Three cheers for the donkeys!

Hip, hip, HOORAY!

I'm a lil excited about Obama. I am, however, very un-excited about working at the club house this afternoon. It turns out that all the crazies at the Scera Park site for Boys and Girls Club were actually saints in comparison. My original excitement for having the first and second graders has turned into dread and an increased desire to invest in a hysterectomy. That's not to say they were all bad, because even some of the ones that got into trouble were adorable and meant well. However, if I hear one more kid say, "Teacher! He hit me!" a parent is going to show up and find their in a blender.

I can't really blame them, though. These kids have busy parents and don't get a lot of the attention they crave, so naturally they become self harmers. At first, the kids would fall down and start crying because they'd hurt themselves and I'd tend to them and help them out. After about two minutes of that, though, I'd had it and started ignoring them when they fell down. My hypothesis was correct, and when they looked up to see me not looking, they just went on their merry way, looking for alternatives to falling down so they'd get "teacher" to pay attention to them individually. When I did make the mistake of making eye contact, I simply told them that we'd have to cut off whatever limb was injured. That made them stop crying pretty quickly.

As crazy as it was, though, it's probably been my best experience in a social work setting. The public non-profit may not pay as much, and the benefits might not be as great, but the employees are genuinely appreciative of one another. After about a half hour, I wanted to take a nap/cry in the corner as the kids attempted to kill one another, but if needed, the other employees were willing to help out when they weren't busy finding alternatives to using a taser on their own chitluns.

Can you tell I'm going to make a wonderful mother?

And in case you were wondering, blueberry pomegranate with dark chocolate chunk icecream is pretty much the most amazing thing to ever grace your tongue. Think about it.