Well tonight I went and saw the Haileybury Year 10 play. I was actually pretty impressed with the acting and overall how the play was presented. Children of the Black Skirt is a very dark play about an orphanage and the children who once were in it. The technical aspect of the show was “acceptable”, with no major mistakes being made. Overall it was certainly worth the $5 for the ticket and I look forward to seeing some of the Year 10 actors in future performances.

Today was a rather hectic yet productive day. I got to school moderately late for me (about 8:20am) and went to tutor to listen to a speech by Mr. Hopwood about my political aspirations (I want to run for parliament in the 2010 election). Then it was class and then some more class closely followed by recess and then more class. Then during lunchtime I managed to get about 20 photos for the graduation power point bringing the total number of needed photos down to 7. I then loaded the photos onto the network, went to another class and then spent until about 5:45pm adding photos to the power point and talking to Luke (not to mention answering my phone about 10 times). Tomorrow will sadly be my last Friday of school as a student, and then it’s onto the final week.

This weekend the FISAF Nationals were held at Haileybury. This morning I had the wonderful privelage of giving up my Sunday to help marshal for this event. However during my duties I came across an abundance of what are often referred to as “Stage Mums”. These are parents who practically live through their children, and with many of these events its not unusual to see a parent highlighting the possible consequences of not winning. Some of the ones I heard today were “you’ll never get sponsored if you lose” and “we spent all this money on airfares and accommodation…”. Now I have always considered sport at a junior level to be something that the kid enjoys, be it football, aerobics or tennis, yet some of these parents seem to take it way too seriously and pretty much suck the fun right out of it. The poor kids look terrified and don’t really enjoy being up on stage performing.

Overall it was a pretty easy day, and better yet I receive compensation for my time, which I don’t often receive when I generously donate my time to Haileybury.

Last night I went and saw Fame. I was very impressed with the professionalism of the show and I congratulate all the cast and crew on their work. Luke has however earnt the nickname “Curtains” for his wonderful performance on opening night, however apart from that everything went relatively well. I wish I had the time to actually be involved with the performance however unfortunately this was not possible.

On another note this weekend will be a relatively quiet one, however I am going into the University of Melbourne on Sunday for their open day so that should be good.

Today was one of those very interesting days that ensured I didn’t have a moment of free time (except for the time I spent at the cafe). After the usual mundane double math, I headed over to the office to ask scotty to pay for something. In the end he did which was good as I wasn’t expecting him to go for it.

I then headed to the hall only to discover that certain staff had decided that the only “usable” computer in the school was now to be only used by those ” that need to be using it”. So I went and hassled some other staff to convince them to provide an Editorial computer where we can actually sort through the photos without students constantly coming up to us and asking for a copy (the answer to that question is absolutely no), anyway in short lawso said that if I can find a spot and the money then yeah not a problem but until then I will have to resort to using his computer or another private computer.

So I then went and bitched to IT, which later led to me having to apologise to IT. After that I cracked the shits with a certain junior precinct and then went to PD, of which I spent the entire time sitting there bored. During lunch I had a high powered leadership meeting which was were I was told to apologise to IT and then spent the rest of the time sitting at the cafe contemplating how in the world I could get a copy of a completed maths assignment to cheat off (Luke initially promised one but then disappeared for the rest of the day).

Tonight was a busy night at school, with the Aerobics & Dance Display Night, and the subject info night as well. I of course as usual took photos of both. I was a little disappointed with the Aerobics photos but they are usable though so thats alright. After the display night we headed up to Springvale and had dinner which was nice and then of course drove home and I have subsequently spent hours touching up photos.

I have been stupidly busy the last week, without even a moment to myself and unfortunately this won’t change for the next couple of weeks. I did however manage to dig up a photo of the Kindergarten class of 1994, which in case you didn’t know is the year the current year 12’s were in kindergarten. Anyway I now have a photo of Luke when he was like 4, as well as some other year 12’s which is pretty funny. I would post it however I would get in a lot of trouble from the school for doing so, so if you want a copy and go to Haileybury I can send it to you via school email. If you don’t go to (or work at) Haileybury then I can’t help you.

The Year 12 magazine has been coming along nicely, and we should actually start putting the content on pages soon. Also in between all this I managed to get a SAC done, and have multiple coming up fast, as well as speeches at each precinct, and literally hundreds of meetings and countless luncheons. Also apparently the play went well last night, and is coming along well tonight (I was just talking to a crew member on MSN). So well done to you guys. And finally I’m beginning to become cynical of Connex like Pant, you see this morning I was stuck at Hughesdale station for 90 minutes while a train was derailed on one of  four tracks at Oakleigh. During this time no alternative arrangements were made in regards to buses, no announcements, no nothing, just an increasingly full platform.

On Friday I went and saw the school play, Inheritance. I must say It was brilliant, a big improvement over last year’s Romeo & Juliet (which just went on and on and on). On the technical side everything went off without a hitch (to the best of the audiences knowledge). Overall it was a brilliant night, however I did have to stand up during the second act as those damn black chairs are impossible to sit in for more than an hour.

On Saturday I had the usual job of taking photos of sport which was pretty boring. However we have now covered Boys and Girls Firsts Soccer as well as Boys Hockey and Martial Arts. After sport I headed home, and then went up to Chadstone. I ended up buying Frasier Season 5 on DVD (I already had 1-4) and picked up a couple of politics and foreign policy magazines from Borders.

On another note it is my brothers 26th birthday today, he’s enjoying his new job up at Sydney and says it’s much better than his boring, stressful one in Melbourne. He ended up getting a gift voucher from Mum to buy some furniture for his new house, and managed to win $7 on a scratchie I put in his card (He usually never wins a thing). Anyway I’m now sitting here watching National Lampoons European Vacation on Foxtel.

Today was an extremely busy day, as I needed to see some people about work which was pretty boring and overall pointless (at least I get paid ). I then spent about 30 minutes on hold for Telstra’s business support to fix up a billing issue, they tried to blame me and it was only when I challenged this they admitted that it was their fault. After my Telstra dose I headed down to school to offer my moral support to all the technical crew (I didn’t actually do anything technical related), but I managed to speak to Ms. Hill which was good. After “helping” at school I then headed into JB Hi-Fi to pick up a MiniSD card for my phone, I managed to get a 1Gb Sandisk for $29 (got it reduced from $33 ). After reveling in my awesome bargaining power and the $4 I saved I then made my way to Caulfield and had lunch (at 3:30pm). I then spent the rest of the afternoon getting prices for the Nokia N95 (for my boss), anyway it will cost a small fortune (about $1250) but that’s the phone he wants so that’s the phone he will get (he reminds me of a certain principal I know ). I’m now sitting down watching the football (Collingwood Vs Richmond), I was going to go but decided that I really can’t be bothered.

Also another note to a certain Connex cynic who shall remain nameless (his blog can be found at http://www.jamesx.net), I caught 5 trains today, and they were all on time (one was 2 minutes late to be accurate). The buses however were a different story (both of them more than 10 minutes late).

Also this is post #98

There are a number of things that piss me off about our school, and it seems this week I have encountered all of them. As you are all probably aware everyone; administration, teachers, students and even IT techs are ridiculously busy. Hence why I always try and go out of my way to make things just a little easier for everyone else, and in return I ask that they pay the same courtesy to me.

However this last week (actually the last 2 days) nearly every staff member I deal with has pissed me off, this is basically through their inability to perform the job that they get paid to do.

For example when I send an email with a query or instruction, I can reasonably expect a response within 7 days. So here I am wondering why an email that has been sent on the 8th December, re-sent on the 27th January and again sent on the 14th and 28th February is yet to receive a response, now of course there is an easy way to deal with this and that is simply refer it to the principal.

I could also reasonably expect that if a point of contact for a certain department or area within the school changes, that I am notified of this so that I do not waste my time trying to contact that staff member (why the staff member didn’t email me back and say they no longer handled this area is beyond me). I was of course not notified of this until today when I found out by asking a senior member of staff. This has been referred to a Vice-Principal.

I could also reasonably expect that any policy changes that are made that directly effect myself or the work I do is passed onto me. I do not appreciate being told two weeks before the end of term that things are going to be done a different (and more time consuming) way this year. This has been referred to the Principal.

Also if a staff member takes actions that I believe have not been what I requested and have not been told about (I discovered it) then I would expect that the particular staff member in question fix this issue if I request it, but of course I have to go through the usual bureaucratic nonsense. This has been referred to a Vice-Principal.

And finally I beleive I could also reasonably expect to be told I have to turn up to events before the actual day, I really don’t find it all that difficult to give the school at least a weeks notice if I am unable to be somewhere, so why can’t they at least give me 24 hours. This has been referred to Head of Precinct.

Basically as you see that I am so fed up with being stuffed around that I have taken the step to make complaints about all of them to the people that can actually make a difference. I of course am realistic and know that the majority of the problems that I have highlighted will never be fixed, or will only be fixed for a short period. However I am confident that all matters referred to the Principal will be dealt with as he made it clear last year that if it continued to happen then he would like to be contacted and would of course take action. Sorry about the long post but I feel that I had to get that off my chest.