Supply Side

My social life is instantly different than it's been for the past six years.
I caught myself sorta flirting––flirting?––with a coworker this week.
About exclamation marks! (I noticed he doesn't use them.)
Oh, happy day--someone who cares about punctuation ! ! !

But... flirting?!
I didn't know I knew how, it's been so long. 
It was just a bit of silliness, but it made me nervous too: we all work closely together in tight spaces with lots of emotion. I'm NOT wanting to complicate that, at all. [ohgodno]
___________________

Crowd Funding

A teacher mentioned spray-painting with the students, and I suggested I ask my graffiti artist friend The Emmler to come do a project with the students. The teacher was enthusiastic--though warned me there's no budge to pay for outside artists to come in.
Em said she'd love to do it as a volunteer, as long as paint was supplied.

Of course there is NO BUDGET for classroom supplies--teachers were regular shoppers at the thrift store, buying supplies from their own pockets. If I spotted them buying cartloads of children's books, I always gave them half-off.
But spray paint could be supplied because this teacher Crowd Funds on their IG, asking people to donate to the classroom for autistic students.

They raised around $500 for this semester---that pays for weekly outings to the grocery store. Students choose something to cook or prepare, shop for it, and then make it. (This is a three-day project, every week.)

Also, they buy snacks for the students--goldfish crackers and fruit crisps, that sort of thing. The kids do get free lunch, but some get hungry mid-morning.

Reminds me of how some of you and other friends and volunteers chipped in for me to make lunch for my coworkers who ran out of grocery money before pay day.

At lunch yesterday, I was chatting with the librarian about what we're reading. Another teacher came in and told the librarian that he's not coming back next year, he's returning to his former industry--(he  was an engineer for a major technology corporation)---because--get this--teaching is too hard!

LOL, I can see that. I would not want to be a teacher--it looks like practically a 24/7 job. I asked one of the sp-ed teachers if the one-hour/day allotted for prep time was enough.
No, they said.
(Though I can see already that some folks are phoning it in--showing a lot of videos, for instance--for which I can't exactly blame them.)

The departing teacher didn't mention money, but I looked up his former employer and they pay like $100k--twice what he's making.
_________________________

Continuing Ed

I'm starting to get the hang of the job, and I would describe it as being exactly like . . . 
WORKING WITH PEOPLE.

Yep. I'm still figuring out a lot of stuff--where is the gym?--how do I sign up for benefits?--but the day-to-day work is super familiar.
I am old, I have done this before.

I wouldn't want to, but with some prep, I think I could even step into teaching pretty easily (and there's one class where I sorta think everyone would be happy if I did--including the teacher).

When I have more time, what I want to learn more about is neurology--specifically brain science and behavior. I asked my supervisor to let me know if there are any "learning opportunities" (conferences?) coming up.
I've chatted a bit with the speech pathologist, and that's interesting.

[See post below for Autism Wheel--that's the sort of thing I want to know more about.]
_____________

One of my coworkers organizes a Friday Happy Hour every two weeks, and my first one is tomorrow.

Happy Hour? Exclamation mark!
So NORMAL in a workplace, but something my fellow thrift workers and I did exactly once as a group--I remember it well---BJ arranged it for Ass't Man's birthday three years ago (the year before she died).

I'm going out tonight with my former coworker/volunteer Abby, the one who works in the field and encouraged me to do it.
I have so much to tell her about my first two weeks! And I'm curious what the news is from the store. My last day was almost four weeks ago...