October 13

Have you ever noticed that sometimes fatigue doesn’t set in until you get off the hamster wheel?

1977

Ups and downs and more downs! Hassles with the program, hassles with Alice, hassles with the dog. I think I have been asking too many “student” questions. That’s why I’m getting “faculty” answers.

1981

Well, I didn’t do any housework, either. Just to show that Jim hasn’t cornered the market on procrastination. I am getting more done every day - very little at night, though. I end up dog-tired at the end of the day, can do little except sit and read. (Not serious reading, either.) Usually I hold out until 9 or so before I go to bed. Jim finds that amusing. But he’s been so sweet lately it’s impossible to get annoyed. I certainly have the feeling that we are doing the right thing in starting a family. Jim will be a wonderful father.

1998

For the last few days I have been longing to tidy. Things are chaotic and the house is no fun. I want to make things but lack space. So today I will tidy for an hour before I sit down at the computer.

I have started going to the fitness center in Greenbelt again, and find that 2 hours two or three times a week is very pleasant! I can do my new “weights and aerobics” workout. Soak in the hot tub, take a shower, and be on my way. Monday morning should be like this: drive Kiddo 1 to school, Greenbelt fitness, groceries, home, Scout stuff.

Tuesday is tidy day, and while I try I will collect my thoughts so that I can sit and do some thought work. It has piled up.

I decided not to submit the LL Bean paper to Costume Society of America. The meeting overlaps with the spring retreat and is the week before the big Web Initiative in Teaching showcase. I would have to be crazy. Believe me, I nearly did it 2 or 3 times. After all, I could cram it in. But I won’t. Aren’t I smart?

I am trying to get to the bottom of the page, and right here it got hard, and I nearly quit. But it is important to move on and really, start writing. Reading, too. The last two things I wrote really suffered from lack of perspective.

Excuse me; gotta blow my nose. I am also going to do Kiddo 2’s  laundry today. Suddenly his room is as messy as Kiddo 1’s.  The downside of having kids so far apart that you get to endure more years of adolescence - and it’s my own doing, as usual. Oh, well. I also had a good long time in elementary school!

2004

Happy birthday, Paul Simon.

Thanks for Kodachrome and Graceland and Bridge Over Troubled Water. And especially for Feelin’ Groovy, which is the very best song to holler out when you are truly feeling fine.

2006

Here I am at Catoctin, feeling completely spent. Tired. In a fog. I left my work behind - some of it, anyway. No grading, no email, no journals to read. The journals are working pretty well, I can’t force my students to be reflective. Some are, some aren’t. Oh, I am weary right now.

Comment 2023

Have you ever noticed that sometimes fatigue doesn’t set in until you get off the hamster wheel?

2011

I have 25 slaves working for me

Slavery Footprint is a newly launched website and mobile app to help consumers calculate how many slaves are working to provide what you use, wear and eat. It's easy to navigate, and "fun" to use, if something that informs you that dozens -- or hundreds -- of human beings, many of them children, are working under the worst possible conditions to make sure you have your chocolate bar, designer jeans and MP3 player. My score was 25, and I am grateful that the website also points me to actions to make slavery truly a thing of the past.

Comment 2023

My enslaved workforce is down to 14. Not perfect, but progress. 

2018

A long-ago Inktober thing.

2024

Today I am tackling the various versions of one chapter of The Book. Eight versions. That is the downside of writing on a computer instead of a yellow legal pad.

Later: Inktober 2024 day 13: Horizon. The word reminded me of the sunset I saw in Nebraska in 2016. Impossible for me to draw a picture, so I used words.

The video I made of the horizon in 2016: