Attitude is everything

Yeah, I guess.

Friday didn't go all that well. I was burnt out on grading (and yet, I did all the additional grading I had), I was tired, I felt pulled too many directions by requests ("Can I still hand this in?" "Can I take the final exam a couple days early?" "Can you help me with this?") and I was also feeling a little...irritated, I guess, when a colleague who had just published a book remarked, "You know, it doesn't really matter if this paper we co-authored and submitted [and which seemed to have been in review a long time] doesn't get published, as I used a snippet of the information in my book" and I was like "and how does that help me for post-tenure review?" (and yes: said colleague is retiring in something like four years, and I have ten at a minimum to go, which means they have maybe one more round of PTR and I will have three)

And I also just felt very sad about the whole book thing. Oh, I know I don't have a book in me but it makes me sad that so little of what I do seems to have any lasting quality - I have papers but I really don't know that many people read them, and all my teaching feels like it evaporates into the air and is gone.

And I also found out the new class I agreed to take on, thinking it would start in the fall? Starts in the spring.

So yeah. I was really grumpy and cranky and sad.

Saturday, I stayed home. Started out fuming because it was the ONE Saturday I could have blithely gone off and gone antiquing for a long time, and OF COURSE the weather is lovely when I'm in class and terrible when I'm free because OF COURSE. And my house smelled bad (I think something died up under the house; seems to happen periodically. There are raccoons and opossums in the neighborhood and no excluder I've ever been able to bash up for the entrance to the crawl space works for long, partly because that's where the hoses and things that connect up to the air conditioning unit go. (The critters pull whatever I try to come up with off, and go under the house anyway).

So, in a rage, I started cleaning, on the grounds that if something bad happened over break and a person had to go in my house, at least they'd not see what a horrific housekeeper I usually am. (I dunno. I suppose I could be all scheduled about it and force myself to do things like sweep the floors daily, but....when you're as busy as I am that kind of thing means some days you get zero time to do what you want)

That helped a little.

(I was also cranky because the wal-mart failed yet again: they no longer carry non-instant grits, and I needed grits for the cheese grits I want to make for tomorrow evening's potluck. "Enjoy your new all-stoner customer base" I snapped on Twitter, because they have snack foods out the wazoo now and much less of what I call "the raw materials of food" - from now on if I want King Arthur flour, for example, I'll have to remember to replenish my supply when in Sherman, or mail order and pay the hefty shipping fee. The wal-mart here now carries their own brand of flour and maybe one other, and I don't think they even have whole-grain ones any more)

I also have a dental check up tomorrow and I'm trying not to think about it. I have no tooth pain so surely there's nothing emergency-level wrong, and even if I do need a filling replaced (I think I still have one or two that haven't been crowned) or need a new filling, it can wait until January.



But yeah. I was in a slightly better mood after cleaning the house, just because a clean house is nicer. And I made the meatballs for tonight. (Sometimes I think I get cranky when I have too many things queued up in my mind that I HAVE TO do).

I also got to thinking, on the new class: I will be teaching it for, it looks like, one person. As an arranged class. So maybe instead of trying to do very much like lecturing instead I give readings - maybe even find papers using the stats tests the person needs to learn about and we analyze the papers and discuss them for the class meetings? And also, during slack times in the coming week I can re-read the chapters in my advanced stats book from years past about MANOVA (which I have used and will just have to re-learn) and ANCOVA (which I don't think I ever used). But yeah, I hope someday soon to be done with having semi-surprise new preps.

Church today was nice. They got the tree fixed so it was lit up. Someone joined (I think it's someone who used to live here years ago and moved back) which is rare enough these days that it merits mention.

There were two moments of "what random thing will nearly make Erica cry because it's Advent" at church today.

First, when we sang "O Little Town of Bethlehem," the last bit of the third verse:

"But in this world of sin
Where meek souls will receive him still
The dear Christ enters in"

And yeah, I don't know why the phrase "this world of sin" hit me so hard (that was what did it), but it did.

The second was the choir piece. It was, oddly enough, a mash-up of "Lo How a Rose E'er Blooming" and the old Bette Midler song "The Rose." (And no, I doubt the author of the lyrics - not Midler - intended it to refer to Christ, though I suppose one could take some of them as being that).

But the lines:
"It's the heart afraid of breaking, that never learns to dance

It's the dream afraid of waking, that never takes the chance
It's the one who won't be taking, who cannot seem to give
And the soul afraid of dying, that never learns to live"

Yeah, no. I feel called out now. One of the reasons I am still single is the whole fear-of-heartbreak and fear-of-rejection thing. And yeah yeah, I know all too well (because people have TOLD me) I'm gonna look back on my life and regret not having tried to be more "social," but, I don't know.

(The other thing is, to my mind, that's another case of "privilegeing" romantic love over all others. I don't think I "cannot seem to give," at least not in terms of what I do for other people. It's just, I don't have a "special somepony" and....I don't know. But I will say it jarred slightly and when I was already reflecting on "this world of sin" it didn't totally help)

 
But whatever.

The Christmas party is tonight. I was able to get grits at the Pruett's and I also bought a box of "Annies" brand "cheese pizza bites" to also heat up for the thing. I had WANTED to get mini quiches but Pruett's doesn't sell them and I wasn't driving out to the wal-mart again (And who knows, maybe they don't sell THOSE any more either). And also these are vegetarian, so if nothing else, that's something our minister can eat.

The best thing? Apparently no pastor-parish committee this month. (This would be the day for it and I held my breath when the person who runs it came in, expecting him to come up to me or have it generally announced it would happen but no). Hopefully that means board meeting will be quiet and the biggest thing we'll have to do is figure out Christmas bonuses.

Got my hair washed and I'm slowly sewing up the Augusta cardigan. Not sure if I'll get the bands done today but maybe I can at least pick up the stitches for them. I have Tuesday evening pretty much off (that day's exam is a machine-graded one) so maybe I can get it finished then.

I figured out my where-to-donate-to: gonna be the local Ministerial Alliance on the grounds that (a) it's local so it helps locally, (b) I know several of the members (the minister at the Methodist church, the Episcopalian rector, the minister at my church, and (c) I trust the money will be used properly - to help people in need. Because I don't think ANY of the ministers get any money for their work with it, so no overhead costs.

Still not sure on the "indulgent thing for me" but that might wait until January at this point.

But yeah. Hopefully I can stay in a better mood for the rest of the week.

Edited to add: Ugly Christmas Sweaters are encouraged at the party, and while I don't have one, I have a Slightly-Overdone Christmas Vest (patchworked from Christmas fabrics, and then with all kinds of tat sewn onto it):

Also - no button bands yet (I will have to do those later, no time right now, I have to leave shortly) but I finished sewing up Augusta):

The sleeves are a hair too long (they often are; I have proportionally-short arms and tend to forget to scale down accordingly) but the good news is the body isn't too large (or too small) and I should be able to comfortably and flatteringly button it when I get the button-bands worked.

(I'm not even sure I swatched for this; I may have just knit part of the back and swatched-without-blocking to be sure I was CLOSE).

Also, once I get this done, I will probably have 800 to 900 yards of Camelino in this sort of caramel color leftover (I waaaaaaay overbought). Even keeping back part of a ball for future repairs, that's a lot. I might put it up as a "for swap" thing on Ravelry (but after Christmas!) or if one of you, my readers, would want it, I'd be willing to pass it on: I have enough other yarn I'd be unlikely to want to make something else of it. (It is handwash, so perhaps not ideal for charity knitting, but....)