloved teacher? I mean, no wonder they loved him, but this is most likely why I failed 1/3 of my class last year: they expected Soup B's mediocrity and got, well, my slightly more hard-assed mediocrity.

Got my hair cut today. I'm back to pixie length, just in time for a family wedding shower! It's unsettling to have so little hair after almost two months of my weird floppy "short" haircut. Curse you, stupid non-compliant hairdresser! You've screwed up my perception of my head forever!