The Last of the Teacher Saga (I Hope)

This post was written on 12/21/11 and got set aside. I have gotten emails, posts on The Facebook, and texts asking me for an update to The Jerk Teacher Saga. I had no idea so many people were interested in what took place. Many people told me that The Jerk Teacher Saga had replaced their soap opera & they are now going through withdrawals. Hubby even got a text from his old boss wanting to know the scoop. That's big, ya'll. His ex-boss reads my blog. That almost makes me famous.  Famous!


This morning I was finishing the final bits of my final speech for my final class with Mr. Poopy Pants when I noticed that I can't log into his class any longer. It showed that I *was* enrolled in that class but had been dropped.

Okay, pure panic ensued. This is the last day of a class with a teacher who has been unbearable & I'm finding out I'm dropped? I stared at the screen. Then threw up. That's pretty much the only way to respond to something like that, I think. I had just gone through an entire semester, suffering all sorts of rudeness, and now it ends with me having done it for nothing? Yeah, throwing up was what came naturally at that point.

Then I called hubby who was at the gym & not near his phone. Then I called my Mom who was at work & not near her phone. Then I texted Ethel (*names have been changed to protect the innocent...but every Lucy must have an Ethel). Then I may or may not have called hubby & my Mom each 40 more times. Because after throwing up, that's the second best way to respond to panic. Which, by the way, if you call your Mother every 30 seconds for several minutes, you will cause Mother to panic. Which means Mother will leave work & come to your house expecting you to be on fire or throwing up. I wasn't on fire, but 1 outta 2 ain't bad.

After talking to those 3 people, I decided I was calm enough to call the school. I called the main number & got the stupidest air-headiest person I have ever talked to in my life. I explained what I saw when I logged into BlackBoard & that I needed to speak to someone who could help me figure out why. She said, and I quote, "Well, I don't know anything about BlackBoard. You have to call the teacher." Dingbat, his direct contact info is on BlackBoard...and I can't access it! That's why I'm calling you...connect me, woman. Your job is to answer phone, connect with appropriate person. You answered, now connect. Kthanksbye.

So instead of understanding that, she asks me why I am going on BlackBoard in the first place. "Um...to see my grades & assignments." She then says, "But if it's not an online course, why would you go online for assignments?"

"Because the class is in a classroom & the assignments are posted online to access later." I was failing to see what this had to do with connecting me with someone who could tell me what was going on. Or why this was her business. If I want to just sit & stare at the wonder that is BlackBoard, I believe that's my right as a paying student. Now connect me, lady.

Her answer, "I don't understand. If it's a class, you need to contact the teacher."

When I yelled, "I can only contact the teacher through you because I can't access his info!" my Mom gave me the Eddi, Calm Down Look. Even at 32 I still get that look & I still know to do as she says. So I hung up on her. Not my Mom. 'Cause you can't hang up on someone sitting next to you. I hung up on the dingbat. 'Cause that was the only way to calm down.

So I went to school. Long story short...he did it to mess with me. Isn't that the funniest joke ever? Aren't you just peeing your pants while you roll around laughing?

Neither was I.

After having his little talk with the dean over all the stuff I have told her about him, he was quite a different man in the classroom today. Very quiet, very humble. He did make some passive-aggressive parting shots but I smiled at him the entire time, as if I didn't have a clue he was talking about me. He told the class that he had been dealing with a "passive-aggressive student all week via email, a student who had a question but wouldn't just come to my office to talk to me face to face." He went on to say that email is a passive-aggressive way to hide behind words.

Um...first off, no, email is a convenient form of communication between busy people. It had nothing to do with passive-aggressive. It had to do with me wanting written proof of what he'd said because every other discriminating, insulting, condescending word from him had been verbal. Second, who here is being passive-aggressive? My emails were asking questions & pointing out inconsistencies. I didn't stand in front of a room full of students & accuse him of something, giving him no way to defend himself.

It was really hard to keep the smirk off my face as he told the entire class that his boss had been discussing matters with him that a student had brought up. He did mention a few of the "matters" & I knew it was part of my 5-page ball buster evaluation that he was talking about. He then said that since a critical eval had been turned in, he also appreciated complimentary ones. Good luck on that, buddy.

I was the only one that got the memo that it was okay to use a country song after all. If you forgot about the country song tidbit, feel free to read it again. I'm the only one that uses BlackBoard, and he knew this because everyone told him this at the beginning of the semester. The best part was that a guy who was very angry over the no country music thing, was going to do a country song anyway. I thought that was so awesome of that guy, I would have cheered if I could have. But I thought that might be a bit much.

The week before, this guy was very angry & had asked Mr. Excuses for a reason. Instead of a reason, he got, "I'm sure if you go back in your history, you will find that country is not the only music you ever listened to. Go way, way back if you have to. There is a song somewhere that is not country." This unhappy redneck replied with, "I guess there's the ABC song." Mr. BoogerButt said, "Then do the ABC song."

Seriously? Seriously.

After explaining what his memo had said, Teacher NoGood went on to explain that it had been brought to his attention that he hadn't thoroughly explained his decision to not use country music. That it wasn't about his distaste for the genre that led him to that decision. It's the fact that someone could go to their car, turn on a country station, and pick a song claiming it's "their" song. He wanted to avoid that. Okay, great, but what is stopping people from turning the dial to 104.7 & picking a pop song & doing the same damn thing? Try again, Mr. Brainless, 'cause that "reason" is not gonna fly. I'm thankful the dean talked to the teacher about his reasoning, but he had 7 days to come up with a good reason. He could have done way better than that. If he was having trouble coming up with something, he could have emailed me & I would have been happy to help (am I the only one that hears that evil laugh? Oh...it is me.)

Of course, he is up against a thinker & wasn't expecting that. Yeah, my Mama only raised one dummy & it wasn't me. Teehee, I stole that one from my Great Gram. But seriously. I'm no dummy. And I ain't no sheeple either. 

One day during class, Mr. AssForBrain announced out of the blue that he got an amazing text & he doesn't know if he should tell us about it. Of course a bunch of nosey students ask him what it is. He hems & haws, the class begs, this goes on for a little while until he says "My wife just said she's pregnant." 

I came home & said, "Wow, what a crappy way to tell your husband that you're pregnant. What's up with that? Well, guess my gaydar is off 'cause he's not gay after all. Or else he's great at pretending that he's straight 'cause he had sex with a girl at least once." 

A couple weeks later, I find out that Mr. PooHead wanted to date a friend of mine. A gay friend of mine. There is no wife. To prove things, my friend had an entire conversation via text with Teacher Idiot, in front of me. Yup, the dude is gay. Not even kinda gay. He's really, truly gay.

My hubby works with a friend of his. There is a baby on the way, but it's with a surrogate. Yay for him. Congratulations on becoming a father. Why hide how the baby came about? Why say anything at all about who is carrying the baby? Say, "I'm going to be a Dad!" If people assume that means you're married or heterosexual, let them. Although in this day & age, does anyone really assume about relationships anymore?

And why would we care? It's not like any student is going to say, "Yo, dude, are you gay? 'Cause if you are, man, I can't participate in this class." It's not like being married would endure him to the class since 1) no one besides me is married in that class & he obviously doesn't like me 2) more than half the class doesn't like him & there was no fixing that.

A teacher lying to an entire class about something so unimportant? Makes me question everything about him. Why lie? Why cover up who you really are? Why make it an issue at all? Sexual orientation has nothing to do with being a teacher or a student & has no place in the classroom. I go to each one of my classes with the intent to learn the subject I paid for, not about the personal life of my instructors or even the students. Unless we start talking outside of class & have exchanged phone numbers for non-class purposes, I do not want to know anything personal about you. This isn't just about gay teachers. This is about any teacher. If I know your sexual orientation because you made an extra effort to make sure I know it, you've crossed the lines. There are lines between students & teachers for a reason. Let's not cross those boundaries by any means, especially not lying.

Apparently he's so freaked about being outed that he has these elaborate stories for every class & hides himself very carefully on The Facebook. Even goes so far as to make frequent comments during class about how he doesn't have a Facebook page & all that newfangled computer technology stuff confuses him. I saw his wall on The Facebook, thank you very much.

Why the lies? Why go to such extremes to make sure you mention things when no one cares? There's 2 reasons I can come up with...1) he's very uncomfortable with himself & his lifestyle choices 2) he's so comfortable with himself & his lifestyle choices that he thinks everyone else is hung up on him & dying to just know every little tidbit about him & thinks we will all stalk him so he better head us all off at the pass. Hint, Mr. GooberPants: if you don't want us to know anything about you, that's okay! We don't want to know anything about you.

The Pud Teacher can take his clothing journal & shove it where the sun don't shine. I got the grade I was hoping for, so I never have to deal with him again.