Is it really procrastination if I'm an artist?

Hello to all 5 of you who read this. Sorry it's been awhile since I updated. I've been lazy on my days off since starting my new job.

And then just as I was feeling some balance in my life, Alex and I got into a car wreck last Thursday. We were leaving the driveway of the parking lot on San Leandro St. when a little Honda came out of nowhere (we had almost 100% no visibility on our left due to all the cars parked on San Leandro) and smashed into the front end of the truck, lifting us off the ground and spinning us 90 degrees to the right, where we narrowly missed hitting a parked car. The seatbelt grabbed me (thank Great Hera) and kept me from bouncing into the windshield. But I was thrown so violently in the crash that the seatbelt severely pounded me in the sternum. It's been really hard to move my torso very much this week. I tried to run errands yesterday, but I still hurt too much and had to cut it short. Today I'm much better.

The truck is a total loss. The guts on the left are jammed into the guts on the right. And the kicker is that we were at-fault. That's right, the driver entering the roadway is 100% responsible for making sure it's safe to enter. So even if you are a little Honda flying down a 35 mph zone at 45 mph (at least) and accelerating while paying no attention to what's in front of you because you are chatting with your boy-passenger and you hit a 2 ton truck so violently you don't even have time to brake and you lift it off the road and then carroom into another car and destroy its rear driver side tire...you walk away with no-fault.

Fortunately, there is some justice. She had no car insurance. Not a smidge. So she got a fat ticket and her car impounded. She somehow got Al's phone number and called him, upset because she couldn't get her car from the tow yard, and now can't get to work, to pay the fine or the tow fees and storage. Alex wrote the book on that (literally, yes. See, Undertow at www.smartasspress.com) so told her to contact his insurance agent. She's injured too, she tells him. Contact the insurance company sweetheart, he tells her. That's why they're there. Maybe you've learned that now.

Sorry to be so callous. I'm glad no one was seriously injured. But you'd be amazed how many things you use your torso for that you take for granted until you can't do them. Like getting out of bed.

Today I'm supposed to put together a new lesson plan for my classes, and perhaps a CD of images of my work to show the students. Naturally I've been goofing off on the internet for hours. I found this link that some might like:

Epitonic

I'm usually the last person to find anything cool, so if you've already heard of this, ignore me.

Classes are going pretty well. Most of my students are pretty great. I have a few meatheads, but the school's been really supportive about that. Pretty amazing since this is the San Mateo High School district and they've been in the middle of a devastating budget emergency all month. Positions got slashed all over the district, and Hillsdale is losing a few teachers, too. It's bad. I find out tomorrow who is getting the axe. My job is through the College of San Mateo, so I've been on the sidelines of this drama. The teachers and the students at Hillsdale have been tense but everyone's been trying to stay focused on education. It's really amazing. But now, who knows. I'm afraid this is going to be pretty demoralizing for the teachers and the students and staff.

The blame for this is getting lumped on the district, but it's really due to the corporations in the area who demanded to have their taxes reassessed (sued, actually, I heard). Not just the little guys, no. The big dot-coms who patted themselves on the back for finding San Mateo when it was cheap and small.

Nice going guys. Have fun recruiting from the pool of talent whose education you failed to fund.

Anyways.

MPK