another snow day

 In a few minutes I will shift to working on the Mystery Project, and I have to say, I'm sorry I can't post in-progress photos without spoiling the surprise but I am REALLY pleased with how it is turning out, and I will probably use the same pattern (with a different yarn, this is a yarn I only had one of) for a version for myself. It's a simple pattern but sometimes simple patterns are the best.

We had another no-school day because of extreme cold. You probably heard some of the kerfuffle about "rolling blackouts" in Texas - which is unpleasant enough in the summer but could be deadly when it's below 10F out and houses down here are not exactly insulated. We didn't get any, though ONG and OG and E said we *might.* It's possible enough people did as I did and turned down the thermostat and turned off all non-essential things and conserved enough. 

I did use a little power - put on enough lights so I could be seen on camera and recorded the next chapter (in two chunks) for the intro class, and the middle third of the current chapter for ecology. I ran out of energy to do the rest of it but I might do it first thing tomorrow. I also did a little more grading that came in overnight. 

I do still need to put together the stuff for stats on Friday - can do that tomorrow afternoon and I suppose Thursday afternoon 'cos if we even DO have classes (I have an 8 am lecture), I won't have the intro lab because the Wednesday groups will miss it and we don't want to get off schedule with each other. 

And then this weekend it's supposed to be above freezing. I've been carefully parcelling out the milk and eating out of cans these past few days, I admit it will be nice to get out to the store again - last time I was there was a week ago and I'd been going about once a week. 

But I was also thinking - once I acquire immunity (either two weeks after this jab, or after I've had the booster on the 5th) - I could start shopping INSIDE Wal-mart again if they have things I can't and can't get at Pruett's.

It'll have been about a year at this point since I was last in - pretty sure early February was the last time because the last "big" grocery shopping I did out was on the 29th of February when I went to Sherman that last time before locking down. 

And yes, yes, I know, I will still need to be careful. But I think if I mask and distance, and if I do have immunity (I got the Pfizer shot which seems to still be pretty good against the UK and even the SA variants), it's probably fine. And I am definitely planning, if the weather is good, on going to Sherman on my birthday and going to the JoAnn's and to Ulta and maybe even the bookstore. 

I guess if nothing else, this makes me appreciate the little things. Someone I follow on Twitter made the comment that when it's OK to go back out to restaurants, it will be like she was a little kid again, and remembering dressing up in tights and Mary Jane shoes and a pinafore over her dress to go out to a place, even maybe not a very fancy place. And yeah, when I was a kid, restaurant meals were a rare thing, mostly a treat - either for birthdays or if you got a really good report card, something like that, and they were special.

of course, part of the 'special' is that they were with my family, and in recent years (in the before-times, I mean), restaurant meals for me were often a solo affair, often lunch when I was out shopping). Once in a while with people from church, or the pre-Christmas meal out with the department. I wonder if those will come back. I suspect if people feel like I do, once it's really safe again, they will come back, because everyone will have missed them. 

Already my mom and I are talking about me coming up for a visit in May. I don't 100% know if that's possible, I will have to watch case counts in the country, but both she and I will have been fully vaccinated by then, and Amtrak seems to be pretty careful, and if I get a roomette and mask any time I'm not in it - it should be okay. 

And so: I have things to look forward to again. I feel like my life is moving forward again. I feel kind of like Phil at the end of Groundhog Day, and once again "I Got You, Babe" comes on the radio, but then Rita reaches over and turns off the clock radio, and Phil realizes he's broken free of the endless loop he was stuck in. 

And also, this happened: I got an e-mail today:

"Congratulations! You have been nominated for the 2021 Faculty Senate Recognition Award for Excellence in Teaching"

This is startling to me because I felt like the past year (these recommendations are based on the previous year) was the worst one I ever taught, like I was distracted and unhappy and I did badly. So much so at some points I was wondering if I should just quit after this semester and try to figure out some other way of earning my bread.

These are mostly student nominations, so....someone thought I did a good job. Oh, I don't expect I have a chance of winning; usually these go to someone who is "leaving" - either a soon-to-retire person, or someone with a serious illness, or someone who is going on to bigger and better things. I'll still write my letter and throw my hat in the ring but I don't expect at all to win. But being nominated is really what matters. And after the awards are given they usually mail out the thing the person who recommended you wrote (anonymously, of course) and that's always nice to see. 

 So anyway: maybe I stick this out a while longer. Hopefully after this fall at the latest, we'll be back to the way we used to be and I won't be doing this half-shadow life of teaching partially online and always feeling I'm doing one and one-half times the work, and not having the energy to do much else.