Tuesday midday things

I got a new lab (the last one for that class) posted, and did all the accumulated grading. Am taking a short break while prepping advanced biostats.

Tomorrow, I am considering getting a bit ahead on the minitests: they are arduous to write, and I don't have anything else I must do (other than prepping for the next week's biostats; I am going to ask my students if they want ordination/classification, or nonparametric tests, or something totally different. We have mainly focused on general linear models, which I guess are kind of the heart of advanced biostats, but I still feel like I've not covered enough)

- I need to stop beating myself up for not doing more. But I am in this very weird headspace where work feels kind of "normal" and when I am not working I feel not-normal. But work isn't normal: I can't see my students in person, I am not in my office, I am sitting in a recliner typing on a laptop, or else standing with the laptop on something tall. I'm trying to be generous in grading and I admit I am sort of pretending not to see what MIGHT be some copying of stuff from online in the minitests.

- This is like "make it up as you go along" on steroids and I hate it. I hate the "make it up as you go along" aspect of adulthood anyway, but this is just so much worse because there's literally no precedent; in the past when something was confusing or hinky I could just truck down the hall to a colleague with more seniority than I have (or to my chair) and ask their input. With this....no one knows anything. And that makes me nuts.

- My desk came yesterday but I have not had the spoons to put it together. Maybe that's a task for tomorrow seeing as I have nothing URGENT to do that day. It will be an effort but if I can get it to fit where I think it should fit it will be really nice to have a desk in the window. (And if it doesn't fit where I was planning to put it I can likely make space in my dining room window for it). If I'm stuck here over the summer (i.e., we're asked not to go into the building unless we MUST), I can set up for my summer reading at it. If we're permitted back in the building? Maybe I get inspired to try to do a little writing.

- I worked a little on the stuffed Wooloo last night but I admit I find my concentration for crafting is less than it was. Part of it is I get tired easily these days - someone on ITFF confirmed, teaching online is considerably more draining than regular teaching. (And also: you don't have the hundred tiny positive interactions you get in a regular day to help build you back up). And part of it is, I do think I'm scatterbrained again with something like grief.

Pretty much the only other thing I've worked on is the big crocheted afghan though I'm contemplating tonight pulling out either the grey cardigan or the vest I was working on....in the before-times....and working on that again, if I can find my place again.

- I mood-swing wildly. Today I am pretty much OK - probably in part because I cleared my plate of the nagging things I had to do (and perhaps partly because I got up/worked out/did Duolingo German/did some piano practice like it was a "normal" day before "going to work"). Yesterday I wasn't so okay.

I do have an EAP, apparently, and I have an appointment (yes, an in person one, with "appropriate distancing") Thursday afternoon. No idea what state I will be in then and that's part of the problem with it - once or twice during the grief counseling she saw me on an unusually GOOD day, and because you have to take appointments when they're available, it means you might have a bad day weeks before you had an appointment scheduled.

And really, my bad days are never all that BAD  - as the EAP intake person asked, "Are you considering harming yourself?" and I was like "Uh, no, I am just....finding it hard to be cheerful right now" (Though I also admit in the bleaker moods I've felt like I won't live long enough to see a time when we can go out into the world freely again, though that's more the "there will never actually be a vaccine or a viable treatment, and I'll spend the next 30 years like Rapunzel in her tower")

- I have a pick up from wal-mart tonight. Hopefully more milk and eggs and butter, and then a few other little things. Also waiting on a few orders - I ordered a few mixes and things King Arthur Flour claimed were in stock, and I also broke down (against my better judgement, and I'd consider cancelling, except it's a smaller business I'd sort of like to support) and ordered another stuffed-toy horse (from Squishamals). I PRESUME I got the IRS payment thing, when I went to the website it said it had been deposited but not how much; I don't know if I got the full $1200 or if they pro-rated it because I'm a  bit better off than many folks here (though by no means rich). I also have an IRS refund coming some time, not sure how fast they are with those. I don't do electronic banking, so I can't check easily. I will probably just wait for my next statement and check on it. Or if I have to go and transfer funds into my checking account (it's lower than it's been in a while), I could ask for a balance check - I presume the drive-through at my credit union is open even if people can't go into the office.

(I also have another small account elsewhere and I could check to see if I have enough to pay one or two of the bills that came in off of that....that might make sense. I can do that by phone)

But yes, things seem much more complicated than they did a couple of months ago, and that greater complication comes ALONG WITH a lot of us being bewildered and worried and sort of in a low-level state of mourning. (And yes, I maintain, this IS mourning - it feels very much like what I lived though last fall. Though here, rather than mourning people, I am mourning a way of life I took for granted.... all those trips to JoAnn's "just because I need to get out of the house" or all the quick grocery runs for just one ingredient, or being super picky about brands and things....all that's gone and I don't know if it'll be back. And more importantly - all the little interactions I had with people in a week. I am not a big one for the phone so some days get a little lonely. I admit I hang out on Twitter more now because I can get interaction there....)

Anyway. Back to prepping advanced biostats.

Edited to add (about 4 pm):

The meeting for advanced biostats went pretty well. I think I was better prepared this week - last week, I had a midday meeting that ate up a lot of the prep time. Next week is the last meeting, we are going to discuss meta-analysis, which seems relevant now and will be relevant to what these students are going to do. I can start reading on that tomorrow; I also set up a "virtual by Zoom" office hours for any of my students in one class who wanted to drop in. I can be reading while I wait for people.

- I also found that the early mother's day gift I ordered for my mom is on its way, which makes me happy. I bought her five pounds of Anasazi beans from Mount Hope Foods (a bulk-foods store that I suspect may have started as a "hippie store" and is still going strong). She was bemoaning that she was out of dry beans and also that Dove Milling is currently closed (I presume because of COVID-19, though it is also the off season for harvesting and processing). So a little searching around found Mount Hope, and while I'd never ordered from them before, I decided to take a chance. And yes, it seems maybe a little odd to send someone five pounds of beans as a Mother's Day present, but....right now....it's probably the thing she can use the most.

It's supposed to arrive Friday. I told her to expect the package, but not what it was, but that she could open it right away. I think I probably picked the right gift, though. I know if there were some food item I really liked and was having a hard time getting, a box of it would be welcome as a gift.

I don't know if florists are doing deliveries now and I know flowers are terribly expensive right now for what you get, so maybe the beans will be enough. I suppose I could make her a card....I don't have any specifically mother's day cards, though I do still have a couple of the alpaca ones I got free from Loopy Ewe, I could dress it up with stickers and send it. 

I also suppose I could look up the florists in her area online, see if any of them are doing deliveries right now, and see if I could order some flowers to be sent to her. I don't know if that's profligate or not. I feel bad for her being there all by herself....though she does also have good neighbors and I talk to her several times a week and my brother and his family call maybe once a week. I'll think on it a little more; I have a week to consider it at least.