Boo and NaBloPoMo

Happy Halloween!! 

I’ll miss the trick-or-treaters tonight because I’ll be teaching, but I usually only get a couple of them anyway.  I hope that at least one of my students or colleagues is dressed up so that it at least feels like Halloween!

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Tomorrow is the beginning of NaBloPoMo.  What, you ask?  It is National Blog Posting Month, and the mission (if you choose to accept it), is to write a blog post every day for the entire month of November.  I post most days anyway, but I will be committing to the NaBloPoMo mission this year.  Two folks on my blogroll — my friend Jenn and a Canadian teacher named Hillary — are participating.  Anyone else want to join in the fun?  There is an official website if you want to be all official about it (just do a search for NaBloPoMo).

An interview

My adventures in teaching full-time will come to a close in about six weeks.  There just isn’t as much demand for lecturers in winter term, and I’m not sure I’d want to teach four classes next semester even if there was.  It’s just not how I like to conduct my work life, doing one very focused thing all the time.  I miss writing and collaboration and all the other cool things I used to do when I had two part-time academic positions (one in research, one in teaching).

So I started actively seeking other work again a few weeks ago, with the goal of starting no later than January 2nd.  I was hoping to find a job similar to what I had before that was a mix of research, statistics, and writing.  And I found a perfect job posted on the first day I started seriously looking again!  And today, I got a call to interview for this perfect job and had a super conversation with the woman I’d be working for!  I am absolutely over the moon!!

And do you notice it’s Tuesday?  I knew I loved Tuesdays.  *grins*

Good old George

Some of the most unsuccessful lectures I’ve ever given were on the topic of geometric similarity.  And that’s what is on tap this week in two of my classes.  I’ve been dreading this week all semester.

And then an idea occurred to me from a teaching conference I went to this summer.  And a weight was lifted, as I knew how to start this process of learning about geometric similarity.  George Washington’s nose!  That’s it!  I have to start with George Washington’s nose!

*dances around excitedly*

Fall Cleaning (or how to NOT get lectures written)

I finished grading my students’ midterms, which was not a happy event (the scores weren’t awful but were not up to par either, and I used up all of the ink in a brand new grading pen on one set of midterms…sigh).  I needed a break before I started working on next week’s lectures, so I decided to change the sheets on my bed.  It’s time for flannel sheets!

I took the old sheets off my bed and realized my mattress pad is a little stained.  So I decided to wash that.  And then I thought, well, while I have the mattress pad off, I might as well flip my mattress.  And while I was doing that, I noticed my bed skirt and couldn’t remember the last time I washed it, so I’ll throw that in too…and my canopy, since it’s dusty.  And speaking of dust, my bookcase was awfully dusty, so I started cleaning that and while I was on the floor, I noticed the dust bunnies under my bed were growing large.  So I moved the bed to vacuum under the bed and dust the wall behind my headboard.

And this, my friends, is how I wasted two hours not getting my lectures written!  Perhaps I should lecture about the importance of Fall Cleaning instead of math.  *giggles*

Teaching Thursdays #54

Some cute moments from class this term…

Moment #1

One of my students could not remember my name.  I was kidding around with him and said, “I have nearly 140 students and I know all of their names.  [This is true!]  And you have, what, four professors?  And you can’t remember my name?”  So, he asked a classmate what my name was.  For the sake of anonymity, let’s suppose my name is Ms X.  So, now, he’s all “Hey, Ms X!” and “How are you today, Ms X?” every time he sees me.  And when he turned in his exam yesterday, he indicated that he didn’t do very well, and then said, “But your hair sure is pretty today, Ms X!  Could you remember I said that when you grade my exam?”  *giggles*

Moment #2

I was waiting for my students to finish up an in-class activity, and as is often the case with me when I’m just waiting around, I kind of started absent-mindedly dancing.  Two of my students saw me and said, “Hey, can you do a River Dance for us?”  I laughed and said, “Well, not an official one.”  One of them said, “Will you do a non-official River Dance for us?”  I hesitated.  And then they said, “Come on!  We’ll give you extra credit!”

*falls over laughing*

Midweek Catch Up

Most of my students have mid-terms this week, and it’s been a crazy busy week!  I was busy almost non-stop today from 9:45 a.m. to 9:15 p.m.  I’m glad to be home and in pajamas!

I haven’t had any other major incidents with my new meds since Monday.  My body seems to have come to terms with this new pill and I’m only having minor side effects now.  I also switched around the timing of one of my other meds to try to offset any blood pressure issues in the morning.  I have to say that I’m noticing some good things on the new meds!  My gyn-related pain level is reduced quite a bit, and I feel like I have more energy.  So, score two for the good side!  *grin*  I am quite pleased.

Adventures with medicine

The other big event this weekend (besides beholding my future, which was way more fun) was that I started new meds to treat several gyn issues.  Oh, the joys of hormone manipulation!

One of our big concerns about this was that these meds can cause unusual fluid retention and high blood pressure.  I’m basically missing the hormone that regulates hydration, so any added challenge to my fluid situation is Not Good.  But I’ve been so miserable with gyn issues that I felt it was worth the risk at this time.  And since my BP always runs low (rarely hitting triple digits), the high BP wasn’t of too much concern and it might actually help to get a boost there.  I promised my docs that I would keep careful records to make sure we were on top of things quickly if there are problems.

Well, so far (and it is early in this process), my body has reacted exactly the opposite of what was expected.  My weight is falling a bit, and my BP plummeted this morning after my shower, prompting me to lie down very quickly.  When I was finally feeling well enough to get my BP monitor out (and no longer felt very faint), my BP was still only 87/68.  This will raise alarms with my doctors faster than if I had started retaining fluids!  But, hopefully things will re-stabilize quickly.  I’m keeping careful records, as promised, and I have a doctors appt on Nov 7th and will call them before then if these problems continue.

Beholding my future

I went to an orientation type of event for prospective graduate students today.  And it made me want to start a doctoral program right NOW!  Not next fall, but right this moment!  I’m chomping at the bit!

I was a little nervous for this event today, thinking someone would say something that would unravel this whole plan of mine.  Like they’d say that they don’t really fund people anymore, or they only accept people who have certain undergraduate degrees.  Or maybe they only accept people who are left-handed or who can parallel park or cook scrambled eggs!  I don’t know!  But it seems like this has all fallen together so beautifully (like it was meant to be), and part of me keeps waiting for the Impossibility of it all to be revealed.  But it hasn’t happened and it didn’t happen today.  All the day long, all I heard was stuff that made me feel really happy and welcome and like, hey, this could actually work.

I could be a doctoral student next year.

At this point, that statement makes me equal parts giddy and scared to death.  I have a funny feeling that will always be how I feel about it too.  Wheeeeeee!

Teaching Thursdays #53

This semester is my first time teaching four classes.  Some weeks, it hasn’t felt like all that much more work than teaching two classes (which is my usual fall semester teaching load).  I was worried that my energy and voice wouldn’t hold up for eight lectures a week, but that really hasn’t been a problem.  I was worried that the difficulty of dealing with twice as many stressed-out students would wear me out more quickly, but I am blessed with fairly low maintenance students this term.  Only a few have been sending me lots of e-mails or requesting special favors.  So, all in all, it’s been going OK.  Dare I say, easier than I expected so far though never easy.

But now, at this mid-semester point in the fall is when things get very hard.  We’re all running on fumes from now until Thanksgiving.  My students turned in projects this week and have exams next week.  I am ready for a weekend off from all the work, as working so hard weekend after weekend gets old after about seven weeks, and I’m tired.  And usually, I’d be able to take a weekend off at this point — with two classes, I could always afford a weekend of rebellious rest!  With four classes, this feels less possible to me at this moment.  I have all my lesson prep and exams ready for next week (yay!) but I also have nearly 100 projects to grade this weekend (boo!).  And if I do no lesson prep this weekend, then I’ll be prepping new units and grading nearly 100 exams next weekend.  Bah humbug!

So, I think this is going to be the hardest thing about teaching four classes.  It’s not the sheer amount of students wanting my attention or the actual time in class (in which I expend a lot of energy but we have fun!).  Those have been a breeze in many ways so far.  But it’s the fact that it’s much harder to come upon that bit of wiggle room that allowed me some actual full days now and then without working.  I never got many of them, but I was usually able to squeeze in one Saturday or Sunday of no work about every three to four weeks, and that was enough to keep me from getting extremely crabby.  I have not had a day off yet this term, but I’m going to have to force some free time into my schedule whether the room is there or not because the exhaustion is hitting hard at this point.  And if I have to make the choice between my students having a well-prepared but increasingly crabby and stressed person teaching them, or a perhaps slightly less prepared but more cheerful person teaching them, I’ll choose the latter.  And I suppose that really is OK.

Tuesday’s Child

Today, I am 34!  I was born on a Tuesday, so it always seems extra special when my birthday falls on Tuesday.  I like Tuesdays very much!

My family celebrated my birthday on Sunday because of my work schedule.  But my Mom is babysitting my favorite two year old buddy at his house (very near my place) today, so we arranged a little birthday playdate before I have to head to class.  Everyone should get to celebrate their birthday with a child, I think, because kids do birthdays exactly right!  *smiles*

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P.S.  A photo from our little party!  He did eventually figure out the blowy thing.  What we really needed was a video of the two of us blowing our blowy things at each other!  It was so funny.