Io sono tu padre...

Hey all,

Ended up watching “The Empire Strikes Back” instead of Star Wars last night, so I could find out what Darth Vader says to Luke in the shocking reveal just before Luke throws himself into the abyss from whatever bit of futuristic machinery he is clinging to, spurting blood from his stump and screaming “Nooooooo......” Now I know. Io sono tu padre!

Very difficult day at school – there are only so many jokes you can make about feeling stupid before it starts to get to you a bit. Also, the last time I felt this out my depth and was unable to follow simple conversations was after the head injuries from the accident years ago – have mentioned this previously – but they are not good memories, and it is deeply unpleasant to feel that way again.

Becoming increasingly angry about the gross disservice done to my entire generation when some bunch of idiots decided that grammar was not necessary any more. For all the guff that justified that decision, the truth is that it was short-sighted, stupid, and extremely arrogant – the results are painfully obvious to me at this particular point in time – the students here who were taught grammar at school have a much easier time of it. The English, the Americans, not to mention the odd Australian, struggle a lot without it – it is one of the reasons the Germans do so much better than most native English speakers. The one thing I can do okay, and it is pathetic how relieved and proud I am about it, is transcribe things when they stand up the front and read a paragraph and have us write it down. I have no idea what I am writing, but at least I can spell it correctly and put the spaces in the right places – their spelling is incredibly easy compared to English – not much that is weird and purely contextual like “there,” “their,” “they're”.

Spoke to K briefly today, at her midnight – her new play opens tomorrow, or this evening by the time you read this – and it has been a lot of work for her – she sounded as exhausted as I felt, although with more reason. Not once did she mention anything about her good-for-nothing boyfriend leaving the country on some vague adventure just when she needed him most... I think I emailed everyone the flyer – in three weeks it will be over and if you forget to go it will be a regret you take to the grave :) Her parents are staying with her at the moment, being all supportive, because, you know, when the going gets tough: I leave the country - anyway, she has just got rid of the creepy props in the background of the Skype window and now I have her parents in bed behind her in the office, glaring at me in a threatening manner for keeping them awake, not to mention bailing on their daughter in her hour of need. More nightmares for me.

Anyway, going to do some homework now so I hopefully have a mildly better day of it tomorrow.

Photos – out the window of my classroom – we are fickle – two weeks ago I was in rapture over things like this – now I am like, “Oh no, not class again, misery...” And then a picture lying on a park bench staring up through the trees in a vain attempt to make my brain stop hurting.

Cheers, B.

PS - I almost forgot - opera singer is feeling better - the tunes he is practicing in the corridor are far more upbeat and less tragic than his moaning from bed yesterday...