Long Week

So today is finally Friday.  I handed the tests back and got typical reactions to the ones I thought would react.  I did give the guy another chance to write his essay question and he is going to do that Monday.  And my students pointed out where I had made  an error on my syllabus so I had to go back and correct that and will hand out a new one Monday or Wednesday.

I turned in my first scene for my play due on Sunday.  I am hoping for some good feedback on it even though there’s not much to it right now. We will see how it goes.  I haven’t received any one else’s to read over before the conference, so I don’t know what I am going to do that night.  Just email and warn the professor I suppose.  Hopefully everyone will have their act together and will send them.

I need to go grocery shopping but I am honestly so tired I may put it off until tomorrow and hope I feel better.  Bob says I snored a lot last might so that may be why I am so sleepy.  Or it may be the Tripleptal getting to me again.  I don’t know.  I have been doing well not obsessing on anything so I don’t want to not take it.  But I am so tired all the freaking time.  I wish I knew better what to do.

Hope everyone has a good weekend.  Good wishes to everyone!

 

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Grading

I am so frustrated with my grading. It is taking longer than I like and I dont’ know how to speed it up.  And now I am having to check for plagiarism out of the textbook.  Very, very frustrating,

Took the youngest to the doctor today to get some warts frozen off.  She was a trouper and didn’t fuss so that was nice.  We also get a new acne prescription that I will pick up later today once I see if my checks come in for the checking account.  In case it’s expensive.

It is still raining today.  I hope it stops soon; the suburb next to us started flooding in downtown.  I pray that doesn’t happen in Brandon.

WEll., I guess I’d better get back to grading if I’m going to finish today.  Hope everyone has a good rest of the week and weekend!
 

Test Misbehavior

Had a student be extremely disrespectful of me and himself during my test this morning, which he then went on to fail in spectacular fashion.  Aside from that, everything went well in class this morning,  So very sad.

Hope everyone else is having a better day.  Hope the rest of your week goes well.

 

Late Birthday Presents

My oldest daughter sent me a Winnie-the-pooh tote bag she found online.  She was going to get a different one she had seen at Disney World, but when she went to buy it they had sold out. My little one and I shopped for me at Hallmark Store and found me a book of all the different characters that havea appeared in the Peanuts comic strip, books, etc.  I still have one more present to come in from my middle one–she said it should come today or tomorrow.  So I am looking forward to that one as well. So far I am vey proud of what all I have received.

I am trying to write on my script and I can only get the action going so far before introducing the other main character, so I guess I’m just going to have to do that before I meant to.  But I will see how it goes.  I think I know what I’m going to do next, but I just need to get it down on paper.

I suppose there’s not much else going on.  I am giving a test tomorrow so things will pick up as I grade.  I will work harder to get that done that I have the last two tests.  I hate being late with one.  This one will be on Shakespeare, Marlowe, and the KJB Bible.  So  that should be interesting to see their answers.

Guess I will run and see what else I can find to do.  Hopefully it  will be a productive day.  Everyone have a great week!

 

 

 

 

Good Start

I have had a pretty good start to my week. My mother-in-law took me out for my birthday to our local Half-SHell Oyster House and we had a good meal, and she gave me some clothes that I hope will fit–I need to try then on tonight.   This minute has been my first chance to sit down and write all morning–I had to do classroom thins during my office hours then had to come back to meet my mother-in-law.  So I am all fat and happy right this minute.

I give another test tomorrow on Shakespeare, Marlowe, and the King James Bible.  I hope they do well.  Most of them are doing better than on their last test  SO we will see how well they do with this test.  it shouldn’t be any harder than the last one.

I am so sleepy but I really have too much to do to settle down like that.  I need to get dinner together in the crock pot and do some classwork on my creative project–I need a few more pages to round out my first scene.  I’m not sure what else to do with it except go ahead an move into the next one.  I’m afraid I don’t have enough pages to make the assignment limits.  So I am going to try to work on it some more today because the rest of the week will be taken up with grading papers.

WE will see how the week goes.  Hope everyone has a good Monday and everything.

 

My Birthday

Tomorrow is my 48th birthday.  I’m not sure how I feel about that yet.  Usually my birthday marks a little bit of a downswing tht lasts until we get fully into the Christmas season. It certainly is sobering to realize I am headed for the downslope in terms of time I have left to do all I want to do.

I think about how many people I know my age or thereabouts who have already passed away.  I think about how many of my relatives passed away in their fifties for one reason or another.  But I have so many advantages over people in the late 20th century didn’t have in terms of access to health care that the fifties is not the death sentence it used to be.

I joke that I can’t be old– I still have a child in school.  But she is getting older and will be a freshman in high school next year.  Scary in terms of how in some ways the time with her has flown by just as it seems to have done with the older two. I have recently begun hearing a saying that is something along the lines of “The days are long, but the years are short.”  That seems so true in my life.

SO tomorrow we go celebrate my mom’s and my birthday together (she’s born on September 12).  She turned 70 this year and is going pretty strong as is my dad.  They can’t do all that they used to do but they can take care of themselves and each other still and that was not true of their parents.  Not sure what we will do but we can enjoy the time together.

Hope everyone has a good weekend!

 

Podcast!

So I interviewed with Tone, the guy who does podcasts for my publisher.  He was very nice and gracious, and we spent a nice 30 minutes talking about my story and about my life.  He’s going to edit it for content and for time and it will be posted next week on http://www.soundcloud,com/runningwildpress.  SO I am excited  about that.

I thought I might get to do another one that  my publisher found out about  but he does his in Skype and I don’t have a skype account so that is out.  Bob said it was okay to do, but I’m not going to sign up for that.   But since I’m not getting paid per copy, I’m not overly worried about doing much promotion.

Had a very sobering message last night at church.  About how if you witness, live a Christian life, etc. you are probably going to be mocked and ostracized.  If you aren’t, then you may not be living out your faith very well.  And about how we don’t need to let fear of being mocked stop us from talking about Jesus.

So my tiptoeing around such topics with my fellow students and professors in my MFA program is probably not what I am supposed to be doing.  I know about three students that I’m sure are Christians, and the rest are very, very liberal and antagonistic to church and conservative politics, etc.  And my professors are all very liberal as well; two of them are gay.  I dont’ know as I will be allowed to graduate with part of my bipolar story that is going to be incorporated into my thesis, how I finally came to know Christ.

 

Finally

finished grading papers and updating my gradebook so I am caught up there.  I still have a ton of laundry to sort through and wash so that is not so caught up.  But I will get there.

Have kind of a cool thing happening tomorrow–I will be interviewed for a podcast in advance of my novella having come out for preorder on Amazon.  It hits shelves October 15 so we will see how it does.  I’m not really concerned with sales because I don’t get royalties, but it will be fun to be interviewed about it and talk about myself.

I forgot to take my meds night before last and had a hard time getting through the day.  It took a lot of caffeine to survive the middle school football game last night, but I stuck it out and enjoyed hearing my daughter play in the band.  They had a little excitement; someone dropped the big bass drum and it rolled down the steps of the stands.  But it wasn’t my child so I wasn’t overly concerned about it.

Had class this morning talking about Christopher Marlowe and his play, Doctor Faustus.  I said he would have been the preeminent dramatist of his day except he had the misfortune to be alive in Shakespeare’s time.  SO that made them laugh.  I start Shakespeare Friday and he gets two days.  So that will be fun.

Hope everyone’s rest of the week goes well.  We have church tonight and I am looking forward to that.  See you tomorrow!

Taking a Break

from grading papers.  I’m almost finished, though.  Only a few more to go  I’m trying so hard to be good and finish them and get caught up on all my housekeeping for class by the end of the day.  But it’s hard for some reason this year.  I’m not sure why.

Just got an invite from my hubby to go to lunch with his at 12:30 p.m. so I am looking forward to that.  WE will see where we wind up–probably a country-cooking place to get our southern veggies.

Going to go to a middle school football game tonight to watch my youngest play at the game.  We will see how that goes.  I think it will be fun to go.  I just hope Bob can stay well after going.

I guess I need to get back and grade these last three papers.  Hope everyone has had a good start to their week.

 

 

Shakespeare

In preparation for my lecture on Shakespeare in a few days, I have looked up some statistics on him an on his words.  He coined 1700 separate common words and phrases that we will use today.  He coined one word that doesn’t exist anywhere else in English–honorificabilittudinitatibus (the state of being able to achieve honors).  It is said to have a Latin root to it.  Some of the phrases are–Heart on my sleeve (Othello), All that glitters is not gold (THe Merchant of Venice) and All’s well that end’s well (play of the same name).  Some of the common words are uncomfortable (Othello), assassination (Julius Ceasar) and  bedazzled (Hamlet). Very interesting stuff.

Have had a good day so far–not sleepy and not worn down.  I still have a lot to do, not only the conference tonight but the paper grading I put off all weekend.  I got half of it done during office hours so now have to get it finished at home. Then I need to input the last test in my gradebook and finish that out. WE talked about how the King James Bible was commissioned today and had an interesting time discussing how people always resist translations of the Bible into the vernacular–how the King James stood as the authoritative translation until the 20th century, some 400 years  (I also told them if they could read the King James, they could read Shakespeare.  Some of them looked resentful at that fact.)

So I am off to see what else I can accomplish today.  Hope everyone has a goo and productive start to their week.