Chapter 267

I woke up early as always and took the dog out. The cat had been sleeping in the bathroom, and he took a nasty shit on the old bedsheet we gave him. I forgot how foul cat poop is compared to dog poop (that usually stays in cohesive little turds) and it made me question once again whether we should keep the little guy. But then I watched him stretch and take a few steps and my heart melted.

I had grade-12 classes and they went so-so. I’m trying to teach them to think logically and apply rational thinking to solve problems rather than just memorizing answers and doing stale repetitive practice but it’s too ingrained in their culture and possibly their DNA, who knows. The content of my lesson, noticing and analyzing trends in carboxylic acid pKa values, was all based on concepts we’d seen before, and I linked them all together.

At midday, I went home and quickly drank a protein shake before going back out with the animals. The cat could fit in my shirt pocket, and the leashed dog followed my bicycle. About 100 m away from the vet’s office, he braced himself and braked hard, recognizing the place he hates so much. I dragged him in. A young female vet and a male nurse immediately received me, calling the dog by his name. He was due for a shot of some sort according to his vaccination booklet, and they also checked the cat out. The vet gave him eye drops, said he’s fine, and doesn’t need shots until he’s a few months old at least. I bought a bag of cat food and a litter box and rode home. The rest of my lunch consisted of half a pomelo, almonds and cashews, I wanted a light meal for reasons that will be obvious in a few paragraphs.

I had two grade-11 classes in the afternoon. One with the strong group, and one with the self-proclaimed naocan class. Compared with the catatonic class, they are quite lively, prompt to make crude jokes (nothing blatantly disrespectful, in fact I do feel they like me quite a bit for joking along with them when it’s appropriate and a way to liven up my class rather than distract them) and ask questions when they don’t understand, which is often, with their limited English, limited academic ability and the content of my lessons that became a bit rougher, after an easy start to the semester. First we mostly reviewed stuff about subatomic particles, but now the electronic subshells and orbitals got them to look at me with question mark faces and say “Budong!” (I don’t understand). I appreciate their honesty and willingness to learn, so I repeated patiently and used all sorts of ways to get the point across, especially encouraging them to take notes, something a lot of them don’t do much and then wonder why they can’t answer my review questions. During the break, I wrote a homework paper I’ll print and give them, and included a bit more mindless practice that I normally do, thinking they need it.

I looked for something to listen, and settled on an album by The Kill, an Australian band churning out some furious grindcore. Then a friend of mine sent me a conversation between Tucker Carlson and Curtis Yarvin, a philosopher who goes by the pseudonym Mencius Moldbug. He’s been penning a bunch of essays online, I read a few of them back in the day but it’s written in a near-inscrutable jargon and obviously the product of a gigantic brain that my dumb ass can’t understand. I listened to half of it before it was time to head to class.

I got home and played with my animals for a bit, watching previews for the big UFC event coming up this weekend. Then I rode my skateboard to the shopping mall, meeting up with the girlfriend and a British-Chinese couple for a Korean fried chicken meal. It was great. Then we went to a pool hall, played two games of 8-ball, and I went to the bar. I got a beer from the fridge, my first in almost two weeks, and it made me all nauseous for some reason, perhaps the accumulated fatigue and big blob of greasy poultry distending my stomach. Still, I like going to the bar and having nice chats with fellow expats.

I rode home, listening to the awesome underground hip-hop gem from Genelec and Memphis Reigns. I was in bed after a quick shower and read a chapter from Michael Bisping’s book, he was talking about his detached retina that eventually lead him to lose his eye. Combat sports are no joke.