Character Sketches

Your Friend's Pseudo Step-Mother

Her outfits consist solely of Harley Davidson gear, worn in varying degrees of formality to every occasion. Her haircut inexplicably makes you think of a bus driver. She spends the majority of Christmas morning sitting on the couch, reading aloud from one of those joke t-shirt catalogs. She periodically yells out "Hey you guys! Listen to this one" while the rest of you brunch amidst her unicorn figurines and novelty sized margarita glasses.

One of Your Favorite Students

She is a refugee and enjoys regaling you with tales of living in the jungle for years at time, delivering babies onto mats made from banana leaves. By a ridiculous quirk of fate and arrangement of syllables, her name sounds just like a slightly scandalous adjective. And her daughter's name sounds like a well-known carbonated beverage.

Most days find her in patterned pajama pants, flip flops, a t-shirt featuring Bart Simpson and a striped cardigan. One day during break, you over hear the class cackling as she relates an apparently hilarious story to them in her native language. When you walk into the classroom, she is miming some sort of hugging/dancing action. She announces to you that she is telling everyone about "the first time her husband loved her."