March madness

Why is it that March is as mad as the character from Alice in Wonderland.  You know, the Mad Hatter and his tea party with the March hare and the doormouse.  I haven't been here for a few days because March madness struck yet again.  Everything that had to be done had to be done last week.  Leftovers are this week and then we all get to sigh a huge collective sigh of relief, collapse on our sofas and vegitate for a couple of days - unless we were crazy enough to book a trip, then it's getting organized for that as well.  I know I'm not alone and it's not only the teaching profession that suffers from the insanity, but somehow that's not a whole lot of comfort when everyone that needs this, that and the other done all at the same time come knocking on my door in the middle of class to tell me I have to have this, that and the other done by yesterday (remember the paperwork thingie - it's alive and kicking down my classroom door!).  Just to make sure we aren't completely lulled into a false sense of done-ness (kind of like dinner), this year the powers that be have decided to cut our spring break down by three days so that we can jam our only Professional Development into those three days in order to tick off all the boxes.   Why you ask?  Good question my darlings and I shall try to answer it given my limited knowledge.  In the past, we have had one half-day a month to do this kind of thing, but because of that nasty creature H1N1, we have lost teaching time, and so must sacrifice those half days.  This, of course, means we have to now sacrifice three days of our much needed and deeply craved for holidays in order to be professionally developed.  So the question is, are these three days a crash course in how to be professional, or are they a crash course in being developed (kind of like the old film used in a camera - you do remember cameras that actually used film don't you?)?  Either way, no matter how short or long the holiday will be, I for one will be thrilled to have the time out.  Then I can actually do things that aren't related to paperwork, like mark student made documentaries.  Wait a minute.  That's still paperwork.  Oh well, at least it will be amusing work to do over the break. Until next time (which hopefully will be much sooner than this time).