Playing hookey

I slept in and am missing church. Having a leisurely morning. My yesterday's illness is my excuse, but I still have every intention of going to an extended family open house this afternoon to see a cousin from Germany who only gets Stateside rarely. When you're a kid, if you stay home from school sick, then you can't play outside after school is over. But I'm not a kid, so even though I stay home from church, I will go "play" afterwards.

I guess the statute of limitations is up on my high school attendance, so I will confess that in my senior year I sometimes just didn't attend classes that I disliked. If it was the first class of the morning, I would leave campus before the homeroom where roll was taken and go have a little bite at a nearby McDonalds. By missing homeroom, I ensured that my name was put on an "absence list" that was distributed to teachers, so none of my teachers would expect to see me in class that day.

My good parents had no idea I did this. They raised me better than that.

In my defense, my first hour class that year was a French class where the teacher had truly dreadful body odor and who spit when he talked. My assigned seat was in the front row, so I would get droplets of his spittle on my desk and notebook. This revolted me intensely. That would be well over 30 years ago now. I wonder if he is still living. He of course seemed old to me then, but I have no idea how old he really was. He was a heavy smoker, which is partly why he stank. When the bell rang at the end of class, he was the first one out the door, and I presume he was running to the teachers' lounge for a cigarette. Poor man. I hope he lived to enjoy retirement.

Lovely thoughts for a Sunday morning. I should at least play some sacred music on a CD.