Freaky Friday

I'm sitting here, Kleenex in hand, fighting a sinus infection, on my planning period. Today has been strange... everyone is being....mysteriously well behaved. I keep waiting for a bomb to drop or a freak tornado to pop up. It's unnatural.

Yesterday, I had my first experience with a child throwing up in my classroom, reaffirming my choice to eventually teach college. I am not made to handle people who cannot control their own bodily functions... but I digress.

So many days this semester I have woken up at 5:30, an hour unseen by my eyes for 4 years now, to make a 45 minute drive to Pope Middle School where I am doing my student teaching. To be honest, when I got my assignment last semester, I was less than happy. I had done observations in middle schools before, and let's just say it wasn't my cup of tea. If there's one thing I know about myself, it's that I don't tolerate certain types of people very well. One of those types of people is "tweeners" and now I get to see 120 of them everyday. I don't remember ever being in a state where I didn't know if I was a child or an adult or whatever this age is dealing with. Not to say that I didn't - I just don't remember it, ergo, I have a very difficult time tolerating a lot of the traits kids this age possess. I understand now why people say they like babies and older teenagers. This age is miserable and hormone-ridden. Having ranted about that, there are a select few that I enjoy talking to. I am starting to warm up to them and some are warming up to me, but like most things, tolerance is taking it's dear sweet time finding me. Today has definitely been a day that is reassuring.

Because I can't readily think of some horrible mishap today (other than the kid that puked) I decided to take a page out of fellow blogger Casey Bonner's (click here for her blog) book and include a list of funny analogies taken from actual high school essays and collected by English teachers across the country for their own amusement. Some of these kids may have bright futures as humor writers. What do you think?

1. Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.

2. His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free. (this made me laugh out loud)

3. He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.

4. She grew on him like she was a colony of E. Coli, and he was room-temperature Canadian beef. (or taco bell "beef")

5. She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.

6. Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.

7. He was as tall as a six-foot, three-inch tree.

8. The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife’s infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM machine. (I want to teach this kid)

9. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn’t.

10. McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty bag filled with vegetable soup.

11. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you’re on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30. (This is obviously from an essay by Rainman)

12. Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.

13. The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease. (who does this?)

14. Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.

15. They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan’s teeth.

16. John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.

17. He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant, and she was the East River.

18. Even in his last years, Granddad had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long it had rusted shut.

19. Shots rang out, as shots are wont to do. (Stealing this at some point in my life.)

20. The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.

21. The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a while.

22. He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame, maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.

23. The ballerina rose gracefully en Pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.

24. It was an American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with power tools.

25. He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he thought he heard bells, as if she were a garbage truck backing up.


Happy, albeit freaky, Friday,
Erin