School starts and I can't tell you how happy I am about it

Sam started high school yesterday and Kira starts middle school tomorrow.  Tonight we went to her open house and got her schedule and learned where all her classrooms are.  God, I hate open house night.  The kids are stressed because nobody can open their locker (that's the overwhelming source of middle school stress before the first day.  Little do they know there are WAY worse things to worry about in middle school! Just wait, kids! You're gonna hate it!) and the building is huge compared to elementary school blah blah blah.  And it was hot.  Really hot.  Like I-think-they-had-the-heaters-on kind of hot.  I had sweat dripping down my spine and I'm not much of a sweat-er.  And every time I get in a crowd of people I am reminded of what a misanthrope I am.  I hate people so much.  Actually, that's not true.  I really like the idea of people (like internet people that probably aren't even real.  Hello, THE MATRIX), but I hate actual people... So I guess it is true.  Never mind about when I said it's not true.  One lady had a pack of kids with her and she was yelling down the crowded hallway for her littlest to catch up and was screeching at the crowd to get out of his way; she said, "God!  Get out of the way!  My poor baby is getting rambushed!"  Which I assume is a blend of  ram and ambush.  Or rambo and ambush.  You know, now that I write it down, I think it's kind of clever and perfectly descriptive but I don't think she knew she was making up a word and it really annoyed me.  Mostly the yelling-down-the-hall-of-a-thousand-people-while-I was-sweating-and-putting-up-with-a-nervous-and-cranky-11-year-old was making me crabby, but still.  Don't make up words and yell them at me when I'm sweating.

Kira saw a lot of her friends and I overheard one conversation where she told her friend that when she was buying her school supplies she chose the wide ruled paper instead of the college ruled because there are less lines on the paper so she won't have to write as much as the idiots who buy college ruled.  Score one for Kira!

Sam is on the fence about whether he likes high school yet or not.  He will.  What's not to like?  Homework, that's what.  He's had homework both nights already.  But he's very conscientious so he will be fine.  He has a few classes with one of the big bullies from middle school and already, the second day, three of the teachers have told that kid to SHUT UP.  In one of the classes his former victims tittered a bit after the teacher said it and then she said to the bully, "Hear that laughing?  That's all the people you've picked on."  Score one for high school!

Ninth grade, nine fingers, get it?