First Day Of School, redux

Several years ago my mom had cut a comic strip panel from the paper and put it up in her kitchen, and we all had a chuckle over it. It was a teacher standing in front of a classroom of youngsters and she was calling roll, and all the kids' names were "Wild West"-type names like Cheyenne, Dakota, etc. The list included most of the commonest ones, then ended up with a couple of humorous ones like "Wild Bill" and "Buffalo Gal." It was obviously poking sly fun at the trendy-ness of those sorts of names.

Well, that group of kindergarteners has entered high school. Calling roll sounds very much like that comic strip... I had to smother a smirk several times.

My six classes went as pleasantly as one might expect. They were full of clean-cut, wholesome kiddos, all of whom I'm pretty sure I'll grow to like very much. This is going to be a nice change of pace.

I think my main challenge will be keeping up with grades. The computer program they use here for grades has far fewer "bells and whistles" than the one we used in the Des Moines district... I got pretty spoiled. At least they've got computers, though... when I taught in Texas 13 years ago I didn't even have computers in my classroom. Oh, wait... yes, we had a couple of computers and we were using DOS on them. I snuck in a bootleg copy of Windows 3.1 and installed it on them. Nothing was networked, of course, and the internet was a distant hum on the horizon.

My own three chilluns had a splendid day today. When school was over, they were able to ride a bus from the elementary school over to the high school, which was highly convenient for me. A few minutes after they arrived, my own lil' JoeMama herself arrived to see how everyone's day had gone. She had brought a roast chicken for supper and the makins for some chocolate no-bake cookies. I needed to make a run to Office Depot for some classroom supplies, and we needed a few things at the grocery store, so we dashed over to Sherman before coming back home for supper.

I fried some fresh okra for myself (the kids don't care for it).

It's been a lovely day.

I sure do need someone to come over and mow my yard, though. The recent rains have brought the scrubby weeds back to life and they're all looking lush and thick again.