September 11, 20XX

Mr. Kafka is a pretty crazy guy.

He is a man of many passions. Stargazing was what he raved about before, which was, not gonna lie, already very impressive, but today he sounded even more impressive when he introduced his other hobbies. Before he gazed at stars, he did crochet, public speaking, painting, and a buncha other stuff that I don't remember. I just remember the crochet part because the word sounds cool. And he showed us clips of him at public speaking competitions. Didn't know that existed. Cool flex.

He also showed us an old painting of his which he did when he was in high school. It was actually one of the finalists in a certain art competition the school held every year. It was a portrait of a rosewood chair. Why am I not surprised.

It was the most beautiful depiction of a chair I'd ever seen in my life. Cool but envy-worthy flex. He really knows how to grind my gears about these new chairs we're receiving. He has to be doing this on purpose. He must know. I mean, I am really excited for absolutely no reason. If you could quantify it, I'd say my hype went from a 1 to a 10 over this past week. They do say waiting does make the heart grow fonder. Curse him and his funny tactics. I digress.

You'd think with so many different interests, he'd have no time for it all. You'd be right. He doesn't have time for it all, so he rarely sleeps and loads up on lots of caffeine and MCT oil. Surprisingly, he's really good at all of the things he's tackled. He's not a shallow person who can't stick to one thing. When he sticks to something, he sticks hard, like gorilla glue.

I made this joke earlier in a conversation with him. He found it crazy amusing. He's probably the wildest teacher I've ever met, even wilder than Mr. Krishna, and she was hella wild. Like, penitentiary-level wild. Mr. Kafka's wild in a good way though. A much better way.

Apparently, the Going-Home Club is not the only club Mr. Kafka supervises over. He's also the coach of the girl's volleyball team. Apparently, he was a crazy good libero in high school. I called his bluff, but he wasn't joking. He demonstated a bunch of these dive warm-ups he used to do where he'd slide head-first across the ground. It was necessary for crazy recieves, he said. No kidding. It makes a little more sense why he dips out unannounced occasionally. Only a little. Sometimes he just leaves for no reason.

This time, he stayed the whole way. We were having an engaged discussion about cold coffee, a topic of intense debate between the two coffee lovers in the room, Claire and Mr. Kafka. Claire was very considerate. Mr. Kafka was not, and argued vehemently, in his over-the-top sort of way. Then, one thing led to the next, and somehow we were talking about what our spirit animals would be. Don't know how we get there or from where, but conversations tend to go in that direction whenever Mr. Kafka's involved. He is having way too much fun. I question whether that's okay for a teacher at this school, for his sake. I've never heard of any bad rumors about him, so I guess it's alright.

By the way, my spirit animal was decided unanimously. Apparently I have a snake. I think they decided that primarily because I was born in September, making me a Virgo. Yup, it's not because they harbor hidden resentment for me because I accidently-maybe-not-accidently ate all of the rich artisan brownies another teacher gifted us (I was very hungry, and everybody was out). Nope, not at all. That has to be a mistake.

Oh yes, Mark is a huge chocolate fan. He swings in the dark direction. He was the first to suggest a snake.

Curse that freakin' man... He thinks he's so tough. He better not incur my wrath (oh, but I don't want to get in a fight with him). He can go back home, for all I care (I hope he doesn't live in the same direction as me). Screw him and his chocolate (dark is really the best, I agree).

When the conversation touched upon SAT prep, I zoned out and switched to writing. With Mark slurping cup noodle in the corner, and Claire and Mr. Kafka joking about particularly nothing, I enjoy another breezy day in the club room.

However, that won't last long. It's coming. The terror, the horror—creeping up on us, ready to catch us after an already maddening wave of struggles.

THE PALOMAR PRE-ASSESSMENTS (capitalized for dramatic effect).

Seriously, how much work can one school cram into their students? Oh wait, this is a cram school.

Curse you, past me! Ah, well, I did get in here for basically free. And actually, to curse my past self would incur future harm to my current self, so let me rescind that.

Curse you, past me in a parallel world line! There ya go. Gotta keep things timely.

El Psy Congree. Or is it Congruu? I don't know: my head hurts and I've cursed a lot of people, including myself. it's time to head home.