Life

Whew! It's been quite a ride lately!

It was so AWESOME to have Anthony home again - and so cool that it was such a natural transition back - almost as if he'd never left. It's kind of tough entering this new semester, though, as he may be gone 3 months longer this time than last time - with a one-month winter term added in and the potential for staying at the college to do mathematical research 2 months into the summer. Such mixed feelings - so happy for him to (potentially) have that opportunity, but not ready for him to be so cut loose from home yet. I was still planning on those 3-month-long summers together for a while yet.

I LOVE MY FAMILY!

My semester, the teaching part anyway, began yesterday. I've now met with all my classes and have had a pretty smooth start despite being sick and beginning the week feverish, achy and congested. I think I started turning the corner on that today, which is good because Tuesdays are my long days. I'm on campus for 11+ hours, six and a half of which are lecture, the grand finale being a 3-hour-long night class. With office hours in there too I haven't quite figured out how to fit meals in - grabbed a bean burrito from Taco Bell on my way home at 9:30pm.

The cool thing was that my order number was 111, and today's date is 1/11/11.

Yes, I am easily amused, but at least that shows I was still in a good mood after a very long day.

So far so good with my classes, but once I start giving and grading tests I might be singing a different tune. I have too hard a time turning students away. They do need the class - for some of them it's the last class they need before they can transfer, for others it's the first math class on their path through college, a path that is quite blocked until they get going on the math sequence. I've got over 100 students between my two sections of 101, which will be rough with grading because a lot of the problems are essay-type and not algebra-type problems. So I'll be putting in some long hours on that. I have about 200 students total. For one of the classes I grade homework every night . . . not typical in college, but that class needs the feedback.

It's just before midnight here. I should have been in bed long ago, but it's hard to wind down after teaching up to 9pm - and I had a lot of student email to respond to tonight - so it goes.

I was hoping to sleep in tomorrow, as my classes don't begin tomorrow until 11am (cool!), but Jacob's school decided to have a "late start day," (but not all that late) so I have to get up on time anyway and get him to school (not so cool). The timing sure could have been better on that!

Oh, and though I'm not as disgruntled as one of my colleagues about working in what he terms "the trailer park" (the portables we are in until construction on our classroom building is finished), and though I was reasonably able to put up with the lack of heat and an interior temperature of 43 degrees last week and early yesterday, I must say that utter lack of toilet paper in the restrooms today and the soap dispenser having fallen off the wall did make for a less than desirable work environment.

Well, and the fact that our portable has no refrigerator or microwave adds to the difficulty . . . ah well . . .

That's my life right now - and my mind has lost some of its poetry for the moment (hence my lack of posting) - between the holiday events and maxing out time with Anthony and rockin' and rollin' into a new semester. Hopefully I'll be back to my "normal" self in a week or so!

For now I'll just try to remember to carry some TP with me :-)