Pen post, lot #2, post 1 take 2

I found the camera earlier when I was retrieving something one of the cats knocked behind the end table.  Here's the Parker 45 I was talking about:

 Capped, with a writing sample.  As it says, it has a medium nib (in stainless steel, I'm pretty sure), and was inked with Parker Quink.

 The pen would probably be long enough to write comfortably with the cap laid off to the side, for those who prefer that, but it does post well, too.

Since it comes with the squeeze converter Parker used to make their pens with, whoever buys this on Amazon will be able to use bottled ink; however, since it's a removable converter, they don't have to--they could conceivably use Parker Quink cartridges.

It is a fairly nice pen, much nicer than the Vector that I used all through grad school and all the way up to...last July, when Odysseus got me a new fountain pen for our tenth anniversary.  The Vector still works, by the way--it's just too skinny for comfort when the weather's being normal Missouri weather.  The Parker 45 is likely as reliable, if not more so, since it is a nicer pen. 

One of those days...

It's already been a hell of a day.  The imp was whiny and uncooperative this morning (which bodes ill for his day at school).  First, he didn't want to get dressed.  Then, he didn't want either of the options for breakfast that were offered (wanted something that's weekend food because of how long it takes for them to eat it).  And finally, he yanked the tongue out of his new pair of (cheap) shoes, then burst into tears because I said he couldn't wear them to school. 

I've got grading to do.  And I simply don't want to do it.  But...I'll be leaving at 11:30 to go pick up the pixie, and probably won't have time to do any of it until after they go to bed if I don't do some of it now.

Pen post, lot #2, post 1

Two weeks ago Friday, I won a lot of about a dozen pens on auction at ebay.  I was a nervous wreck--I sniped it at the last possible second.

Out of those pens was one that will be going up for sale as soon as I test it, then re-clean it: a Parker 45 in a dark blue.  It's a very pretty pen, with a medium nib (not my preference, honestly).

A little bit of history, here: the Parker 45 was the first cartridge fountain pen that Parker made.  I'm not precisely sure when the specific one in my possession was made and sold, but it does come with something that newer ones don't: an original squeeze converter.  The converter that has the metal frame around the rubber sac, with a squeeze-bar as part of the whole thing.  You dip the nib into the ink up to the grip section, then squeeze and let go slowly about three or four times for a full fill.

It's supposed to be one of the nicer, under-appreciated pens of Parker's lineup, but I haven't inked it up to try it out, yet, and don't really have the time to do so and try it out.  I need to have already started grading...and I haven't, yet.  I'm half a mind to do it anyway...

Never mind.  I'd intended to write with it, and take pictures to use to sell it (and post the pictures for y'all) but I can't find the damned camera. 

Maybe later.

No pics tonight...

Sorry about that, but today's been rather hectic.  Our new washer arrived today, amidst a bit of a clusterfuck.  See, we don't get home until 12:30, at the earliest, and we asked the store to arrange an afternoon delivery.

That got fucked up.  And the delivery guys tried to deliver an hour before we got home.

Thank God they were willing to come back today, since it wasn't their fuckup, or that would have fucked tomorrow and Wednesday, too.

In any case, we have a new washer...and we've really put it through its paces.  It's working on its fifth load (three loads are dry, one's in the dryer).  I think it's safe to say that it works, and works quite well.

I am rather beat.  Because along with that?  I've also unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher, put away things drug out to try to make room to bring in the new washer, and gathered more dirty clothes from various parts of the house.  And supervised homework, and showed the kids a bunny I saw sitting in the neighbor's yard eating his grass.*

I don't think I have the energy to do much grading tonight.  I can do a few, but then I'm going to go to bed.  Tomorrow's going to be a long day, too.

But I'll try to find the camera and get pictures of the pens I got.  And maybe a bit of a writing sample of the one lever pen that's not freakin' going anywhere because I fell in love with it.  And I can do a writing sample with the Parker 45 that I'll also be putting up for sale when I do the Parker 21. 

*I wish the bunny would bring all of his/her little friends and mow the back yard.  It needs it already, and we're not going to have enough dry days for our ancient little mower to survive trying to chew through the tall, wet stuff.

Pens!

I got another dozen in the mail, yesterday.  Between the Parker 21 I already acquired, and the 45 in the lot, I already had pens enough to cover what I spent acquiring twenty pens.  Also in the lot is a Sheaffer Fineline, with the goldtone cap.  Which will also be a nice bit of change when I sell it. 

Odysseus compared my pen lots as panning for gold.  I haven't found anything incredibly valuable, but the ones I have found have been able to recoup enough for me to be able to keep the few little oddities that I like--like the Universal fountain pen with a stupid-huge screw in glass cartridge.  Or this nameless little lever-fill with the silver-palladium alloy fine point nib that writes like a fucking dream.  Or the adorable, elegant little Marlowe ladies' pen, with someone's name inscribed on it.  (Yes, I'll post pictures later.  If anyone's interested.)

Some of the pens that aren't worth a whole lot will probably be fixed, and the ones I don't plan to keep will either get sold at flea markets, on Amazon, or handed off to anyone who wants to buy one on campus (or as gifts--I have a transparent Sheaffer students' cartridge pen with a medium nib in a blue plastic section that should work fine now that I have it cleaned up, but isn't worth more than about $5). 

Out of the two dozen pens I have, I'm planning on keeping five or six--the Eclipse ladies' pen is too damaged to sell, otherwise it'd be going, too, despite how cute it is.  One is the Waltham (for which I cannot find a clip), one is the slim and elegant little Marlowe pen, and then there's the lever fill I've been playing with all day.  I'm planning on keeping the glass cartridge Universal pen, since I'd get maybe five or ten for that.  I'm undecided on the Arnold pen (it's a very pretty green, and isn't worth much...but it is in very good shape, and should be a simple fix).  There are another six that are either in awful shape, and/or will take more time to identify and find caps for.  The rest will be put up for sale as I get them rehabbed.  And/or figure out an alternate for a cartridge that's no longer made (*cough*Wearever*cough*). 

random ramblings

Sometimes, I really hate not home schooling the kids. 

Both were sick on Wednesday (which meant that the pixie missed her class's Easter party), but the imp was good to go for Thursday...just in time for his class's party.  Where they served Easter colored treats.  Like sugar cookies with orange frosting, and (probably) kool-aid. 

Both of which had red food coloring, judging by his behavior. 

We've asked his teacher, and asked his teacher, and asked his teacher to make sure he doesn't  get anything with red food coloring in it, and pointed out that his behavior becomes uncontrollable, and it's not his fault.  And it still happened, and he still got in big trouble, and we didn't realize what was going on until I found the remains of his goodie bag in his backpack. 

I am seriously so angry about it I could spit.  And I am inclined to ask for him to be sent to the office for all parties next year (with treats being given when he gets home). 

It's a damn good thing that he doesn't have a life-threatening allergic reaction to red food coloring.  Otherwise, I'd have had to sue the school, and I hate the thought of that.

I'm really thankful the pixie doesn't have any similar problems with food coloring. 

I'm going to have to work with her on the alphabet, though.  She's missed enough school to be a bit behind her classmates.  I hate that she gets so sick so easily, and I'm beginning to think I'm going to have to get her a boys' coat next fall, and save her cute little wool-blend coat for special dress-up occasions.  Because the imp's coat has an elastic band that keeps the hood close around his ears, and hers doesn't.  And she is the one with ear trouble.

We had a tornado warning that sent us to shelter, Wednesday night.  Unfortunately, I'd given the imp a dose of Benedryl when he went to bed, and couldn't get him to wake up.  I wound up walking him down the hall by kicking his heels because he's too big for me to carry, now.  He's over four feet tall, and I'm four feet eleven inches.  He wound up curling up on the bathroom floor and going back to sleep.  Odysseus had to carry him back to bed. 

Cricket flipped out and wouldn't settle while we were in the bathroom, but Shadow found a comfy spot and refused to move.  She was still there when we went looking for the cats to put them in the utility room for the night. 

I'm still really angry about having my chalkboard taken out of my room.  Worse was that they'd already taken it down before class started, and I'd needed the damn thing.  I wound up only able to do about half of what I'd planned to do, because I didn't have a chalkboard.  And Monday, I'll have a piece of shit dry erase board to work with.  If I'm lucky enough to have anything at all.

I'm about two thirds of the way through with another short story.  I've got just over 20K words in the short story collection I've tentatively titled Normalcy Bias.  I've got maybe a quarter done on Detritus, and it's just under 20K words.  And...I forgot the draft book at my mother's, last week, so didn't get any work done on it last week. 

I think that's it, for the time being...I'm waiting on the mail to run, because there's another 12 fountain pens coming today.  One of them is the first cartridge pen that Parker made, and I'm a little excited to see it, and test it out.

Fucking maintenence twats.

The head of maintenance (read: chief janitor) of the library has decided that he hates my chalkboard, and will replace it with a whiteboard. 

Never mind that I never make a mess with it, and I tend to clean up messes as I find them left by the other twits using my classroom.  Never mind that I bring my own chalk.  Never mind that whiteboards glare under any lighting, always over the text  Never mind that the fucking whiteboards are never readable.  Never mind that the markers never work (and chalk always does).  My chalkboard will be replaced by someone who doesn't do their job anyway to excuse the fact that I am the one that does their job in my classroom. 

At the point where I no longer care one way or the other, I may bring in a fucking Sharpie to write notes on their wonderful whiteboard. 

Not much longer...

I picked up the fourth paper from my classes, today.  And we started the lecture over the last paper, the research paper. 

It's due in 17 days.  After that, we'll do the blogging while I grade papers.  Any revisions needing done will be due by email during final exam time (adheres to the letter of the requirement that I schedule something for the final exam time set for a fucking skills class, the true final exam for which is the research paper).  While they're blogging, I'll have a four hour bloc where I sit in a quiet room, by myself, three days per week--about six class days. 

And then, we're done.  The last day of semester is the first of May.  The next week is finals. 

The kids will have three more weeks where they're in school, so I'll have three weeks of half days, on MWF, with no children underfoot. 

And, over the summer, I plan to pick a day every couple of weeks where I run the kids up and drop them off with my mother, and have the day to myself. 

One of the things I plan to do is work on refurbishing fountain pens.  I've got twelve, now, seven with caps, four that need them, and one that's not worth trying to mess with, with another twelve shipping from Chicago soon.  There is at least one Parker in that bunch, and two Sheaffers.  At the moment, though, I have one pen ready for sale right now, six pens that are worth refurbing (but two that I'll be keeping--the Waltham and the ladies' Eclipse), four that I'm not sure about because they don't have fitting caps, and one that was badly redone, and cannot be repaired without a new pen body. 

(One of the pens I found at a flea market yesterday is interesting, and quite pretty: it's a Remington, and looks like this...but lacks the cap for the fountain pen end of the pen/pencil combo.)

This fall, the imp will likely* start first grade, and the pixie will be in every day half day classes for pre-K for four year olds.  And I'll be back on campus (I think--I haven't gotten my class assignments, yet).  Odysseus graduates this summer (end of July) with an accounting degree, so I don't know what his schedule will be this fall. 

But for now, that's not really what I need to be focusing on.  Right now, I need to be focusing on watching my sick kids, and getting things around here ready to be gotten out of the way for the new washer, which will be coming in sometime Monday afternoon.  And the eight plus loads of laundry that are awaiting it.

Teh suck

The pixie is sick.  Again.  With yet another head cold, which is clogging her ears and making her throat sore.  Sore to the point of making her cry...which exacerbates the problem.

The imp has it, too.  Just not with the ears.

I can feel a sore throat coming on myself. 

Damn it.  When is it going to fucking stop???

Because I was curious...

I can't tell what four of the pens that arrived in the lot of seven are.  Two of them have no unique feature, other than a previous owner's name etched and gold leafed into the side of the pen.  One is the yellow hermaphrodite.  The fourth is the little, three and a half inch long pen with the ring on top instead of a clip on the cap.  I think I got a good picture of that one--it's the fourth picture down on the post from last Friday.  It's absolutely adorable, even if the barrel of the pen is bent, and because I couldn't identify it, I wasn't planning on selling it.  I'm still not, since the barrel of the pen is bent, and there's a tiny crack in the pen body at the top of the lever.  But the not knowing was bugging the ever living hell out of me.

I typed the description of one of my pens' unique feature into a search engine--a laurel wreath engraved on a teensy medallion on the end of the lever.  Turns out, that was the identifying feature: the pen is a lady's pendant Eclipse, made between 1928 and 1932.

I found some pictures, and yep: that's my pen. 

Mystery solved.

I'm not dead yet...

...but life is holding the club at the ready to bash me in the head. 

It's been a long weekend.

Gah.

Got my pens, and found out that one had had the sac replaced, and someone had done it really, really badly: instead of letting the rubber cement dry before putting the pen back together, they ended up gluing the nib section to the  sac to the bar to the pen barrel.  Which cracked when I tried pulling the pen apart with my fingers. 

And it was a rather neat pen, too--the feed is transparent, and the nib looks to be in excellent shape.

I got two unidentified pens that came without a cap, and one extra cap. (And yes, that is my hand.)

 There's a yellow hermaphrodite* pen with a bent nib.  The cap doesn't fit the rest of the pen...which is what bent the nib. 

 I got an unidentified lever pen with a ring on the top of the cap rather than a clip, and a missing nib and broken feed.  The lever has some really pretty engravings, so bent or not, I'm going to replace the nib and feed and ink sac, and keep it.  If I can straighten the barrel, I'll consider selling it.

 I got an Eberhardt Faber Permapoint with some of the cap decorations (a ring at the bottom) missing, a nib bent away from the feed, and no ink sac.

And I got a Parker 21.  Probably a first generation, made in 1948, with a fine nib.  Yes, that's my handwriting. 

Nothing is  particularly worth a lot of money--the Parker is worth the most, and it might cover the cost of this lot  of pens. 






*The pen is both fountain pen and mechanical pencil...which works and has a blue lead in it.

Squee!!!

I just checked the tracking on my fountain pens coming in for refurbishing...and they're out for delivery!!!!  I get to dismantle and inspect very old pens today!!!  Looks like I've got one (bent) hard rubber fountain pen (of indeterminate brand until I get a chance to get a REALLY GOOD LOOK at it) that will need a LOT of work, since it's actually missing a nib and feed as well as needing to be heated and straightened...but all of the rest look usable with just a new feed sac.  Which I will need to measure each pen for. 

If it seems like I'm excited, it's because I am.  I like fixing things, and tinkering.  I don't have the tools or capabilities to do that with my guns, but pens?  Pens I can do.

Busting my ass.

I got the pixie situated with a coloring book and Sleeping Beauty this morning...and then went and cleared the stuff out from between the end of the bed and Odysseus's dresser.  Then, I put on the new Tinkerbell movie that the pixie bought with her own money.  And got books shelved.  And put up a new set of plastic shelves on top of the dresser.  Put the pixie down for a nap...and got the sewing table mostly cleared off so that we can put it up on risers, and make it a more comfortable desk for Odysseus to use here at home. 

I still have quite a bit to do back in the master bedroom today.  I should go get back on that before my energy level drops into the negatives. 

I'm hoping the increased peace of mind from not living in the middle of a huge mess helps my writing output. 

OH, COME ON!

FOR THE LOVE OF FUCK, CLEVELAND, OHIO, POSTAL SORTING CENTER!  DO YOU HAVE  TO HANG ON TO THINGS FOR MORE THAN TWENTY-FOUR FUCKING HOURS, WHEN IT'S NOWHERE NEAR A WEEKEND!!!

Damn it, I'm WAITING on the rest of my pens, and beginning to be VERY UNHAPPY with the postal service.*

*More so than usual, at least.

Boo!

In soaking the nib and feed* to be able to pull them from the section holding them for a good cleaning, I discovered that the feed was broken.  The only thing holding it together was dried ink.

And, given the time period when the pen was manufactured, finding a feed that fits could be a pain in the ass.

Current tally: I need a new feed, and an ink sac.  The presser bar is in sparklingly perfect shape.

*I'm assuming this isn't needed, but just in case: the feed is the plastic thing just behind the metal nib that brings the ink to the pen tip.

Yay!

My Waltham pen has arrived!  I actually got the nib and feed section pulled out of the body with no problems...and promptly dumped out the ossified and shattered ink sac.  I've got the inside of the pen barrel cleaned, and the nib seems to be in good shape.  I do, however, need to get some clear, non-sudsing ammonia to clean the nib and feed.  I can see dried ink stains, but can't get them cleared out.

Long couple days

So.  Our washer, a 32 year old almond colored Maytag, is dead.  The parts aren't even made anymore.  The repair guy can't work any more miracles.  Doesn't even need it for parts, because all of its generation are dead or dying.  Were it a car, it'd probably have somewhere around a million miles on it.  Or more.  As 'tis, the last time being overloaded was the last time.

Time to get a new washer. 

We already know what we're going to get to replace it.  It's got a feature I can't resist, despite it being a hundred, hundred fifty more than my second choice: a cycle for extra heavily soiled clothes (read: small boy playing outside). 

In the meantime, we'll either be taking all of the clothes to a laundromat to get them all done at once (three baskets full--it might be the best option) or borrowing a friend or family member's machine. 

This happened last week.  Thursday or so.  I noticed it on Friday, and called the repair guy on Saturday.  He promised he'd call and come by yesterday.

And so, Sunday, I cleaned half my house.  The living room and the kitchen--the biggest mess in the house, due to small children helping make the mess.  It took almost all day, and I managed to do most of the work.  With zero energy.  I just...kept moving. 

I paid for it yesterday.  My feet still hurt. 

And today, I get to start on the bedrooms.  Once I get the cat butt off my arm and can get up, at least.  Most of that will be done (today, at least) sitting on the floor.

random ramblings

The kids have been home all week.  Home and a little bored.  We've gone through several coloring books. The pixie has been using a kindergarten curriculum workbook as a coloring book (completely ignoring all instructions and expecting praise for a job well done).   And the imp has done a good number of worksheets in a grade 1 workbook--which is about where he is in school.  I think he'll probably be well into, if not finished with, the stuff in the book long before the end of the school year, since they have a full quarter left. 

Yeah, and he's been working through the worksheets on his own.  He just needed help with figuring out the word search and the crossword puzzles.  I'm hopeful that, with this latest leap forward in maturity, he'll be ready for first grade by the end of the year.  If he's not, he's not--I don't want to push him past his capacity--but I think he will be.

The pixie is finally recovered from her latest round of nasty.  She's done with her antibiotics for her ear infection, and she's not hacking and stopped up (which I'm not sure if that was a virus or allergies--I'll be starting her on Claritin tabs before school just like I do with the imp).  Last night, she came to me whining that she needed help blowing her nose.  So, I helped her, and she got rid of the last of the problems: a wad of nasty about twice as big as a jellybean.  Since then, she's been fine. 

The cats have had a new version of entertainment, this week.  The birds have well and truly returned, and seem to really love the maple trees out in front of the house.  Shadow really, desperately wants a birdie.  She'll sit on my end table, staring out the window, chin quivering, and tail sweeping everything off the table.  Never makes a sound, though.

Cricket, on the other hand...yeah.  She talks constantly, and when she's in the window, talking, with the same chin quiver as Shadow has, she sounds ridiculous.

Odysseus and I have been on Spring Break this week, too.  We've gotten some things done, but not a whole lot.  Mostly because he managed to overload and overheat our washer in doing laundry.  It never finished a spin cycle, and now, it won't.  I'm not sure if it's dead, or if there's just a belt slipped half off.  We've called the repair guy, and he'll be out sometime Monday to look at it. 

I suppose in the meantime, I'll just focus on the kitchen.

I found out, this week, that I can't really focus on writing a whole lot after the kids go to bed.  I'm usually too fried from watching them--even when they're watching TV, they're often poking at one another to start fights.  I won't have any grading next week, so my office hours should suffice for some writing, at least.

I've not given up, people.  I promise.  It's just taking a lot more time than I'd figured on.

Just jumped.

I was given a bit of cash for my birthday, and I had an idea I've been wanting to try for a while.  So, I took my birthday money to Walmart, and bought a prepaid Visa.  And then, I went on ebay and used it to buy a few vintage fountain pens in need of repair. 

I have one that I want for me--it's a lever-filled Waltham, an almost tortoise shell brown/gold marble celluloid pen that was made in the '40s by a company that went under when the owners were nailed for tax evasion and war profiteering.  It probably cost about $0.35 new, and the nib looked in good shape from the pictures.  The sac will need replaced, and I'll have to see about the presser bar (it might be fine, it might be rusted).  The clip is gone, but...I may be able to fix that, too.  It's a lovely pen, from the picture, and has a history I can only wonder at.

It looks, in coloring and pattern, a bit like one I'd put in my Amazon wish list.  That one would have cost $25.  And not had the interesting company history.  This one was actually made in the U.S., and cost $10.

The rest were a lot.  About seven pens in various brands, including at least one Parker. 

That one is going to wait until I'm sure I can do the restoration by practicing on the other pens.  Because I want to make sure I don't screw up on a pen that could bring in a few hundred dollars when I resell it.

I'll post pictures when I get the pens, and when I get them refurbished. 

I'm a little bit excited, here.

Awesome video.

Had this one on my mind for a while, so I thought I'd share it here.  It's not the song, it's the video.  And it's Christopher freakin' Walken.

Random ramblings

So, the imp went back to school, last week.  He did fairly well, from what I can tell.  Four days blue with only one green.  He got 8/10 on his spelling test, and from what I gathered, got everything he was supposed to do done in class, during the time set to do it. 

We're pretty proud of him.  Everything's continuing to improve. 

The pixie went to class on Monday, and popped a pretty significant fever on Tuesday.  She spent Tuesday and Wednesday sick and lethargic, and we took her to the doctor on Thursday.  Turns out the fever was being caused by an ear infection (as was the nausea and other tummy troubles--which she'd been having for about a week).  We've got some antibiotics for it, and she's been perking right up.  Today is her third of five days of antibiotics. 

Hopefully, we'll get her respiratory crap under control, too, since she's got this next week to recover. 

Speaking of, this week is Spring Break for the kids, and for us.  I have a week off where I can work on the housework, and work on finally getting enough rest and maybe get to feeling human.  The pixie has a full week where she's not around the other little snot-gobbling germ factories.  And the imp will have a break from the expectations of school.

I'm sure the cats will be happy to have the kids home.  Shadow has been desperately wanting the imp, in particular--she tries to sleep near him in the afternoons and evenings, and tries to claw her way into his room to sleep on him at night.  Needless to say, that gets her tossed in the laundry room with the door closed.

I begin to be tempted to toss Cricket when the pixie is sleeping.  When I go use the hall bathroom and close the door, Cricket is instantly there, clawing and yowling for me to let her in (the pixie's bedroom door is about four or five feet from the bathroom door), which makes me afraid that the dumb, codependent cat with severe separation anxiety will wake the pixie.  I do love the cat, but I swear she's got less than a third of the smarts of a normal cat.  She's three years old, and still plays like she's six months old (and is as clumsy as a small kitten), and talks to her toys the whole time she's playing with them--sometimes up to two hours at a time. 

As I mentioned, I finished grading papers and got midterms turned in...just before the pixie and my other half took sick.  The pixie's was an ear infection--Odysseus's seemed to be a mild flu.  I'd been planning to go out to eat Wednesday night, but...yeah.  We went today for lunch, instead. 

Odysseus is finishing up the last bits of class work due before his Spring Break officially starts.  And I've got projects lined up for myself, and I think he's got a couple lined up, too.  Not sure what (beyond a couple of requests on the housecleaning front). 

Part of my intended projects for Spring Break is another 18,000 words written on Detritus.  I've got a bit over 17,000 words done, and I think this is going to be a longer book than I've been writing.  I think 18K more words might get me to the halfway point.  Might.  It might only be about a third of the way done, at that point.  It's kind of slow.  More character than plot driven. 

Another project is to finish the cover art and get "Bar Tabs" Kindle published. 

I still don't know when my cover artist will have art ready for Fire and Forge.  I've been feeling like I'm taking advantage of her, since all I'd been paying her with up to now is a hard copy of the book her work appears on.  I'm hoping she'll give me something I can do for her to pay her for this art. 

Any case...I should have some time (and maybe some mental energy) this week, so I'm going to see what I can get done on the fronts that teaching school has pushed to last place in my priorities.

Midterm grades turned in...

...I can breathe for a few weeks.  Next week is Spring Break (for all of us), and then paper 4 isn't due until 4/1. 

Time to buckle down and focus on something else.

Ouch.

I did it.  I graded half a class's worth of papers in two hours.  With the exception of one extension granted, I'll be ready to turn in midterm grades as of tomorrow night.

My head hurts.  I'm going to read and decompress for a little bit, then go to bed.

Ah. Time to settle in with yet more grading.

I'm planning to bust my ass tonight so I can finish everything (including turning in midterm grades) by tomorrow at the latest, and hand it back on Wednesday.

And now, for something completely different...

I'll be spending the next three evenings grading papers! 

(okay, I'll stop being sarcastic, now.)

random ramblings

The kids have spent the week sick, which has been hell to juggle between my schedule and Odysseus's.  They're finally getting better, just as I've come down with a head cold (which is now moving from my head to my chest.  Damn it).  They're feeling good enough to start fighting, so they're feeling good enough to be confined to their rooms since I'm not feeling good enough to intervene every two minutes. 

I wish I felt good enough to start working with the imp on last week's spelling words and bible verse.  It might keep the little twerp too occupied to fight with his sister...even if it did have the side effect of making him as miserable as I am.

The cats have been...cats.  Cricket has been co-dependent and is back to drooling and slinging drool everywhere.  Shadow has been clingy--she's taken to walking up on my chest and flinging her legs out from under her.  I have to catch her to keep her from landing on my laptop keyboard...at which point, she lays her head on my shoulder and exhales a loud purr.

I have been sick so very much this year--and we're only at the beginning of March--that I'm beginning to wonder if I've been carrying too much stress, trying to keep too many balls in the air between taking care of the kids, and keeping up with my classes and grading.  I cannot let the classes lapse, since that's where most of our income comes from, and I will not let the kids suffer, either.  I can't wait until summer.  And I'm afraid that something's gonna give before then, even though there's not more than about eight weeks of my semester left.

And I'm already dreading the start of Fall semester.

I can tell you one thing that has been dropped, for the most part, since I can't keep up with everything else: my writing.  I've only written something like about 3,000 words since the beginning of the year.  And I do not have the time, or the energy (physical or mental) to do better than what I've been doing.  It just isn't happening, and won't be happening.  I'll be working on getting the things I have done published, and then that will be it until summer, at least.  I'm not giving up, but I'm barely treading water.

When I said...

...that I'd rather be sick than have my kids be sick, I meant with what they've got, not some random head cold that comes out of nowhere!

It never rains...

...but it pours.  The pixie started throwing up last night, and is running a fever this morning. 

At least the imp is getting better.

Cold and nasty.

So, schools in our area have been cancelled.  Many of them after the kids were bussed in.  Snow is coming down pretty darn quick--at times, blizzard quick.  And that, on top of frozen rain and sleet.

The university was one of the last to cancel classes. 

I am so damn sick of all the snow and ice that I could scream. 

Yet another fountain pen repaired.

Back when I got my Jinhao 250 set (four pens, all quite nice, varying in nib size from fine through medium fine to true medium), I was very much a fountain pen newby.  I made the newby mistake of thinking that bottled ink was bottled ink, and nearly ruined three pens using India ink, which contains shellac. 

One didn't get as much abuse as the others, and Odysseus has been using it (the medium fine nib in the silver pen body).  One was worse than the others, and had major issues with drying out and skipping...and I will admit I lost my patience with it a bit, and when the cap cracked on one of my favorite pen barrels, I switched the bad nib into that pen body and said to hell with it.  I'd just about decided to leave it un-inked, once I got the ink used up out of the converter. 

Yesterday, I decided to use the ink up.  I found it a lot worse than I remembered, and utterly lost what patience I had with it.  I pulled the nib and feed...and found chunks of the India ink clogging bits of the feed almost totally.  It was bad enough that it took a toothbrush and some elbow grease to get the chunks cleaned up.  And time.  It took enough effort that I was about ready to set it down and go get my gun cleaning picks. 

I also taped the cracked cap on the inside of the cap. 

The pen writes beautifully, now.  My only complaint is that it really is a true medium on the nib, and very generous with laying down the ink--traits I don't particularly care for.

Sick kid.

No, not the pixie.  The imp.  Started throwing up Friday night, threw up every half hour or so all night, then all day Saturday.  Finally got him to stop around 10:30 Saturday night.  He's still down, because he just doesn't feel up to eating much.  He refused anything at all until around 6:30 Sunday afternoon--nearly two full days without eating.  No, he didn't go to school.

Well, let me revise that.  The pixie is also sick.  Hers is respiratory...like usual.  I am really, really beginning to regret my decision to go ahead and follow their preferences to put them in school.  I love my kids, and I hate disappointing them, but  I should have remembered that school = getting sick constantly.

I'm frazzled, fried, and feeling like a massive failure as a parent...not because they got sick, but because I'm really, really losing patience with the sibling who's sicker competition, and the constant, miserable whining.  Supervising my classes' peer editing today was a huge relief.

Right now, they're down for a nap, so I've got a short break.  I'm trying to get some writing done while they're down.  Failing that, I'll do some of the backed up housework (but I'm not feeling that great myself, and would rather put it off until I'm not feeling mildly flu-ish).

My family keeps wondering why the kids aren't just in public school.

The imp has a spelling test, today (if they don't run out of time--it's a Friday thing, but Friday's cancelled).  He's in kindergarten, if y'all remember.  He's also reading fairly well. 

He is not being bullied.  At all.

Not like this poor little five-year-old girl in Pascagoula, Mississippi, who was kicked in the face repeatedly while playing on the slide (though the school somehow thinks she beat her own face misshapen, and blacked her own eyes because they didn't see it happen). 

And definitely not like this poor twelve-year-old boy who was hospitalized with a skull fracture (and leaking spinal fluid) by another boy two years older and three times bigger. 

There's a point where kids ought to be taught to stand up to bullies, and then there's a point where the bullies need to be forcibly removed from interacting with other children.  Unfortunately, most public schools are beyond unwilling to do anything but close their eyes and blame the victim. 

Honestly, were I either of those children's parent, I'd be yanking my kid out of the schools, homeschooling them, and suing the pants off of the district.

I hate being behind in work.

Whether that work is housework or the stuff that brings the paycheck, I hate being behind. 

And I'm behind in everything.  Trying my best to catch up, but it's not going quickly.  And the thing I most want to be working on (my writing) is what has to be set aside until I get everything else done. 

Yesterday helped, but not as much as I was hoping.  I got my papers that were turned in via the course website graded (eight very good papers in the course of an hour), then turned to the print copies.  The very first paper I  picked up...yeah, I got lost in trying to decipher what the individual was trying to say, and didn't manage to get through the paper in an hour.  The student really needs an ESL tutor, really, really badly.  Their ideas are spectacularly good, but their word choices and structure really make that hard to see.  And their papers take me over an hour to get through and grade.  I'm honestly tempted to put an F and a "see a tutor to turn this into standard English" note on the top, and be done with it.

And now, I'm behind in where I intended to be, on top of being a week behind in my grading thanks to that damn bout with the stomach flu.  

I know I'm late with the announcement, but it's been a busy day.

Today was Odysseus's birthday.  We spent most of the day with his parents, or with wrangling the kids after we got home (rather: I wrangled, while he did homework and took an online quiz).

I'm just about done in, so I think it's time for me to head for bed.

random ramblings

The imp was sick, last week (got over it totally around last Saturday).  I didn't realize how bad until the call of "Mommy, my butt threw up."  And this past week, the pixie caught it, and I caught it.  We went down hard.  I've lost around another ten pounds.  I can tell the pixie's lost a bit of weight, too, and she didn't have it to lose.

She was incredibly cute, the night she started eating again.  She looked up at her daddy with big, sad eyes, and asked, "Would you carry me to bed?  My body's all wiggly."  It only took me a second to realize she meant she felt weak and shaky.  That was around Wednesday night.  

I will admit to being terribly irritable and short with the kids, this morning.  I woke up with a minor earache, and I'm a little dizzy, still with the earache, and now with a headache joining in.  And, of course, the kids are contentious and whiny. 

This morning, Odysseus has gone off to the volunteer tax prep service that the university set up (for credit for their accounting students.  I wasn't sure he'd have the opportunity--we had some sleet last night--but the roads were no more than just wet, this morning.  And he's good at driving on snow and ice with the Civic, much less the Subaru.  I'm only minimally worried, and more about the other fuckwits on the road causing incidents.  He'll be back sometime after five, right around supper time.  I've got some plans, but it'll depend on how I feel whether I can get 'em done or not.  Gonna do one of my chicken casseroles, if I feel up to it. 

The cats have started beating on each other in the evenings.  Turns out Odysseus doesn't feed 'em as much as I do, and leaves 'em hungry in the evening.  Which makes both kitties--both of which are normally sweet tempered with each other--really, really cranky and aggressive.  I'm gonna have to put a flat stop to that.

I'd actually planned on taking the kids up to my mother's, today, but the weather scotched that.  I'd planned  on helping my sister wash my dog, so that she didn't smell like a riverbank (Scotty dog likes to dig, and sleep in the holes).  They've started having her out in the house with them, just puppying about.  She likes to sleep between feet and furniture, and neither of the other two dogs in the house have the manners to be permitted the same treatment.  My dog's mother (my mother's dog--a puppy mill rescue) isn't really even house trained, though she's getting there.

I picked up papers last Friday, right before the pixie got sick.  I haven't managed to get started on 'em yet.  I'm gonna bust my ass to get those done today and tomorrow. 

I just realized something...I hope I have pants that fit to go teach in on Monday.

No, I have not gotten one word written during this past week.  I should be able to change that in short order during my office hours next week.

I also didn't manage to get a pound and a half of sliced mushrooms parted out and frozen.  Or any used to make meatless spaghetti sauce for the freezer.  And now, my mushrooms, which have been sitting in the back of the fridge for a week, are gonna have to get tossed.  Damn it.

Being sick sucks.  That has been a full seven weeks I've been mostly out of commission, and the year's only eight and a half weeks old.  Definitely praying for things to start looking up...

Still alive.

The tummy bug that hit the pixie was rather vicious.  She didn't eat from Sunday through yesterday, and all I've been able to get down her have been pancakes and goldfish crackers. 

I know first hand just how vicious it's been: I caught it, too.  I seem to be on the mend, but there's probably at least another day of fasting involved for me.  But it's definitely going to keep me out of the classroom tomorrow, just as it did on Wednesday.

Rough 24 hrs and counting...

The pixie has been sick.  Vomited twice in her bed fairly early on last night, and a few more times into a bucket while laying on the couch much later last night, and has spent the day laying on the couch sleeping and watching stuff, and vomiting at random points.  Only once did she get any on the couch, and even then, it wasn't much.  All over herself, on the other hand...yeah. 

She's already gotten her bed again tonight.  And the sleeve of the last clean, dry nightgown.  There are more in the wash, but I'm not whereabouts in the cycle they are.  She's currently in a school dress she wore last Wednesday, since that's what I found on short notice. 

I absolutely hate it when the kids are sick.  It's emotionally rough, since I'd rather be sick than watch them suffer, and physically demanding jumping around to make sure they hit the bucket when they lose what little they've managed to put in their stomach.  Given that I spent until two this morning sitting up with her*, I'm inclined to lay down on the couch and conk out for a while, until the next time she needs cleaned up.

*My wonderful husband got up with the kids this morning, despite having migraine level pain with a sinus headache, and let me sleep until my need to take care of my sick baby woke me up.

random ramblings

The imp had his first spelling test, last week.  He got every word right, including the extra "surprise" word at the end.  We are very, very pleased. Unfortunately, they somehow managed to run out of time, this week--it's not surprising, since they had Friday off for a teacher development day.  They'll have Monday off, too, as that is President's Day.

He finally got a purple day* and got his toys back.  Including the blocks that had been in the pixie's room.  We had to find a set of blocks for the pixie--a small set of small, painted shape blocks, something that won't get mixed up in the imp's blocks.  Unfortunately, the blocks are so small and light that they won't build up on carpet.  I managed to adapt something for her (a 1" x 12" x 14" rectangular board), but she got awfully frustrated, at first.

We met up with some friends, last night.  My six year old son is almost as tall as her nine year old son.  They were a bit shocked.  My daughter is almost a foot taller than their son, who's only about a year and a couple months younger than she is.  Hell, to be honest, I  was a bit shocked.  I didn't realize my kids were that tall.

Anyhow, they're homeschooling, and she complained about her youngest daughter's handwriting.  I offered the loan of the fountain pen I fixed yesterday--kids, especially, are forced to slow down and think about what they're doing until they're used to it, and even then, are often so pleased with having something special to write with that they take more care.  My kids desperately want a fountain pen each, for example.  I've promised that I'll get each of them their own pen once they learn to write with one.  And I sent my friend the link, because the fountain pen I found is designed for kids: the grip part is molded, and there's a smiley face engraved in the nib to teach them how to hold and use a fountain pen.

My kids had their Valentines Day party at school, last Wednesday.  The pixie brought home a paper heart that she'd glued decorative puff balls to...badly, since all of the balls came off.  The cats...the cats just love those things, and have been routinely stealing them to play with in the kitchen where they slide and roll around on the linoleum.  I'm not sure what about them has attracted the cats' attention so firmly, but both cats have been acting like kittens with them.  Which makes me wonder if I shouldn't get the cats some new toys.

I picked up paper 2 yesterday, and one of my students told me they had a friend in a different Comp II class that hadn't even written one paper, yet.  They also told me that they'd picked my class for convenience (my class is in the library, in the middle of campus, rather than way off away from everybody but the business majors), but were incredibly glad they did because of how much they were learning, and because of the laid back environment, and the way I let them choose the topics.  (I rarely have two papers over the same topic, and almost never from the same point of view--which makes things a damn sight more interesting as I grade papers.)  Pretty much everyone in the classroom agreed with that student.  And they're planning to have a lot  of fun with the evaluation essay--they can review a movie** or a book** or a video game** or music, or anything else they can think of.

Writing hasn't totally stalled, but I've had less time than I'd prefer--I'm still trying to catch up with the housework that I couldn't do for almost six full weeks.  I've gotten caught up with taking care of the cats, but I've still got laundry (and clean clothes to put away), the kitchen (although I've banned the use of real dishes until further notice), and the living room to deal with.  Not to mention the master bedroom.

And I'm still waiting on cover art...

*The imp's class has a behavior chart, graded by colors.  Pink is spectacular, purple is excellent, blue is good, green is "ready to learn" and is the minimum acceptable, and yellow, orange, and red are bad behavior.

**For the movie review, they have to watch something they haven't seen; however, since books and video games take a lot more time to get through, I don't require fresh eyes on that.  I don't want to hamper them with getting stuff done for other classes in doing homework for mine.

I feel a sense of accomplishment.

Back in 2003, just after I bought my red Parker Vector pen (a decent pen for a student), I bought a blue Parker Reflex (which is no longer in production, though you can still find them).  From day one, it didn't work.  It either flooded or skipped, depending on the angle I held it, and the letter I was trying to write at the time. 

I very sadly put it away, since it was precisely my favorite shade of blue. 

Fast forward twelve years.  I spotted the problem with the pen last week: the tines were uneven.  Not crooked--the feed slit in the nib was cut unevenly.  One tine was shorter and much narrower than the other. 

So, I started trying to figure out if I could replace the nib--hard to say, because I cannot figure out the size of nib I need.  I know more than I used to, but I'm still far more novice than expert.  I did get the nib and feeder* removed and got a better look at the problem, today. 

And then, I fixed it.  It's a cheap, soft stainless steel nib--nothing high quality, but utilitarian, when it works--so I took an emery board to it, and evened up the tines, then put it back.  Inserted a cartridge, and tried it out.

It works.  For the first time since I bought it, it neither floods nor skips.  

Best of all?  I much prefer a fine nib to the medium it came with, and after the work I did evening up the tines on the nib, it's now more fine than medium.

*The feeder is the plastic thing behind the metal that makes up the nib.

Sounds about right.

"At a news conference last week in Brussels, Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of U.N.'s Framework Convention on Climate Change, admitted that the goal of environmental activists is not to save the world from ecological calamity but to destroy capitalism."

I'd show you my shocked face, but I'm too busy rubbing my temples with exasperation that everyone seems to have fallen for this shit, and is in the process of destroying  first world nations' economies in the guise of trying to save a planet that isn't dying.

Granted, developing countries--like India and China--need to do an absolute fuck-ton of work on just how badly their industries pollute their air and water; however, these nations either are too busy trying to boot-strap themselves up into the current century to give a flying fuck about trying to save the rest of the planet (which again, isn't in danger), or they saw through what had fooled everyone else.  Honestly, I'm betting on the first: it takes an affluent society to have the breathing room to raise their eyes from their work and wonder what they can fuck with next.

I don't think I can imagine the frustration.

Okay, here's the story: a nineteen year old girl in Texas has some of the shittiest parents I can imagine.  I don't know if there was any abuse defined as such, but there's certainly a level of hampering her getting on with her life that I think merits at least a short prison sentence.

Alicia Pennington was born at home.  Her parents refused to file for a birth certificate, or a social security number.  She was home schooled, and never needed medical care.  There is no official record of this girl.  Her attempts to file for a delayed birth certificate were denied, because the judge said there wasn't enough evidence she was born to US citizens on US soil, and her parents refuse to testify to their citizenship...or hers. 

In my honest opinion, this smacks of a nearly perfect attempt to control the girl.  She isn't able to get a job, much less do anything else that even an illegal immigrant does as a matter of course, because everyone knows she's American but she can't prove it officially.   

I think her parents ought to be jailed until they cooperate, and any children still in their home need to be removed and processed for identification so that they cannot do this to another one of their kids. 

No, I'm not against home births (though I think the people who opt for them are gambling the life of both mother and baby, with how fast things can go critically wrong), nor am I against homeschooling.  What's gotten my back up in this case is that the parents are purposefully and maliciously crippling their daughter's chances at creating a successful life away from them. 

That's the way to do it.

If the police want to regain their old reputation of being public servants, and keep the populace cooperative instead of having everyone, rather than just thugs, refuse to be friendly and courteous much less cooperate, they need to follow this guy's example:

One of the first things Magnus did when he took over was to disband the department's "street teams," units of heavily armed officers deployed in high-crime areas.

The teams stopped "everything that moved," Richmond Police Capt. Mark Gagan said, in hopes of finding suspects with warrants or carrying small amounts of illegal drugs. ...many in the community perceived the aggressive street teams as an occupying army.*

Magnus also eliminated the seniority system that allowed officers to choose the areas they would patrol. He required officers to take on more responsibilities on their beats beyond responding to calls. Beat officers are required to attend neighborhood meetings and to maintain a high profile at churches, schools and businesses. They're encouraged to hand out their mobile phone numbers and email addresses to residents.

What he's doing is working.  Crime of all types has plummeted, and citizen cooperation--in a city that's 1/3 black, 1/3 hispanic, and 1/3 white--is skyrocketing.

I am not surprised it's working.  I live in a small town in the Midwest, and I've seen anti-cop sentiment skyrocketing as the cops get more belligerent, confrontational, and self-isolating.  They're not acting like soldiers--not ours, at least, since ours are trying to win the hearts and minds of the nations they're occupying in the attempt to aid.  No, the police around here are acting like the Nazi occupation did, in areas they suspected people of aiding the Jews.

In the town where I grew up, on the other hand, we had two cops.  They tended to get bored and lonely while they were patrolling, and go to wherever people were gathered, and just hang out.  Everyone knew them, everyone liked them, and everyone...cooperated.  Even the local pot grower/dealer (and yes, they did know he did that...and didn't care because...) tended to let them know who was making meth, and where.  Everyone trusted them to do the right thing, and not to go shooting people's pets...or the people who they were supposed to be protecting.

People cooperate with their neighbors.  No one with any amount of self-respect is going to cooperate with an occupying enemy army that acts like jackbooted thugs.  And Chief Magnus gets that.

Unfortunately, very few other departments or chiefs do. 

*emphasis mine

Well. That's done.

I picked up papers last Friday (and will again, next Friday).  I graded one class's papers over the weekend, and half of the other class's on Monday...and then, I got hit with a mild migraine.  Which stuck around through Wednesday.

I just finished grading papers a bit ago.  Now?  Since I've gotta be up and moving no later than 6:30 a.m. to get the kids up, dressed, and fed, before getting myself ready...now, it's time for bed.

'Night, y'all.

Pretty sure the "I didn't mean it like that" defense didn't work for Edward II.

Back in the early middle ages, a king appointed one of his courtiers to the office of Archbishop of Canterbury.  He assumed that his man would represent the interests of the crown rather than that of the Church. 

It backfired spectacularly.  Thomas Becket was ordained, and began representing the interests of the Church, which pissed off the king...to the point where Becket fled to the Continent for a few years.  Once he returned, during the reign of the following king (who broke tradition and was crowned elsewhere--a bad sign), things got worse: the king, Edward II, said something along the lines of "Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?"  The exact wording is under dispute, but what happened was that four knights, freshly returned from the Crusades, decided that this was a Royal Command, and went to confront Becket.  And then, they murdered him in the cathedral. 

Three years later, he was canonized.  No, the king wasn't directly punished, but that was pretty much a slap in the face, a "we don't believe you didn't mean it" from Rome. 

I see shades of that happening in San Diego, now.  San Diego has passed an anti-gang law that states that even those inciting gang violence, knowingly or unknowingly, or profiting from it in some way, are liable as conspirators.  And now, they've arrested a rapper--Brandon Duncan, aka Tiny Doo--under said law.  He faces prison for life with all of the charges laid against him.

The ACLU are protecting him, stating that he has a right to rap about whatever he wants--that the first amendment protects him and his art. 

I can, on the one hand, see their point. 

On the other hand, Duncan's defense strikes me as a cross between that of Edward II who implied that he wanted the Archbishop of Canterbury murdered, and that of the type of idiot that screams "fire!" in a crowded theater, then tries claiming that it was his right under the freedom of speech. 

Pretty much all of the gangsta rappers tend to incite violence, crime, and rioting.  Why shouldn't they be prosecuted under similar laws that normal people inciting riots are prosecuted under?

One down, one to go.

I finished grading the papers for my 8:00 a.m. class, last night.  Twenty-four students per class times two classes means 48 papers.  I'm down to one class, just 24 papers to go.  Twelve tonight, and twelve tomorrow night means I can hand papers back on Wednesday.

Unfortunately, I don't get to rely on my usual crutch, this time: my printer ran out of toner, which means no rubrics until I get a new toner cartridge...which should be arriving sometime Wednesday. 

So.  The plan is to grade twelve papers tonight, starting with the ones turned in on the course site platform.

I will admit it. I'm taking a break.

So, I went and checked my FB account, and I found this story. 

What.

The.

Actual.

FUCK!!!

Who the FUCK sets a six-year-old's hair on fire???  And fucking WHY???

Whoever did that needs to be caught, impaled on a short stake, and his pubes set on fire. 

Spec-fucking-tacular.

Very first student paper of the semester...wasn't the paper assigned.  It wasn't a definition essay, but a weird amalgam of a policy proposal (which I don't teach) and a causal argument (which is what paper 2 is).  Yes, it's possible to reword parts of it to work, but as the paper stands right now...

It's clear that this particular student did not listen to a damn word, nor did they read the fucking chapter.

And I'm still chest-congestion blocked from going and pouring a drink.

Fuck.

random ramblings

So.  Wednesday, the imp told us he'd gotten a green day (minimum level of good behavior that we'll accept).  Thursday morning, Odysseus found that the imp's clothespin was on yellow, not green. 

The imp had lied.  For the lie, he got spanked.  A yellow day only gets TV privileges revoked.  Had he chosen to tell the truth, that would have been all that happened; as it was, he'd gotten a yellow day on Thursday, so he didn't get to watch TV that day, either.  He hasn't lied since, and usually won't for about two or three months. 

I will not raise a politician.

The pixie had a good week, this last week.  We took her to Walmart's salon, this past week, and she's been delighted about having her bangs trimmed and shaped.  The beautician did a brilliant job--the pixie's hair is unevenly curly, and you'd never know that looking at the job she did.  And she handled a squirmy little four year old who'd never been to a salon incredibly well.  Yep--the pixie is four years old, and had never had anyone but Mommy or Granny (my mom) trim her bangs before, and has never had her hair so much as trimmed in the back.  And she has no split/dead ends. 

Her hair is naturally curly enough that when it's dry, it comes to her waist, but when it's wet, it's all the way down to her butt.  We keep it long to keep it semi-manageable. 

We hit Sam's Club, today.  I made the mistake of noting the clearance things on the end caps--and got three boxes of soup.  Marie Calendar's makes an awesome chicken chili, and the boxes (6 cans) were nearly $9 normally, but were marked down to $5.  I also noticed that Frank's Red Hot sauce was marked down from $5/2 bottles to $3.  And the imp and I are almost out of hot sauce anyway, so...yeah. 

We ended up with a cart so full that I had a hard time maneuvering it around corners.

Last night, the cats decided to be downright adorable.  Cricket walked a circle on the imp's lap, then snuggled down to sleep curled up as tight as the big kitty would go (she's about 14 inches tall at the shoulders, with most of that leg length, and about the same in the length of her body--the tail adds another 12 inches--but isn't more than about 10 lbs).  Shadow (who weighs in at about 12 lbs despite being two inches shorter than Cricket at the shoulder and in length) snuggled as close as she could get to the pixie, and wound up curled around her hip, half behind her, and half beside her.  And both kitties and both children were still and quiet watching Transformers for about two hours after dinner.

I think I may have lost my dog for good...my sister's beagle and my mom's Scotty dog (my dog's mother) are both about at the end of their normal lifespans for healthy dogs of their breeds, and neither dog is healthy.  And my mom and my sister have fallen in love with my dog...who is still put out at us for having taken her to my mother's because of the shitty neighbor.  By the time we're able to afford to sell our current house and find someplace out in the country, our dog will have been my mom and sister's house dog (something she wasn't willing to be for us) for a few years.  Possibly even the only dog. 

I suppose it's for the best...the Scotty was so hyper, and is so hyper, that the kids are as scared of her as they love her. 

I just picked up my first set of papers from my classes, yesterday.  I've got my 8:00 class's papers organized, and I'm ready to start grading after I put the kids to bed tonight.  I  need to do 12 papers per night from tonight through Tuesday night, so that I can get them handed back on Wednesday.  I've picked back up with being a teaching assistant, grading a colleague's student work to save his eyes, and he's assigned a paper for them to turn in on Sunday night/Monday morning, so his stuff will be off my plate until Wednesday.

Writing is going.  Slowly, but it is going.  I think I won't manage this one until I've got time this summer, since my plate is a bit more full this semester. 

Wow.

What do you want to bet this will get swept under the rug, just like exposure to Agent Orange got swept under the rug for years?  I'm acquainted with people who still deny that there were negative effects to Vietnam vets from Agent Orange exposure (as well as those who say that if the effects aren't exaggerated, then the soldiers deserved it--needless to say, I don't voluntarily associate with those kinds). 

Office hours.

This semester, I have two classes: one at 8:00, and one at 9:00.  I've scheduled office hours from 10-11:30 on MW, and 10-12 on Friday.  Odysseus has a 10:00, an 11:00, and a 12:00--but only on MW.  Friday, he only has one class, and it's inane, and the instructor doesn't respect herself or her students. 

So.  Mondays and Wednesdays, I'll be driving myself in, then running over to pick up the pixie.  It's going to take a lot of time before I get confident enough to park in the heavily used lots, but there's another, smaller lot within easy walking distance of the library that isn't used so heavily.  And the pixie's school is about three minutes away from campus. 

Right now, I'm sitting in  office hours.  And hoping my battery holds out, because I totally forgot my power cord.

Beat flat.

I spent yesterday looking for a lost Roku remote.  I cleared the coffee table, sifted through the stuff on Odysseus's desk, and cleared flat surfaces in the kitchen where it might have been set down.  No joy.  I'll give it a couple more days, then I'm going to order a replacement.

But I think I did too much, yesterday, and am still exhausted (and feel like crap) this morning.

Thank God for freewrite days.

...damn it.

We just took three big boxes of toys out of the imp's room.  They were not put away in the places that he has for them, so he loses them for a couple of days.  If he doesn't care enough about his toys to put them where they go, then he doesn't care enough to keep them...yes, there was a tantrum.  No, I don't particularly care. 

He can have them back, box by box, but he can lose them again, just as he did tonight, if he doesn't put them away, or puts them in the wrong place, like he did tonight. And yes, he was warned.  I warned him that this would start happening, starting last night.  He was warned three times tonight.  And it did not one damn bit of good.

I hate being a hard-ass about this, but this is the attitude that loses him his scissors, his markers, his pencils, and his crayons at school. 

Maybe I should have been harder on him sooner.  I don't know. 

random ramblings

We had a conference with the imp's kindergarten teacher, this past week.  The imp is doing incredibly well with the academic aspects of kindergarten (what was first grade when I was small); however, he's very weak in the maturity needed to actually succeed at school.  He's not very good about working independently--tends to drift off in daydreams when he's not got someone standing right over him--but I think that's as much because he doesn't see the point.  I think if he has a clear goal that he wants to work toward, things will clear up. 

We have a plan for that.  Now, we just have to put it into action.

The pixie has caught another cold.  She was sick from late September through the first part of Christmas break.  I'm betting she's going to be sick from now until Spring Break at the earliest.  She's having so much fun in preschool, though, that I honestly think it's worth it.  She's asked for every day classes next year with pre-K-4.  I've started tweaking the budget to allow for that.

The kids tried getting up at 6:30 this morning.  If they'd been quiet, I might have tolerated it, but since they were screeching at each other (and I was too tired to be able to tell if it was joyful or angry, and too tired to care), I made them go back to bed.  Yes, there were tears and tantrums.  No, that wasn't tolerated.  They woke me up again around 8:00.  And since I'd had a bad night anyway, I was really, really unhappy with them when I got up.

So, last night, I was relaxing in my recliner, with the footrest up, and I feel a warm weight settle in between my ankles.  I assumed it was Shadow, because it settled and dozed off, instead of spazzing around on my lap.  I was wrong--it was Cricket.  She's almost never snuggly, so I ended up staying up about an hour longer than I'd planned. 

I discovered, when I got up to go to bed, that Shadow had ensconced herself between Odysseus's knee and the back of the couch, and was curled up and snoring.

So, I made it in last week for my classes.  I've got an 8:00 and a 9:00, both Comp II.  Wednesday, we went over thesis statements, and Friday development.  I discovered I can't lecture long, and can't write up on the board for long; when I try to combine the two, I run out of breath really fast.  But I got the point across both days, and got to watch the lights coming on like nobody's business. 

Which is why I'm still doing this.

I've actually got two writing projects going on at once--Detritus, which is finally picking up on the writing pace (the plot pace is much slower than I usually write), and a collection of short stories I've tentatively titled Normalcy Bias.  Most of the stories are set in our world, but with a small twist that takes them just slightly out of the norm.  One of the stories is about a veteran who buys a new house and land, and discovers that his place is home to a group of gremlins; another story is that of an amoral dragon who decides to clean up a neighborhood.  When I get stuck on Detritus, I pick up with one of my many short story ideas, and write that.  Usually, after the random story is written, I'm good to go with the novel. 

We had our scanner--which was mainly used to scan in the cover art created by my friend--die on us last month.  We just got the replacement delivered, so all I'm waiting for now for Fire and Forge (and for "Bar Tabs") is the cover art. 

FFOT: ugh

Catching a cold (including post nasal drip and the accompanying cough) right on the heels of pneumonia can seriously fuck off. 

I am so fucking tired of this shit it's not even funny.

I managed it.

I taught both of my classes today.  Didn't stick around for office hours because I desperately needed to lay down* but I made it through classes. 

I'm tired, but I did it.

*Apparently, I looked like I was feeling bad enough that one of my students, when I was making the rounds helping them with their thesis statements, grabbed me and made me sit down before she was willing to accept help.

I suppose...

There's one good effect to having been so sick for most of the month: because my appetite's been limited since I got sick (as in: I haven't been able to eat more than half a ham and cheese, or half a 15oz can of soup), I've lost about fifteen pounds. 

Granted, when I'm up and doing, trying to keep up with the kids and the house, I can't make it on that kind of a diet.  But currently, that's what it takes for me to be able to lose weight. 

Holding it stable once it's down I can do.  It's just getting it down there in the first place that I haven't been able to do since I had the imp and developed the thyroid issue to start with. 

More than ready to get back to normal, thanks.

So, I figured that since I'm done with the antibiotics, I'd be done with the queasy when faced with something hot or bitter, and I could have coffee. 

Nope.

I'd also have thought I'd be closer to being back on my feet at this point.  Again, nope.  I'm still pretty useless.  I'll get a little bit of energy, get up to do something, have a coughing spell, run out of oxygen, and the energy and everything I thought I was starting to recover goes poof. 

I need to get back on my feet.  I need to stop being useless.  I need to be able to get back to work, both at my job and at home. 

I have had an absolute gut full of this being sick shit.  I want it to go away.

random ramblings

I haven't had much contact with the kids this past couple of weeks.  I've honestly been too sick to do much more than lay in the bed and read.  I've finally started improving to the point where I can shuffle around and do a few things, but I'm still pretty damn sick.  Still coughing my lungs up every so often.  I have today and tomorrow left in the antibiotics, and then I'm done.  Hopefully, things will pick up from there. 

My boss has been spectacular.  She not only told me off for trying to keep up with my classes when I was down with pneumonia but took them on for me on Friday to get a physical roll taken.  She's sent me a list of who was absent on Friday that I can add those who haven't done anything on BB to. 

Shadow has been a rather constant companion.  She's stayed with me since I went to bed two weeks ago, curled up somewhere near my knees or feet.  Cricket has come and gone, but is much less of a restful nursemaid: she tends to walk up on me and knead dough on my sternum...which hurts and makes it hard to breathe. 

So far, I've got no time in classroom this semester.  I've barely been able to get the class functional, and get stuff posted.  I'm recovering, and hoping that it'll be enough by Wednesday, when classes start back up after MLK day.

Since I'm feeling better, and since the other half and the kids are visiting the in-laws (which means quiet time), I'm going to try spending the afternoon that I can keep sitting up writing.

FFOT: pneumonia

Pneumonia can fuck right the fuck off with knobs and cheese.  I swear, I have never in my life been so sick as I have been for the past two weeks.  I'm getting better, but it's slow going, and I still get tired really easy...which can also fuck the fuck off, since there's shit that needs done, and it takes teamwork to get it done!

I am so ready to have this all the way behind me.

What's made your week(s) blow?  Sound off in the comments.

Good deal.

This one definitely deserved his place on the Better Dead List...and the state of Oklahoma agreed. 

Too bad the puss writing the news story had to moralize about executions for half the story.  Irrelevant and unnecessary, and kinda took away from the message of "Rape a baby to death, and die."

A "White People Thing?" Really?

And here I thought showering more than every few days was a hygeine thing.  Or perhaps a consideration thing, considering that most people don't want to smell you coming before you enter a room.  Nor have somebody who's just worked out sit all whiffy next to them at a board meeting, or working next to them at work.

She says "ethnics" just don't shower as much...I really think that more speaks on their culture of lack of consideration for others than it does anything else.

Whups.

I sorta overdid things, yesterday.  I felt a lot better, so I sat up and completely built my class sites.  Everything needed for the semester, rather than only what was needed for now.  Took about five hours.

I paid for that.  And Odysseus paid, too--not what I'd intended at all. 

It started around supper time: I started hacking up gunk every few minutes.  Could not control it.  At all.  And it continued all night, bringing me out of sleep ever half hour to an hour. 

It did the same to Odysseus. 

I feel really, really bad about that. 

I've taken a lot of care, today.  I've not done more than I absolutely had to, and I slept a lot.  I feel a lot better now than I did when I woke up, and that usually isn't the case. 

I'm going to take it easy tomorrow, too, and spend as much time sleeping as I can get away with.  I've been taking antibiotics for about four days, now, so I should start recovering quicker soon. 

I hope.

As things stand, I'm not sure if I'll be going in Wednesday, either.  I shall see how I feel tomorrow, and perhaps post a lecture.

I'm also going to hope Odysseus gets more sleep tonight.  Because this past week has been really, really hard on him, and I hate that, and hate that I've been the entire cause of it.

Random ramblings

So, the imp and pixie have had a full week back in school.  The imp's handwriting has improved a whole lot, and he'd buckled down, behaved himself all week, and earned a new Hot Wheels toy.  He's already got a math grade recorded for quarter 3, and it's very good.

The pixie is incredibly happy about classes starting back up.  I didn't realize she'd missed everything so much.

I...am still sick.  I can tell I'm on the road to recovery, but I'm still really, really sick.  At least the fever broke this morning.  I've had three solid days of antibiotics, with seven more to go.  I'm hoping that's all I'll need.

Shadow, our black cat, has been my constant companion since Tuesday afternoon.  She's very much a little nurturer, and snuggling a person in a bed just makes it so much better, in her opinion.

Cricket has come back a few times to check on me and let me know she hasn't forgotten me, but the one time she got snuggly, she started eating my hair.

Classes for the university start tomorrow, and I'm not going to make it.  I've got the course site for my 8:00 class mostly set up, but still need to finish the 9:00 (discussion board and assignments tabs still need set up).  I did notice, when I was setting the assignments up, that they've added a plagiarism checker to their assignments tool...no way in hell was I not going to enable that.  

As for writing...well, I did some while I was waiting for pickup after my x-ray on Thursday, but that's just about it, and it's on a short story I'm playing with until I get time and energy to type up what I've got written on Detritus.

Pneumonia.

It sucks.  But I've got antibiotics, so I should be better soon. 

I would so much rather have a stomach bug.

This respiratory crud is kicking my ass.  I rattle when I breathe, and can't go for long without a coughing fit, most of which...do nothing. 

At this point, I've called the doc's office and set up an appointment.  And I'm hoping it's a bacterial infection, rather than a virus that's just going to have to run its course, and could take up to another week.

I don't have another week.  Classes start Monday, and I can't get into my class site to set it up.

sick

Had a blog post planned for yesterday.  Never got around to it because I'm absolutely miserably sick, and have been since I woke up Sunday. 

I'm not usually the first one in the house to get sick.  And it doesn't usually disturb my sleep, but it sure as hell is this time. 

So content is going to be thinner than I'd planned until I get better, especially since I've got to work on getting my class site unlocked, and get my docs updated and loaded into my site.

Excuses

I am beginning to be of the opinion that people use psychological and/or medical diagnoses to excuse their own behavior, rather than choosing to work to better themselves. 

My mother is an example of this.  Yes, she has fibro.  Yes, she has something that mimics COPD.  Yes, she's clinically depressed, and Medicaid won't pay for treatment.  But y'know, she does do that which truly matters to her: despite the fibro, she keeps her house neat (for the most part) and keeps the kitchen clean.  Yes, she's got some help paid for by Medicaid, but she does everything but the vacuuming and the dusting herself (the things that bother her breathing).  Because she cares about a clean house.

What she isn't doing is looking for a better home, one that would get my sister out of the attic where she breathes in mouse leavings mixed with fiberglass, which triggered some nasty asthma. 

What she isn't doing is moving away from a place where she's convinced that my male genetic donor spread rumors (true) and ruined her reputation (false--she did that herself, by acting ashamed).

She blames her depression for that.  She also blames needing to stay to help her younger sisters, and that she can't afford better (which is bullshit--she makes more than I do). 

My father was another example.  He survived an abusive childhood...to perpetuate the abuse upon his own children.  He chose his actions, despite knowing that what he was doing was wrong.  I know he knew it was wrong, because he worked so hard to be perceived as a saint by everyone not living in his house.  He chose to be an utter bastard. 

I was diagnosed in high school as a borderline sociopath.  I made the choice to be better, partially because I knew I was broken and didn't want to be, partially because I knew it was in my own best interest not to act on my natural inclinations. 

I have been diagnosed with low thyroid, which limits what I can get done because I just...run out of energy.  I still do the critical tasks, like making sure the kitchen is clean, my kids are clean and fed, and the kids' laundry is clean.  I prioritize things by their importance: my kids are important, a clean kitchen is important; a clean living room, or hall, or master bedroom is far lower on the list of priorities.  I do not use the thyroid as an excuse.  I work around it, and I am planning on discussing raising my dosage with my doctor at my annual appointment in July.  And, for the moment, I'm taking an herbal-based thyroid supplement that works in short bursts to make sure I have the energy to get the important stuff done.   I am trying to solve the problem, not use it as an excuse to be lazy.

I chose to work to be better than what I am.  Just as my mom chooses not to let her constant pain and exhaustion limit her taking care of her house, but chooses to let her depression limit where and how she lives. 

Those who choose to take a diagnosis and use it as an excuse...yeah, I'm beginning to have less and less sympathy for them. 

random ramblings

So, we took the imp up to his grandparents for a two-night stay.  He took his bike because they spoil him by moving the cars out of the two-car garage, and putting a heater in there so he can ride comfortably. 

The pixie was very quiet, yesterday.  Didn't wake us up.  We finally woke up at around 9:30, and found her playing in her brother's room, building a castle with blocks.  I begin to think we need to get her her own set...

Monday starts the next semester for the kids.  I'm hoping to see the same improvement out of the imp as we've seen between first and second quarter between second and third.  He went from a low C average to a high C average.  I'm hoping to see that nudge upwards a bit more.  I'm really hoping his teacher will deem him ready for first grade. 

The pixie is just missing her friends and teachers something fierce.  I dread what summer will be like.  For both kids, honestly.

My mom got the pixie a huge, wide-brimmed, semi-floppy hat with feathers all over the brim for Christmas.  There are pink feathers scattered through the house, and the pixie is in a constant fight with Shadow about whose the hat really is.  It's sort of comical to see a slightly pudgy black cat trying to make off with a hat that's three times her size, and to see the pixie running after her to take it back.  Maybe it'll teach the pixie to keep her toys put up, and her bedroom door closed...

We've had to change the cats' food, recently.  The healthy metabolism that we'd been feeding the cats (which got Shadow playing right after eating, but didn't keep the weight off despite her not eating but a third of what Cricket--who's never totally still--ate) vanished from the stores.  We switched to an indoor formula Purina One, which claims to include the greens that the cats would be eating were they outdoor cats...and Shadow's been a little more active, her fur is silkier and healthier, and Cricket has calmed down just a little.  Hairballs have been going down rather than coming up, too, for both cats. 

Semester for Odysseus and me starts on the 12th.  We have a week where the kids will be in school, and we aren't, so I'll have three half-days where I don't have a pixie underfoot, and we can get some more furniture-moving and some Insect Growth Inhibitor put down.  So far, Odysseus says he's got Tuesday/Thursday free.  I do, too--I teach at 8:00 and 9:00 on MWF, and plan to hold office hours until 11:30 on Monday and Wednesday, and until noon on Friday when I'm not needed to pick the pixie up from preschool.  He says he's planning to try to keep TTh free for a once or twice a month jaunt to the local shooting range. 

I think I have an idea for writing that stubborn book that's not wanting to come, despite not letting anything else out, either: since the Rolling Stones album I want is out of stock on Amazon, I'll look for a used copy at the local music stores.  Failing that, I'll get the memory upgrade on my laptop done so I can find a playlist on Amazon.  Or at least listen to the music I have on Amazon Prime, which the laptop won't play without an updated Adobe Flash (which is what was crashing everything).

So, at least I now have a plan...

Just one of those things...

I've had several acquaintances with chronic health issues.  Some have been my students, some are my friends.  One or two have been friends who are college students. 

Out of all of them, only one has blamed the health issues (rather minor, all things considered) for having to drop out of college.  All things considered, yes, hypertension combined with Chrohns and type II diabetes isn't a fun set of conditions to deal with, but they can be controlled.

All it takes is a willingness make the choice to grow the fuck up and do what must be done to control the chronic issues.  And no, the individual (whom I dearly love) isn't willing to do that.  His wife tries to help by serving food that won't exacerbate his conditions, but he'd rather go get fast food that drives up his blood sugar and irritates his digestion, but tastes "good" (even though he isn't willing to even try the things his wife makes). 

It isn't his health responsible for making him drop out: it's a severe lack of maturity and drive, combined with a probable fear that even if he does get his degree, nothing's going to change for him and his family.  And then, he'd count himself a failure.

This is one of those things I can't do anything about.  I'm not stressed over it, but I'm still shaking my head in absolute bewilderment at the way my friend is approaching and handling things.  I see what he could do to be able to get what he wants.  I see his path.  Why in the world is he unable to? 

Urgh.

I'm suffering from a bit of not-quite-apathy, but certainly disinterest in the local, national, and world-wide events as reported by the headlines on the various news sites my computer will load. 

Especially anything having to do with politics and/or the legislation of morality. 

The libertarian in me is depressed...and worst of all, I know I'm helpless where any of it's concerned. 

Resolutions...

I honestly didn't think about it, this year.  Too busy chasing kids and cleaning, over the past few days. 

Alright, fine.  Let me see...

I resolve to...

• stop worrying about things I can't do anything about. 

• stop worrying about the alcoholism running through my family.  I don't like feeling intoxicated, so that likely won't be a problem for me.  

• stop worrying about my weight.  It's stabilized at a higher number than I would like, and doesn't really go down even when I'm starving myself.  I'm going to try talking to my doctor about a slightly higher dose of thyroid meds, which is the reason my weight has gone up.

• keep pecking at the clutter.  The house is better than it was at this time last year, and with continued effort, will continue to improve.  

• get the deck torn down, and the back yard fence repaired/extended. Planning on that during any February/March warm spells.

• get a few raised garden beds put together, one for chilis and jalapenos, one for tomatoes, onions, potatoes, etc.  Oh, and one for herbs in a sunny corner in the front. (March/April)

• take the kids out to the back yard to play more during good weather in the spring and summer, no matter how much I actually hate being outside.  It's worse on Odysseus because he has terrible allergies.  

I think that's all, but that's enough to be getting on with.  I'd resolve to stop hating the mess around holidays, but I never set myself up for automatic failure. 

Time to go check on my black-eyed peas...which I need to make more often, despite being the only one in the house that likes them.