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Thursday, March 17, 2005

 

Annoying Self-Pity

You'd think that, in a full day of teaching, there'd have to be at least one bright spot; at least one period when the kids listened; at least one class that didn't elevate your blood pressure to the point where you felt like your head was about to burst and shut the little cretins up by covering them with your blood, grey matter and shard of your skull. You'd think.

Not today. Today was eight periods of fucking torture. I yelled today. A lot. I don't like to yell. It's the mark of a crappy teacher. I yelled almost non-stop for months at a time last year and I didn't ever want to revert to that type of technique again. Couldn't help it today. I just ran out of patience.

Then, to put some rancid buttercream frosting on my turd-cake of a day, I get an e-mail telling me that my sketch group didn't get into the New York Sketchfest. I already knew that, of course, seeing as how I'd sent in the application a month and a half ago and hadn't heard a fucking peep since, but it always sucks to get confirmation of bad news you already pretty much know.

So the day has left me in a sort of bleak, there-is-no-light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel-and-the-tunnel-is-full-of-diseased-rats kind of places that all non-lobotomized people inhabit at one time or another, my usual merry sort of depression-lite replaced by actual despair. This, too, shall pass, I know. But it's absolutely no fun until it does.

And so, I'm distracting myself by trying to think of ways to promote this blog. This summer, my intent is to go on an all-out blitz, trying to attract new readers. Here's what I've got so far:
  • Kidnapping Donald Trump and issuing, in lieu of a ransom note, a demand that everyone in his employ read Hairshirt for a month.
  • Standing outside of the MTV studios during TRL and mooning the camera with "Hairshirt" written on my ass.
  • Dropping quarters with "Read Hairshirt" written in marker from the top of the Empire State Building.
  • Applying for a Christo & Jean-Claude-style artist permit and dressing the Statue of Liberty in a giant hairshirt.
  • Setting up a face-painting booth in Central Park, where I can lure kids in with the promise of a flower on their cheeks and then send them out as walking bill-boards.
  • Standing in Columbus Circle and yelling "Hairshirt! Hairshirt! Hairshirt!" for twenty-four hours.
  • Offering a free vial of crack to every new reader.
  • Buying some cheap, affordable air-time to run a commercial during one of NBC's many, many slow nights.
I don't know. I've still got some time to mull this one over.

Comments:
Hang in there, Joe. You're still one of my favorites. Even though sometimes I feel that as a Cancer you kind of hate me.
 
At least you have a job ...
 
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