Heatwaves and Quizzes

My Orchid is blooming!  Finally, a plant that I can keep alive.  I'm terrible with house plants, and it took ages for me to find a spot in the house that the Orchid was happy with, but eventually I did.  It has fully bloomed once already.  All the flowers died and there were no new buds, and I thought that was it, but suddenly I had 18 new buds!  They are all coming out now, and it looks wonderful.

This week has been unbearably hot!  It actually reached 40 degrees on Thursday, and still the school stayed open.  The kids go really nuts in the heat, and the classrooms have been smelling rather ripe, especially because the kids are being kept inside at lunch due to the extreme heat.  It has felt like much longer than 5 days at work this week.  Monday seems an age ago.  

Monday was the rescheduled sports day (it rained last week).  Year 3 and 4 were in the morning and Year 5 and 6 in the afternoon.  I ended up leading teams for both, so I was outside for the whole day.  Unfortunately, my house (Dickens) came last for both!  Still, we all had fun.  I'm pretty sure I had heat stroke though because I felt rotten when I got home, and on Tuesday.  I slept for about 3 hours when I got in!  On Tuesday I covered for Year 3, which was quite nice.  They are so well behaved, and it wasn't ridiculously hot, so they were fine.  Wednesday, I covered for Year 1 in the morning.  I haven't taught them before, but they were quite sweet.  Their classroom is on the ground floor of the school, so it was nice and cool.  I'm normally on the 1st floor which is pretty bad, and the upper school are on the second floor, in the roof.  I actually heard one of the kids say that it was 'hotter than the sun' up there!  On Wednesday after school I went into Duisburg to the shops with my friend to buy another friends birthday present.  We bought it all in the craft shop, so I had a ball buying lots of interesting things.  Then we went for a huge cocktail and some veggie fajitas.  It was lovely sitting by the harbor, in the shade, with a nice cool breeze.

Thursday was horrendous!  It hit 40 degrees, and some of the parents actually complained that the kids were watching films rather than doing school work!  I'm not good for anything in that heat, let alone a class full of kids.  You can't get anything out of them!  We had the Year 6 leavers assembly, where they reenacted some of their favorite moments throughout the year.  The best one was when the teachers got gunged at the Halloween disco.  Two of the lads dressed up as two of the female teachers.  It was pretty funny!  Thursday evening, lots of us went to Shaenke.  This is the pub that Matt goes to with two of his mates.  Girls aren't usually invited, but this was an exception because one of the founding members is leaving, so it was like his leaving drinks.  We had schnitzel and ice cream, and it was very pleasant.

Friday was transition day at school, where all the years spend a day with their new teachers for next year.  It's mostly a big deal for year 2, who move up a floor to year 3, and for year 6, who move into the upper school.  I kept spotting them throughout the day looking very stressed!  I can't do much on transition day, since there are no Maths or English classes.  So I spent the day in various cupboards and the Art room, getting them tidied and restocked for next year.  They were roasting hot, and I was on my feet all day, so it was quite exhausting.  Still, it was a job well done.  Friday evening was the staff Quiz.  The year 3 teachers organised it this year, and I was with some other TAs, and a few teachers from Early Years, plus Sean.  Lots of people (Matt included) had chosen their teams really carefully, based on who was clever and who could help them win, but MY TEAM WON!!!  It was a bit of a shock really!  I was thrilled.  I never win quizzes,  Matt's team came third.  There are some seriously sore losers in the school - behaving like the children!

On Saturday it was really hot again.  We stayed in during the day, at the hottest time, then went to the lake at 6pm, with Andy and Chris.  That closed at 8pm, so we had a couple of hours to sit in the sun and enjoy ice cream and beer.  It was still seriously hot even when we left.  Then we had an impromptu BBQ at Andys, in his (Soon-to-be-ours) garden.  It was lovely.

Today there are thunder storms off and on.  It's cooling things down a bit which is definitely needed.  We have started doing some packing for moving house.  We're not in a rush, but we're going to do a box a day, and it should all be done by next weekend, when we're off to Amsterdam.

Here are the boys with their Duff beers...