£4.65 for a Coke ... Only in London.

Arriving at Waterloo at 14h05 there was enough time to head to buy something for lunch before scooting off to the theatre for a 14h30 show. I couldn't decide on anything to eat so I thought a little burger and coke from Burger King would suffice. Lining up at BK for the burger was enough and I should have know this was a bad idea from looking at the burger shoot seeing very few burgers there. I ordered a Whopper with cheese and a Coke ... nothing out of the ordinary. The Coke arrives with in about 30 seconds ... 2 minutes later, I am still waiting for my Burger, which I see others being made and snatched by other workers trying to fill their orders. Finally I just ask the guy for my money back for the burger, I will pay for the Coke, as I have been drinking it. He says that he can't open the register to refund my money, but he will with the next customer. He forgets but remembers just as he closes the drawer. It doesn't enter the skull of this pipsqueak to actually call a manager to get it organised. At this stage a good 10 minutes as passed and I am about to miss the start of the show, because of the walk involved and search for the theatre. GRUMPY Jordi, just leaves so £4.65 is the most I have ever paid for a Coke in my life.

Got to be made of Milo III

I know you think that I keep going on about this whole Milo thing. You are probably right. There is another twist that I discovered today on s'appelle TONIMALT .. It's friggin Milo! Who'd have thunk that I have been in France for so long, wanting Milo, although enjoying the other yummy chocolates in France and Milo has been hiding under another name ... how cheeky. We found it today in the supermarket. Now, researching this product, its been in France since the 1950's.
INCROYABLE but True.

2009 - The Plans Unfold

I am not into wishing my life away, so don't get started on me wanting my life to pass ... this is simple forward planning. I decided a while back to learn Italian, as I did, French. So today, I have been searching for Italian language courses in both London and throughout Italy. Upon my internautical travels I came across possibly the best idea of an Italian cooking and language course. Looking at the price of €8000 for a comprehensive 6 month course, including accommodation, trips, uniforms and the like, it is time to start saving.

The course I would like to do is here ... click on the MASTERS course and you will see what I would like to do. This will also give me enough time to save the money up and ensure that I can give my current school a full 2 years of service before resigning, if indeed they don't give me 6 months leave without pay. I don't know how it works in the UK system...but seeing Food Technology Teachers are rare, perhaps they will consider it.
So whilst waiting for the course, it's time to find some language courses to study in London ... Saving some money and errrmmm keep up with the girls at work. It's a bit exciting though ... isn't it!!

CIAO BELLI

Half Term Review ...

The girls have been very very tough over here, girls being girls i guess and working in an all girls environment can be tougher BUT saying that, I think it works in my favour to be a male teacher. they are less bitchy with me and never bad mouth off other male teachers but the female teachers get bagged to no end ... Of course, I don't know any other teachers on staff so they bad mouth all these teachers, not to me, but in their general conversation and when I finally meet the teacher "Ah yes, Ive heard the girls talking about you". Tough work as it is, and whilst not by ideal place of work, I guess it was me who chose the job, it was me who accepted the position. Albeit hard, there are some really positive changes that have come about over the past 6 weeks.

I am particularly excited about introducing the A Level Food Technology course. JFS could do with introducing it too, it has already given the girls a little extra confidence and push in seeing that their GCSE leads further afield. Must sign off as tonight it is Parent Information evening for 6th form ... strange to think myself a sixth form teacher again. Ah well, I will have ambitions, I will try to achieve them!

Have a great mid term.

J.

Its a Snow Go for Snowdraphillics

How very sad it was today to be a teacher. I have break duty (yard duty) and it happened to fall today, being Snow Day for the kids of London. We had a staff briefing this morning where the Head informed us that the snow is HER snow and that the students didn't have permission to touch it.

The number of times per year that it actually snows in this city can be counted on one hand. How very very unfortunate for the kids who are in school today, were not allowed to have some fun in it. Where is the joy? Why has the fun of being a kid being taken away from them? SIMPLE fun, build a snowman, putting snow down someones back, throwing a snowball.

Looking out my classroom window is the boys school's sports fields. The boys were outside having a competition as to who could roll the biggest snowball ... if it hasn't melted I will go and take a photo. Where as next door at the Girls School, they weren't even allowed to walk through the snow.

On good days, I don't mind being grumpy with kids to 'guide' them away from a feral path and try to show them how life expects them to behave ... but life says, see snow, pick it up and throw it! Just don't eat yellow snow.

**sigh**

Cheerio then.

**** UPDATE **** 15h13

The girls and boys came out to play ... As soon as the bell range all the girls ran to the boys' playng field and they started their lovely snow fights and then their kissing ... BEURK adolescent hormones ... Good Luck to them!

CIAO

London The Lame

So a whole 10cms of snow fell last night and predictions are for the snow fall to continue until around lunch time. Its very very pretty here in London. There is a certain softness that snow can bring to take off the roughness or the edge of an otherwise sometimes imposing city and suburbs.

My whinge today is about the whinging poms and their complaints about having a little snow on their roads and their inability to be able to cope with such a natural phenomenon. This is England, right, yeah? Where in the not so distant past, there would have been a good metre of snow dropped in the height of winter. Now, 10 centimetres is the best excuse for not going to work, driving at 15 kms an hour, for the trains to run to a halt or have 3 out of every 4 cancelled because of snow on the platforms. Yes, snow on the platforms!

The gritters were out last night in force at about 9pm up my street so obviously the task forces around the city were preparing the 'best' which is 'not good enough' they could for the dibbles of snow this morning. We had a practice run about 3 weeks ago where I was so annoyed with the way this "London White Wash" results in London grinding to a halt. Having such a great annoyance for the pathetic organisation in this country and every excuse under the sun, or snow cloud, I was part of the BBC news 'Your Views' that evening, expressing exactly what I have just written here.

Yes, I understand its a big city, lots of people, lots of traffic but please ... having knowledge of all of this, surely there would be more effective contingency plans? Holy Guacamole!

The photos are from this morning 07h15

Have a great day. I will!

Jason Donovan - Im a celebrity Jungle

This is the show I was talking about and a little Jason in it.

All hail pakistani corner shops in London!

All hail ... All hail ... MILO has arrived back into my life in more than so many ways ... how so? I am glad you asked!

I am currently writing this blog instead of my work presentation for parent information evening, next week because of the excitement of my discovery. I have to say, that my initial discoveries were 3 weeks ago, only to be reinforced twice more at 2 different locations. TODAY, however, to my absolute joy and love of life, I found Milo by the tinful; dried and ready made on the shelves of TESCO ... all hail the mighty supermarket chain. HAIL HAIL ...

I have purchased a tin, OF COURSE, and its made by Neslte, Kenya... Milo is international ... gotta love that... gotta love the spoon dipped in Milo now...that's how this story ends ... How do you eat your Milo?