It’s a little windy here and I am trying to conserve power (in case we lose it and I have limited battery life on my laptop), so here are some random YouTube videos.
For more Quick Takes, visit Kelly at This Ain’t The Lyceum.
For Today… December 2, 2018
Looking out my window… dark. It was sunny, but chilly today.
I am thinking… about how to work it so that I get the maximum number of assessments done on the computers in F110 for Keyboarding. I tend to be faster on those than on my laptop.
I am thankful… for the beginning of Advent and that I’ve largely been able to avoid stepping into retail establishments playing insipid secular Christmas music.
One of my favorite things… Advent music.
I am wearing… jammies. It’s late.
I am creating… typing session certificates.
I am listening to… Advent hymnody.
I am hoping… tomorrow goes well, and I don’t have to deal with an obnoxious student in my Keyboarding class too much.
I am learning… flexibility in my internship.
In my kitchen… Greek chicken from Trader Joe’s.
In the school room… Daniel is doing well and loved by his teacher and staff.
Post Script… some thoughts on missionary John Allan Chau and how the mission organization who sent him has some serious explaining to do. I rarely agree with my dad’s anti-Christian thoughts, but I’m with him 100% that going to the Sentinelese people was stupid. I’m also profoundly happy that India is refusing to recover his body, as doing so would be dangerous for both them and the Sentinelese.
Shared Quote… “Many people, meeting Aziraphale for the first time, formed three impressions: that he was English, that he was intelligent, and that he was gayer than a tree full of monkeys on nitrous oxide.”
? Neil Gaiman, Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch
A moment from my day… “Mama, I’m not in the tree. #fakenews”
Hosted by The Simple Woman.
Good news: I’m not a zombie. I got a “get in here!” call from my doctor a few weeks ago and got scheduled to be seen today. Last Sunday was Blood Pressure Sunday for our faith community nursing program and one of them noticed that my pulse was a little weird again. She told me to mention it to my doctor and I told her that I’d mention it when I got seen today. When I told my doctor about it, she tried taking my pulse using my left wrist… and couldn’t find it. This was a little weird because my hand wasn’t turning any weird colors and obviously I was sitting there alive in front of her. They had also taken my blood pressure on my left arm and done the pulse-ox sensor on that hand as well so we knew it was there. She tried on all my pulse points and she had a hard time finding it on my left side while my right side was fine. She finally decided to have her nurse take my blood pressure on both sides and see if there was any measurable difference. When they did, my left side was two points above my right side but still normal. Apparently, I have a very quiet pulse on my left side?
But hey, I’m not a zombie, so I guess that’s good news?
The 2018 election. Absentee ballots arrived in the mail today and mine is filled out and ready to mail. Having done my civic duty, I will issue the following reminder:
If you are eligible but don’t vote, you don’t get to complain about the people who get voted into office.
Argh. Carolyn Hax had a letter in her column today about a mom who is butthurt that her son and daughter-in-law (DIL) aren’t calling her to be present in the week after they have their twins. The mom apparently had twins (the son is one of them) and *SHE* knows how much work twins are. One of the DIL’s kids from a prior marriage had surgery right before the DIL is due to have her c-section and the mom’s husband is making noise about requiring an apology before they go help (because they’re positive they’re going to be called in to help now).
Carolyn’s response: don’t be obnoxious and let the parents decide when and if they want visitors during that time. Beautiful.
For all my readers who need to hear this: being present after the birth of a baby is a privilege, not a right. Being a grandparent is a matter of biology and does not entitle you to impose yourself on the new parents because you want baby cuddles or to “educate” the parents on the “proper” way to take care of their babies. Srsly, knock it off.
Mama. This is fascinating.
Boggle. The program we use for improving our typing speed (Keychamp) has a Boggle-like game at the end of every lesson called “Wordchamp” and the highest score for each lesson gets posted for people to see. I may or may not have started playing “Boggle with Friends” on my phone to improve my Wordchamp score.
(Yes, it’s working.)
Church music take. We’re working on this right now. It sounds very Rutteresque.
Paul Allen. Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen died this week. It’s a BIG deal in these parts because he has given quite a bit of his wealth away, he owns various sports teams in the Pacific Northwest, he has invested in cultural things up here… I’m seeing people on the street in Seattle crying on various news reports. I’m wondering if it will be this way when Bill Gates passes.
For more Quick Takes, visit Kelly at This Ain’t The Lyceum.
School situation. My schedule needs to stay flexible for some Daniel therapies that will start (hopefully) in January, so I am having to put off job-hunting until everything gets resolved. My parents are amenable to me taking a couple more classes so I will be doing the three classes I need to graduate with BOTH degrees in my department in June.
Keyboarding. I dropped my Final Project class and added up a Keyboarding class in its place. It is aimed at improving my speed and accuracy, so I need to find something to teach me to type with the correct fingers on each key as that seems to be an issue.
Tutoring. I’m doing 4.5 hours of drop-in tutoring this quarter along with whatever one-on-one tutoring they need me to do. We’ve changed some degree requirements in my department since I started all of this two years ago, so I’m tutoring an introductory Accounting class that is more theory-based. I don’t have the book for the class and all the learning aids are proprietary to the publisher, so I’m tutoring it off of whatever spreadsheets the instructor (who has more alphabet letters after his name than I have in my first name) is using. Thankfully, I’m able to figure out how he is doing things and how to explain it a whole lot more simply. (He’s doing the typical pontificating-on-theory approach, which is not incredibly helpful to someone who just needs to know how to do the math, journalize the transaction, and post it.)
Why ‘Murica has an obesity issue. This is disturbing. Fried chicken (especially TWO Cornish game hens) does not belong on a Bloody Mary. #ew
Nobel prizes. It’s one of my favorite weeks of the year: Nobel Prize announcement week! The Nobel Peace prize is being announced tomorrow (I’m terrified of Kim Jong-Un and 45 being among the recipients) and I’m heartened to see some women among the laureates of the prizes for Chemistry and Physics this year.
Srsly. A friend who is a middle school science teacher told me that she had to have a conversation with one of her classes on why you don’t eat things in chemistry.
/facepalm
Pretty darn fabulous. Did you know that Sir Anthony Hopkins, the actor, wrote a waltz? It’s a favorite of mine. Here is André Rieu and the Johann Strauss Orchestra performing it in Vienna.
For more Quick Takes, visit Kelly at This Ain’t The Lyceum.
I’m staying away from TV and most social media today for reasons. For my Quick Takes this week, please accept random videos off of my YouTube recommendations.
For more Quick Takes, visit Kelly at This Ain’t The Lyceum.
Prayer request. Fulton, the son of our hostess-with-the-mostest Kelly, had spinal fusion surgery on Tuesday. He’s doing better but he’s still not a happy little panda. (Spines get stabby when you correct them.) Could y’all please keep him and his parents in your prayers?
Thanks!
Another prayer request. Daniel has some granulation tissue around the stoma where his g-tube is. It started bleeding today. Could you please pray it’s nothing serious? (I’m waiting for a call back from Seattle Children’s that I might not get until Monday.)
Too funny. A reading from Rachel Held Evans:
When it comes to processing these troubling stories [referring to the passages in the Book of Joshua about conquest and killing women and children], there are generally three types of people: (1) those who accept without question that God ordered the military campaigns in Canaan and has likely supported others throughout history, (2) those who are so troubled by the notion of God condoning ethnic cleansing that it strains their faith or compels them to abandon it, (3) those who can name all of the Kardashian sisters and are probably happier for it.
It was a lovely passage I read while on the way back from Audiology today.
Bumper stickers. I have a Dump Trump bumper sticker on my car. (It and my other bumper stickers are currently covered with duct-tape because we have the lone Trump supporter in our family coming over for dinner tonight — we love him even if he is a snowflake.) Shortly after I got it, a neighbor came up to my mom to ask if it was mine. Mom replied that it was and was inwardly cringing that I might have offended the neighbors.
It turns out that he was asking because he wanted one and hadn’t been able to find where to get one. He’s Internet-phobic so I ordered him one off of NorthernSun.Com the next time I made an order. He loved it and his wife asked if they could pay me for it. I told them “no” because I love them and it was cheap. Their next question: “Can we make a donation to the Democratic Party in your honor?”
My response: “Absolutely!” 😀
Music take #1. It’s Holy Cross Day so…
Music take #2. For all those who are being forced to watch the Baby Shark videos, this is the CORRECT way to do it:
Music take #3. Need a palate cleanser after that last take? Here you go:
For more Quick Takes, visit Kelly at This Ain’t The Lyceum.
For Today…
Looking out my window… dark. It was sunny today, but I’d be happy with rain again.
I am thinking… about the church mission statements I have been researching for the Vestry.
I am thankful… for the naptime I got today, considering that I’ve been getting up at 6 to medicate my kid and do his morning tube feed.
One of my favorite things… cold drinks. I prefer pretty much everything I drink to be cold year-round.
I am wearing… jammies. Clothes for today were a green shirt and dark wash denim capris.
I am creating… characters, places, and plotlines for my NaNo piece.
I am reading… Inspired: Slaying Giants, Walking on Water, and Loving the Bible Again by Rachel Held Evans. It’s the chapter on Deliverance Stories and I’m enjoying it immensely.
I am hoping… I can get my internship paperwork together sooner than later.
I am learning… how to keep Daniel from puking up his feeds.
In my kitchen… Dad made sauce and pasta from scratch a few nights ago. It was awesome.
In the school room… Daniel is back to school and loving it.
Post Script… This is fun to watch.
Shared Quote… “Of course, the fact that a single biblical text can mean many things doesn’t mean it can mean anything. Slave traders justified the exploitation of black people by claiming the curse on Noah’s son Ham rendered all Africans subhuman. Many Puritans and pioneers appealed to the stories of Joshua’s conquest of Canaan to support attacks on indigenous populations. More recently, I’ve heard Christians shrug off sins committed by American politicians because King David assaulted women too. Anytime the Bible is used to justify the oppression and exploitation of others, we have strayed far from the God who brought the people of Israel out of Egypt, “out of the land of slavery” (Exodus 20:2).” —Rachel Held Evans
A moment from my day… The altar flowers on Sunday in memory of my grandfather whose 100th birthday would have been Thursday. Ich liebe dich, Opa.
Hosted by The Simple Woman.