near disasters avoided

A few of us started a PLC (professional learning community, for those of you who aren't on the cutting edge of the education profession) - focusing on some tech issues. Well, the first meeting was all about helping one particular person get her email groups set up, while the rest of us sat, bored, for an hour. So I emailed the tech guru to ask if we could change the meeting place or the format or something that would make this group be about more than just helping this woman.

Unfortunately, I sent the email to all new faculty, not just the one guy.

Fortunately, we have an "unsend" function, but darn it, it wasn't working. So I sent a "help, please!" message to Mr. Tech, while envisioning my new nameplate, "Ellen (formerly nice) the B#@$!" Then, of course, being 13 years old, I forgot about the whole thing completely, until 15 minutes later when . . .

phone call from "Luke" - Hey, Luke, how are you? (thinking: how nice that people care about me and want to call me just to say hi; or maybe he wants to borrow some money? Why else would he be calling me?) So Luke says, "Ya know, I just opened my email, and . . . "

Luckily he had had a similar experience, and he was able to walk me through the "unsend" function so that I could get rid of both the offending email and the one I had sent immediately afterward, falling all over myself trying to apologize for sending it to everyone.

Some of you probably remember when Annie, the FACS teacher, sent out a request to all Edina staff for a poodle coat pattern. But she actually meant that one.

On another aspect of maturing, I am going to take Hindi starting in two weeks. The taxi and rickshaw drivers around here (who are, ironically, on strike - because the police are harassing them if they don't have their licenses - the nerve!) will probably be much happier, since every single time I've taken a taxi or auto-rickshaw there has been a confrontation similar to one between any two people who have no idea what the other is saying.

E: "Taxi?"
(Inquisitive look from driver)
E: "Sarojini Market?"
D:"As you like, Ma'am. 50 rupees Chanakyapuri"
E:"No, Sarojini Market"
D: No Chanakyapuri?
E:"Sa-ro-ji-ni market" (despite the syllabic breakdown, Ellen is still completely mispronouncing this word, and the driver assumes it is an English curse.)
D: "Hindi curse unintelligible to Ellen - 100 rupees as you like" (Driver has no clue where Ellen wants to go, but no matter. This is India.)
E"No! 50 rupees!"
D:""100 rupees!"
E: "Ok" (sigh)
Driver heads off into crazy traffic, swerving to miss two beggars and a couple of oxen. Two miles later, the driver is lost, but Ellen has no idea where they are, were, or will be. Driver stops several times to ask for directions.
Ellen uses one of the many Hindi phrases she learned from her tapes to ask a guard: "Do you want tea or coffee?"
After receiving contradictory directions from several guards posted next to
a) embassies, or
b) private residences, or
c) any one of the thousands of places with guards in front of them
the driver happens to go past Ellen's destination, so she calls out to him, in Hindi,
"Your children have four o' clock!"
but she fortunately points at the same time, so the driver stops, she gets out, and pays him 500 rupees by accident, because the notes all have a picture of Gandhi on them and look alike.

So hopefully taking Hindi will teach me how to say things like "We're going in the wrong direction," or "Where are we?" or "Do any of these streets have signs?" or "Just drive me in circles for half an hour and then drop me off on a dark side street."

Enough for now.