Multitasking Much?

I was walking through the halls of the school today. I passed several of my students and stopped into the ISS room for a few minutes to help one of them figure out what work he was missing so that he could try to get it done before the end of quarter tomorrow. I passed a couple kids loitering (and by loitering, I mean pawing all over each other like teenagers in heat – which, of course, they were) and shooed them off to class. I continued on, trying to find a room where I could hold a meeting for the Young Writers’ Program. I ended up at the end of our wing and stepped into a colleague’s classroom. She was in there working at her desk while a handful of students worked on something at tables. She asked me if she could help me, and I asked if I could use her other classroom – a computer lab. She said that that would be fine, because she was using the small room that day. I thanked her, said something to one of my students who was in the room.

Then a sound near my head made me jump, and I woke up.

Monday night I was out at a marching band competition until well after 11 PM, and didn’t get to slep until after midnight. Hardly a big deal in my heyday, but now that’s a Responsible Adult who wakes up at 5 in the morning and deals with teenagers all day, I can’t hack it. I got through Tuesday with a minimum of zombie noises, had an appointment right after school, and then was out and didn’t get home until after 10. I probably didn’t fall asleep until after 11 – again, shouldn’t be a big deal, but in conjunction with Monday night…

So yeah. Today, I was hurting. We were reading a story out loud, and during first period I almost fell asleep. I mean, it’s bad enough when one of the students falls asleep, but what are you supposed to say when the teacher nods off? Gah.

Fortunately, after first period I had an 87-minute prep period followed by lunch, and I decided to make the best of it. I stripped the throw pillows off the loveseat in the back of the room, grabbed a fleece blanket (stashed in the room for just such an occasion), locked my door, and set the alarm on my cell phone for five minutes before the end of class. I turned off the lights, curled up, and shut my eyes.

It took a little while for my brain to relax enough for me to fall asleep. And then… back to work, apparently! I accomplished an awful lot during my prep period today – too bad none of it actually happened.

And let me tell you, I was SO disoriented when I woke up. I’ve taken 20-30 minute naps on that couch before (hey, sometimes the best use of a prep period is a power nap so that you are prepped to remain upright for the rest of the day!) but apparently 80 minutes was just enough time to drop me into some pretty solid REM. That, or I was astral projecting all over the building…

(Oh, and for the record? My colleague doesn’t have two classrooms. I just very conveniently invented a classroom for her, right where the bathrooms are IRL, so that I’d have a meeting space. Nicely done, Mrs. Bees.)