Rewards

The school I work at has a chef program complete with pastry classes, and for a couple hours every day they sell their class creations just around the corner from my office. I've been resisting all semester long.

This morning I walked past as usual with a longing gaze. As I got closer to my office I saw a sign announcing flu shots. I hate HATE HHHAAAAAAATE needles but a flu shot is a pretty good idea for someone who spends time around lots of stressed-out people, many of whom currently work in the health industry, handling things they've been handling (and I suspect they may sometimes cough on their homework assignments on purpose). So I made an internal pact that if I got a flu shot I could also get a little box of 6 handmade chocolates.

It seems like a good compromise to me. Also having a bit of fancy chocolate at my desk helps me to resist all the free, low-quality Halloween candy spread out over the campus. I'll hoard that box for a good week, too.

My arm hurts.

Gah.

You know you're a bit busy when a good day is one in which you do not fall further behind.

Yep

The first week of class is seriously kicking my ass. I've got a billion people on my wait lists, people having to stand during my lectures, more students whose names/faces I have to learn in one room at a time than ever before, and an algebra class that I'm doing the prep for hours before class every day already.

It's pretty fun.

But the real reason I got on here is that after I finished clearing all of my new students' photos off of my camera (gotta learn all of those new names/faces somehow), this was the picture I found, that I did not take. For those of you who don't know, B.L. is an enormous cat who is adorable playing with milk rings and terrified of everything.

Mr. & Mrs. C

My parents visited from MO this weekend, just left this morning. We did the usual stuff - farmer's market, kitchen store, other various strolling and window shopping. I took my parents to my school to show them where I taught and we checked out my new office. Didn't do any gardening activities because the mosquitoes are so bad this year, even DEET won't keep them off. Mumsie helped out with the big Saturday cook-off; took Pfather out to a couple bookstores and a couple good beer spots and had a variety of IPA's on hand at the house. Did a bit of eating out. Got my mom hooked on the Inspector Linley series from PBS's Mystery!

My parents and I made some more stained-glass looking mosaics (pics at left with and without flash - m&d's on left, mine on right). I couldn't find any good glass at the local craft stores so instead I went to St. Vinny's and bought a bunch of clear, colored glasses and plates that we broke into pieces. As such, the shards were of varying thickness and degree of curvature, which made grouting pretty difficult. Still, I think they turned out well and I'm hoping they'll garner a bit of cash for a friend's cancer benefit next weekend. I also took a couple pics of the mosaic I made for the class I took with S, on the right.

I was going to go to work today, but really I need a recovery day, to re-organize my room (they brought up the matching low, long dresser to my other dresser), and to help pack gift baskets for the benefit silent auction. Tomorrow I will plan my chem class for the fall - shouldn't take long - and with any luck start planning the algebra class, which I imagine will take a good week. I suppose I should change out of my PJ's and get to it.

The most popular part of my life...

...seems to be what I eat. To be fair, we do eat really well around here. I took a photo of our refrigerator this week, just so you can see the serious level of organization it takes to pack that much food in one average-sized fridge.

On the menu:

• "primal" peanut butter-banana muffins
• "half-primal" (1/2 whole wheat flour, 1/2 coconut flour) carob zucchini bread
• cheeseburgers with caramelized onions
• apple seaweed salad
• black beans in homemade beef stock
• rosemary roasted potatoes and chicken
• creamed herb zucchini
• mexican-style grilled corn
• smoked, dry-rub ribs
• sausage, onions and peppers with fennel root (I think the sausage was made by roomie D? El señor B was on a freezer-clearing binge)
• watermelon

I purchased some aluminum baking cups for the primal muffins this week and it worked WAY better - I think the eggs are what made them stick so bad to my non-stick muffin tins. I'm going to try to re-use the ones we pull off without ripping. We'll see if that works. I am very much enjoying the cut, 1/4-watermelons available at our grocer. Small enough for us 3 to finish easily and also we get to see the apparent fruit quality. I tend toward choosing less-ripe melons because the light pink-whitish bites are my favorite.

Finished editing lab experiments, mostly finished my department's website work, turned in my final grades, have gotten a bunch of chores done around the house. Now I need to run a bunch of "big box store" errands this afternoon.

Had a nice cocktail with ladyfriends G and M last night at Restaurant Magnus. The Finn's #7 Cup and Batida were tasty-tasty and not too sweet. The Dodsfall Manhattan was okay, but with a sort of apple-juicy aftertaste (no, I did not have 3 drinks, we all traded sips). It's always hard for me to deviate from a plain ol' dry martini, but the last couple times I've been rewarded with an interesting mixed drink.

Tomorrow night I'm invited to dinner with K & S - I'll have to take over some of the carob zucchini bread for dessert. I'm supposed to also play some Wii games, we'll see.

All in all I'm very much enjoying my rather laid-back "home vacation" aka the 3 weeks between semesters. I've still got a lot of prep work for my algebra class but I'm going to worry about that next week.

This week

Yesterday I gave the final exam for my summer session. Spending a good 5-6 hours per day, 4 days in a row every week, for 8 weeks, with my students meant that I got to know them really well and was able to get most of them through with a passing grade. It also meant that by this week, I was dead out of patience, even snapping a few times at roomie D and el señor B. I really like my summer students and I am really glad to not see any of them perhaps ever again.

Today I have to grade those final exams and edit the lab experiments for the fall semester. Then I've got 3 weeks to get ready for next semester, in which I will again be teaching chemistry, and also ALGEBRA!!!! and also be the director for an engineering transfer program. I'm pretty nervous but excited to try some new things and have a full-time salary again, at least for a while.

This week I finished a 3-Monday night mosaics class with my friend S. She made a really cool serving platter and I made a window hanging. It's fun to do crafty stuff even just a little. We were trying to have craft night once a week this past winter but once spring hit we got too busy with gardens and yards and the like.

Also enjoyed many evenings with el señor B, roomie D, popcorn and re-watching Deadwood. It sounds a little boring but I'm a homebody at heart and would rather be sitting at home with a couple choice friends rather than go do something "exciting". That said, have been going out on the occasional martini/beer date with lady-friends, and that has also been nice, and of course there is still Zumba.

To wrap it up, on this week's tRBC menu:

summer vegetable gratin
garden greens with bacon
sausage and olive-stuffed italian peppers
slow-cooked pork roast
el señor B's veggie slaw
homemade sour cream (a little sourer this time, but we still haven't got it quite down)
beef and broccoli stir-fry
mashed root veggies
smoked salmon with soba and yu choi
"primal" (no flour) "pumpkin" (can't find pumpkin right now, used a sweet potato) muffins

Yellow squash, zucchini, italian frying peppers, kale and collards all came from the garden. For the second week in a row I forgot that we have shallots from the garden and bought some.

The muffins turned out really good, although with 6 eggs to 1/2 c. coconut flour were more soufflé than pastry and stuck like mofos to my non-stick muffin pans, even though I had larded them liberally. I think I'll try a modified version with almond flour and the teensiest bit of wheat flour this weekend, and might get some silicone muffin pans.

Catch of the week...

I'm very pleased with tRBC's menu this week:

• watermelon
• fruit salad
• grilled salmon
• squash bread
• sage water and anise hyssop tea
• iced herbal tea
• thai-style chicken coconut soup
• garlic and herb green beans
• pulled pork
• brussels sprouts
• delicious protein bars
• coconut cauliflower
• talkin'-like-a-sausage stew
• cole slaw
• homemade sour cream
• jalapeño mustard

The green beans, parsley, sage, basil, thyme, oregano, squash, jalapeños, anise hyssop, kale and chard that went into stuff all came from our garden. The mosquitos really suck this summer, but we did a lot of work early on in the garden so even with weeds - I can usually pull up about three before I get chased back inside - it's really producing. I've even got some baby okras!

Too sweet

So a few months ago roomie D stopped washing his hair with shampoo entirely, sort of as an experiment. His hair was pretty greasy-looking for about a month, but then his scalp adjusted and now his hair is beautiful again. One problem is that we have hard water, and it kind of builds up on your hair, so he's been using vinegar to dissolve those damn carbonate deposits.

Currently I've reduced my shampooing to twice weekly, and in the 3-week break between semesters also plan to do away with it entirely. The first month I switched from what was approximately 4-times to 2-times per week, I had some greasiness issues as well but then that quieted down.

That was all really just a build-up to this: last night I soaked my own hair in vinegar to de-lime, then washed it regularly with shampoo and conditioner. Still though, my hair smelled all vinegary when I went to bed with it wet.

Whether out of good judgment or simply because it came naturally, el señor B, instead of telling me that I stunk like old sweat (which I did), said I smelled like an Easter egg. Too too sweet.

Sorry, old friends

Honestly, I should just give up and write one blog post every 2 months because it seems that's all I can handle these days. But realistically, I think I'm letting down all of 5 people, so it's tough to feel that bad about it.


STUFF I HAVEN'T YET WRITTEN ABOUT:

• my birthday party - birthday challenges mostly accomplished
• the end of the semester of extra-remedial chemistry
• saying goodbye to Big Red and adopting Black Beauty (respectively, my old truck and a new car)
• teaching summer school
• trying to get back into outdoor climbing...really this time
• reading "Good Calories, Bad Calories" - excellent!
  

So yeah, I've got a lot of catching up to do. Things are generally pretty chill and same old-same old around tRBC, doing a lot of cooking and gardening, and hanging out with roomie D and el senor B. Oh, and the rubbish Lenny's. I'm going to go take some pictures right now so that I'll have some for the next post. You know, the one I'm planning for August when I'll actually tell you about things in that bullet list.

GAH! Again!

I am a fairly sucktastic blogger, due to the fact that I just can't keep it up as a habit. BUT I shall blog my birthday party soon. Just need to get past the end-of-semester crunch.

Weekly wrap-up

Last week before spring break, and man am I ready for it. I'm actually planning to work all through it but no student contact hours! Today had some long teacher meetings and for once a meeting was actually productive. I got a lot of good feedback on tweaking or even totally rewriting some labs I've wanted to fix for over 2 years now.

Found out that a former roommate and overall sweet, sweet dude is pretty sick. Everybody at tRBC is really bummed about that, to put it mildly. Hopefully we'll hear some good prognosis news soon (fingers and toes crossed). It took several days for the seriousness to sink in on me. I'd say the ambiance here has been pretty down all week for that and other reasons. Last night we watched The Brothers Bloom, which was really long but it made me and others laugh out loud many times and that was greatly appreciated.

A surprise cold snap hit midway through the week (okay, this is the Great Frigid North, so in March it's not that much of a surprise, but still unwelcome). A month ago I would have been delighted to ride my bike in 25-30˚F weather, but I am way done with that now. I'm tired of my balaclava and mittens. On the bright side, I did get to wear the scarf that SG recently sent to replace the one I lost in IL.

Some good. Some bad. If your are the praying type, say one for my friend. It can't hurt.

Nothin' much

Not a lot to tell anyone about but I'm trying to be better about blogging and so I don't want to let a post lapse. My friends B-alicious, A & J came to visit from Mpls this weekend. Except for teaching a morning lab, I had Friday off and so once I got back home, B-alicious, M and I all met up with roomie D at a fantastic Indian buffet where I had previously had dinner but never before done the buffet. It was pretty good and upon returning to tRBC, B-alicious, M and I sat with very full bellies and watched "Pumpkin" while I embroidered and we all tried not to doze off from food coma. Then we took a walk around my neighborhood, which is always larger than I expect, evaluating peoples' choices of yard decor. There was a really cool bottle tree that I want to go back and take a photo of.

I'm trying to pick back up on doing crafty-type stuff. Since moving to tRBC over 3 years ago now, I haven't done much in the way of crafting, largely due to the fact that all my crafty shit is packed like sardines into my closet and a pain to get out, and also there's rarely a bare table upon which to work. I should clean up the porch table now that the weather is nice. The last two Sundays have been "ladiez craft days" with friend S (and this weekend B-alicious joined in). I've done some card-making, some quilling, and a little embroidery. Inspired by a series of "Stitch-a-day" posts on the Hand Embroidery Network, I'm trying to take up embroidery again. I used to do it a lot as a kid, but I only knew the straight stitch so I'm gonna get fancier this time.
There was some other stuff this weekend, but I don't want to use all of my thrilling material at once.

Scary me

So I believe that I've mentioned that I'm teaching a special class this semester for students who don't have the pre-reqs they need, and they are supported by taking concurrent math and reading classes that are targeted to the skills they need for my class. Thus, each student in my class has 3 teachers in this block of classes.

A couple weeks ago, one of the math teachers mentioned during our weekly meeting that the students were afraid to come to my office hours. That is, they were afraid of me. Me. The other teachers chimed in that a student or two had admitted something similar, and honestly I'd kind of suspected it since my office hours were always empty. We were all baffled because really I'm just not that scary of a person. Especially because I go out of my way to be positive and encouraging as a teacher (yeah, you just might barf if you saw me in class), and because, you know, I'm just kind of goofy. I think their fear has to do with the structure of the block, that everything is building up to them passing my course, and so I'm the "heavy" who they have to impress. Plus these students have not historically performed well in classes nor had positive relationships with teachers.

Anyway.

I made an announcement in both of my lab sections the next week that I really did want them to come ask questions, and I wanted to help, that I'm impressed by students who show the initiative to come to my office, and that I don't bite. They all laughed, and nobody admitted to being afraid of me, but I didn't try to find out who it was, either. I guess they just needed that extra little push, which I never would have known if somebody hadn't 'fessed up to another teacher. Now I'm swamped during my office hours, and it is awesome!

Greens Heaven

This week both roomie D and el señor B made greens, kale in chorizo and collards in sausage and bacon, respectively.

I can eat greens twice every day without having the same flavor twice. You have no idea how happy this makes me.

Report Out

I think this week went pretty good, despite the absence of el señor B and roomie D.

The hardy participants: C & K, E & M, myself.

Dynamic warm-up (1X):

high knees
butt kicks
reverse lunges
spiderman lunges
wall scapular presses with forearms in low, mid, and high position (these are very difficult for such small movement)
all were preceded/followed by regular, X-style or Y-style jumping jacks

Hip-opener warm-up (1X):

front/back leg swings
side/side leg swings
reach up/reach down
side lunges
deep squats (bw)

Core warm-up (1X): this varied slightly from the original plan due to participant input. Hey, why not?

bird dogs
dead bugs
glute bridges
quadruped extension/rotation
rocker hip stretch
all preceded/followed by mountain climbers

I didn't deviate a lot from what has become our standard warm-up. Just a few different things thrown in.



1-min. station circuit (2X): 1 min. at each station, no rests, for a total of 12 min. work

jump rope
right plank
split squat right (bw)
jump rope
left plank
split squat left (bw)

I got this idea from the time it was just Bond and I inside Ford's, and we did something similar in 2 15-min. sections. That was really brutal. Today's incarnation was still pretty brutal. We all noticed how the minutes at the end seemed WAY longer than the initial minutes.



5-min. station circuit (1X): 2 min. rest between stations. Each station consisted of two alternating activities.

1. one person does a KB farmer's walk to the end and back while the other chooses push-ups or plank. I think the ladies all rolled with ~26-35lb. KB. The men's KB were larger, didn't catch the weight. This was fun, and I'm feeling it across my shoulders already.

2. one person OH carry to the end and back while the other does good mornings. A wide range of KB/sandbags got used for this. Personally I managed the first two reps with the 16lb. KB, but for my last 3 dropped to a 20lb. sandbag.

3. one person prowler push and back (I believe we had 90lb. loaded on) while the other slams a 12lb. or 6lb. medicine ball.

Since we had an odd number, I went partner-less and just chose a number of push-ups, slams or good mornings. I tried to keep an eye on people when they were on the split squats (new) and the good mornings (new for some). Overall it looked pretty good. I really like thinking about the good mornings as reaching your butt back vs. leaning over, I think it helps to develop good form. We all did these standing next to a wall to have a target to reach toward.

We were all pretty toasted by the end, and it was fun making a KB caravan to take all the equipment back inside. Then we hit up the People's Bakery for gyros, falafel and doughnuts. All agreed this is a good way to end a workout. I don't know why I was so nervous last night, it was a fun workout with game friends!

Big Boots

I'm running the Saturday warehouse workout tomorrow morning.

I'm a teensy bit nervous about it. No injuries (everybody) + no crying (me) + hard effort (everybody) + doughnuts after (definitely me) will = success.

My favorite doughnuts are plain cake. You can tell the true quality of a bakery by their plain cake doughnut.

I'll post how it goes later on.

Hmph

I'm not a resolutions kinda gal, but informally I made 3 this year (progress in parentheses):

• Drink a lot more water (getting there...)
• Don't use snooze button as much (extremely minor improvement, thanks A for the idea!)
• Blog more often (FAIL)

I guess I've got some work to do still. I'm going to try to have something to write about once a week anyway, no matter how mundane.

Some recent highlights:

I traveled to Minneapolis a couple weekends back in order to visit with B-alicious and to see roomie J and K perform in the Best of the Midwest Burlesk festival. The festival was AWESOME, way more professional than last year, roomie J and K were AWESOME and B-alicious (who, by the way, is always AWESOME) and I dressed up, as illustrated by the photos here,and managed to hold ourselves to a single bottle of wine during the event. Got to do some chillin' with A and J (very gentlemanly, per usual) as well.

I just gave my first exam of the semester today. I'm a little nervous to look at them, partly because most of the students finished fast, and I'm worried that's not a good sign (as in they either gave up or didn't understand the complexity of the questions appropriately). But maybe it means they found the exam to be easy. Only one way to find out...

I've been editing my department's web page. The school has implemented an exceptionally limiting version of Drupal for the job. No html coding allowed. It is very frustrating.

On the calendar: an xmas date with el señor B next weekend, for which I have been saving a very tasteful (read: not especially revealing) dress. Yeah, it's pretty late for an xmas date, but that's just how we roll and also we've been waiting for his post-holiday diet experiment to finish. I wish to go to a fancy steakhouse, and am thinking here.

I've got a nice workout balance going right now:

• Mondays = HipHop dance class (more strenuous on my brain than anything else)
• Wednesdays = climbing
  
• Thursdays = Zumba (I miss the 3X weekly Zumba schedule, but that's just how this semester panned out)
• Saturdays = el señor B's park/warehouse workout

I've gotten in some random XC skiing here and there, but the snow hasn't been great this season. Speaking of the Saturday workouts, roomie D pointed out to me that he and el señor B will be absent in 2 weeks for the Birkie. Mayhaps I shall run the show?

Phew, that was a lot. Okay: next anticipated blog date = Monday, Feb. 22. I can do it!