Tawnia's Terrible Horrible

No good very bad WEEK! (I could say "day" but it started on Monday.)

Monday: I got up and went to work... just a normal happy ordinary work week. I was outside at recess when Billy's* lens got knocked out, and so I stayed out after the other kids went in to help him look for it. We never did find it. I finally sent Billy* into math. Meanwhile the fifth and sixth graders were out at recess and Sally* was trying to be a surfer on the short slide. She landed on the ice at the bottom of the slide, and slipped backwards, hitting her back on the end of the slide... she stood up and walked about ten feet, then collapsed and blacked out. So we called the paramedics and they took her to the hospital (it's just sprained)

I got back inside, just 40 minutes later then usual... and brought up the fact that Sammy* hadn't been at school all week. We finally got an e-mail from his foster parents at lunch time explaining that his father was getting custody back so Sammy* was back to California with him (where he'd been living in a CAR at one point.) Yeah, Eileen and I were not very happy. Neither was the principal. I wanted to cry about this, but held it in. Then as I drove home I did something that rarely occurs in Utah, I stopped for a pedestrian. It was such a shocking experience that the car behind me honked at me and the guy in the truck at the stop sign glared at me as he turned left in front of me. That is what actually made me cry for a moment, but I didn't know that the worst was still to come.

Tuesday: I had a horrible dream Monday night that Mom had called me just BALLING and told me that Mindy had been in an accident, something about driving in the snow. It wasn't the best thing to wake up too. Then I got up and drove to work as usual. It wasn't such a bad day, in fact it was kind of nice that I didn't have to scrape any ice off my windows. And then I got to work and it decided to snow, and snow, and snow. I watched the snow covering all the pavement, and knew that it was going to be bad. I called my roommate and asked how the weather was in Provo, this was about lunch time, she said that yes, it was snowing and sticking... you know it's bad if it's sticking in Provo. So I went into panic mode and decided to drive home at 1:00 instead of waiting until 3:30 when I would usually get off. The rodes were icy in Eagle Mountain, but by the time I got down into Lehi (about 7 miles) it was just slushing, and the rodes were just wet. So I ended up missing out on 2 hours of work.

Wednesday: That would be today. I got up a little late because my roommate had a final and wanted to shower before me... so I was just a little off schedule, but nothing I couldn't handle. I got down to my car at about the normal time and started my car. Then the nightmare began. My car was idling HORRIBLY. It's hard to describe in words, but if you call I'll give you the sound effects. I tried driving it around the block hoping that it would get better if it was warmer. I got two blocks from my house when my phone rang. It was Eileen telling me that she got to work, only to find her desk in a lake. The roof above it was leaking something awful, all over her lesson plan book, and lap-top computer. She wanted to know if I could get to work early. I told her that my car was having issues, so probably not. I drove around the block and woke Amy up. She followed me to a mechanic and I asked if she could then drive me to work. So we got out to the freeway and then her car started vibrating (we think her tires are off balance.) So we pulled off in Orem (we made it a whopping three miles.) I called work and Natalie, the secretary, said she would come and get me, but it would be a half hour. So Amy and I wandered around Wal-mart until Natalie came and got me. I jumped in Natalies' car and we continued on the way. She told me she just needed to make one quick stop on the way back to the school. So we stopped at Office Max. The "quick stop" ended up taking about 30 minutes, because they hadn't saved her order, didn't have the tax free paperwork, had misquoted the price, and then were having issues excepting her check. I finally got to work at 10:20. I got inside and saw the lovely lake in our classroom... the room was in a shambles and then they brought in a big loud fan to dry up the lake. We ended up in a different room for the afternoon which was our geography bee. That was okay. And I got a ride home with some other teachers who dropped me off at the mechanics. I went into the mechanic and paid $540 for my car. Got in my car... started it... and it did the same thing that it had done this morning. It was already 4:30, I knew they wouldn't fix it today, my ride had already left, and I was just really really mad... so I drove it home and ate ice cream for dinner.

Tomorrow I'm having Amy drive me to work, we'll hopefully make it this time, and then I may just take the day on Friday and hopefully get my car fixed. (It's days like this that I miss my good old mechanic Dave.) So there is my day. I still haven't cried, like I need to, but I did get a hug from my friend Scott on my way here to the library. And now I am going to go home and eat something semi-healthy for dinner... and I really need to figure out how I'm getting to the airport on the 21st... and I really really really just want to go home.


I hope everyone else is having a better week then me.

-Tawnia

*names have been changed to protect the innocent*