- before I run out the door for the annual AAUW dinner (It's at 6, and I was luckily able to reschedule piano for tomorrow)
* Sadly, Gordon - the man who went into hospice last week - died. Or, more "sadly" for the family who couldn't get there to say goodbye; I suspect with things like he had (advanced melanoma that apparently invaded the brain), quicker is better.
The memorial service is in mid-June. I'll be back and I'll be free so I can go (I was friends with him and his wife) and if there's a meal, I can cook and help serve.
Still, cancer just sucks. (And this is a reminder to me to schedule a baseline appointment with a dermatologist; my father and both his brothers have had small pre-cancerous things removed from their faces; it's the fair-skinned-spent-time-in-the-sun thing. I think Gordon had a similar heritage (I think he was Scots/Irish) and he also golfed, so...)
I also have a thing on my temple that my doctor says she's almost 100% sure is a benign lipoma (at any rate, it has not grown in five or more years) but I'd still like to have it off, provided I don't have to have part of my head shaved for it. (I really am too chubby and old for the Thompson Twins look). Or if the doctor thinks it should come off and it needs to be shaved around it, at least I'd have a few weeks to start looking less odd before classes begin...
* The Sanrio Loot Crate I broke down and ordered came. Nice! No stuffies, but there's a sweatshirt with several of the characters (Hello Kitty, My Melody, Chococat, and Little Twin Stars) on it, and a nice canvas bag with several of the characters, and some "embroidered pins" (like the kind people put on backpacks and things) and a baseball cap with My Melody and a nice reusable travel mug sort of thing....I might just stay subscribed for the next crate. As I remember, it's a bit more than Doki Doki but it's really quality stuff.
* Everything teaching-related is done for the summer; I have to hear and grade the last few student presentations and grade the last batch of hourly exams, and then grade the finals next week. But I don't have to get up in front of the class again until August 20. Which is weird to contemplate.
* I passed the extra copy (The Native Plant Society sent me two, and I am sure this is why) of the journal with our article in it on to my research student. She was excited and kind of hugged it to her chest. (Heh. I don't remember being that excited when my first article came out but I probably was.)
She did say she might not be back in the fall. I am pretty sure this is a "money" thing and it really sucks that it is - but that happens to a lot of our students; they can't complete a degree in the normal sequence because so many people here are living so close to the bone.
It's instructive to me - I came from a family that was "poorer" than the rest in our town, but we were well-off enough that there was no question of college, and no question of how it would be paid for - but I've had to learn a lot about how to be gracious and to work around the financial difficulties people here has. Oh, it frustrates me - I would like to see her be able to "neatly" finish her degree so she can go and get a better-paying job than what she would otherwise have - but I guess that might not be.
Hopefully she will come back and finish her degree after a little time off.
(THIS kind of thing is also why I rage at people who ding us for a "low four-year completion rate." Given the population we serve - we have LOTS of people dropping out for financial reasons and then coming back maybe 5-10 years later and finishing. It's not that we teach badly or have unusually bad or irresponsible students: we have a lot of students who have life-circumstances 100% beyond their control that prevent them from being traditional full-time students.)
* And argh, I am just TIRED. I hope I can get all the grading done tomorrow morning so I can come home and do the rest of my piano practice and then relax a little. Saturday is the training session for the Wesley Center Board (it's some kind of "best practices in non-profit board directing") and while I suppose it's important, it's like - the one weekend I am MOST tired and would MOST like to just either stay home or run off to Sherman for shopping. Oh well. I am telling myself that Wednesday next week I can go to Whitesboro and that helps.
Edited to add:
Okay, I'm back home. Half a serving of tortellini alla panna (I ate two garlic knots so felt I couldn't finish the pasta, but that's okay, it's in the fridge for tomorrow). One of the other members ducked out early and PAID FOR ALL OF US (the intention was it was to be "pay your own way" and I am FINE with that). I'm a little gobsmacked because the bill came to just under $200....but I don't know, I think she was actually a past scholarship recipient so maybe she felt it was a good thing to do. (She can't make any more in a year than I do - she's an assistant principal).
And I have food in the house for the weekend, and *maybe* enough milk to last until my Wednesday trip out (if not, I could run out early Saturday morning just for milk before the training thing. Though I confess I am half-hoping for an e-mail tomorrow going "the guy doing it can't make it, it's cancelled" though I don't see that happening).
Oh hey - I could change the sheets on my bed tonight. (I was counting on getting home WAY later than this). I washed sheets, mainly because when I thought my teacher was coming, I needed to get some stuff out of the overflowing hamper, and sheets were the easiest thing to deal with but...hm. I didn't have time to change the sheets over the weekend (when I normally do) and I had pulled off the v. thin flannel "blanket" I use in the summers to wash and had had a heavier vellux one on there - but now I NEED to take the vellux one off, it's too hot...so maybe changing the sheets and going to bed early is a good idea.
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