This morning was a surprise. I went to bed toward 3, completely failing at trying to get to bed much earlier on Wednesday night and Thursday night so I could ease into getting up early tomorrow morning for Six Flags Magic Mountain.
Mom woke me up at 10 minutes before 6. John, the head campus supervisor, put a call into the automated sub system, which called me. He needed a sub. Did I want the job?
I always want the job, no matter who I'm subbing for, because there's money. I need money. I love money. I need to let my savings account rise more, and I love buying books (at least until Henderson, when I'll have a library to go to again).
I wish John had decided this last night so I could have had time to get lunch ready and to get to bed earlier. That's not how this always works, though, so I went to the dining room table to get Lady Luck's Map of Vegas by Barbara Samuel (I finished The Goddesses of Kitchen Avenue a little after 1 this morning), went back to my room, saw that my clock said 5:52, and got back into bed for a few minutes. I was fully awake, but knew that I have to take it easy today. I'll do the job as professionally as I always do (I'm at the school right now), but I'll walk around the campus a little less during the class periods when there's not any calls to answer on the radio. I need my exercise, and I'll get that, but I also need to be sharp for the brunch and lunch periods, supervising the kids, since I'll be walking around. It's not like subbing for Alex and Carmen, standing near the lunch lines, making sure no one cuts in at the front of the line.
I didn't open Lady Luck's Map of Vegas. I just lay there wondering how I was going to make it through the day on little sleep, but I remembered that I had slept nine hours the previous day, and when I'm at home during the school week, I do a few chores after I get up, then spend my time on the couch reading, as I did yesterday. So there's not a whole lot of exertion there. That serves me well today.
I looked over at the clock again, saw that it was 6, and thought about if I should wait to take a shower after I got home, which actually wouldn't be until after we come home from school, pick up Meridith, go to $5 Friday at Pavilions (in which many items are $5 each, including fried chicken this week), and go home again. That wasn't going to work. It was time to just get it done. I don't think I would be able to think about one after all that activity, and I needed one.
What a relief a shower is when you're trying to wake up. It sets up a good mood for the rest of the day. I don't consume caffeine anymore, so I needed this.
During the shower, I remembered that today is the holiday luncheon for faculty and staff in the library. No need to make lunch to bring with me. Just three oatmeal raisin granola bars and three bottles of Arrowhead water. I had breakfast before Dad and I left the house. I hope for egg nog during this luncheon, but I doubt it. That reminds me that I still want my one carton of regular egg nog for the year. I've been drinking Silk Nog occasionally from the end of October to now, and I'll only partake of regular egg nog once this year. Copious amounts of regular egg nog, even the low-fat kind, is part of what got me fat over the years. Not again. Total moderation.
John's hours are 8:30-4:30, and even though it's later than I usually work, I'm very happy with it. 8 hours instead of 6. Money earned, and then Six Flags Magic Mountain tomorrow. It works out perfectly because I'll definitely crash later tonight and then be up by 7:30 or 8 tomorrow morning, well ahead of 10:30 when the park opens. We're all going anyway, not just Meridith and I, so we'll need to find a parking spot too. The weather is going to be warmer tomorrow, which means I can wear my "All You Need is Books" t-shirt (http://www.unshelved.com/store/Shirts/AllYouNeedIsBooks) with a white t-shirt underneath and a jacket.
So now I can buy my slightly overpriced Superman t-shirt tomorrow without feeling like I'm pushing my financial limit. And if they have a t-shirt that actually has the Ninja rollercoaster on it and not just an outline of a section of the park (as it is with the Ninja t-shirt I already have), I'll grab that too.
I just remembered that the Sky Tower Museum is open as well, in which you take an elevator up that orange tower to the first floor (The second floor is for storage, I imagine, though I heard rumors that there's a kitchen up there too) and there's memorabilia from decades past at Magic Mountain, in glass cases, on hangers, and even an old ride vehicle from one rollercoaster and a seat from another. It's a tradition of sorts for all of us, and before that, when that floor was entirely devoid of anything, we'd just go up there to see the view of the Santa Clarita Valley, which looks far better than the reality. We'll still do that, because that's really the main reason to go up there, and for me to see the Ninja track obscured by trees.
It's just like our tradition to go on "It's a Small World" together whenever we go to Disneyland, though that's not likely to happen again before we move because those tickets are so damn expensive now. When we went to Walt Disney World every weekend when I was a tyke, we went on "It's a Small World" often, and that carried over to when we visited the Magic Kingdom once in a while when we lived in South Florida years later. (Never EPCOT or then-Disney-MGM Studios. Magic Kingdom had enough for all of us, including Tomorrowland for me with Space Mountain (my favorite attraction there), Tomorrowland Transit Authority, and Walt Disney's Carousel of Progress. I only needed those, and the arcade next to Space Mountain, and I stayed there the entire day.)
Work is good, especially this work which lets me read at lunch, completely unperturbed. With Magic Mountain tomorrow, it's even nicer.
(Addendum at 8:11 a.m.: Dad came back from the office before going coffee-hunting to tell me that I have Alex's hours of 9:30-3:30. On days when John is absent, Alex takes his hours. I'm not disappointed, because 6 hours is better than no hours. Plus, that gives me an hour to lay on the couch upstairs in the teachers' lounge and rest up and read before I have to start. I think I'll be better, more awake than I thought I'd be when we got here.)
