The Weekly Rot

Boys are leaving school too early – say the experts. Why are they leaving school early? Alternatively – why are they staying so long?

My grandad left school when he was 12. He could do multiplications (right up to the 15 times table) in his head – and fractions and percentages and he could do long division on paper. He thought calculators were an unnecessary gimmick.

It’s the same every holiday – you go away for a few days, read some books, relax, sleep, eat, drink almost too much red wine but not quite… and when you come back the world is collapsing. If it’s not Al Qaeda, it’s global warming, and if not that then it’s economic Armageddon.

I can feel an election coming on. Vote for me. If you don’t see my name on the ballot paper, just get your red pen and write it in and then put a tick next to it and maybe even a stamp with a little green mouse that’s shouting ‘excellent’. The vote-counters will understand.

Two teacher friends are having a baby soon. They should be thinking of life insurance and university fees and pushchairs but they’ve not decided on a name yet. He thinks Bullet but she thinks not. I thought Little Red Wagon but have changed my mind to Rice Pudding. It evokes feelings and thoughts of warmth and love and has no connection to filthy brats skulking and festering and rotting in the back corner.

I must protest. The Consumer Price Index, the CPI to most of us, is supposed to indicate the cost of living for an ordinary NZer and so it should include the price of the things ordinary Kiwis buy, like clothes that aren’t Gucci, food that isn’t oysters, and cars that aren’t European. StatisticsNZ is excluding saveloys, condensed milk and frozen cheese cake from its list.

It’s winter and muddy and wet and cold and it’s dark and dull and I’m tired. The counsellor suggested a lavender-filled hugging cushion and a vanilla-scented candle. My look said these wouldn’t do. The counsellor said ‘go to your happy place’.

I’ve just been talking to friends who were in Beijing. It began with explosives and flames and firebursts, extreme incandescent lighting, electronic wizadry, no cost spared to make a positive and lasting first impression.

There’s always been the debate of whether sex ought to be taught in school or at home. It’s simple – teach it at school. School’s are expected to teach reading, writing, spelling, smelling nicely, brushing teeth, tying shoes, driving safely, good table manners, pet care, nutrition, exercise, rectal health, percentages, safe Internet use, safe television watching, so why not sex?

I wonder if detecting plagiarism could be an event in the teacher-Olympics. Unjamming photocopiers would be, of course, as would be drinking skanky luke-warm instant coffee.

Exercising extreme patience in the face of glacially slow Internet will be and rocking backwards and forwards gently whilst humming a happy tune and thinking of a happy place will be the teacher triathlon.

I don’t see why, just because I’ve got classes to teach, that I can’t be an Olympian. I want to stand on the winner’s podium, wear a gold medal, and have the national anthem played for me.

The normal sweaty athletics and synchronised-swimming and equestrianing-about are all just brawn and training and weights and press ups and sweating and steroids and – ooh can we say that? No really, long jump? Run run, as fast as you can, you can’t catch me I’m the long jumping man. And triple jump? Why not hop-scotch or tree-climbing?