Chapter 334

Yet another day. One more month and 2021 will be in the rearview mirror, and finally I will be able to focus on other writing projects.

I had a practical session with the eleventh-graders, it was a bit of a boring one on their side, they just mix the chemicals and wait, stopwatch in hand, for the color to change and then do calculations on the rate of the reaction. Then I went home, had lunch, and had an interview with another school, located in Nanjing. I’m happy at my current position, but sometimes it’s good to test the waters elsewhere, get some interview practice, and keep options open. Also, the girlfriend is as unhappy as ever in her position, and that Nanjing school has an art program so we’re looking for a couple’s position. I talked to the principal, a guy I met in the past a few times in an informal manner, and whom I get along with. So it was relaxed, but he still asked me the usual questions. It went quite well I think, let’s see how it pans out.

I taught more classes in the afternoon. The guy who runs the black metal radio show in the Arctic sent me a link to the episode I helped him with, and I listened to it between classes. It was really great, he played all the Chinese black metal tracks I sent him, with lengthy and detailed introductions. I realized though that he didn’t use the notes I wrote, and only then did I go through the e-mails we had exchanged and saw that I didn’t in fact send him those notes. Oops. I did send the Word file with all the audio tracks, but since the folder was too big, I went back and sent all the songs one by one and just forgot to also send the notes. He did a tremendous job as always though, researching the info himself and presenting it with his passionate and erudite style.

I went home, dropped my bag and immediately went to the girlfriend’s school with the dog in tow. We were supposed to go pick up the construction materials, but the guy texted the girlfriend and said he can’t stay at his shop late because he has to go pick his child up at the school. Ah well, change of plan. Since we were already there though, we decided on the spot to go to the pizzeria, it’s been a while. So I drove in traffic for a bit and got to the street where it’s located.

I parallel-parked, and a skinny man with a wispy mustache ran to my window, knocked on it, and said I just scratched his car. I didn’t feel anything, and thought there was enough distance, but he was all mad and called the police. Fucking hell.

There was the tiniest of tiny scratches on the otherwise immaculately white bumper, and he pointed at a scratch on my own bumper that he thought was the smoking gun piece of evidence. I scrolled through my phone a bit and found a picture of the car from several days ago, with the front bumper already damaged. We argued a bit, and then the fine representatives of the constabulary force eventually arrived. They went through the process of listening to both parties argue like they likely do multiple times daily, and one of them pointed his flashlight at my bumper, saying “Yeah, this is an old scratch no doubt, but here’s one that’s fresh. Look at the tiny paint chips. If you dispute it, we will tow both cars to do tests, but the culprit or false accuser will have to pay the fees” Better just admit that I probably grazed the guy’s bumper, and get it over with. They got our insurance papers and printed some kind of receipt I had to sign.

So I was in a bit of a bad mood even though the pizza was amazing. I did some kind of mock job interview for the girlfriend, since she will also talk to the Nanjing principal soon. She was a bit nervous but I gave her pointers and good buzzwords to use in her answers.

We got home and I made a bit of music on FL Studio while she kept preparing for her interview, then we went to bed and watched an episode of Foundation.