It sucks.

It sucks big time. 

"What sucks?" you may ask.

Simple.  You have students that you KNOW are plagiarizing.  You have students who can barely compose a comprehensible email (reads like it was written in their native language and put through Google Translate, including the email the paper was attached to), can't comprehend English, and turn in a paper that's an A.  You KNOW they didn't write it.  They aren't CAPABLE of writing it. 

But...prove it.  Prove it, or be called racist and fired. 

I'm not an ESL teacher.  And an ESL teacher is not going to be able to help a student turn something like that out without writing it for them.  Not in four weeks.

It sucks. 

Feeling hopeful

But only a little.

I've got a doctor's appointment today.  I'm hoping that she's going to be willing to listen to me, but not really expecting a whole lot considering. 

I'm hopeful that eventually I can increase my endurance to sustain a low level of activity so that I can get everything that needs to be done, done.  Right now, I have high and low energy points.  High energy for me is most people's dragging exhaustion.  I can do things for ten or fifteen minutes, then I have to stop for half an hour or longer. 

Today, I sorted two baskets of clothes, unloaded the dryer (towels and bathrobes, all dropped on the end of the bed), and gathered dirty clothes to start reloading the washer.  Took maybe fifteen minutes to do, an hour to recover from.  Same with gathering up a trash bag of graded kid worksheets, missed wrappers, and stuff from the living room coffee table and floor: ten minutes to do, and I'm still not feeling energy coming back after half an hour of sitting.  I'm actually blogging so I don't go to sleep.  No, moar coffee doesn't help anything but the emotional side of things.  Yes, I'm sleeping eight hours almost every night (last night was the only exception this week, and was caused by a sinus headache that wouldn't let me go to sleep).  That's a bit under 2/3 of my to-do list for today.

Honestly, that's more than I was expecting to get done.  Less than what I was hoping for, but more than I was expecting.

I've felt worse than this for a very, very long time, but kept pushing.  Kept going.  Because what choice did I have?  This is the closest to normal I've felt in about eight and a half years.  And it's still not what "normal" is for most, and isn't what my "normal" used to be.

At this point, I'm hoping for "better" but will settle for "good enough." 

As long as "good enough" is by my definitions, not theirs.

*headdesk*

Two weeks ago:

Student S: I don't understand.  What is annotated?  what is bibliography?

I get it.  I do.  The title of the assignment--annotated bibliography--is scary, but it's really stupid easy.  So, I walk the student (who doesn't understand spoken English well) through how to do it. 

Last week:

Student S: I don't understand.  What is it I am to do for this assignment?

It's the annotated bibliography.  You put together the bibliography, and summarize the sources in six lines or less.  Basically, it goes source, summary, source, summary until you're done.

It was due Friday at midnight.

Today:

Student S: I did not understand.  I did not turn it in.  I am not sure it was correct.  I will bring it on Friday.

No.  Just...no.  It was due last Friday.  It was 15 points of credit/no credit.  It didn't have to be perfect--I did give feedback on what they didn't do right, when they needed me to do it.  Everyone that turned it in got credit.  I DO NOT TAKE late work. 

Can we re-institute a rule that tests the spoken/written comprehension of a non-native English speaker before permitting them to take UNIVERSITY classes?  Please?  I'm getting REALLY DAMN TIRED of this shit.

Especially with Saudi males.  And especially in September.

Okay. New doctor it is.

I was willing to listen.  I was willing to give a fair second chance to the endocrinology practice that had already blew it once.*

Yeah, no.

I had the appointment last week.  Last Wednesday.  The doctor, a man from India, decided that I was no more than a half-wit, and treated me as such.**  Implied that I didn't take my meds often.  Told me that I needed to do the things I was already doing, and told me to do them after I'd told him that they were things I already did.  As if I were lying to him.  I asked him to check my T3 to make sure I was metabolizing the levothyroxine properly, and he refused, and told me that I'd metabolize the T4 (levothyroxine) into the amount of T3 I needed, if I just took the medicine properly. 

I don't miss doses.  I've done that once, since I did it on doctors' orders.  Never again.  I'm more likely to double up now, than to miss a dose.  I'm pretty sure I'd doubled up the day of the visit, and told him that before he sent me down to get blood work done.

Today, he had his nurse call and tell me to take half a dose one day a week.

Really. 

Really?

Really.

I double dosed the day he told me to get my blood levels checked.  And it was a little high but not much.  And he wants me to do a half dose one day a week. 

I can either choose to comply, in the hopes that maybe he'll listen to me, or I can refuse to comply and ask for a new doctor. 

So.  If I choose to comply, which day should I choose to be a non-function halfwit, rather than a half-functioning person who can think almost well enough to do her job?  Because that is the choice I'm facing.

Yeah, I don't think so.  I'm just trying to decide whether to find a new GP or give the endocrinology practice a third chance by asking for a different doctor.




*When I fell pregnant with the pixie, the blood tests were so low in thyroid hormone that they sent me back three times to run the test again, then tried to get me an appointment with the only endocrinology practice in the area.  They said they wouldn't see me until late November (it was early May).  The pixie was due in January, and born in December.  I did research and found that waiting would have been heavily detrimental to her development, and had the labs sent to my GP.  She put me on a low dose that was adequate to save the pixie a painful childhood, at the very least.  

**I've had male doctors from India before.  Without exception, they have treated me this way.  I don't know if it's because that's just the way they are, or if it's institutionalized sexism, but it's unacceptable either way. 

FFOT post

In order of when they pissed me off:

Microsoft Word can fuck off.  It shat the bed and deleted, with no recovery, two nearly-finished course schedules, this morning.  I had to start over during my office hours, and hand write out the schedules of due dates for my comp 1 and comp 2 classes, just to make sure this did not happen again.

Other parents of kindergarteners in the school that the pixie goes to.  The children's kindergarten teacher should NOT have to remind parents to FUCKING FEED THE FUCKING CHILDREN BEFORE FUCKING DUMPING THEM IN THE FUCKING SCHOOL!!!! What kind of LAZY FUCKING FUCKS doesn't even FEED THEIR FUCKING KIDS FUCKING BREAKFAST???

Bicycle riders can definitely fuck off.  They can fuck off with their handlebars held perpendicular to their anus when they FUCKING FORGET that they ALSO FUCKING HAVE TO FUCKING STOP AT GODDAMNED STOP SIGNS.  I FUCKING HAD THE RIGHT AWAY, YOU RANCID TWATSTAIN!!!  Do NOT scream at me with both middle fingers extended because YOU ran the FUCKING STOP SIGN, and vegetation and other vehicles blocked my view of you until AFTER YOU'D RUN THE FUCKING STOPSIGN!!!  May you try that with a city dump truck, because THAT'S THE ONLY FUCKING THING THAT WOULDN'T BE FUCKING TOTALED BY HITTING YOUR GINORMOUS ASS.

Hotmail can fuck off, too.  Changing the privacy and end user agreements should NOT BE CAUSE TO FUCKING GO OFFLINE FOR THE ENTIRE FUCKING AFTERNOON.

Your turn.  Sound off, and have a good Labor Day Weekend.