I think a lot of this might be late-fall allergies; ragweed levels have been high here and I know I've been coughing (Also, I think some of the cleaning products used in the department - our newish custodian is using more heavily scented ones or cleaning more diligently than the past one, and some days I can really smell the scents in them). Also I think I'm just TIRED. Four different classes is a lot, and I have a lot of people who have problems I have to help with.
I did try to get a little data analysis done today; I twitch that I'm getting zero research done BUT when I'm getting done with my teaching stuff at like 4 pm some days, I don't have a lot of desire to stay a couple more hours and try to read journal articles or analyze data. I keep telling myself I'm close enough to retirement that if some upper admin harassed me about it too much, I could just hand in my paperwork (and maybe have them beg me to stay on, I don't know, given I teach four very different classes in the fall I don't know that there are a lot of people out there that could do the range of classes I do).
And I do need time to myself, time to breathe, time to live. (And time to get groceries and do laundry and vacuum the floors and the other "doesn't spark joy but must be done" tasks).
I think also it IS the state of the world. As much as I pretend to be a cynic who is tired of everything, I still have enough idealism left in me that, for example, an encouraging election return in one nation makes me think "oh thank goodness, the problems are beginning to be solved" (or the same, when some kind of official ruling is handed down stopping something that's bad) and yet.....and yet....no one ever seems to face consequences for doing wrong, or, sometimes they keep doing the thing they were told they legally can't do. And I get discouraged, because it really does feel any more like nothing is ever fixed, and then I feel like a fool for feeling hopeful when there's some ruling or whatever.
I don't know how to learn to live without that kind of foolish hope. Maybe it's easier if you have a family of your own or "found family," but as I noted yesterday...I don't exactly have that, so I have to beat on against the current as a lone boat.
But there are a couple things.
- Playing piano is going better currently and it's one of the things that makes me forget - temporarily - about all that's bothering me. I'm working right now mostly on refreshing a simple Clementi sonata, which, yes, it's sort of a beginner piece, but once in a while it's nice to have something you can play through without errors AND with getting the dynamics right (sometimes I focus so hard on getting my fingers in the right places that I can't think much about "oh you have to crescendo here" or "this is supposed to be pianissimo, you're playing too loud"). I'm also working on an arrangement of "In My Life" (yes, The Beatles), which I LIKE as a song, but also I find it does make me slightly melancholy because of associations I have with it - they played it at Del's memorial service, and also played it at graduation the fall my dad died, and of course it has that line about "some are dead and some are living," and it is....I don't think it's in a minor key but it feels like it is.
(the original is in A major; the arrangement I have looks transposed to G but given it starts on a B and has accidentals here and there maybe it IS B minor? anyway, the key changes to what I think is C midway through, so I guess G is more likely)
I also tried to clean my office a little, mainly getting rid of papers I no longer needed and also sorting the non-handed-back papers (I wish, oh I wish, people didn't skip so often, especially when I'm handing stuff back, I just want it OUT of my hands but I can't throw them away for "grade appeal" reasons - if the students have it and appeal a grade, they have to produce the papers, otherwise, I have to hang on to them for a calendar year)
I've been picking away at the various socks; none are photogenic yet. I do need to look at my other yarn; I want to do the Mrs Hudson's socks out of the Sherlock Knits book, but the original yarn I planned will be unsuitable (either it was a defective skein - lots of breaks - or insects got at it. Given what the breaks were like I almost wonder if it was a couple skeins just patched together when it was wound, and I don't LIKE joins in my socks if I'm using a single yarn. I know I have some other pastel-y pinks or peaches that would work for them.) And I've got a simple cable pattern and a nice blue-grey yarn I want to use for it (from Quixotic Fibers, dyed by their owner).
I do think my "Friday night Poirot rewatch" is a solid thing. Maybe expand my Passport watching to other nights, and take up something like Marlowe Murder Club or the Miss Marples they have on there. (I never like Marple as well as Poirot, and of course Suchet's Poirot is my all time favorite).
Halloween is this week. I really haven't any plans, probably won't even try to do a costume this year (it's Saturday, anyway). I did buy a big bag of little packs of Haribo candies at Aldi, so if I get kids, I can toss a few packs into their bags. And I realized I have a LOT of those strip-sheets of stickers from Mrs Grossman that are still totally intact (= I didn't use any stickers off them) and given that I only get a few kids every year, I could give a strip of stickers too, at least until I run out. Most kids like stickers and I have some very kid-themed ones (fairies, construction vehicles, baseball stuff, cartoony animals, funny monsters....) and maybe they'd enjoy those.
I don't have anything I HAVE to do Saturday and I admit I wish I could think of a Fun Thing for me. Not any kind of shopping; I've spent too much money recently and also I find stores tend sometimes to do Annoying Things on halloween (like, there was one grocery that used to have a big model spider that would drop on your head when you walked in, and I don't love being pranked or startled). But I can't think of anything. It might be raining, so a trip out to hike might not be so great. There aren't any "pick your own" apple farms in the area. And there's not a nearby-enough museum that I want to go to.
I don't know. I don't know if it's a deficit of Fun, or if it's being overtired (which, maybe, lying in bed part of the day and reading could fix). I wish I could figure it out. (Maybe a hard freeze - which we're not likely to get for another month - to kill off the ragweed would help).
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