Still here!

"So, then you should probably email the head of HR and see if we can push the start date up one week..." my phone is wedged between my shoulder and my head, and I am half listening to my boss and half struggling to pull a pair of tights on without injuring myself.

"Uh-huh," I agree eloquently.

I grab the nearest pen and scrap of paper (a theater ticket from six months ago; I'm not sure why I still have it) and scribble down 'email - head - date', which will make exactly zero sense to me in about five minutes.

"Then also that thing with the invoices... you know, from Teresa? With the big summary thing?"

Interestingly, this actually makes sense to me. I'm unsure at this point whether that's a good thing or a bad thing. I switch my phone to the other shoulder, dutifully add 'Teresa, summary' to the back of my defaced theater ticket, and move on to zipping up my boots.

Moments later, the boss and I have finished our morning update session, my theater ticket contains a list of seven things to accomplish, and I am fully dressed. All there is left to do is blow dry my hair, and I'm good to go.

8.02

I stride to school, pondering the issue of the invoices. It's a nice enough day, which, in Reggio from November to about March means 'light fog - you can still see the buildings on either side of the street as you walk down it', rather than fog like 'wait, where did the other side of the street go?'

8.22

I arrive at school. Only the cleaner is there, which is nice: this means almost forty minutes of quiet, un-interrupted time in which to get some stuff done before the secretary and potentially the other teachers arrive. I could even sort out the problem of the invoices!

Just kidding. While I was walking to school, one teacher has messaged me to say her son is ill, so she can't make it in today (four lessons to find subs for... ready, set, go!) and another teacher to say that his student is MIA and can I please find out where he is and why he isn't in his office, ready to have a lesson?

Never mind about the invoices.

8.47

Subs found for three of the four lessons. Apologetic email to cancel the forth composed and awaiting the secretary's excellent Italian proof-reading skills. Missing student located (he's apparently in Prague, and forgot to cancel his lesson, che bello) and missing student's teacher somewhat pacified with the assurance that he will indeed be paid for the lesson.

Invoices still not sorted out.

9.12

Secretary and two of the teachers arrived. The secretary knows nothing about the invoices. The teachers both want to know when the new courses will be starting. The head of HR of the company where the courses in question will be taking place has not yet answered. A third teacher calls in and wants to know if she can move her Monday morning lesson to Thursday, her Thursday lesson to Friday, and her Friday morning lesson to Monday afternoon in order to have Monday mornings off so she can go swimming. The head of HR of a different company calls to ask when we can email him the results of all the students' (there are 80-ish of them) progress tests. I cup my hand over the receiver in order to ask the teacher in charge of monitoring progress reports about this, and it transpires he forgot to send the email reminding everyone to give progress tests. So there are no scores to email to anyone, because there aren't even any tests yet.

I tell the HR guy I'll call him back later.

9.27

My first student walks in.

"Today, we talk about string theory!" he declares happily, waving a sheaf of papers at me.

"Great!" I muster as much enthusiasm as I possibly can for string theory at 9.27 in the morning, scribble down a bunch of stuff onto a series of three post-it notes, paste them into my Sacred Notebook of Everything Ever Related to the School (volume 5) to be dealt with later, and accompany Mr. String Theory into a classroom.

10.32

"Okay, have a good day!" I wave physics guy out of the door and try to gauge from the secretary's face if we have made any progress on the invoice situation (of which I apprised her via post-it when I first got in).

My student thanks me again for a great explanation of string theory, and I manage not to laugh. (NB: Lest there be confusion - we are still a language school, teaching mostly English, sometimes some other languages. None of us are experts in string theory.) However, he knows all about math and physics. I know all about the meaning of "nevertheless", "amenities", "concede", and most of the other words that trouble him in his research articles. So between the two of us, we can muddle through whatever he wants to read on any given morning. (I still know nothing about String Theory, despite having spent an entire hour "explaining" it to him.)

5.57

Three lessons and two (super fun!) hours in the office later, I'm gulping down a piece of erbazzone in the first two seconds of down time I have managed to achieve since getting dressed this morning, and surveying the situation.

The invoice problem is well on its way to being solved. A million emails have been sent. It's looking like the courses at Company #1 will be able to start on time after all. The teachers have all been notified that they are to give progress tests this week at Company #2 and get the scores to us as quickly as possible. Some missing books have been found. We have tested another potential private student and managed to wedge them into the timetable. This evening's children's lessons are just wrapping up, the parents stuffing their kids into coats and dragging them out of the school and the teachers sinking down onto the chairs recently vacated by the parents for a few moments of well-deserved respite.

"Anyone up for pizza tonight?" says one of them. A chorus of enthusiastic assent goes around the office.

"What time does everyone finish?"

"7.30"
"8"
"7"
"now"

We take a moment to glare good-naturedly at whoever is already finished with lessons for the day before assessing the earliest time we can possibly be stuffing pizza in our mouths (probably around 8.30 for today - not bad) and decide where to meet. I head off to a nearby industrial company for my last lesson of the day - a middle-aged man who speaks pretty good English but tends to use it mostly to make inappropriate commentary about his female colleagues. And English teachers.

8.07

Length of lesson: 1 and a half hours
Number of sentences uttered by student using the present perfect correctly: 3
Number of sentences uttered by student using the present perfect incorrectly: I lost count
Number of inappropriate comments on part of student: 13
Number of times teacher laughed agreeably at inappropriate comments: 12

Which means if we cover the present perfect again for the next eighty-billion lessons, he might actually learn it, and meanwhile, I mostly managed to refrain from getting all eyebrow-raising on him. All in all, a success.

8.46

Pizza with rucola and pomodorini. A birra piccola. Animated discussion of Jon Stewart's latest antics.

10.04

We all have to be up early tomorrow and really it's too cold for gelato, but we're stranieri, so whatever. We all crowd around a table in the one gelateria with inside seating, and discuss the relative merits of pistacchio and nocciola (hazelnut) gelato. (Conclusion of this debate still pending, stay tuned.)

11.53

In bed. Barely have the energy to set the alarm for the next day. Colleague with sick kid sends another text to say kid is still sick, please cancel all lessons tomorrow as well. Vague impression that I should be irritated, but no energy to actually carry it out, let alone answer the text.

- - - - - - -

All this to say that I've been a little busy the past few... months. But then eventually I got tired of seeing such a somber post at the top of the page every time I happened to think of it, so here I am. Also, having only about 6 months left in Italy, I feel like eventually I might enjoy having a somewhat more complete record of... things. So here I am.