Some Like it Hot

...however, I do not. A sudden heatwave has come over Austria, and it sucks.

Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon as women

Today's high is 29 C -- that's 88 F. Yucky. Beach weather is what I'd call it, though I don't know of any beaches in the area around Amstetten. Although nice for sunbathing, it's hard when the weather is this hot to move around much without breaking into a sweat. And I don't sunbathe. My complexion  - a freckling strawberry blonde - is too pale for any good to come of that.

Today is also my last day of school...this, above all else, is reason to celebrate! As a kid, I loved the last day of school (don't all kids?) and would relish walking home with an empty backpack (no school work!) or nearly empty - a few broken crayons at the bottom having been overlooked in cleaning it out from the day before. I always cleaned out my desk (ergo, backpack) the day before the last day of school so I could relish the empty backpack feeling the real, very last day. Being somewhat of a pack rat, the feeling of nothing weighing me down is to this day is not a feeling I can experience too often if I have a bag to carry. And even if I don't.

Being free from school as a teacher is  really exhilarating, perhaps even more so than as a student. We are free from tests and papers and books and planning and the nervous energy that comes from standing in front of an audience for hours on end, hoping you do well enough to make your point known, whether that be the dialog of a play, the joke of a stand-up comic, the evening news, or the lesson at hand. But only for a few days. Contrary to popular belief, teacher work a hell of a lot during the summer...when else do you think we get all of our lesson planning done? In our sleep?

In three weeks, I will be headed out to Zell am See in western Austria to do more of the same: teach English. In the past year, I've realized how much I honestly enjoy it, and am happy to welcome a new teaching experience (and Austrian experience!) to my repertoire.

NB: The film Some Like it Hot was one of Marilyn Monroe's greatest comedic successes. Interestingly enough, it was written and directed by Billy Wilder, who was Austrian. His other films include many of my favorites: Ninotchka with Greta Garbo, Sunset Boulevard, Sabrina, Ball of Fire with Gary Cooper, The Seven Year Itch (also with Marilyn), and Love in the Afternoon. According to IMDb, Wilder apparently shared an apartment with fellow Austro-Hungarian ex-pat Peter Lorre during his early years in Hollywood.