I just reached a new low...

So you know how you used to skip classes every now and again back in school?

I mean, I did, alot, but then again I was in a study program that made it hellaciously easy. So skippin' school has never been anything I cared about. I tend to believe that if I kid doesn't want to be there in the first place, they'll be less likely to learn and more prone to fuck shit up for the teacher, so just let'em skip.

Of course, it doesn't work out so well when the teacher (c'est moi) forgets his schedule and full misses and entire class.

When I realized and came running into the room, they were all quietly doing their homework.

Sneaky bastards must have posted a look out...

Talkin' 'bout a revolution...

This is so gonna get me hashed on the comments...

So as I'm walking through the bright Fall sun this morning, tramping my way to work through an increasingly traffic-jammed Rvk, I was pondering some of the political/social questions that always plague the Icelandic life of Sma.

I managed to puzzle out just what it is that makes Icelanders as a nation such an apathetic people in the poli-social arena.

Its really very simple. Maybe too simple.

But my theory is that its all due to the fact that they've never had a revolution here. Ever. At least not one they started.

Some English sailor tried to take over the country during Iceland's time as a Danish colony, but the Danes, or the Icelanders granted power by the Danes put him down.

The Icelanders didn't gain their independence with a long and costly struggle against the Danes, rather they had it rather unexpectedly handed to them courtesy of both the Axis (who invaded Denmark) and Allied (who invaded Iceland) powers during WWII.

The economic revolution that transformed Iceland after WWII had a great deal more to do with copying other nations and massive influxes of cash thanks to the Marshal Plan than with anything the Icelanders did themselves. (Sorry, but its true)

About the closest thing they've had to a real revolution here was the women's rights movement, which led to at least official equality of the sexes here on the lava lump. But even that movement, after the heady days of the general strike, slowly withered away into an establishment, which then withered away into a bureaucracy.

The thing about revolutions is that even when they fail, they instill a bit of that rebellious spirit, that urge and drive to rise up and change things.

But there's no history of that here. Which is one of the central reasons why protest isn't so much looked down on but rather not understood.

"Why are these people shouting and yelling for change?" the average Icelander asks themselves, "They ought to just write a letter to Möggan and get back to work".

Why am I applying for citizenship again?

Wanderlust

I've been dreaming of far-flunbg places lately, especially India.

I just finished watching one of those Michael Palin travel shows, which made me want to go walkabout even more.

I'm just terrified of the the Bombay trots and such. As any regular reader of this rant well knows I have the immune system of a irradiated baby seal with a lymphatic disorder.

But scary as it is for me, I really want to just pull up stakes and go. I think it's the combo of having had my life turned around combined with my usual autumn-induced bout of introspection. I want to run off to India, or bugger off to France, take off to Latvia where my friends are starting a restaurant or go bike across the US. Anything but stay here and teach bored teenagers to sit still and obey orders while pretending that English is the real lesson.
Funny how quickly what you want becomes what you want to escape, eh?

The Teaching Life...

I just finished my first three classes.

It went OK.

Despite the random class cancellations.

Despite the dust and paint fumes.

Despite the masonry drills and general banging.

So now I'm surfing the net for slightly more up-to-date ESL lessons, listening to Ryan Harvey, and trying to look like I know just what the hell I'm doing.

But I don't.

Seriously, not a god damn clue.

I mean, the teaching is a breeze. I'm good at that. Its the rest of it, the attendance and writing down every little thing, the seemingly meaningless coffee-klatching that seems to the only way things get organized, and the constant photocopying-binding-folding-stabling-ad-infifuckingnitum.

I mean, I don't know about the rest of them, but this English teacher has got himself a text book to teach from and a collection of class readings (My own, I'm not making them read that tired ass out dated Oxford Reader crap, no sir) and hence feels no need to make up complicated spiral-bound assignments on a weekly basis.

Which makes me look lazy.

But honesty is my strongest defence.

When the principal asked me what sort of work I wanted I replied "As little as I can manage".

Not that I think it will stay like this. Oh, no. It'll get crazy soon enough. With the testing and stress and "discipline" and crap like that. But for now, its shockingly, surprisingly easy.

Gonna go watch something on You Tube now...then sneak off for a chat with my friend Nic and some lunch.

They don't pay me enough for anything else.

I'm back...kinda...

Just a brief note to let people know that soon (ish) I'll be up and blogging again.

I think.

Thing is that after being netless for the better part of a month, I no longer feel the need to log in every chance I get. Combine that with the fact that my relatively easy new job (Assistant Gym Teacher! How funny is that!?) suddenly metamorphosed into a full-time English gig teaching 8-10th graders with no warning whatsoever and you get a Sma who is very the busy and insanely the freaked.

Been watching to much Buffy I guess.

But, yeah, major wiggins with an extra helping of wig.

Meanwhile my new place has yet to see anything in the way of remodeling done, my ten-day vacation to the glorious north plus the standard first week of work flu have seen to that. So I'm still kitchen-and-showerless.

Hopefully I'll be getting the particulars figured out soon and then go all Bob Buildery on the place while house-sitting (i.e. mooching interweb and cable) for Embla and Klaus while they're off gallivanting around Thailand.

Other than that, not much is up aside from my impending 31rst birthday. I'm really not sure what I want to do for it. Usually I throw a massive do, but this year I might settle for a nice dinner with friends and a couple a beers.

Which makes me afraid I'm going all mature and shit.

So to combat it, I'm going to finish this random ramble with a b-day wish list of doom.

I wanna...

Kitchen!

Parquet!

Furniture!

Internet Connection!

Seasons 2-??? of Stargate SG1

Buffy Buffy Buffy!!!

The Iron Council, Perdido Street Station, and The Scar by China Mielville!!!

Angel season 1-???!

Both Hjálmar albums!!!

Jeff Who!!!

Black leather jewelry (studded or un)!!!

Whiskey!!!

A naughty weekend with either Salma or Alyson "Willow-was-the-cutest-lesbian-ever" Hannigan!!!

Or just a good day with good friends.

I'm not that picky really...