I feel brain dead and bone tired. True, I'm frustrated on a particular problem I'm working on now, but instead of wasting my time and energy throwing tantrums I'm attempting to think up of more solutions.
I'm used to people venting their frustrations with sharp oaths. It is only the things beyond verbal outbursts that scare me.
For instance, this morning a young woman (who I never saw before) with a stack of papers and a red pen had taken up the lab bench next to my desk. Okay, no problem, maybe she's new. I usually use a different lab bench anyway. But whenever I was at my desk working on something, I heard sighs and moans and mutterings of obscenities about students answering questions incorrectly. She gave me dirty looks as if I were to blame.
Hey lady, I may look like one of those undergrads you've TA'd (after all, undergraduates have mistaken me for one of their own), but I haven't taken any of your classes. Today's the first time I've seen you!
I don't appreciate people's insidious attitudes that reach out in an attempt to infect innocent bystanders. Sometimes I wonder if this particular attitude is the result of a spoiled childhood where she got too many time-outs and not enough swats on the behind.
Fortunately, she left before noon, before I decided to snap out of my laid-back temperament and throttle her.
