timna

Madonna Day in the GLBT class or almond joy goes to college

last fall when she came to the 10th anniversary party for the WS department we were chatting with my friend about his new course: intro to GLBT studies. he told her about Madonna Day and I promised she could attend. I figured that if I took her as a 9-year-old to "take your daughter to work" day, that as a 14-year-old she could get a view of college.

yesterday I had to keep my promise. she was so cool. a few of the students had taken classes with me so they knew whose daughter she was when the teacher introduced her. she didn't speak up in class but neither was she taken aback by the content. she had a lot of comments later about icons and whether gay men would have different choices than the LBT component of the class being studied. interesting questions.

then we went to a turkish lunch with mr. t. after that she helped me pick out a not too conservative suit at a consignment store (under $30, three pieces. I swear I get no pleasure from clothes shopping). this is my concession to the fact that there is an interview next week that I seem to be trying very hard not to think about.

the rest of the day was a blur of driving: lacrosse, wrestling, swimming, my class and finally back to lacrosse. my class was ok -- I'd returned the book to ILL by mistake so I was a bit lost. I'd also missed about 4 of the last 6 classes -- with different spring breaks, 4C's, our WS conference and travelling last weekend. teaching Tues/Thurs has contributed to a very mobile timna this semester.

today the adjuncting full-time-five have been summoned to sign up for spring 07. I suppose it's nice that we get our choices of the leftovers. later, the part-time folks choose among the really less desirable sections.

off to exercise. this is the staying sane plan. so far, so good.

nb -- ben t's library book showed up in the library. I still have to call the other boy's mom since the counselor said the school doesn't deal with after school activity issues. 

aligning parenting styles

(originally written yesterday - Wed)

argh. too much energy drained in the last day or so because we really don't parent in similar manners. nor do we usually try to change the other person. most days we just accept the differences and stay good friends.

yesterday, during the crazy driving schedule that I had, there was very little time at home to see how ben timna was doing. I get an accusing phone call at 5:30 pm from mr. t. about why hadn't ben t. done his homework before getting ready for wrestling? all I can say is that I'd been home for somewhere between 30 and 40 seconds between work and driving almond joy to lacrosse. and I'd be back for ben t. to take him to wrestling. he should bring his vocab work if he needs me to help him -- we can do it on the ride.

still swimming and academic lettering ahead. get him to wrestling. breathe. even eat something. work on quizzes for the online class. mr. t. apologizes.

later, however, since ben t. is not one to say much, I find out he has detention today for not paying attention in class. ok, no big deal. I don't tell him how often I had detention in middle school (often). and then we find out the worse news is that he apparently left  his lunchbox and library book on the lunch patio on Monday and Tues a friend tells him that some boy scout "friends" threw them into the nearby woods. this is all coming out around 10pm Tues night. it's pouring rain. he doesn't want to name names. he still has chapters to read and problems to solve.

still later, I tell mr. t. who blows up. I ask him to stop yelling. he storms off. we don't talk anymore. this is very unusual. we normally settle and resolve before sleeping.

this morning he still wouldn't talk. so I try to figure out how to best help ben t. he'd like to check the lost-and-found and the library and the woods himself. he isn't sure that the source is reliable. I'd like to let him do this. if it's not solved on his own today, I will talk to the counselor since it's a nasty pattern of bullying and taking his stuff that's been going on all year.

mr. t. sees all that as just giving in to the forces of evil. why aren't we there today turning over tables? demanding justice? 

even yoga didn't help much this morning. sigh.   

(held for 24 hours... and edited a bit. ben t. found the lunchbox in the woods -- totally destroyed. the book -- we're hoping the kids really did deposit it in the library book return box; we'll know that today. mr. t. and I worked it out. today I'll go see ben t.'s dean. I'm not as upset as I might have been last fall when it seemed that ben t. was getting picked on and seemed to be very alone. he's had some good allies in this incident, so while he's angry, he's not overwhelmingly hurt.)

sigh.

academic lettering

I am so proud of you, almond joy! And I'm thrilled that your high school has an evening program and reception to honor the first year honor roll students, including giving out letters. I know you want to wait to get a jacket until you have an athletic letter (good luck and keep on swimming), but I think your school is great to recognize that so many of you are doing homework, taking honors classes and learning to balance very well.

do I dare?

book orders for fall were due today. after turning in two that were the same as a previous semester, I balked on the third. nevermind that each of those two classes has challenges: one will be a 50/50 hybrid so changing texts is not a good idea at the same time, the other is going to go from a discounted cap of 20 students back up to the usual 30 (online).

the course for which I just couldn't order the same texts is going online for the first time. I have a truly well-oiled and interesting course that works well.  but there's this enchanting text that I got from jo(e) called Saving Place by Sidney I. Dobrin and it seems to be a text I'd really like, with new subject material and still I'd be able to do most of the rhetorical analysis that I try to squeeze in. or is going online change enough?

as my grandmother would say, "you dasn't do that young lady." course, I'm not the young lady anymore and I do get to choose how much change I dare.

on track in many ways

a gorgeous morning.

I can hear the wind chimes and see the buds on the trees out the front windows. the kids are off to school. mr. t. just left for work. have to get the online folks up and running for this week's unit. exercise class before driving over to school. many conferences and meetings at school today.

there's a fairly intimidating driving schedule from 4-8pm involving entirely too many sports but that will taper off in about 2 weeks.

the classes are going well and I'm fairly caught up (8 papers to grade). still have a presentation to write in the next month. not going to the conference up north this coming weekend; my conference friend cancelled and I'd rather go to ben timna's wrestling tournament.

weight loss contines, excercise classes and yoga are working well.

good to see family and friends over the past 4 days. I'm so happy that my sisters (and brother) are my best friends and that we can easily travel to visit them.

not going to lose my balance this week.

from family to family

on vacation in the big city. we go from one sibling of mine to the next as we circle the city. today everyone is coming to one of my sister's home. the weather is perfect, the kids are having fun,  and work is far away (actually I checked in on my online students this morning).

we went to a sushi resturant last night with one of my sisters and her husband. mr. t. is slowly starting to eat fish. one new kind a year, or so. the chef came out and asked him why no sushi? as we were leaving the chef encouraged him: next time you try sushi!

have to make some more horseradish this morning since we've pretty much finished the other batch before the fish. today it will balance out. have gefilte will travel.

happy holidays to all!

got the interview

at my current cc. in two weeks. have to just stay normal even though that's so difficult.

am not going to the department retreat today. at some point, right after the dept head put me on the agenda anyway (after I emailed her that I wouldn't be attending and she wrote back and said sorry to hear I *might* not be there), I started to feel like it was really important for me not to go. isn't it enough that I take off a personal day for religious holidays when our majority folks get tomorrow off since the calendar just works that way? they don't call it a religious holiday, but it works out nicely for people who would rather not work on Good Friday.

so I sent my report via a colleague.

ps - the gefilte fish got too hard. taste perfectly normal so the recipe's fine. probably shouldn't have watched 3 episodes of desperate housewives while the fish were simmering. 2 would have been just right for the texture! but I'd never seen it before and I'm just starting the first season.

the 60 second version of the hagadah

we're not going to do this version tonight! though our hostess was suddenly called back to Israel (her mother was hospitalized, she left yesterday), we will still be going to the same family we've been to most of our years here.

horseradish is soaking. still have to pick up the wine: why oh why did we order it through hadassah (I know, it was a good cause) but they don't deliver and it's far on the other side of the city.

yoga first. then think about what else I have to do. my dept head still thinks I "might" get to the retreat tomorrow and put me on the agenda. what about Passover does she think might change?

happy holidays to all who are celebrating!

gefilte fish in the fridge, I can go to sleep now

crazy around here. maybe I'll post the recipe tomorrow.

the oddness of interdisciplinary hiring

since I've never been offered a job in academics, it was quite strange last weekend to be in a conference session where the presenter talked about her academic career and even I, slow with math and dates, understood that she lost her adjunct classes because I had been offered them. she has a MA in the field, I don't. she had four years of teaching experience in the field, I had none. I hadn't ever, ever looked at academics from that side of the table.

so what did I have? a degree in a department with hiring lines. some would claim that a lit degree doesn't really qualify me for composition, but at least it's from an English dept. and that meant I had a chance of being hired, or at least to be around on a fairly full-time basis. 

on the market I've always felt not quite lit enough (or at least canonically) for the lit people, not quite comp enough for the comp/rhet people, not quite ws enough for the ws folks. oddly enough, I get the most invitations to speak from the Jewish studies folks since most of my research is there (but I'd never be hired there since I really have no credentials at all in that field!).  however, when I use similar non-canonical conference proposals -- they go nowhere in lit or ws, so I take what I can get.

just thinking. interdisciplinary background sounds good, but I'm not sure it's good for getting a teaching position.