Shave My Beard

So it's a go-ahead for the Shave Gryphon's Beard initiative. My fundraising group that is collecting for the Patrice Butts Fund saw my beard as a resource, and for the first time in five years, I'm making myself vulnerable to being shaved.

I grew it in Katimavik when I entered a group beard-growing competition. Perhaps, since its birth came at the start of my educational journey, it's only proper that it dies at the end of it.

We decided on $250 for the beard. They said $100, I said $500, we met in the middle.

If it happens, it will be on April 2nd. I will be shaved in public and video taped to be presented on the Internet. The highest bidder will choose a facial hair style for me. So if you ever wondered what I'd look like with a goatee, muttonchops, handlebar mustache, Fu Manchu etc. Now's your time to find out.

I'm hoping for a Hollywood Hulk Hogan, but and I'm worried about those creative types. I've heard suggestions of one-side shaved one-side not, beard-hair Pikachu cheeks, a reverse-chinstrap, stripes, and of course, a Hitler mustache.

I'd keep the chosen style for a week, then shave it off completely. Then immediately grow my beard back with my amazing facial hair growth.

I started a GoFundMe which takes online donations. So do it.

http://www.gofundme.com/n9or2s

Raading Week

Strange string of days recently. Friday the 13th followed by Valentine's Day, followed by the anniversary of the Canadian flag, followed by Family Day.

It's Reading Week too, which is kind of an equivalent of Spring Break, just not in the spring, and with the superficial expectation put to it that students will spend it reading.

My Extend-a-Family contract fell through. The family decided to spend their funding on something else. Found out about that on Friday the 13th. After my previous prospective contract's decision not to take a worker, I'm feeling a little pessimistic.

The two Respect Meetings from last week were record low in attendance as well, so I'm feeling a little defeated overall.

School Email

Last Tuesday, I was on the bus to placement and I saw the man and woman who'd had that altercation a few days earlier. They were sitting in the same places as before. I guess they didn't feel the need to build space. The guy had his backpack on his lap, so I guess the woman won that dispute. In a way, I'm happy that the guy learned proper bus etiquette, but in another, it's kind of aggravating that the woman might feel encouraged to use that communication style.

I got some lining for my bundle buggy. Awwwww, yeah, no more anxiety about items falling through the iron mesh!

Roll Up the Rim is happening at Tim Horton's. There's a participant at WALES who I always have guess if I'll win because he. Is. Never. Wrong. Just one of those weird oddities of life. I had him guess my first Roll Up, he said I'd win which, of course, happened. Good way to start things off.

You can't just use a win on your regular order, I believe. You have to get the best value for your win. Felt a little weird asking for the Caramel Dream Latte, though.

I hate the school emailing system. I'm supposed to send a Respect Question of the Week every Monday. I'm supposed to include everyone in a BCC so their emails come in individually, but the BCC option doesn't wwork on my home computer for some reason. So I go to use a school computer, but the school computer doesn't let me copy/paste addresses. Last time, I wound up typing in every address manually for the entire campaign, which takes forever.

And when I tried copy/pasting from my home computer, it wouldn't send because it needs a semicolon between each address. So I tried putting a semicolon between each, but then the address recognition function kicked in and switched the recognized addresses to student names. But for some reason when it did this, it changed every address that didn't have a semicolon into one, giant, unrecognized address that it wouldn't let me edit.

 So now I've thought to copy/paste into a word processor and then manually put the semicolons in, then copy/past from that into the address bar. This way, I only have to make modifications when new people join Respect. But the graph that I pull data from auto-formats in a way that it can't be put in the address bar. So now I've got to do each address individually and put semicolons between them. Gonna take a few hourrs maybe.

It's annoying because the address recognition function and auto-formatting are supposed to be convenient, but their side-effects make my life a lot harder.

Snow Day

Last night we had a snowstorm and today all the schools were closed, including Conestoga. During my time at Conestoga, that's only happened once before, and that was two years ago when I was in HSF. Apparently we have a reputation for never closing, something about how we double as a cellphone tower and closing the school costs them money.

But school closing doesn't help me when I've got placement on Mondays. Well, guess what? WALES was closed too!

Yahoooo!!! I didn't think I got snow days as an adult! I feel like a kid!

Bus Incident 2

Yeah, so apparently I can't just ride the bus peacefully anymore. After I had to break up that fight, the very next time I had to bus to placement, the emergency exit window next to me broke open. I was just sitting there, and suddenly, I had no window.

We had the Human Library the other day. It started out a bit slow but really picked up at around noon. Lots of people wanted to speak to people in groups this year, instead of one-on-one. I got to go to it, since a member of WALES was being a Human Book. I had that dual-position thing going on, though, since I'm a Respect Intern and also a WALES worker.

Bus Incident

In my letter to myself, the younger Gryphon had the audacity to call me old! Stupid kid doesn't realize that I'm only one fifth my total lifespan older than him! And he signs "Love, Young Gryphon". I'm still Young Gryphon! He asks me if the future is as bad as he imagines. Comforting to say that if I could write him back, I'd say that things are a lot better than he feared and that the five years ahead of him would be the best years of his life.

I was riding the bus to placement a couple days ago, and this older woman told this younger man to take his backpack off the seat next to him so that someone could sit down, since the bus was full and people were having to stand in the aisle. Fair enough, but she took it further and started calling him rude, ignorant, selfish etc. And she appeared to have been holding onto it for awhile, because she started talking about how this is something he does everyday. He started saying that she shouldn't talk about him because she doesn't even know him, and that she could have just asked. Then she said something about his mother, and he started shouting about how she shouldn't bring his mother into it. Then he suddenly jumped out of his seat and charged at her. Faster than I could think, I jumped between the two of them and he hit me.

He just sort of stared at me, looking scared. I tried to assure him that things were going to be okay but he needed to calm down. The woman started shouting about how she was going to throw him in jail. The bus stopped. He ran away crying. The bus filed out like nothing had happened.

School Fundraiser

For one of my school projects we have to do a fundraiser. One of the gimmicks that my group is doing is that, if enough money is raised, I will have to shave my beard!!! Five year dedication to this thing, can't imagine myself without it. I'm growing it out as long as possible before the event, to boost motivation. I'm not even allowed to trim!

I just got a letter from myself from when I completed Ways2Work five years ago. I don't even remember writing it!! I'm steeling myself to look at it. Grrr... So nervous!

Just did the first Respect Meet of 2015. The theme was Human Library! I'm facilitating another one tomorrow.

Jut ordered a phone case for my smart phone. If I'm gonna have a decent phone, I'm going to treat it right!