Monday, September 12, 2005
Routine and Regular
Not even 8pm and it’s dark out. The days are getting shorter, although the temperature reached the mid90s today. Public schools let out at 2pm. Weatherwise, this isn’t so much different from 3:15, hot is hot, and a couple teachers were quoted in the newspaper about that point.
The corn growing beside the parking lot of the college looks so dry and brown. Usually corn gets to be about 7 feet high, high over my head anyway. This stuff is only as high as my shoulder. I didn’t have my camera in my bookbag today, but I’ll try to remember it sometime this week. The old song about ‘amber waves of grain’ was written about the North American prairies.
I put a beef roast into the crockpot, with the idea that the meat will be used to make vegetable-beef soup in the next couple days. Heat outdoors shouldn’t stop the ritual of having some soup in the fridge for re-heating in the microwave as quick meals for us busy folks.
This afternoon, I drove down to the coffee shop. It was just too hot to ride the bicycle, plus my bag weighs way too much. Textbooks, even the paperbacks, are heavy. I had some deep reading to do, and being at home has too many distractions. The computer and blogs being tops of the list. Cats and laundry are a close second.
I got most of my homework done for Math and Ed Psyche, but by the end, my backside was numb. To be that engrossed in a task hasn’t come readily to me for quite some time.
Maybe I am getting my act together for this school stuff. Although I’d much rather be figuring out a crochet pattern.
When I got home, there were my two guys/housemates standing beside the crockpot. A wonderful smell was wafting up and filling the room. Husband declared the roast to be done, and he was about to be slicing off a hunk. We all had some, then I put the rest into the fridge for making soup on my next afternoon off, which is Wednesday. Perhaps by that time, it may become plain old vegetable soup, what with how good that meat tastes.
After supper, when I went outside for the laundry on the clothesline, there was Mahalia with a mid-size squirrel in her mouth.
It was shreeeeking like I never knew a squirrel could noise.
I grabbed the cat by the back of the neck with my left hand, then the neck of the squirrel with my right. Halley finally loosened her jaw, and I set the squirrel down on the walk. It moved all its limbs, and was breathing hard. I turned it over, no bloody spots, so I picked it up again by the back of its neck and carried it to the lowest branch on the maple tree.
So small and cute and scared. It tried to climb up to the next branch, but still seemed to be in a state of shock. Chris went inside and got a couple walnut meats to get it to calm down a little.
Husband took pictures.
without flash
with flash
Mahalia has been whining at the back door for a half hour. She really is mad at me for taking away her prize. She wants to get back out there and try again. I went out and made sure the poor little thing isn’t too close to the house. It is no longer in the tree, and the nuts are gone.
Well, that’s about how the day went. So routine and boring. I did get a card from the Red Cross saying where the nearest donation site will be this week. Today I am eligible, but since I just got my teeth cleaned last Friday, I had menopausal symptoms all weekend, and there is a Blood Drive at the church building in about 3 weeks, I think I’ll wait until then. The Parish Nurse wants to reach a certain quota of units on that date.
~~love and Huggs, Diane
Saturday, September 10, 2005
Interval of Ease
A bit of a reprieve.
I rechecked the syllabus for Composition 102. Merely the topic proposal is due Tuesday’s class, not the whole paper. That’s like 6 pages of typing I can put off awhile. Yay!!!
The list of words for Music Appreciation is still confusing. The Instructor says music is a whole language unto itself and gave us a couple quotes along the lines of the ‘speech of the angels’. Says Music Theory and Therapy are whole ‘nother courses of study. I already contributed for youngest son on that artistic path. Myself, I just need a Humanities credit class.
Husband and I went to SAM’s and then he wrote out the check for a number having three digits and change. There’s only 3 of us who live here! that better be plenty of meals for awhile….
I got a real nice Land’s End book bag at a yard sale for $1. Then I took a half hour to rearrange my stuff into it, checked the schedules, wrote a bit of a list/timeline. Organization helps this evening to be much nicer than last.
We are about to sit and watch a rented dvd movie spoken in French with English subtitles. It might make crocheting difficult, but I’ll manage somehow! I usually do!
~~love and Huggs, Diane
Update: Sunday afternoon: You can read all about our Saturday evening over at Husband’s blog Decrepit Old Fool. We both were laughing aloud quite often at the movie Les Visiteurs done in 1996. In a couple places we even had to back it up and see some of it over again.
Friday, September 09, 2005
Hamster in a treadmill
Three people this week have told me that I seem to be ‘down’ as in depressed, non-perky. ‘Tis True, ‘tis true….and I will be the first to admit it. Just look at my bloody cuticles and you’d know that a lot of stress is underway.
The weekend ahead looks dreary.
Composition class Two credible sources for a five page paper written out to be a Rebuttal to something I find in a newspaper or magazine. First I have to find something I want to read at all, then I have to disagree politely and find a couple other folks who back up what I am trying to say. I don’t want to be a lawyer, I just have to get through this writing class because it is required for graduation.
Music Appreciation Study for an upcoming quiz on Gregorian chants. Listen to the section of the educational CD. Have you ever heard Gregorian chants? I’m dozing off by the 10th note.
An online personality test to take for Educational Psychology. Oh Joy….
This afternoon, I did the first half of the Math assignment. I shanghaied a friend’s 2nd grader son to do Math problems so that I can write up an evaluation of problem-solving skills.
Maxine and I are buddies with the hot flashes and night sweats (damn, that link back to April 5 ain’t working but it’s a good story), and I had to write papers for classes and my face is all broken out as bad as chicken pox and there was a computer snafu in the library and Husband had a medical appointment and I had a teeth cleaning and the current baby blanket project is on crochet deadline for the last Sunday in September and I do NOT understand the Latin words for the parts of music well enough for a quiz and every time I pick up a newspaper or read a weblog or turn on an information device there are hurricane aftermath problems. The Red Cross sent a card telling me about the nearest blood drive, but my next donation date isn’t until 12 Sept and I am not giving blood the same week I have dental work done. The old body is currently doing enough.
Add in that the house is an absolute mess all because of couch cushions and stubborn spouse communications (on both sides) and the dehumidifier over-flowed all over some of Lucas’s papers and the kitchen floor got sticky Dr. Pepper spilled on it so a good mopping is needed and the car has bird poop all over it and needs the rear wheels to get balanced. Not to mention the $24.18 to put fuel into the little tank.
So this evening I decided to break in the new VCR (purchased last Monday along with a new microwave. I wonder why appliances seem to die in pairs around here) and pulled The Full Monty off the shelf and had a few good laughs.
The red thongs get me every time.
Distressed I am. A not-so-good kind because this pressure comes mostly from outside. I don’t like sitting in a class getting told to do something I don’t connect to daily living. Something in my head all these years just won’t let me believe that academics makes a job worthy. According to research, schooling does help to get a bigger paycheck. I’m trying to keep that in mind.
~~love and Huggs, Diane
Wednesday, September 07, 2005
This gave me proud vibes
Army of Mom sent us to an amazing story…yet one I can understand because I went through some trauma when I was about six and had three little sisters to look after. That one will have to wait though, gotta meet DoF for lunch.
6 year old boy caring for youngsters
Saturday, September 03, 2005
Yes, I made This
This is the latest project to come from my crochet hook. I just got done with the last stitch of the red border last evening.
The yarn was purchased the summer of 2003. Since then, I have been working every so often trying to finish it. When youngest son claimed it because he loved the colors and the softness, I kinda would set it aside, knowing it would be staying in the house.
Without a deadline, there are too many things that I shrug off.
This afghan is made with a size I crochet hook from Aunt Lydia’s DENIM Quick Crochet 75% cotton, 25% acrylic.
It covers the top of a twin bed.
~~love and Huggs, Diane
Thursday, September 01, 2005
Ungenerous Thoughts
Some ideas flitting through my daydreams today, very selfish ones at that.
The first is that menopause with its fatigue and college classes with papers to write and computer programs to learn are very ill-at-ease with each other.
What in the world am I doing here?
The other idea is that I am really glad I don’t live in New Orleans. Better them than me. Narrow-minded of me, I know this. I’d like to say that I’d handle things alright, keep a good head on my shoulders, carry out the family pictures and birth certificates first. Trouble is, those take some time to find even when I know there’s a needful appointment coming up, let alone if I were running from a raging storm.
I’d grab my crochet bag, there’s enough thread for several small projects, and also holds a paperback book. I’d be ready to pass the time waiting for rescue.
Just in case there was anything around to eat, I think I’d remember a fork, spoon, cup, and plate like I would carry to a church potluck.
The scene of the movie AMISTAD ran through my mind. You know the one where the sailor was ladling out porridge to the black folks in their shackles, and all they had was their cupped hands to receive even that little bit.
A jacket, a couple changes of underwear and shirts, and my eyeglasses case.
Tools. Grab the ax, the coiled rope from the rafters of the garage, my Swiss Army knife, work gloves.
What I could carry in two small suitcases and my backpack. My dad had a rule for trips when we were teenagers: we were supposed to take only what we could carry. It didn’t matter that the car was loaded to its roof with what mom thought we would need, but that’s a story for another day.
Where would I go? I have friends and family all over the country. I like to think that they would be willing to take me in, but I am not easy to have around as a roomie. It would have to be a short visit, maybe a week at a time in each place.
Much of my attitude is that I would want to stay, to stick around and see what happens to my house, to my friends and neighbors. To try to help, with whatever skills I have. I can cook, do first aid, entertain children, be a go-fer.
I certainly would not take the gun and be shooting at rescue helicopters, nor would I steal a generator that someone owned, a guy with more foresight than me and was using for his family.
To sink to such a low level is a disgrace, and puts a blemish on all citizens of this country.
Where did the idea I gotta have MINE come from?
It’s more productive to barter and support and assist anyone who is in the same predicament. “Be careful. The toes you step on today may be connected to the ass you have to kiss tomorrow.”
at lunchtime, one of the guys at my table in the cafeteria said that the people of New York were courteous to each other after September 11. I love it when a young man says the word courteous, it shows he has a good background education.
I tried to explain to him that on that day, only a couple buildings and airplanes were involved. The traffic simply moved around the epicenter of the troubles, people were able to walk across the bridges, return to their homes and pantry, where the toilets worked and the evening news showed the family what had happened downtown.
In New Orleans, the situation is crazy. Nowhere to go and no way to get there. No plumbing, or TV news, or way to cook food. I have been to St. Louis, and let me tell you the heat and humidity would be enough to send anyone over the edge of sanity. New Orleans has high temperature and too much water and isn’t looking better for awhile.
Even with all the mess, I am so disappointed to learn that humans have gone so low so fast. Having never been truly desperate (the WIC program for my babies doesn’t count), I don’t know if I could handle being a refugee, but golly, shooting at the helicopter?
This is one of the times when “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” takes on its true meaning.
Donate something to the place where you believe it will do its best. The Red Cross was founded for just this sort of circumstances. I did a book report in 4th grade on Clara Barton, so I can vouch for good intentions.
If that’s not possible, then send good vibes and prayers to those who are in the thick of the aftermath, both the victims and the workers. And especially the electricity providers.
So much of this country depends on the volts.
~~love and Huggs, Diane
Tuesday, August 30, 2005
Class and getting there
I can say the communication has stepped up quite a bit for the transportation of the family. For this evening’s class, I will be driving son’s car! Yikes!
The classes and homework are going fine.
Math class is getting into unfamiliar turf.
We have to add Tony’s 60 apples and Joseph’s 80 apples using Base Seven units. Do you know how hard it is to do counting by 7s!?! and then say that 7 is the last of the first unit and more than 7 units = the next. No wait, that’s not right.
Count 0 - 9 and then put a 0 in the Ones place and a 1 in the Tens place. That’s the way metric counts, right?
Base Seven is count 0 - 6 in the Ones place, then a 0 in Ones and a 1 in the Seven. Still not explaining it well.
Hhmm, I’d better read some more of my notes, then try the problems.
Music Appreciation I have to do a one page report on the song SCARBOROUGH FAIR.
Ed Psyche—not gonna go there tonight. That headache is put off until Wednesday afternoon. The Instructor is difficult. Believes that education is a goal unto itself and I’m not clear on how to put it to use in regular jobs.
Gotta go. Composition Class in 40 minutes, and I’m using a car I’ve never driven before. Cross your fingers and sprinkle a blessing. Thanks!!
~~love and Huggs, Diane
Update: getting to evening class—Husband decided to go fill the tank of son’s car and drive it to where he was going….so I got to be like usual and drive my own car. Yay!
Monday, August 29, 2005
Playing Taps for Van
The weekend went by way too quickly. Most of the time, I was reading for classes.
For the Math class, I am to ask questions and take notes about what I am reading, then come into the scheduled time period well-prepared, alongside doing the assigned problems. Not too hard, but very time-consuming.
For Ed Psyche, I had to watch videos on a certain website and answer pertinent questions posted on the WebCT. It’s a good thing that within the past year I have learned so much about the Internet. Thanks for all the Tech Support, housemates!
After church on Sunday was a potluck lunch with ‘summer fare’ (foods that did not need to be heated nor use utensils). Followed by an informational meeting about some changes in policy that need to be updated to comply with insurance.
More Playing Taps for Van... below the fold
Thursday, August 25, 2005
He’s Home!
After a couple minor complications and some extra time in the hospital after open heart surgery, our friend John is home. And he slowly walked a mile around his subdivision! Way to go! Thanks for modern medicine, skilled hands, and great angels watching over all…..
~~love and Huggs, Diane
Wednesday, August 24, 2005
Weary too soon
Some things I have learned about the community college:
** Unless in dire straits, do not use the restroom closest to the cafeteria.
The one at the far end of the hall on the 2nd floor is much, much cleaner, there is always an ample supply of towels and potty paper, and the locks work for each and every stall. It is hard to believe both rooms are the same age. One gets used continuously, the other is near classrooms where nerdy subjects are taught.
** The door to the Library is still in the same place as always, but you have to walk several extra steps to get to it. The Security office got re-modeled and enlarged over the summer.
** Every teacher has to show the Safety video at the first class session. It doesn’t matter if every student in the room has already seen it, the teacher must show it.
** There must have been a lecture to the Instructors about learning the names of the students. Every class had some sort of “let’s all get acquainted and learn a little something about each other” exercise which was not the routine last year.
I have to brush my teeth as soon as possible after each period.
** Due to construction of a new building, parking is a problem. Allow maybe an extra ten minutes to walk from car to classroom.
** Elementary Education Majors tend to be female, young, and blonde both in looks and attitude. A few years down the road, the poor little First Graders won’t know much about people of color.
** In my Music Appreciation class there is no one else who likes John Denver songs as much as I do.
** Playing with Rods of Tens in a study area, and making it look like the math homework it is, does not get nearly as many comments from bystanders as does crocheting in the coffee shop.
I guess I’d better get back to my WebCT assignment.
I have to make up a Personal Philosophy of Education. My old stand-by of ‘letting nature take its course’ or ‘survival of the fittest and smartest’ won’t earn teacher ability accolades.
~~love and Huggs, Diane
Tuesday, August 23, 2005
Gonna miss her
This is copied from Comics.com
On September 1st “For Better or For Worse” will be discontinued due to the fact that the creator has not renewed her contract with Comics.com. As of September 1st the strip will no longer be available on Comics.com and e-mail delivery of the strip will stop. We hope you will continue to enjoy Comics.com and our other popular strips like “Peanuts”, “Dilbert”, “Luann” and “Get Fuzzy” as well as new titles like “Brevity”.
It would be nice if Lynn Johnston would find someone else to do the drawing, and she carries on with the plot lines. The best reading ever to be on the comics pages.
Monday, August 22, 2005
Casual Encounter
There are honors that come along in life for which one will never see a trophy or a certificate. Little everyday happenings, and realizing their significance comes later, much later.
Having lived in this town for more than 22 years, and having raised our sons through the school system, having had a few ‘low-end, meet-the-public’ jobs, I know faces. Not always names, but folks here and there.
The first summer we lived here, I got to know the immediate neighborhood. I had a 3 year old pedaling a tricycle and a new baby in a carry pouch, and we went walking.
We had moved here from the college town where Husband earned a B.A. degree. It was in the mountains of eastern Tennessee, so being able to mosey along the sidewalk to the blue mailbox without worrying about going downhill and gravity was a nice improvement.
A couple lived down the street then. We got invited to sit on their porch and have lemonade quite often. The lady loved my children, and confided that she and hubby had been trying for years to have some. Infertility was not an easy subject to discuss when a 3 year old is chattering at my elbow, and I was nursing a bald bitty baby.
Come the Fall, I heard she was going to have surgery to help with the ‘getting pregnant’ process. Broke as we were, I made a casserole and took it by during her recuperation. She said this was the last resort, if it didn’t take, they would look at adoption.
It didn’t take.
Their road to adoption was easier than some, and I am not sure of all the details. It took a couple years, because I had another baby in the meantime.
What I do remember is the day I stood in their driveway with my third son in my arms to tell them he had been chosen to be the Baby Jesus for the church Christmas play.
What I did not know right then is that was the day they brought home their own almost 4 day old adopted son. My baby was almost 8 months old, and seemed so big by comparison. As an adopted mom, she was also moving quite a bit better than those of us who gave physical birth.
We had Congratulations all around, but it was a blustery Fall day, and I was worried about wind and cold and germs, so I headed home and they went inside their house. I didn’t see them the rest of that winter.
They adopted a little girl a few years later, not a baby, but still a younger sister. I never think much about those youngsters being adopted, I just know they are a family glad to belong together.
They moved to a newer house on another street, but the kids still went to the same junior and high schools, so the occasional Parents Night caught everybody up to speed.
A few weeks ago, at a festival downtown, they approached me and asked about my boys, and told me their son would be going to HCC. I mentioned I would be a full-timer there myself.
Which brings me up to today. I was walking down the hall after class, when a gentle touch on my elbow caused me to turn my head.
There stood a fella who I know to be 8 months younger than my youngest son.
In typical college girl fashion, I got a bit tongue-tied that a handsome young man had come up to me and started talking first. I know we said something about his mom, but I couldn’t quote it on a stack of Bibles. He looks Just like his Dad!! He said he was glad to see me, that I am quite brave to be returning to school like this. He talks Just like his Dad!!
You know how they say that just before a car crash you can see your life flash before your eyes? I’m standing there in the hallway and I see the last 20 years galloping past. This is that baby on a gray November day. The boy in the school’s book club when DoF was the advisor. The star of the high school play. And he was talking to Me!!
On the way home, I’m thinking that maybe he saw my familiar face in the crowd and needed a bit of assurance. Cuz, like, I’m buddies with his mom, everything’s gonna be all right.
But still, I feel flattered I got noticed.
I’ll remember this elation next time I see someone who might need a bit of cheer.
~~love and Huggs, Diane
Saturday, August 20, 2005
Next Oscar Nominee
Perhaps an Academy Award is in my future.
How should I behave towards the former boss, the one who fired me, the person who said I should write up my side of the story, did not even read it and tossed it on the desk, then shoved some papers in front of me and said I had to be “let go”??!!
I was Fired, for crying out loud. 98% shock, 2% history.
For the rest of the summer 2004, I sat around my living room watching old videos from the cabinet and crocheting for charity causes in three states.
‘Withdrawn’ is how my therapist described it.
Husband and I happened to be shopping at SAM’s Club, I was wearing one of my old t-shirts from the daycare even. Hey, it’s quite comfy and all cotton.
I hear a voice say “Hi, Diane….” I turned toward it, and saw Her husband first.
Well, like I said, actress duty kicked in. I smiled graciously and asked about the kiddies. The husbands both look Very Awkward during this little chitchat, and neither one of the guys said anything.
As the couples walked on past the frozen foods in opposite directions, I realized that I have moved on. I have found myself in college full time, making new friends, learning how to cope with studying, starting over.
All this doesn’t erase the sense of loss, that my self-confidence was taken from me. More than a year to re-build, yet I know I am on my way.
Maybe a chance meeting in the grocery store was to my benefit after all.
~~love and Huggs, Diane
Friday, August 19, 2005
Share the Streets
This evening, I was going down to meet Husband at the coffee shop to celebrate TGIF. I rode my bicycle because the dorm move-in traffic is all confusing.
The streets that are not blocked off are temporarily going One Way, parking times are short, and so a bicycle is easier to navigate campus.
On University Street are three drains between the street and the curb which are not level with the asphalt.
Bicycle riders have to be very careful, a front tire suddenly going down four inches off the pavement wouldn’t be good.
So, I’m coasting along, and I am familiar with the physical hazard.
However, town is receiving the influx of college students, who are braving the great unknown.
One of these young ladies was driving too fast for conditions, the most obvious being there are stop signs every half block and pedestrians and bicycles and carts and clipboards and Red Shirts blowing whistles.
She must have decided she wanted out of the thick of it and turned off into a side street.
However, in her cluelessness, she failed to notice one broad’s bottom on a bicycle. The woman wearing a bright blue t-shirt who was just passing a recessed storm drain. I have excellent peripheral vision, thanks be to heaven, so I saw her swerve the front wheels just a hint and then she turned Right in front of me.
I grabbed both brake handles and hopped off the seat, coming to a complete stop about twelve inches from the passenger door. She had been looking at her friend in the passenger seat, did not even have the turn signal going. The window was down, so I blasted her with some verbal assaults, as she had the grace to look a bit scared at how close we had come to a collision. The passenger turned her head and her eyes widened in surprise. Neither one had any idea at all about crowded situations.
She went on her way straight down the side street, and a bit more slowly.
As I got myself going again on the bicycle, I realized that the back tire had scooted into the drain after my feet had touched the ground. I was still shaking and furious when I got to the coffee shop.
With the price of fuel being what it is, I hope more folks use bicycles and that drivers of motor vehicles pay attention to road safety.
~~love and Huggs, Diane
Thursday, August 18, 2005
First Day of Classes
What a whirlwind of a Day!
Educational Psyche at 9:30am and we had to fill out little cards to say something about ourselves. The Instructor seemed a bit impressed that I have my own weblog, and smiled a bit when I raised my hand saying I know how to use the Web-CT.
Old broad knows new technology!
Then a meeting for Project Rise, which is a program to help underclass students get through college. It is provided by the Federal Government, and there are Peer Mentors, Study Groups, Tutors, Field Trips. She said we should be proud we got in, there were only 41 slots open. I gather that the main reasons I made the cut are that I am older and returning after 26 years away from school, qualify for Financial Aid, I have proven test anxiety, and neither of my parents went to college (they didn’t ask about spouse or children doing so).
Then lunch at the cafeteria. I told the clerk that better signs were needed about where the people in line are supposed to wait. Very confusing, much bumping of trays.
Math class is designed for those who want to become Elementary Ed teachers. After the purchase of two Expen$ive books, the supply list also says Pattern Blocks, Line of Ten rods, and Fraction Wheels. Another $38 at the Educational Toy aisle, but at least this is more my style than a graphing calculator.
So far, so good. DoF says he is most glad for the Project Rise. Whatever it takes to keep my spirits and grades up.
I’m thinking that Peer Mentor person should be able to give my guys and their ears a rest.
This evening is a retirement party for a nurse friend. Might be one of my last ‘going out’ celebrations for awhile before the research papers come up on deadline.
~~love and Huggs, Diane
ps Please keep John B. in your prayers. He had open heart surgery this afternoon, and will have some days to stay in the hospital.
His wife Evelyn is one of my most faithful readers! and both friends provide much encouragement for both Mister and MrsDoF!