Compulsory Attendance

I'm stuck in a goddamn training on the 11th. 
Please go ahead and visualize me rolling my eyes here.
Yes, I get paid for my time.
And it will be a whole day.

I don't object to free training, I really don't.
And had it been offered to me along with the explanation and agenda, it would have probably been interesting enough to me to sign up. But I deeply resent being told that something is mandatory.

I am no longer a captive teenager in school.
I suppose that management's idea that people are not responsible enough to show up for training without threats gives you still another glimpse of the lowered expectations* of this place.

(*show up, have a pulse...)

We also received an email this week (everyone's email addresses are on that email... making us a target for spam and scams) and were threatened with, "If you don't show, you will be written up!!"

OOOh, I'm so scared!! Someone might write something negative about me on a piece of paper!! And then, if I keep being BAD there would be MORE pieces of paper and eventually they might even toss me overboard!

::shiver:: The class is about having fun with books and literacy, doing art projects to add to a child's enjoyment of a book or several books. There will be things to put our hands on and several opportunities to make different projects. I don't think it will be boring, although it *is* a long day and both the start and end times will be during peak traffic hours.

Most of the people attending don't live way out here where I do, most of them are within about 10 minutes of the office. It's 23 miles for me, most of it freeway. The day of my interview, it took me more than an hour to get home, the first 75% of the trip in stop and go and stop and stop and go and stop traffic.

You see, the Oregon freeway system pretty much sucks donkey balls. Our 'planners' can't plan worth a shit. So when any 'new' freeway lanes are finally finished (after six to 10 years of construction) they're already overwhelmed because another 20 thousand cars per day are on that road and it's just as slow after being fixed as it was when you had to slow down for construction.

When you get on the freeway out here, you'd better be ready to stay there, since there are only a few exits between my suburban area and downtown Portland. If you take one of those exits with the intention of getting back on the freeway, good luck. It's very unusual for there to be an on ramp within five miles of the off ramp. It's truly a crappy system, apparently run by morons.

Our "representatives" were so proud a few years ago, they doubled our vehicle registration fees, called it a transportation package and boasted about how many roads were going to be repaired with all that money!

I'm still looking for a road that's been repaired.
Assholes.

And those rotten fucks are once again holding out their hands asking for more money. When we say no, they find a different way to steal from us. I don't even have the words to tell you how much I hate them. Gahhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Thursday I will be having an all-day program at my school. I'm in the process of planning what we're going to do for projects and entertainment. Probably going to start on the woven trivet project. That will be a gift to the parents this year. It's time-consuming and requires me to help a bit, but with a small group, it's definitely something I can do. I think. Even if I'm not being threatened.