My First Day of School

Today has been one hell of a day. It was good, it was bad, it was funny, it made me want to cry, I loved aspects of it, and I loathed others. All in all, it was a day. At least I didn't die (though, it was pretty iffy there for a few minutes)! Today was "Mr. Meeusen's" first day of substitute teaching for my mom's 5th grade class. She had a doctor's appointment, and her charter school was willing to accept me as a sub without the teaching certificate so long as I had fingerprint clearance. Without boring you all on the details, it was kind of fun. I got to teach math, introduced a new class book for reading, helped with spelling/vocabulary practice, screened a "Goosebumps" movie during "game time," held a Writer's Club meeting at lunch, and discussed voting and basic election facts for social studies. The kids were great, very quiet when they needed to be, and respectful all day. No major or minor problems among any of them. That was a big plus on my day. At the end of the day, my mom picked me up on her way home, and we got a phone call that my aunt's car was out of gas, and could we drive a few miles out of our way and bring some to her? Yeah, sure, why not? Easy enough. Go buy a red gas container, a gallon of fuel, put it in, send her back on her way to north Scottsdale, right? WRONG! You know how every family has that one crazy relative? The wacky one who wears the Hawaiian shirt and socks and sandals to Thanksgiving dinner? The one who cracks the WORST possible joke at the worst possible time? The one who thinks "pull my finger" is still funny? Um, yeah. So we put the gas in the car, and then she decides to tell us that the car won't start, too, and could we jump it? Ugh, slightly more hassle, working out in the sun in a parking lot, yadda yadda, but what the hell, I've got nothing better to do for an hour, right? So she gets out her jumper cables, and proceeds to hook them up to her car. I'm not watching this, getting my end ready. I hook the red cable to the positive side and hook the black cable to the... ZAAAPPP! And the cable starts to smoke and the rubber wire coating starts to MELT off the cables! My aunt had hooked the + wire to the - port and vice versa, shorting out the battery, and just about electrocuting me with a nasty voltage! So while mom and my aunt are freaking out about the Incredible Melting Jumper Cables, I ignore the fact that I could be dead right now, grab a cardboard box quickly from the car, and proceed to very quickly smack the cables off the battery terminals, thus cutting off the electricity. But, of course I'm not finished yet. I get "volunteered" to run to Wal-Mart a few blocks away (still nervously making sure the second-degree electrical burns on my hands are imaginary) and buy some NEW jumper cables so we could try this again. Upon returning, you better believe that my mom and aunt were not allowed within 20 feet of the batteries! However, the jump didn't work (possibly because my aunt's mistake fried the car), and we drop my aunt off with my grandmother and go home to see if my dad can help fix anything. At this point, I started to relax, getting into the groove of "House, MD" and watching the DBacks beat up the St. Louis Cardinals. Around about the 6th inning, I get a phone call from mom. "Your dad and I have to come home, will you come and watch your aunt here until the tow truck comes?" It's 7:30 at this point, and if you have been paying attention to entertainment news lately, you'll recognize that the "Heroes" season 3 2-hour much-anticipated-for-6-months premiere is TONIGHT at 7:00! VERY reluctantly, I agreed to help out, and I finally got back home at about 8:15, over halfway through the show. There was just no point in picking it up from there, so I have missed it. I know blood is supposed to be thicker than water, but come on.... it's not like I was really looking forward to this for a few months or anything (please note the inherent sarcasm in this remark). I can't wait to get my own place....