bloodwork

just got out of meetings. am exhausted and not at this moment in enough pain to justify leaving the apartment again today. will make this trip tomorrow, in the morning, when it's a decent temperature outside and am not hot and sweaty. also, am crampy, have sore back, headache, and intense desire for cool bath and silent darkness. let me tell you, my meeting was lots of fun. hurrah, let's all go nap a while.

end.

Happy Full Moon!

Look up and bay a while. It'll take a bit of time, but the later you do this, the more responses you'll get from your neighbors. Don't let societal influences dictate your actions. Recall the primitive; relive the instinctual. Howl. Growl. Jump around and be.

AaaaaOOOOOOOOOOOOOOoooooooooo!

More Updates

Well, Thursday's morning class was sheer bliss. Everything went well. My wrist was feeling so good (I had full movement!) that I didn't wear the brace, the students responded well to group work, and they enjoyed learning about sentence fragments (this last was probably helped along by my worksheet on Papa Smurf's moonshine operation). I got them back on track with ease, and they asked intelligent questions. I have never had a greater experience.

The other shoe, however, contained an entirely different foot. The afternoon class was a riot--in the stamping of feet, clamouring of many angry voices, blatant disregard for rules type of way. These guys just don't care. I'm not sure how to motivate them. I spent about twice the time I'd planned for doing thesis statements, because instead of working with their partner, they each wanted me to go over their individual statement. I finally had to cut it short and re-announce my office hours. Surprisingly, I had 7 takers for that. They hardly got to the Smurf story, and I ran out of time to go over it with them properly.

And, the highlight of my Thursday, one of my better students in that class "covertly" started text messaging someone. Rather than cause a scene, which lets them all know I'm irritated (a bad thing to let them know, as they then work together to irritate the prof), I pretended I couldn't see what he was doing, and walked over to the other side of the room to help a student. As I came back over, he tried to cover his cell phone, and I muttered just loud enough for him to hear: "You might want to put that away before I take it from you." He was shocked that I'd known what he was up to, but let me tell you, he could never hack it as a spy of any kind.

So there was Thursday. Sorry about the lack of HNT. It was a busy, busy day. On Friday, I worked on my novel. The office saw me at 8 am, and aside from taking lunch at Rosa's for E's b-day, the office and I were close and personal until after 10 pm. But you know what? I got the most amazing amount of work done. K.C. and the Sunshine Band have a way of keeping you moving, and the continual presence of folks in and out actually provided enough tiny breaks to keep me plugging away at the map.

I have an atlas of the place now, and it's all labeled. The cities are all properly placed, and all I've yet to do on the map is make two extra copies of each country, and put all the cities on the giant world map. Each country takes 2-4 sheets of paper to get in full, and the overall world map is downright huge. So after I scratch in all the cities on the world map Sunday afternoon and write up a three sentence summary of each city's major claim to fame, a trip to Kinko's is in order. I'm thinking Kinko's on Wednesday afternoon, and the doctor for this Friday.

And there's the segue leading to the return of arthritis. All that handwriting in small letters fucked (excuse my french) my wrist up again. All that movement I was so proud of fled the next day due to the mapping. Well, to be realistic, I can move the thing still, but now it hurts again. It hasn't gotten to the point where it was before the last doctor's visit, but I'm not letting it get there. I'm going to go in and let them suck my blood out. I'm getting more than sick of this. My handwriting isn't legible with the brace, so I have to finish the map without it, which will make my Sunday afternoon sheer hell on earth. But with all that writing, by Friday I'm sure my wrist will be nice and bloodwork-worthy. The stupid thing hurts with or without the brace, but it's a dull burning as long as the brace is preventing it from moving. The real pain comes with movement. And damn it all, I thought I'd get more than three days of relative comfort before my wrist acted up again.

Also, I've decided that I'm going to buy the voice recognition software. It's a matter of saving up for it. I should be able to get it by early November. I can save all sorts of money on my energy bill since it's the perfect temperature out and the A/C is not necessary, and I can cut back on other stuff too.

And that's my life right now. Classes are going well, 1301 is going well-ish, thesis kicks ass, and wrist also kicks ass, in a different way. To end on a high note, I finally made a pot of beans that doesn't taste like BEANS. The little guys found some flavor somehow, and this rocks, though I doubt I can reproduce the effect. I'm going to ask K how to make beans when I see her next, and get a list of what she puts in them. Her beans never taste like BEANS. They've always got this rich flavor I utterly envy in cooking.

Well, I'm off to write some more, and then go to bed.

End.

More Updates

Well, Thursday's morning class was sheer bliss. Everything went well. My wrist was feeling so good (I had full movement!) that I didn't wear the brace, the students responded well to group work, and they enjoyed learning about sentence fragments (this last was probably helped along by my worksheet on Papa Smurf's moonshine operation). I got them back on track with ease, and they asked intelligent questions. I have never had a greater experience.

The other shoe, however, contained an entirely different foot. The afternoon class was a riot--in the stamping of feet, clamouring of many angry voices, blatant disregard for rules type of way. These guys just don't care. I'm not sure how to motivate them. I spent about twice the time I'd planned for doing thesis statements, because instead of working with their partner, they each wanted me to go over their individual statement. I finally had to cut it short and re-announce my office hours. Surprisingly, I had 7 takers for that. They hardly got to the Smurf story, and I ran out of time to go over it with them properly.

And, the highlight of my Thursday, one of my better students in that class "covertly" started text messaging someone. Rather than cause a scene, which lets them all know I'm irritated (a bad thing to let them know, as they then work together to irritate the prof), I pretended I couldn't see what he was doing, and walked over to the other side of the room to help a student. As I came back over, he tried to cover his cell phone, and I muttered just loud enough for him to hear: "You might want to put that away before I take it from you." He was shocked that I'd known what he was up to, but let me tell you, he could never hack it as a spy of any kind.

So there was Thursday. Sorry about the lack of HNT. It was a busy,busy day. On Friday, I worked on my novel. The office saw me at 8 am, and aside from taking lunch at Rosa's for E's b-day, the office and I were close and personal until after 10 pm. But you know what? I got the most amazing amount of work done. K.C. and the Sunshine Band have a way of keeping you moving, and the continual presence of folks in and out actually provided enough tiny breaks to keep me plugging away at the map.

I have an atlas of the place now, and it's all labeled. The cities are all properly placed, and all I've yet to do on the map is make two extra copies of each country, and put all the cities on the giant world map. Each country takes 2-4 sheets of paper to get in full, and the overall world map is downright huge. So after I scratch in all the cities on the world map Sunday afternoon and write up a three sentence summary of each city's major claim to fame, a trip to Kinko's is in order. I'm thinking Kinko's on Wednesday afternoon, and the doctor for this Friday.

And there's the segue leading to the return of arthritis. All that handwriting in small letters fucked (excuse my french) my wrist up again. All that movement I was so proud of fled the next day due to the mapping. Well, to be realistic, I can move the thing still, but now it hurts again. It hasn't gotten to the point where it was before the last doctor's visit, but I'm not letting it get there. I'm going to go in and let them suck my blood out. I'm getting more than sick of this. My handwriting isn't legible with the brace, so I have to finish the map without it, which will make my Sunday afternoon sheer hell on earth. But with all that writing, by Friday I'm sure my wrist will be nice and bloodwork-worthy. The stupid thing hurts with or without the brace, but it's a dull burning as long as the brace is preventing it from moving. The real pain comes with movement. And damn it all, I thought I'd get more than three days of relative comfort before my wrist acted up again.

Also, I've decided that I'm going to buy the voice recognition software. It's a matter of saving up for it. I should be able to get it by early November. I can save all sorts of money on my energy bill since it's the perfect temperature out and the A/C is not necessary, and I can cut back on other stuff too.

And that's my life right now. Classes are going well, 1301 is going well-ish, thesis kicks ass, and wrist also kicks ass, in a different way. To end on a high note, I finally made a pot of beans that doesn't taste like BEANS. The little guys found some flavor somehow, and this rocks, though I doubt I can reproduce the effect. I'm going to ask K how to make beans when I see her next, and get a list of what she puts in them. Her beans never taste like BEANS. They've always got this rich flavor I utterly envy in cooking.

Well, I'm off to write some more, and then go to bed.

End.

More Updates

Well, Thursday's morning class was sheer bliss. Everything went well. My wrist was feeling so good (I had full movement!) that I didn't wear the brace, the students responded well to group work, and they enjoyed learning about sentence fragments (this last was probably helped along by my worksheet on Papa Smurf's moonshine operation). I got them back on track with ease, and they asked intelligent questions. I have never had a greater experience.

The other shoe, however, contained an entirely different foot. The afternoon class was a riot--in the stamping of feet, clamouring of many angry voices, blatant disregard for rules type of way. These guys just don't care. I'm not sure how to motivate them. I spent about twice the time I'd planned for doing thesis statements, because instead of working with their partner, they each wanted me to go over their individual statement. I finally had to cut it short and re-announce my office hours. Surprisingly, I had 7 takers for that. They hardly got to the Smurf story, and I ran out of time to go over it with them properly.

And, the highlight of my Thursday, one of my better students in that class "covertly" started text messaging someone. Rather than cause a scene, which lets them all know I'm irritated (a bad thing to let them know, as they then work together to irritate the prof), I pretended I couldn't see what he was doing, and walked over to the other side of the room to help a student. As I came back over, he tried to cover his cell phone, and I muttered just loud enough for him to hear: "You might want to put that away before I take it from you." He was shocked that I'd known what he was up to, but let me tell you, he could never hack it as a spy of any kind.

So there was Thursday. Sorry about the lack of HNT. It was a busy,busy day. On Friday, I worked on my novel. The office saw me at 8 am, and aside from taking lunch at Rosa's for E's b-day, the office and I were close and personal until after 10 pm. But you know what? I got the most amazing amount of work done. K.C. and the Sunshine Band have a way of keeping you moving, and the continual presence of folks in and out actually provided enough tiny breaks to keep me plugging away at the map.

I have an atlas of the place now, and it's all labeled. The cities are all properly placed, and all I've yet to do on the map is make two extra copies of each country, and put all the cities on the giant world map. Each country takes 2-4 sheets of paper to get in full, and the overall world map is downright huge. So after I scratch in all the cities on the world map Sunday afternoon and write up a three sentence summary of each city's major claim to fame, a trip to Kinko's is in order. I'm thinking Kinko's on Wednesday afternoon, and the doctor for this Friday.

And there's the segue leading to the return of arthritis. All that handwriting in small letters fucked (excuse my french) my wrist up again. All that movement I was so proud of fled the next day due to the mapping. Well, to be realistic, I can move the thing still, but now it hurts again. It hasn't gotten to the point where it was before the last doctor's visit, but I'm not letting it get there. I'm going to go in and let them suck my blood out. I'm getting more than sick of this. My handwriting isn't legible with the brace, so I have to finish the map without it, which will make my Sunday afternoon sheer hell on earth. But with all that writing, by Friday I'm sure my wrist will be nice and bloodwork-worthy. The stupid thing hurts with or without the brace, but it's a dull burning as long as the brace is preventing it from moving. The real pain comes with movement. And damn it all, I thought I'd get more than three days of relative comfort before my wrist acted up again.

Also, I've decided that I'm going to buy the voice recognition software. It's a matter of saving up for it. I should be able to get it by early November. I can save all sorts of money on my energy bill since it's the perfect temperature out and the A/C is not necessary, and I can cut back on other stuff too.

And that's my life right now. Classes are going well, 1301 is going well-ish, thesis kicks ass, and wrist also kicks ass, in a different way. To end on a high note, I finally made a pot of beans that doesn't taste like BEANS. The little guys found some flavor somehow, and this rocks, though I doubt I can reproduce the effect. I'm going to ask K how to make beans when I see her next, and get a list of what she puts in them. Her beans never taste like BEANS. They've always got this rich flavor I utterly envy in cooking.

Well, I'm off to write some more, and then go to bed.

End.

Exciting News ... Not for the faint of heart!

Guess what one of our darlings [that would be the students here in Dirt Town] brought to school today?

Well, the wrist is getting better steadily, after a long, long rest this weekend. If I can manage to keep resting it until Thursday, I may be able to write on the board for class. With the main writing taking place in a night-before, powerpoint kind of way. But still, this is good. I'm almost thinking that I'll be okay after I run out of the Celebrex, at least until the next flare-up. And when that comes along, I'll go in for bloodwork. Ugh.

Are you guessing?

The IT job's going well still. I enjoy spending my morning hours doing this, as opposed to the afternoon, because in the afternoon, everyone is, for some reason, more irritable. In the morning, they are all too groggy to really complain about any problems, so I mainly work on long-term stuff and maintenance. Still, it isn't ever dull. Today, I almost didn't make it on time, though. I experimented with the order in which my three alarms go off, and it wasn't a success. I got up, ready, packed and gone in a little under half an hour. But I wasn't late, and that's what really matters.

Okay, okay, I won't make you wait any longer for the big surprise. Some anonymous darling gifted our building with viral meningitis. Not nearly so bad as the bacterial version, but still not at all pleasant. We're all a bit skitish about touching things right now, but we aren't paranoid, or anything. I hear you're pretty much safe with the MMR stuff, anyway. Still, I'm not going around licking things, or other stupid stunts. There's no reason to tempt fate.

So. This drama class is downright boring as hell. The reading is so fun and exciting, but the in class portion of things is more than a drag. Just about every head nodded at some point today--I know, because I have been spending a great deal of class time busily people watching. Ah well.

And there's the exciting world I live in. More next time.

End.

Ah, the stabbing, shooting pain

Of a wrist that refuses to do a full class's work.

This time around, I'm writing on the board, as I might have mentioned. And now, after, it is pain all the way. I might have to get some student to write on the board for me this next class if things keep getting worse throughout. I have lots of candy, so maybe I can bribe them. And just think, last night, I'd been thinking "Wow, I guess this Celebrex stuff is really starting to work." Ugh.

More later. The group work would have been successful if I'd had more time.

End.

HNT

Here it is, folks: The Evil Arthritic Wrist of Doom.



This is the wrist that has me taking Celebrex at the young, young age of ... way too young for arthritis. I'm still wearing the brace, and today I get to experiment with the chalkboard. I'm plum tired of standing up there gesturing to a screen, and my handwriting isn't that bad. Well, it is, but they can have me rewrite the truly awful parts.

I leave for campus at T minus 7 minutes. Yee haw!

Katrina

Well, several busses have arrived bearing victims from New Orleans, and the Red Cross is in desperate need of volunteers. To that end, E and I are planning to go fill our their forms, watch their orientation videos, and volunteer in our copious spare time. There's just the timing issue. Sometime this week, certainly we are planning on doing this. Then, we'll be official volunteers and able to help out for months.

I remember at one time, I was considering Tulane as a potential grad school. This, at least in part, could be me. It's a strange thought.

In more mild news, the Celebrex is bringing the wrist pain back to pre-last night levels, and I hope that continued doses will relieve it more completely. It no longer causes me pain to blow my nose, which is good, because I have developed a cold. I know, I know, this blog is becoming all about stuff like this and not about life as a grad student. Oh well.

My thriller class is becoming thrilling for the first time since I started reading the books. Marathon Man now comes highly recommended. I won't tell you why, because that ruins it. But my God. I had to call E and ruin it for her I was so excited about a plot twist. She's stuck reading about Melville among the cannibals, so any hint of exciting plot was welcome.

Oh well. No more typing tonight. There's only so much pain I'm willing to go through for you people.

End.

and the verdict is

arthritis. I've got several packs of Celebrex, and we're going to see if that helps. If not, then blood work.

End

Yeah, so.

No HNT. When I got home it was late, and I was more exhausted than I've been since the 72-hour paper-writing marathon of DOOM. I came home, crashed, and didn't revive myself until eight this morning. Thank God I didn't remember to set the alarms, or I'd have had to drag my tired ass out of bed at six. Those two hours were the most wonderful two hours of sleep I remember.

My writing went well today, and I'm finally moving on to the real plot and whatnot. No more narrative introduction crap. Things are going to happen and they're going to happen in a right old kick ass fashion. Characters will suffer. War will descend upon the bickering folks at the border, and all hell will break loose.

Dinner was a smashing success. Thanks go to those ladies who came up with the recipe's, the people who put the book together, my mother, who gave the book to me, my grocer, who sold me the ingredients, the apartment manager, oven and crockpot manufacturers, and ..... yeah.

Bad news, guys. I'm going to have to go to the doctor tomorrow or Monday afternoon. This wrist situation got a lot worse really quickly. Earlier today it was just about as fine as it's been (which would be hurting whenever I put the wrist at an up or down angle), but after dinner it changed its tune. It now screams at me whenever I put it at any angle. Side to side, up and down, rotating is sheer hell. There's a spot on my middle finger's knuckle that has been hurting recently, and it's kind of swollen and tender now, and also, as if this stupid limp wasn't giving me enough problems, any pressure to the wrist itself is painful. Even just lightly pressing on the thing (like taking pulse, but squeezing gently) is bad. Wearing the brace isn't even relieving as much pain as it was before.

And so, I find myself unable to type much more tonight, and will be posting, taking some aspirin (swelling and pain relief, I hope), and going to bed.

End.

A Bit Hectic

Don't worry folks. HNT is coming; I've just got to get home first. I rode in with someone today, so look for stuff about 9:30.

My classes are... diverse. The earlier one is nothing short of peppy on the whole, though there is a kid in the front who seems to be challenging me with his posture (slumped and splayed to trip me and show disinterest) and his expression (nothing short of a "what right do you have/I'm much cooler than you" glare. My second class is more chatty on the whole, but the entire front row is dominated by the kind of folks who usually choose the back row. Sleeping (forehead to desk), snorts and groans about the assignment and the need to actually buy and bring the book, etc.

Overall, I think my first class when better. In the second one, I forgot to mention stuff because I had already talked about it ninety minutes earlier. They had even fewer questions though, so I'm not sure what's going on there. I've already got students emailing me drafts of their assignment. That's amazing, considering they first got it today and the thing's not due until Tuesday.

Oh well. I wasn't at all nervous going in, despite all the dread before today. In any case, I'm exhausted, and I did not enjoy my second class. I'll try not to teach in the afternoon next time around. I'm thinking nine and eleven.

I'm off to write some on the thesis while I'm here. Ta.

End.