What, that was a whole week that went by then?

So, what happened then, time?

I thought you and me had a deal. I thought we agreed you were going to pass at the regimented, usual speed. We had this discussion, didn't we, where I told you, "Hey time, I totally hate it when I wish my life away and I realise a week has gone by without me noticing," and I think I remember you saying, "OK Sal, point taken, I'll stop messing with you."

And then you do THIS.

How can it be Friday already? I mean, what were you thinking?

There now follows a whinge about my job. I try not to be too specific in my job-related whinging, but this, I feel, bears dwelling on momentarily.

Today, I pulled all year 11 gifted students out for a day of study skills - revision and memory techniques, aimed at helping them get better results at GCSE. It was costly, but worth it. I calendared it. I cleared it with SLT. I put it in the staff bulletin a month ago asking anybody to see me if it was an issue (nobody did). I put it in the bulletin last week. I announced it in briefing yesterday. And then the head of English came and told me he wouldn't be releasing students from his subject - to which, I replied, he most definitely would.

And then after lunch, the second in English came and said the same thing, shaking his finger at me and telling me it must never happen again - and when I told him they would definitely not be in his lesson, he actually PUT HIS HAND UP IN MY FACE AND WALKED AWAY.

This, I think, would not have happened had I been older/more experienced/longer standing in the school/a man (possibly). And it's the second time the head of English has done this. And, since we're dwelling on this, let's also point out that they are both men of size - both far greater in height than me. And they both said, when I pointed out my announcements in the bulletin, "Oh, I don't read that," as though that's MY fault.

Srsly. I was so angry I wanted to be throwing things around. The fury lasted until 7pm. The fury caused me to cry in my classroom for 10 minutes before school started (this, I assure you, was pure white anger, which always makes me cry). The fury led me to gently and woebegonely talk to every member of SLT I could find, until at the end of the day, the Head told me, "Don't worry about that little problem with J - I'll sort it out."

Were there any stuents missing from today's course? Why no, I believe there were not.

Sal: 1. People who don't read their bulletin: 0.

(I sort of have to gloat here. I try quite hard to be professional and not gloat at work, and that extends to not updating my Facebook status to the above, which I am ITCHING to do, because I have a lot of colleagues friending on Facebook.)

Luckily, the best thing about my job came into its own yesterday - the kids. Every class lifted me higher, with a rousing finale from my year 7s, who got so excited about their half term homework project that they actually jumped up and down, and I had to spend 15 minutes answering their questions about it. And my year 12s and I enjoyed discovering that one of Mussolini's hardest squadres named themselves "Cherry Brandy" after their favourite drink, and they totally get what we did yesterday which is amazing. And year 8 nailed Holbein. YEY.

Oh, and totday's session was superfun. Really funny presenter, made the whole day a laugh from start to finish, and lots of good sciencey learning things about neurons. Did you know, the brain can remember a quadrillion things? Q quadrillion is so many that it would take 300 million years to count that high. Or 30 million. I don't know - I wrote it down somewhere.

Fave Friday will return....but probably not next Friday, since I'll be in the Smoke with Kerrie Marie and Stu, old friends who used to feature prominently in my blog before I went West. And after next Friday....well, I should probably start thinking about blog celebrations, because the Friday after, will be my blog's 10th birthday.