Friday, May 21, 2010

Thursday, May 20, 2010

Alt-Text From Dinosaur Comics #4

"Lesbians!"
"Lettuce!"
"Levitation!"
"No Children, it is none of those things!" I hit the mirror with my cane again. "And stop guessing L words, it is not an L word."
A boy in the front wearing a blank grey t-shirt raised his hand quietly. I ignored him and instead called on the boy next to him, flailing his arms around wildly and calling out very loudly for my attention.
"Is it Rumpelstiltskin?" He asked.
"How did you know that?" I asked.
"Cause the name of the story is Rumpelstiltskin," he said, leaning back on his palms.
To be honest, I hadn't really organized much of a lesson plan for the day. The white walled classroom didn't give me much to go on in terms of inspiration and the desks had been missing for about a week; they were supposedly stolen, but I was suspicious the students had found some way to hide them on me.
Also, I had really expected their regular teacher to come back by now.
"Well Zachary, I suppose you're correct," I said to the boy. "I will be honest with you all, I didn't have much else to do besides this story."
"Well Mr. Peters," said a girl in the second row, "this does happen to be an 8th grade Social Studies class. Maybe you could teach us something about that."
I took it into consideration.
Also there was a doctor. One of the shards of glass that broke off after I hit the mirror logged somewhere near my lower leg and I am pretty sure I had to go see her not long after the class was over.

Wednesday, May 19, 2010

Alt-Text From Dinosaur Comics #3

My actions were once charged with symbolism, long ago.
When I turned off episodes of Will and Grace, it meant something, damn it.
When I went into the kitchen and unwrapped granola bars, entire worlds of question were opened in all the major universities as to what implications the subtext of my movements had.
Then I moved to Seattle.
Please do not doubt me when I say it is a wonderful city. The people are kind and the space needle is as tall as I had hoped it would be, but something in the physics is different here.
No longer can I walk down the hallway of my office building holding a stack of papers without bumping into a coworker of the opposite gender and having said papers scatter hilariously to the floor as we lock eyes. No longer can I lose my wallet in a taxi cab and not have it returned to me the next day by an heartwarmingly adorable accident prone copyeditor who gets into the cab after I leave. When I am at check out stands, I fear going close to the take a penny leave a penny tray, dare my hand accidently meet that of a quirky, wonderful, 20 to 30 something looking for another chance at life.
I have moved to a Romantic Comedy, and I believe there is no way out. I could try leaving, but I fear I will only be setting up the plot for one of those long distance relationship movies. No, I am afraid I must stay here and make the best of it.
It might not be so terrible, adapting this new kind of life. I took my dog for a walk in the park the other day, and only once or twice did he find an energetic legal counselor on a journey of self discovery to accidentally tangle up in his leash.
Also there was a doctor.
I apologized on all three incidents and the rest of the walk went on uneventfully.