Am Getting Irritated

There are things you can put on your Facebook status, and then there are things that you can not.  This blog is one of those things.

I realize that everyone needs to bitch on occasion, and I realize that I do that from time to time.  What I can not understand is the desire that nothing is ever good enough or that everything must be suited to you.  Little pisses me off more.  Perhaps I am finally hitting my mark on these points because of recent events, crap of recent and old, or it is just life and my personality. Yet, I have the following to make note of here.

I am fully aware that living up north for eight years has given me a skewed sense of winter.  I also know that living in Fort Wayne, Indiana (or Fort Rain, Windyana--as a friend's Mom noted it) for three years of my teens made me slightly indifferent to mass snow and rain.  I have a slew of other states and weather conditions I could make note of haired weather conditions, but those should suffice for this point.  Hence, I think of snow and rain differently.  I don't see an impending snowstorm as a reason to go buy three months worth of groceries.  I generally keep a reasonable amount of groceries around, and I certainly won't starve if locked in my place for a week or more.  I might run out of most things, and I might get tired of every food I have on hand . . . but I won't go hungry.  The average American is the same.  Seriously.  I might go pick up a few extra things, or more often than not, make the usual trip I would make to the market.  Though, when snow storms appear eggs and bread are always sold out.  I can't drink milk, so I never have a problem getting a container of soy if I so desire.  Fresh produce . . . yea, when snow storms come that section is always still abundant.  None-the-less, my point is I will never understand why people must run to the store and buy it out lock, stock, and barrel.  More so, this past week I had to run into town for things like tampons and Tylenol.  I am still horrified at the store.  Even though I despise Wal-Mart, I currently have CVS, Food Lion, Rite Aid, or Wal-Mart in the small town I reside.  I opted for Wallyworld as I knew Food Lion would be a zoo, and the selection is there leaves a lot to be desired.  Wallyworld wasn't much better.  The benefit of Wallworld is that most of the crazinees/crazies remained quarantined to the grocery section.  My meander to the tampon isle, picking up of two Naked Baby Angel Day items for the 'rents, and some Benefiber wasn't so bad.  Well, that is until you count the check-out line.   I got to use the quick check out because I had far less than fifteen items, but all around me lines twisted through the front of the store with people carrying on about the snow about to fall.  Seriously, the forecast for this neck of Dixie said ours would be minimal.  It was, as always.  This pocket of Virginia gets maybe three to five snowfalls a year, and those white shrouds never last more than two days and a few inches.  In December almost eighteen inches fell, and it was gone in three days.  Roads were drivable within twenty-four hours. 

So . . . why the need to freak out?  Even had we been blessed with the blizzard of NOVA, and the multi-feet of snow it has, we would only be housebound for a week or so.  Two carts of groceries . . . not needed, particularly when several shoppers specifically said they had just gone shopping but were "stocking up" for the storm.  Wanna know what they were stocking up with? Crap like Doritos, dip, salsa, frozen pizzas out the kazoo, soda, and other delights along those lines.  Now, if you've ever had a question as to what is causing the rise of obesity in America I have the answer to one branch of the issue.  Stocking up for snow storms with that crap is one way to add on a few pounds every winter.  Now that I have that off my chest, let me get to my real gripe of the moment.

Snow is part of life, and it is a part of every winter.  In some locales, like areas where snow rarely makes a long or heavy presence, school systems take a stronger side of caution when forecasts predict it.  What is irking me, as of late, is that parents (by the bus loads) are complaining that their kids have been out of school for too long.  Well, that may or may not be true, but then they are complaining about upcoming make-up days.  Some schools have already told their students that they will be in school on Monday, President's Day.  Today, when someone I know, proceeded to complain about it it took every ounce of my bitterly cold soul to not tell her to shut her pie hole.  Seriously, first you complain because your kids have been home too much/too long and now you moan because the school is taking a day.  Please, save me your drama.  More so, I lived amidst some of the most glorified suburbanites--i.e. Long Island--and you aren't holding a candle to some of the helicopter mothers I encountered.  Not to mention, the double-edged complaining is just lame.   

On the same note of school closing, stands the all too often heard wails of someone who now wants teachers to put the work online so parents can have their kids keep up with the studies during winter closings.  She justifies this remark by saying that internet is easily accessible, on mobile phones, and free at the library.  Um . . . if the roads are too dangerous for school buses then you shouldn't be going into the library.  The library computers are often crowded and have long wait times, and not everyone has access to the internet at home.  Many libraries are closed when schools are out for weather.  Yea, yea . . . the library has it.  Not everyone can get there, and not everyone has the luxury of having an hour or two to tote children there.  I won't even bother going into a diatribe on income levels, what the "average" American really makes (it isn't fifty plus thousand a year), and differing dynamics of each home.  What I will say is when forty percent of a locale is still in partially cleared roads then school should be postponed.  Not to mention, online learning lacks the human contact and interaction that individuals need to add dimension to instruction and life. Rarely will life be scheduled to your every command, so learn to compromise. 

Then . . . Facebook updated its homepage recently.  From what I have seen, every. single. time. Facebook does this slews of people complain.  Rather than giving the system a few days to work out possible kinks or playing with the new features to see improvements being made, folks spend their time bitching about it.  Seriously folks why don't you try clicking on the links, reading the help section, and--oh, I don't know--seeing different ways to use it.  Someone today said the new set up is like Office 2007.  Again, I like Office 2007.  The biggest difference? Office 2007 makes you turn on the features you want; things like spell check, grammar check, tables, etc. have to be put on your toolbar.  All of these features are in the software, but Office listened to feedback and let us use what we want and not add what we don't.  I will admit that the first time I used it I didn't know I had to turn on spell check, and I sent a one page document to someone without spell being checked.  Kind of embarrassing, but other than that . . . I have no problems with it.  Charts, images, and massive documents work just fine.  Book manuscripts work just fine.  See what I am getting at? I took an hour or so one day to see what had changed.  Now, with Facebook . . . either take an hour or so to learn it or just play with it when you log on.  I really haven't notice a huge change this time, and I just don't see why people are getting their undies into an uproar over it.  I really am tired of seeing the "I hate the new Facebook" status messages, and I am really irked at seeing another invite to a group to remove the new layout.  Please.  Hence, just take some time and see what happens.  Afterall, it is just Facebook.  It isn't a book manuscript or trial brief.

Finally, those of us who teach in higher education have numerous stories and miffs about students with entitlement issues.  Actually, issues is a polite way to put it.  All I have to say is that students with demands of entitlement and demands that you "give them the answer" and that you should only teach what is on the test abound.  I currently teach for a community college, and many of those classes are college level courses taught inside a prison.  Yes, folks, prisoners get their college classes for free if they qualify under the federal grant.  And, yes, they too attempt to demand all kinds of things from you.  I have two prisons right now, and one is a delight to teach in and the other . . . let's just say that this week was exhausting and trying.  Not to mention, that Virginia prisons went smoke free on 1 February.  Lovely.  I want to smoke after the one . . . the other prison has exceptionally well mannered students.  Ironic on one side, startling on another.  On that note, folks should be careful what they wish for because their classrooms could always morph into something else.

So . . . I've cleared some air.  Or not.