Seraph’s week of encripplement

They tell you a lot of things of tv to try and keep you from falling in the warm blubbery embrace of obesity. They tell you to push play for thirty minutes a day. Be active. Do exercise. That kind of thing. But they NEVER mention the dangers involved. There’s never the disclaimer “WARNING ! Robust physical activity may leave you in a screaming heap of agony and piteous weeping!”. The kind of warning which might have done me some good last Friday playing soccer with some of the guys at work.

I was doing quite well it must be said. The game had been going for around 40 minutes – and I had managed to stay moving the entire time – mostly at something approaching a running speed. No Beckham, but pretty good for me. I had even made a couple of half-decent attempts at goal !

It sure puts a crimp in your game when your right knee decides its going to bend the wrong way though. I’m not really sure how it happened either ( it’s lost in that moment of white pain you get in these times ). Two of us were going for the ball at some speed – we might have got tangled up, I might have slipped … but whatever the cause, I remember hearing a distinct POP, and then I was rolling along the Astroturf in a large degree of pain.

Oww.

So – after VERY CAREFULLY driving myself home with a rapidly swelling knee, I spent the rest of Friday with ice wrapped in a tea-towel clasped to my wounded flesh. Things were still pretty bad the next day – so after being ordered to seek medical help by my sister, I asked Viv to take me to the after-hours doctor in Newtown.

I was given crutches, pain-killers, anti-inflammatory meds and an order to stay home for the week. Luckily the seniors have gone – so there was a good deal less relief to have to write each day.

I should have done more school work ( like the report comments I should have finished by now ), but I tended just to sit around playing video games. I managed to finish Okami ( which is a very cool game ! ).

I saw a physio this morning, and got the all clear to drive again and go back to work. She thought that I might have damaged some cartilage inside my knee. There’s a chance that something may have ‘snapped’, which would require something called ‘key-hole’ surgery to fix ( man – I don’t like the sound of that ! ). I have exercises to do to help fix things up. If I’m lucky – then I should hopefully be alright in another 6 – 8 weeks.

Sigh.

Oh well. I’ve had worse ! At least there’s no bones broken.

In other news – today is the end of ‘Movember’, and I have been supporting the cause with my own effort. Behold ! The glorious ‘Anarchy99’ !

Curse you, NZQA !!!

What IS it about education in this freaking country ? Why must it be administered by a bureaucratic bunch of losers which would make Kafka* spin in his grave ? Get this - the year 10 ( 4th formers for all you old-speaker out there ) have an English exam soon, and it's going to be based pretty heavily on the format of the 1.6 NCEA exam for Y11 ( 5th form ) students.

I know that they have old exam papers on-line, so I go to download a couple of poetry question sections so my students can get a taste of the kind of thing they'll have to answer. Found questions, copied them, no problem.

So then I go to open the on-line resource book for that years exam. This is the one that actually has the literature / text extracts that they're having to answer the question ON. Kinda important to have.

The document is opened, and I was stunned to find that EVERY resource you would need to make any of the questions USEFUL to look at have been removed and replaced with the uniform comment 'This resource has been removed for copyright reasons'.

WHAT !!?!!?!

$#@$#**&^%@$@ !!!!

What kind of bollocks is that ? Since WHEN is rampant publishing of a POEM on-line been a major breech of copy-right law ??

I can imagine the ads now :

"You wouldn't steal a handbag ! You wouldn't steal a car ! YOU WOULDN'T DARE STEAL A POEM !! YOU TWISTED SACK OF INFECTED INTESTINAL WALL ! Downloading POETRY is THEFT ! And poetry theft will be met with swift and terrible justice delivered by CHUCK NORRIS HIMSELF !!!! YOU WILL PAY with BLOOOOOOD !!!"

Yeah - because I heard that the international poetry studios are REALLY hurting because of that whole on-line exam racket. Sylvia Plath is righteously pissed off ... no wait - she's DEAD. Like your freaking MEDIUM !!!

Look, nothing against poetry, but it's HARDLY at the vanguard of the arts. Incan-restoration interpretive dance is more widely regarded ( and NO - you can't claim that 'song lyrics' count as poetry ! ). If I were a poet, I'd be BEGGING to have my poem in a senior English exam - just for the freaking exposure ! Do you realise how many teenagers could be baffled by your obscure metaphors about pioneer NZ women or a sunset ? HEAPS !

So I just photocopied the original exam paper we had in the department files.

Yeah - way to stop me in my poem-piracy tracks, huh? You like that NZQA ? Cos I got more where THAT came from ! Jerks ...


* I have no idea if this reference makes sense. I have never read Kafka. He wrote a story about a castle that was supposed to be some kind of allagory. And he never finished it ... or something. It sounded good though, eh ?

So childish !

Driving to work I noticed that the :

REDUCE
SPEED

sign on the side of the road had been the target of some vandalism. Two of the letters had been covered with spray paint, changing the sign to :

REDUCE
#PEE#

I hated myself for doing it, but I laughed so much I nearly drove square into a church.


Reduce pee ... *snigger*