Soon to be famous, my Gemco paper clips with box! in Halt and Catch Fire!
photo via JunkDrawerLoveEtsy
I wrote to the Etsy buyer because I saw that these clips were being shipped to Stalwart Films and thought these might be on "Walking Dead" one of my favorite series to watch and was answered with:
Hi Kennedy,
We are using these are set dressing for a new AMC tv show called Halt & Catch Fire. It's a show about the new computer age that takes place in 1983. We are very happy to use your gem clips!
Thanks so much
So AMC's new TV show, Halt and Catch Fire is going to be an early 80s period piece of the personal computer boom through the eyes of a visionary, an engineer and a prodigy whose innovations directly confront the corporate behemoths of the time. Their personal and professional partnership will be challenged by greed and ego while charting the changing culture in Texas' Silicon Prairie. ---from Halt and Catch Fire Imbd
And my Gemco paper clips may be in it somewhere at sometime in one of 10, one hour long episodes! Stay tuned maybe you'll see them there too!
photo via JunkDrawerLoveEtsy
Anyways, the thought of being able to see them on a show gives me a good giggle and smile! I kept a box for myself, which I don't really know why since it's just going to sit in a drawer!
Several items of my hoard have gone to interesting to semi famous new lives and homes! Here's one that didn't make it on to a Casablanca set because while I was calculating overnight shipping costs they found the exact one locally! It's still available, here.
Also this person turned his collection into the Museum of California Design! Read here. I would like to thank these people for their emails and how their kindness and time has been inspiring, motivating and insightful to myself as a recovering hoarder.
In my last posting more teacher drama trauma came up from peeling away from the layers and having a "freeze" on teacher supplies at our school for six months due to most likely embezzlement or some sort because no one ever figured it out.
And one thing my first principal was good at was balancing the budget! The yearly staff meetings over budget allocation were very hard to follow and I mostly only payed attention to budgets concerning nurse, teacher aides, supplies and furlough days! Every year the budget was explained to me I just pictured hundreds of separate little rooms inside rooms inside rooms were different monies is kept, budgeted and allocated.
Anyways, in the beginning of the six month "freeze" on school supplies because there weren't any, one of my Aunts, (remember all of my aunts, one uncle and cousins are teachers at one point in time or another) basically let me go shopping in her personal stash at her home! And these paperclips were part of the many supplies she let me take home.
I remember that year too, we could still get paper clips, but she told me to take them anyway in case they ran out because if you are at teacher, you know paper clips can be your best friend teacher tool, especially when collating!
That was the year when my students wanted to make tissue paper flowers and tissue covered bottle vases for Mother's day, but all I could afford was white tissue and they weren't interested! So instead, we made paper clips necklaces! I bought several different coordinating and colored shelf papers and we basically made flat beads or joined paper clips covered with shelf paper.
They had a blast! They made more than necklaces, but bracelets, earrings, garlands, dress belts and all kinds of other stuff I can't remember! And it was very good for their motor skills attaching all the paper clips together and peeling off the backing of small cut pieces of shelving paper!
It was also a good English Language Development lesson for small, medium and large, long, longer and longest, short, shorter and shortest, etc and Math lesson for patterning. During my last several years of teaching, it did not include art, music, social studies, cursive and even PE because there were not scheduled into the district wide curriculum.
Imagine that! Yep, it was basically 3 hours of reading and 1 hour each of math, writing and science. With every little minute on a district wide schedule, with teachers in each grade level practically saying the same things because reading was scripted too. I used to wonder if it was quiet enough if I could hear all 34, 000 teachers turning the page when I was!
In hindsight, teaching went downhill from my third year of teaching starting with the 8% pay cut for three years that took eight years to catch up to my first years pay! And it kept rolling downhill from then on with the six month "freeze" on no supplies because their weren't any, then changing math curriculum text books every six month for two years, America's Choice fiasco that cost our school half a mil for a 3 year program that lasted six months, a scripted reading program that took four hours a day to teach and I countless hours of teacher off and on campus learning on how to teach this program and
When I realized how boring it was too teach this way, I wondered how boring it was for my students. I still tried to stick it out thinking it would change, but no! the only thing that changed was testing! With this new reading program that went on what felt like forever, the biggest issue I had that boggled my mind was 60% was considered passing! Yes, that's less than 50%, what test have you ever taken when getting half wrong and half right was passing And get this, all of the five or six sections reading part of the test was only 10 questions!!!! So you could get 6 wrong and pass with getting 4 answers correct!!!!
I don't know how many times I told my students that the "real" world was not like this! and that I had no idea what world we were being prepared for! Until... one day through the grapevine I heard that in two years passing was going to be bumped up to 80%. What in the world?
So now out of 5 to 6 sections one had to get 8 answers correct with only 2 mistakes? Of course, I told my students that 80% in the real world is considered a "B" grade. Oh yeah and the district kept changing the report cards too. So much so, it was just confusing with grades being given with numbers and effort grades were given for each subject and sub subject. And failing wasn't even a zero or option, a 1 was giving for failing as a "D" grade and it went numerically from there.
Regardless to say, all my students learned percentages very well with a "grade" scale that is given in college.
I could go on and on as if I already haven't! I'll end with, I learned Real Estate Investing very quickly to leave education!
Actually the last straw for me was when the district stopped paying many teachers for six months! How long would anyone last without pay for six months?! (Well, I had six month pay on reserve since the 8% pay cut years because I thought it was certain we'd go on strike any minute! which later helped me start my real estate investing)
And then add injury to insult those teachers were given a $300 voucher as monthly pay with a promise to pay it back with interest! I listened to many who had lost their homes, cars (they were taking the bus to work and some from different counties!), credit scores were ruined and some couldn't even borrow money from family anymore because now their families were all tapped out too!
I wasn't one of them nor were the teachers at our school, but I had other issues with my paycheck, but that's a whole other story!
photo via JunkDrawerLoveEtsy
I have no idea how to untangle my memories from teaching and would like to learn how to do so without judgment and chalk it all up to a grand learning experience, but at the moment I'm not sure how to do that yet.
What I Learned:
1. I need some lessons on "forgive, ness" and to see the silver lining of the pain, resentment of injustice, disgust and wasted dedication I feel at the moment.
2. Last Wednesday, I was all weepy and today I'm angry! I need to go find my book on Kubler Ross, "Death and Dying" because it just popped into my head!
Thank you Etsy buyer from JunkDrawerLoveEtsy for taking the time to answer my questions in an email. It's brought me a long ways and I thank you for that!
Thank you Etsy for helping me unload my hoard to such kind people who pass through and help me with my journey!
Thank you US, Germany, Ukraine, Australia, Canada, Indonesia, Poland and others who have visited since Wednesday as I lift off my burdens through my HoarderRehab and The Destiny of Things!
Click on the shop names to visit my hoard listed daily: HoarderRehab, The Destiny of Things, VintageToGoEtsy and now JunkDrawerLoveEtsy! There are about 110 items listed on JunkDrawerLoveEtsy and will resume new listings in a few days and will continue to relist 1-2 items at the other shops! Thanks for looking! Maybe you'll find something to take home and share your story too!
And thank you Ivy for using the invite to open your new Etsy shop, Love Lotus Vintage! Visit her newly opened shop, Love Lotus Vintage for some 80s to 90s romantic wear! She'd like to clear out her closet and have less stuff for her big move!
If anyone else would like an invite to open their own Etsy shop and get 40 free listings, let me know how I can help you!
Related Stories from my inner city teaching days:
1. Freddie the Frog: Forgiving my inner city teacher past! Read here
2. Puffer Fish Boy Friend Christmas Gift: Best student realia ever, read about it here
3. Receipt Spike and Service Bell: Some of the best teacher tools ever
5. Polaroid Camera Story: teacher memories of trials and tribulations!
6. US Puzzle Maps here, more funny dark truthful funny teacher drama trauma!
7. 90s Dixon Ticonderoga ORIOLE 267 Pencil Artist: Wed. post had me crying and today I'm angry and starting to feel sad.
Most Read Story of the Week, Month and All Time: My Louis Vuitton Collection: the end of my collection is the beginning for someone else. The last piece of my LV collection, my 80s LV gold cornered wallet is available here at The Destiny of Things!
Onwards and upwards! Thank you for stopping by!
Love your story! It sounds like you were an awesome teacher!
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