Today is the second day of my summer vacation. It's just now starting to register that I don't have to go to school tomorrow, and that giddiness of unexpected freedom is just now starting to flow through my veins.
Tomorrow I have to go to physical therapy for the first time, and I know that's not going to be fun. I am, however, looking forward to starting on the serious road to recovery with my knee. I'm already able to walk/hobble for short distances, and although it's a small thing, I'm proud of it.
I wanted to travel this summer here in Mississippi, to go to Clarksdale and to Natchez and do some simple tourism, but I don't know if I'm going to be able to get back on my feet fast enough. What I will be doing is spending time up at our shack in the woods on the porch with my Kindle reading. Just the thought of being able to do that without a pile of papers waiting on me is a luxury like sliding into a hot bubble bath. I can't wait.
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Huginn Arrives
"Every morning the two ravens Huginn and Muninn, are loosed and fly over Midgard; I always fear that Thought may not wing his way home, but my fear for Memory is greater."
-- Odin, From Grímnismál
Earlier this year, I was named STAR teacher by one of my wonderful students, and I was surprised to learn that there was a check that came with that. I pondered for quite some time as to what I should use that money for. I wanted it to be something lasting and something that I could use in relation to school as befitted an award given for teaching. Since my school laptop weighs a ton and has started dying at intervals, I decided to explore netbooks. The result currently perches on my lap, sleek, black, light, and lovely.
In keeping with my tendency to name things either literarily or mythologically, I chose to name it Huginn. Paired with my 500 G Seagate Freeagent Muninn, I now have both Thought and Memory working together, and what a pair they are. The netbook is an MSI Wind, and it's wonderfully fast. I am still in the process of updating everything and getting all my programs loaded on, but so far, I love it. I can't believe how nice it is not to have all that weight sitting on my lap! This is what computing should be, light, portable, and simple. If I need a workhorse, I have a desktop in the back for big stuff.
The keyboard is taking a little getting-used-to, but to be honest, it's not all that much smaller than usual. I had a wireless mouse, and I attached it. It's much better than the touchpad for most things. I ordered a skin from skinit, so when it gets here Huginn will look good, too.
I'm looking forward to a pleasant summer of recovery and convenient computing. It will be a nice change.
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Seven Days After
It's the one-week anniversary of the day they re-threaded my knee. Is there a Hallmark card for that? No? Slackers. I can't believe they haven't hit that one yet....
The knee itself is UG-LY. Sometimes it swells, but even when it doesn't, it's kind of a science-fiction-ish thing. The sutures are small, so this set of six scars will not be too bad. My knee is mostly still shaped like a knee, also pretty good. Right now, the worst part of any of it is the bruising. It looks like they hit me with a hammer all the way down my shin. Maybe they did. What do I know about it? The very cute anesthesiologist (a Dr. Luke) and/or his nurse anesthetist gave me some Very Good Drugs indeed, and I was gone long before I knew more than that the tile in this operating room, too, was blue. (Is it blue in all of them?)
I tried to go to school yesterday to take care of finalizing senior grades and closing out other things, but that was a mistake of epic proportions. I was okay for about the first hour, and then I started to have pain and disorientation. I made it through until about 1:30, and then I had to leave.
There were a few good moments, though. I got to see several of my seniors. I already miss that class. They were, for the most part, very sweet. Two of our very best brought me an arrangement of yellow roses. The roses are lovely, and once Mom and I found a spot here in the house where the cats won't snack on them, they brighten up my exercises.
I will try to express my gratitude to everyone for all that they've done in some nice thank you cards here soon because I know I haven't been able to express it verbally in my typical fashion. So many people have done so much, been so kind. I am humbled. There are some that I'm simply never going to be able to repay, like my mom and my friends at school who are picking up all the loose ends and keeping them from unraveling. Those debts go too deep.
I will have to sleep again soon. That's mostly what I do now. I am trying very hard not to get frustrated, but as you know if you read much here, I am not a patient person. My Wonder Woman complex tells me that I should be leaping tall buildings, blah, blah, blah, and my poor human body just laughs and laughs, demands a Vicodin and dozes off. I am trying to look at this philosophically as a patience-building exercise, but really, there is only so much sophistry my mind will let me get away with.
This, too, shall pass, I know. In the meantime, I think a nap on a rainy afternoon sounds about the right speed. I think there's a cryocuff full of ice waiting, too. This, right now, is my definition of bliss.
The knee itself is UG-LY. Sometimes it swells, but even when it doesn't, it's kind of a science-fiction-ish thing. The sutures are small, so this set of six scars will not be too bad. My knee is mostly still shaped like a knee, also pretty good. Right now, the worst part of any of it is the bruising. It looks like they hit me with a hammer all the way down my shin. Maybe they did. What do I know about it? The very cute anesthesiologist (a Dr. Luke) and/or his nurse anesthetist gave me some Very Good Drugs indeed, and I was gone long before I knew more than that the tile in this operating room, too, was blue. (Is it blue in all of them?)
I tried to go to school yesterday to take care of finalizing senior grades and closing out other things, but that was a mistake of epic proportions. I was okay for about the first hour, and then I started to have pain and disorientation. I made it through until about 1:30, and then I had to leave.
There were a few good moments, though. I got to see several of my seniors. I already miss that class. They were, for the most part, very sweet. Two of our very best brought me an arrangement of yellow roses. The roses are lovely, and once Mom and I found a spot here in the house where the cats won't snack on them, they brighten up my exercises.
I will try to express my gratitude to everyone for all that they've done in some nice thank you cards here soon because I know I haven't been able to express it verbally in my typical fashion. So many people have done so much, been so kind. I am humbled. There are some that I'm simply never going to be able to repay, like my mom and my friends at school who are picking up all the loose ends and keeping them from unraveling. Those debts go too deep.
I will have to sleep again soon. That's mostly what I do now. I am trying very hard not to get frustrated, but as you know if you read much here, I am not a patient person. My Wonder Woman complex tells me that I should be leaping tall buildings, blah, blah, blah, and my poor human body just laughs and laughs, demands a Vicodin and dozes off. I am trying to look at this philosophically as a patience-building exercise, but really, there is only so much sophistry my mind will let me get away with.
This, too, shall pass, I know. In the meantime, I think a nap on a rainy afternoon sounds about the right speed. I think there's a cryocuff full of ice waiting, too. This, right now, is my definition of bliss.
Sunday, May 10, 2009
Dead and Gone (Sookie 9)
Here there be spoilers....
Friday, I ordered the ninth book in the Sookie Stackhouse series on my Kindle, and I finished it about midnight that night. I've been turning it over in my mind for the past two days, and I think now I'm ready to write about it a bit.
I have a mixed reaction to this book. The fact that Sookie is back with Eric in any way, form, or fashion makes me happy. I love the big blond vampire. I think he and Sookie fit each other very nicely. There is more tenderness between them in this book than in any of the previous ones, in fact more just simple contact time, and that was very satisfying. I was getting very tired of everything between them always having to be put off until later. I liked that they talked, that they spent time together not fighting, not being jerked around by higher powers, and that they actually shared some things other than blood or sex with each other.
I like that Eric is being more direct with his feelings. He's still sneaky, though. The bit with the bonding knife was classically him. I wish Harris would write a short story sometime from his POV. It would be nice to know what's going on inside that clever and calculating mind.
I did NOT like what happened at the end. It felt like something I've seen other authors do whenever they suddenly realize they have too many characters on their plates, a "housecleaning" of sorts. Claudine, in particular, bothered me. Maybe more than any other character in the whole thing.
I also have to say that I hate the fact that there is any ambiguity about Bill remaining. I don't think I'm going to be able to keep reading this series if Sookie goes back to Bill, even temporarily. I know there are probably die-hard Bill fans out there who swooned and cheered at the end of this one, but to me, Sookie and Bill were never a good match. He doesn't have the fire to keep up with her.
Also, really, really, really, I don't want Sam to declare how much he loves Sookie. I mean, yeah, we all know that he does, but if he makes that declaration, it's going to stink to high heaven. I like Sam, but I don't think he belongs with Sookie, either.
Ultimately, I did like the book. I love the series as a whole, so I was bound to, I suppose. I hope that someday soon we'll see Sookie be able to be happy with one guy. I don't think the series would have to suffer if that were true. Harris has created such a rich world that there are other plot lines to explore other than the perpetual dance of guys around Sookie's front porch. In fact, I think it might be a lot more interesting if that weren't the only thing or the main thing going on.
Scorpions and Starlings
This past week was filled with lots of animal oddness. It started with Roux injuring herself in a bizarre way last Saturday. She was outside to play for awhile during the afternoon, and when she came back to the house, she had two pencil-sized pieces of cedar impaled through her paw crossways. I still don't know how she managed to get the first one in, much less continue on to get the second one sideways.
I called Dad, he came down and picked us up, and we took her to the vet for emergency surgery. I stayed with her while the vet rendered her unconscious and cut the wood from her poor paw. She has stitches between most of her toes, but she, in her typical pit bull manner, doesn't seem to notice it much. She stayed at the vet for the weekend, and now I'm cleaning the sutures each day with peroxide and shoving an antibiotic down her throat twice a day, but other than that, she's doing okay.
The next fun with nature moment came Tuesday. My TA was building boxes to help pack up my classroom for my big move at the end of the year, and she suddenly stepped away and said, "I think I just saw a scorpion." My TA is an extremely level-headed and reliable individual, and if she says she saw a scorpion, I believe her. I got up and limped around to the pile of flat boxes and began to lift them gingerly to see if I could locate the insect. Sure enough, after a couple of minutes, a brown scorpion about two inches long fell out of the flat box as I tilted it.
My TA, the student taking a makeup test, and I just kind of looked at it for a minute. Scorpions just aren't common here. However, I wasn't awed enough not to know what to do with a crawling nasty. My trusty Crocs flops smashed it flat. I do have to say though, that they're not very easy to kill. I had to step on it several times before it crushed. I am also glad it was a small one. Otherwise, I'm not sure a flip-flop would have been sufficient.
Since then, I've been surreptitiously looking around on the floor for "friends" of his/hers and praying that one was both male and alone. The thought of it having laid eggs in those boxes as little "surprises" for me to find when I open all those boxes in August is just shudder-inducing. I think I'll get some Raid before then. Surely Raid works on scorpions, too?
Anyway, Friday afternoon right before the last bell, I started hearing high-pitched shrieking in the stairwell outside my room. I stepped out to see what merriment prompted this, and I saw a poor little starling just crouched in a puddle of sunlight on the landing. The kids were backing away from it like it was rabid Bengal tiger. I knew with the bell about to ring, the next thing to happen would be that someone would harm it, either accidentally or on purpose, so I grabbed the first thing that came to hand, and empty file folder box, and eased my damaged knee down the stairs.
The little bird is one of the many that nests in the nooks and crannies of our old building. Occasionally, they come inside our building when one of the upstairs doors gets left open. They flutter around in a pitiful fashion, and of course, they are terribly distressed every time the classes change because of the noise and motion of several hundred active teenagers moving around.
As I approached it, it didn't move at all. I just placed half of the empty box over it. A student brought me a file folder and I slid it under the box, and then I slid a ring binder under that allowing me to lift the box with the bird safely contained in it. I got it up the stairs and took it out on the upstairs walkway. I opened the box. I was afraid that it was injured or shocked, but when I removed the lid, it flew away straight and true. My heart lifted with it as it soared away. It was a good ending to a bad animal week.
I hope next week will have less of a menagerie in it. I think I have had enough of bird and beast to last me for awhile. If not, well, I guess I will just have to continue to be creative with my solutions....
I called Dad, he came down and picked us up, and we took her to the vet for emergency surgery. I stayed with her while the vet rendered her unconscious and cut the wood from her poor paw. She has stitches between most of her toes, but she, in her typical pit bull manner, doesn't seem to notice it much. She stayed at the vet for the weekend, and now I'm cleaning the sutures each day with peroxide and shoving an antibiotic down her throat twice a day, but other than that, she's doing okay.
The next fun with nature moment came Tuesday. My TA was building boxes to help pack up my classroom for my big move at the end of the year, and she suddenly stepped away and said, "I think I just saw a scorpion." My TA is an extremely level-headed and reliable individual, and if she says she saw a scorpion, I believe her. I got up and limped around to the pile of flat boxes and began to lift them gingerly to see if I could locate the insect. Sure enough, after a couple of minutes, a brown scorpion about two inches long fell out of the flat box as I tilted it.
My TA, the student taking a makeup test, and I just kind of looked at it for a minute. Scorpions just aren't common here. However, I wasn't awed enough not to know what to do with a crawling nasty. My trusty Crocs flops smashed it flat. I do have to say though, that they're not very easy to kill. I had to step on it several times before it crushed. I am also glad it was a small one. Otherwise, I'm not sure a flip-flop would have been sufficient.
Since then, I've been surreptitiously looking around on the floor for "friends" of his/hers and praying that one was both male and alone. The thought of it having laid eggs in those boxes as little "surprises" for me to find when I open all those boxes in August is just shudder-inducing. I think I'll get some Raid before then. Surely Raid works on scorpions, too?
Anyway, Friday afternoon right before the last bell, I started hearing high-pitched shrieking in the stairwell outside my room. I stepped out to see what merriment prompted this, and I saw a poor little starling just crouched in a puddle of sunlight on the landing. The kids were backing away from it like it was rabid Bengal tiger. I knew with the bell about to ring, the next thing to happen would be that someone would harm it, either accidentally or on purpose, so I grabbed the first thing that came to hand, and empty file folder box, and eased my damaged knee down the stairs.
The little bird is one of the many that nests in the nooks and crannies of our old building. Occasionally, they come inside our building when one of the upstairs doors gets left open. They flutter around in a pitiful fashion, and of course, they are terribly distressed every time the classes change because of the noise and motion of several hundred active teenagers moving around.
As I approached it, it didn't move at all. I just placed half of the empty box over it. A student brought me a file folder and I slid it under the box, and then I slid a ring binder under that allowing me to lift the box with the bird safely contained in it. I got it up the stairs and took it out on the upstairs walkway. I opened the box. I was afraid that it was injured or shocked, but when I removed the lid, it flew away straight and true. My heart lifted with it as it soared away. It was a good ending to a bad animal week.
I hope next week will have less of a menagerie in it. I think I have had enough of bird and beast to last me for awhile. If not, well, I guess I will just have to continue to be creative with my solutions....
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