tengrrl’s thoughts & news on teaching writing, literacy, and literature
June 17, 2006
Because you may not have seen enough pictures of my car yet, here are pics that show the cross-bars I got added to the roof rack and the side and back
window deflectors that were added. You’ll especially love the first one, from the
inside of the car that proves these are quality Saturn parts :)
Also two random flowers blooming in my yard because I was out there anyway and they
were pretty.
June 16, 2006
I seem to be not going anything that I should be doing. I should probably be in bed, for instance. But instead, I’m sitting here looking for solutions that don’t seem to be online. I do have a PDF index building in the background, which is my excuse for not being gone yet.
Of course, that’s not all.
I should have loaded my stuff into the new car, but it’s still sitting in boxes in the garage. I can’t figure out the right place to put anything. And some things don’t seem like they can go in the new car. Others, well, I’m trying to decide if they SHOULD be in the car. So I’m not doing anything.
And I’m supposed to be writing a journal for something, but I can’t make myself start. I just put it off indefinitely. It’s just too impossible anyway, and I don’t want to write what other people want.
I should be repairing all the damage the Microsoft caused with their latest IE patches; but I don’t feel like figuring out the shockwave scripts.
I should be loading the dishwasher and tidying the kitchen. I never seem to get things where they belong.
I should be cleaning up the mess of boxes and nonsense sitting around; but everything feels so scattered about and beyond me.
I should be doing so many things.
I can’t seem to do any of them.
Maybe I just want things I can’t ever have.
I know some things are impossible
But that doesn’t make me stop wanting them
Or tell me how to deal with not having them.
So instead I do nothing.
And hope that maybe things will change.
June 12, 2006
eSchool News online – Bias-busting tech keeps kids focused—”A handheld computer with software that randomly selects students’ names is an effective tool for making sure students pay attention and do their homework, an education researcher has found. Originally intended to increase class participation and eliminate any bias in how teachers call on students for discussion, the solution also was found to increase students’ attentiveness and boost their chances of success.”
June 10, 2006
After a hellish week of what folks of my type might call “women’s issues,” my plan for today was to get get the oil in my car changed at 10 and have them look at the leak near the sun roof. It looked like some rubber was loose and needed glued back down. Next, I was going to pick up my prescriptions, go by the grocery store, and be home by mid-afternoon. It didn’t really work out that way.
Instead, I arrived at my dear Saturn dealer’s and found that my car needed one of its super maintenance visits: rotate the tires, new spark plugs, oil, new air filters, etc., etc. Great. Not good enough? $300+ estimate and 4.5 hours to do the work. Okay, fine. I was planning on looking at a Vue, trying to get a test drive, and finding out how to sign up for a hybrid so that I might get one of the first ones.
The test drive was easy. They let me take a car that the business manager had been driving (a front-wheel drive, 4-cylinder green one) and do whatever I wanted. It helps to always go to the same place for my maintenance. They didn’t even ask to see my driver’s license before setting me free in their car. I drove down to the nearest interstate entrance, drove it on the highway, back through town to my house, tested it in the garage (to make sure it fit properly), played around with parking it in the movie theater lot behind the Saturn dealer, and back into the dealer’s lot. I had it for 45 minutes (and they said I could take an hour, so I was quite the good girl).
At that point, I sat down to do a little busy work in the waiting area. About 30 minutes or so after settling in, one of the salespersons, Dale, was finished with the previous customer and chatted with me about the options. I explained that I wanted a hybrid, etc. After some quizzing of my habits though, he said that I wouldn’t really save money on the hybrid since they’re more expensive and I didn’t do enough driving to benefit from the hybridity. Hmm. Okay, I figure I have time to think about all this. I wasn’t planning to do anything today anyway.
About 30 minutes after that, the service person tells me that the sun roof has rusted out. I identified the right place, but not the right cause. Cost? Almost $500. That was when I started in on the phone calls. It was pouring rain, so I couldn’t go outside. Instead, I closed myself up in the kiddie playroom and called my mom for advice. We decided that I needed to ask the salesperson about trade-in value with and without the fix. Salesguy at this point is eating lunch, so I tell him when he’s done that I need to chat with him again.
I explain the situation to him once he finishes his pizza, and he goes off to figure out the trade-in value. It had stopped raining; so I went outside and called my brother for advice on what I should do and what I should go for: all-wheel drive 6-cylinder OR front-wheel drive 4-cylinder. He said the AWD, since if I was in Virginia at Christmas and needed to get back to Illinois, I’d need the more capable snow car. This is not, of course, the way that I usually make decisions. Usually I would do all this research myself so that I could make my own decision.
Go back into the dealer. They came up with a kind $1700, not bad for a 10-year-old car, and they did take into account the maintenance underway (new plugs, etc.). The salesguy explained that fixing the roof was not going to increase the value $500. So essentially I was going to lose money. Sigh. That was when I realized that I was buying a new car and soon. You can’t run around with a rain roof, and if I ruined the top of the car, its trade-in value would plummet.
So we went through the available cars on the lot. The AWD, 6-cylinder was pricier (and they didn’t have the color I wanted). Things were also limited by my adamant insistence that there would be no sun roof in my future. This is the second time the damned thing had a major problem (It stuck open in St. Louis once, and refused to close). Since I was unsure, and Dale my sales chum wasn’t sure that I really needed AWD, he went to find one that was close to what I wanted for me to drive; so that I could compare them before deciding.
Called Mom again at that point, and essentially she listened while I talked myself into the cheaper FWD. After all, if the weather is that bad, I have no business going out and driving around in it. While she and I were on the phone, I got the dealer’s book of details on the Vues on the lot and found that there was a FWD in my color, no sunroof, with the basic things that I wanted.
Dale my chum comes back, and I tell him what I’m thinking and the other car I’m considering. He had me drive a bit in the AWD. I grant that it felt a little smoother than the FWD, with a bit more pick-up; but it wasn’t enough to make the price difference worth it—especially since I was going to have to settle for a color I didn’t really want (Storm Grey). I decided on the FWD—$4K cheaper, the color I wanted, enough of the features that I wanted.
Next thing I knew, I was filling out forms and meeting with the business manager (whose car I started out driving at 10 AM). We went over the preliminaries, and she suggested that I go get my gold car, which was ready, minus the new sun roof, run some errands, empty the car, and come back around 4 PM to get the new car.
The rest of the afternoon was a hurried blur… prescriptions… groceries… emptying the car (no small task after 10 years)…. Just after 4, I was signing paperwork. By 5, I was driving off in my new car.
The stupidest part is when I got weepy when I had to hand over my old car. It was my baby car :( I swear it hurt to have to give it up. and I know that’s dumb, but that’s how it felt.
After I finished that purchase, I drove to Philo, cuz I needed to drive somewhere. Unfortunately, Lisa wasn’t home. There was a point as I was driving back to Champaign when I thought I should just get on the phone and call Dr.B and tell her I was coming over for a Mai Tai.
I still haven’t gotten to show it to anyone in person. Maybe I should go out and make sure it’s still in the garage or drive it around in the dark. I haven’t driven it in the dark yet. It still doesn’t feel real. If anything, it feels very unsettled. This isn’t how I planned to get a new car. I was going to wait till the Fall and get a hybrid. All said, I’m sure this had to be the right decision, but it just doesn’t feel perfect and right quite yet. From some distanced logical place, it feels like what I was supposed to do, like it has to have been the right thing. But from the emotional and real place where I am, it still feels so bizarre and unsure. Maybe after I drive it around a bit more. It had 22 miles on it when I got it, so I’ve only driven 31 miles. I’m sure it needs more time before it feels right.
June 4, 2006
Yesterday I decided that I really wanted ice. Ice in a glass. Crushed ice. Surrounded by icy cold liquid of some kind. So despite the fact that it is the weekend—and I NEVER get dressed or step outside on the weekends—I went to the store.
Then, as if getting dressed and going out into the sun wasn’t enough, I went to Lowe’s and bought some plants. That’s right. I have hanging ivy pots and a deep purple petunia on my front porch—AND I dug the wind chimes out of the basement and hung them up too. I haven’t put plants or the wind chimes outside since the summer of 2001.
2002. 2003. 2004. 2005. Nothing.
It’s not really clear what made me think I could accomplish this yesterday. My house is a wreck. Junk is stacked everywhere. Christmas stuff that I haven’t put away. Things I didn’t unpack after CCCC. Recent piles from the Lubbock trip. Yet I decided to make the front porch pleasant. I dunno why.
I did get the ice too, btw. Now if I’d write up all the CW notes.
May 30, 2006
I’m sitting around in my Tulsa hotel room. Leaving not only means that I have to get dressed and go out into the heat but also that I have to go back to the daily to-dos.
The problem with long road trips is that there are very long spaces for thinking and the ideas that were percolating throughout the conference get insistent in the bubbling out of the percolating and making a mess of the kitchen kind of way.
I was relatively happy doing ReadWriteThink work, but conferences make me question things. So many things came up that I want to research and write about—but when? Nothing counts. In fact some things need disclaimers to make sure no one confuses private rambling with official work for NCTE. The thing is that I don’t care so much that it counts, but I don’t have time to work on things other than work recently. I can’t even get my house cleaned up. How on earth would I find time to do that research project I talked briefly with Cindy about? I need to be an independently wealthy scholar.
Instead, I’m going to have to put on pants, as Oklahoma and Missouri are not clothing-optional states, and get myself on the road.
May 29, 2006
It’s time to load the car and head home from Texas. Unfortunately, I have reached the lazy point of the trip, where I would just as soon sit in the room and do nothing as go out into the heat to load the car and deal with the hassle of the swipe cards that no longer work. This dorm set-up has some incredibly stupid aspects to it.
Just told Samantha and Karen goodbye, as they head out to the airport for their flights. And greeted Cheryl as she entered the bathroom with the constantly running shower. I guess I have to go shower too now. Thought I wonder if it’s worth the bother—I’ll be dripping hot and feeling nasty again as soon as I take the first load outside :( Texas is so much nicer in the winter.
May 27, 2006
As my audio blogposts mumble, I left Champaign on Tuesday, and I drove and I drove and I drove and I drove. There is much driving to get from Champaign to Lubbock. And the pathway that you drive is populated by far more of those large hollow metal animals than you’d think would be necessary. That one at least serves a purpose, trying to get suckers, um, I mean tourists to come in and eat an oversized steak. Many of them are totally beyond my understanding however. One place had a small menagerie of the critters—horses, cows, a ram, and a giraffe that was smaller than any of them. What kind of giraffe is that? and don’t forget about that zebra I audioblogged about when I was leaving Tulsa. What he has to do with gun cleaning and reloading is still a mystery.
The treasure trove of hollow animals is broken by long stretches of vast emptiness once you get past a certain point in Oklahoma. You begin to wonder if you haven’t joined the Joad family, and even more if you might not be Grandma who will never make it to the other side. There’s a lot of dry land that looks very human-unfriendly. Just before I left Oklahoma, I was interested to see a large field fire. You could see the smoke plumes miles down the road. Perhaps all those “Do not drive through smoke” signs there do serve a purpose. Fortunately for me, the smoke was far off the road and no driving through smoke was necessary.
Eventually I did make it to Lubbock, and after a tour of many side streets in West Lubbock and Wolfforth, I did make eventually make it down the many-rutted wagon trail that doubles as the road to Locke and Becky’s house. Menageries became a running theme for the trip as the Carter-Rickly herd of dogs, horses, cats, and other youngling. First there were horses to feed, and dogs to keep out of the horses food. The evilest dog is the newest, a puppy that just showed up. The boys are calling it Spike. I want to call it Barni, cuz it was found in the barn—and also it’s an annoyance like the large purple dinosaur. It’s also a girl, and Spike just doesn’t fit its hair-do.
I bowed out of the fun-filled weed spraying and horseshoe collecting and instead watched young Carter-Rickly 1 play in the pool. He has grown much taller since I last saw him. He’s tanned and has those long little boy legs that jump and run and fly around. He confessed that he doesn’t really remember me, but that he was telling his mom that he did. That didn’t stop us from silly giggling around the pool. My favorite part of the poolside antics was when Barni asked if she could jump in for a swim too. I gently helped her into the pool. Becky wasn’t really amused however. I think Barni really enjoyed it. She was swimming happily at the pool edge, but Becky made me grab her back out of the pool (getting drenched in the processs). I stand by my belief though: that puppy loved her pool time and it wasn’t traumatizing at all that she couldn’t climb out. Not at all. She relished in the joy of a life unbounded by the all encompassing dusty soil that is the panhandle of Texas. Really she did. Locke heard my account of puppy swim and he concurs. And when Locke agrees, you know that it is true. These really are great days.
Unfortunately, it was later Tuesday Wednesday evening that I learned of the depths of weeniehood that our Will Banks has attained. We’re talking far, far deeper than the Walk of Shame through a conference hotel lobby. A weeniehood much larger and all-encompassing than the horror of not getting a bagel with cheese when you ordered that very explicitly at the McDonald’s drive-through. It is a weeniehood that may go on record as the biggest weenieness in the history of computers and writing. Indeed so epic is Will’s weeniedom that I shared the details with the V2 people for publication.
Now what horror transpired? How did my once dear and sweet Willie Bobbie accomplish this feat? Well, weeks ago, he argued that I had to stay in the dorms because he would be in the dorms and we’d have fun. That evening at the Carter-Rickly hacienda I learned that he who was formerly known as Willie Bobbie wasn’t even coming to the conference. Did his massive weenieness let me know? Had I any idea that I was being stood up? Why no. SuperWeenie just ignored me completely and went flitting off to some bar or club or dance recital and left me abandoned. He whined something about travel money to Becky, but we all know that there is no amount of travel money deficit that would be too much if he truly loved his tengrrl. Sniffle, sniffle. Clearly he does not. The weenie. I shame him.
May 26, 2006
cheryl inspires
and people ask, “Why? Not yet?!!!”
sorry too tired
it will come later
patience my little one
tomorrow perhaps
what to write of then?
giggly lipstick cell phones
OH!!! the delicious
sleep now my darling
and dream of the red pantsuit
must rest my gray cells
