01/11/2007: "I only want to stab myself in the head. That's all."

Dear friends of technology,

I don't know what I did wrong, but it seems that technology - once my friend and source of income - has turned on me. In an ugly way. Big time. Scary stuff. And I wish I knew what I was doing wrong because I want technology to like me more. It's really bad when technology hates me because when it hates me? It HATES me.

Maybe technology is mad at me for some slight I don't even know I made. If that's the case, I heartily apologize to technology and I'd like you to pass on the message, because it appears that technology won't hardly even speak to me anymore. I'm SOOOOO SOOORRR-EEEEEE, technology! Honest to God, I didn't know! I coudn't be sorrier! Please stop hating me!

See, the way I know that technology is being a hater is this. I have been nagging my students since the moment we got back from winter break to turn in late homework, NOW. I have turned into Hard-Ass Teacher and am giving out a day's lunch detention for each and every homework assignment that isn't turned in or is turned in late. I don't like being so tough but something had to change and this got their attention. I'm already seeing a lot more homework and instead of half the class not turning in their work, now I'm down to one or two missing. This is a vast improvement.

I am also seeing students turn in late homework for partial credit, which is good, because the quarter ends in two weeks. So this week and last have been a flurry of updating my electronic gradebook and giving credit where credit is due and so forth and so on.

Today, as I was adding the second to last grade on a HUGE assignment and was just about ready to print out updated grade sheets for my classes - technology turned on me. For some completely unknown reason, the file I was updating went... boom. Softly. It just... stopped working. I could not input the last 2 grades. The file refused to allow me to input the grades. And then it insisted - rather rudely - on shutting down. AND THEN IT WOULDN'T OPEN UP AGAIN, UH, UH, NO WAY, GO AWAY WE ARE CLOSED AND ALSO WE HATE YOU.

And the file size went from about 220 kb to about 50 kb and I wanted to begin stabbing myself in the head with a pitchfork because I know from corrupted files. Although there was no reason on God's green earth for this file to be corrupted because I wasn't doing anything to it except what it was made for, so I sort of hate it back.

I emailed our onsite tech guy, who said he'd seen the error before and the file had gone to it's grave. I sent a ticket in to the company who makes the software who replied very promptly but with no help whatsoever. Seems our district is using a version of this program so old that the tech support reps at the company that makes the software gave themselves hernias laughing at us. And we'll be using it for the next 18 months at least.

I don't know whether to hurt technology at this point, or our school district. Both are nebulous entities and it's hard to know where to begin.

Thus, I spent the last 45 minutes rebuilding the grade file from a backup I did over winter break. It's only 8 days out of date and not too bad, really, all things considered. I have a lot of unexpected work to do tomorrow to get things put back together and there are a few assignments I may have to throw out because I've turned the papers back to the kids and even though you tell 'em not to throw anything away until the quarter ends... they're 8th graders. They don't listen. It's heartbreaking, but it's true.

Anyway, friends of technology, please relay to aforementioned technology that I am very disappointed with it's behavior and hope that we can mend our relationship soon. Please let me know technology's demands at your earliest convenience. I will do whatever is in my power to see to it that technology is kept happier than it's current behavior indicates it is.

Thank you,
Kristin

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01/11/2007: "I only want to stab myself in the head. That's all."