not grey gardens

This week, the summer semester comes to a screeching halt. All that densely packed material thrown into final exams, and then nothing for a couple of weeks until Fall semester begins. I'm thinking up a few small projects I can do with the downtime from tutoring.

One project I take no credit for is "our" bountiful garden. That was Magnum's thing - building the raised bed and framework to keep the greedy bunnies out, filling the soil, planting and nurturing... 

No lettuce parasites in our burritos!

It's been too much to eat to keep up with, really. Plants will likely keep thriving long after the humans are gone unless we nuke the whole planet.

Speaking of nukes, like many households, we have a microwave oven. I rarely use it, and really only for heating oatmeal or coffee that's gone cold. Magnum often uses it to cook, which kinda grosses me out. He doesn't use it to cook meat, at least (although there was that one chicken tenders incident), but anything else is fair game. 

When the kids were at home, it was useful, but now, I can most definitely live without it. But we keep it around for his sake. At least it sits in a corner under a cabinet, in a space that would be pretty useless as a surface anyway. And once the zucchini and summer squash is ready for harvest, I will confiscate them and bar them from said microwave! 

Speaking of kids at home, I find I get nostalgic this time of year with the back-to-school fervor. The school supply lists, the clothes and shoes shopping. Weird, the things we miss.

But I don't miss being responsible for dinner. Every. Single. Day.

gifted

I'd not thought of myself as one of those people who carries an umbrella to block the sun. But yesterday, there I was, undercover. The temperature was hovering around 100^o .

I was thankful to have that umbrella as the full onslaught of sun was bearing down as I waited for the bus to go to work. My pick up stop has a bench, and nothing more. 

The all-black backpack is no help to beat the heat. 

But, we're surviving, and I don't mean to complain. In fact, this is meant to be an appreciation post, starting with my appreciation for that umbrella and the ease of taking the bus on my short work commute on inclement weather days.

We got some welcome rain overnight, which didn't cool things down much, but we always need the moisture. I had a lovely jog around the neighborhood this morning, appreciative of the overcast skies.

I came across these two friends, living the good life.

The summer semester is wrapping up. POOF, ten weeks of frenzied activity. Tensions are a bit high among the tutees, working hard to keep their heads above water for about one more week. 

One such tutee end-of-semester-gift-ed me a [lovely Japanese mechanical pencil]. What a nice and unexpected surprise.

Now, I realize some may think a mechanical pencil is a strange gift, but I can attest to the fact that it is a wonderfully fitting item for a math tutor.

Well done, Tutee!

I've learned that this particular pencil is a fave among mechanical pencil aficionados. 

I've happily added it to my pencil case as part of my everyday carry in the aforementioned backpack.

The fuzzy thing in the background of the pencil pic is our cat - Napolion The Skinny. Can you see his butt bones?

I have begun giving him a daily can of kitten food, which he loves. It also makes him the envy of all other pets in the house. 

sticks and stones

I was supposed to have a remote tutoring sesh a little while ago, but my student no-showed me. I texted her at 5 minutes after and got the old "Oops, forgot to tell you I have a doctor's appointment..." 

Speaking of lies, that excuse is about as worn out as the homework eating dogs. Welp, two strikes and she's out as per the general rules. I've got another student scheduled for this afternoon, so the day's not a total bust... so far.

Yesterday, Magnum and I found ourselves with some extra free time, so we headed up to our place in the clouds to do a little trail bustin'. 

It was a beautiful day for it, and we broke out our shiny new trail building tools, one of which is called a Mcleod. We'd bought it a few weeks ago, and it was brought out to us all shrouded up. We undressed it, and I was a bit surprised to see that it's yellow. The catalog showed it as "dark metal" colored.

I'm not disappointed, I saw it and immediately thought of Big Bird, mainly Big Bird's feet. 

That's it parked next to my rough draft of trail. "Trail" seems too impressive for what I've created so far. "Path" is maybe more fitting.

I tried spotting places where the deer have already formed trails and following their lead. Hopefully they'll continue to travel that path, thus helping to maintain it.

So it was just nice to be out there in the quiet and fresh air. A turkey vulture circled overhead, likely waiting for one or both of us to keel over.

Meanwhile, we're getting used to the idea of owning this land. There are actually several other landowners surrounding the area. We met our closest neighbors on our last trip, and we've since gotten access to the discord group, which seems friendly and welcoming. I'm sure we can use their advice on all relatable things.

As I was toiling along, I thought, "wouldn't it be fun if I dug up something of value?

Nevermind, that sort of thing doesn't happen to me.

But who knows, as we get to know more of these "mountain people", maybe they've got some cool cult we can join.

Okay, never mind. I may have gotten too much sun.

I, robot

Two weeks of summer break, and I'm having trouble keeping track of what day it is. 

I've been working a few extra shifts in the testing center - which never sleeps - so that's helped somewhat. The college summer session began yesterday, and I've already got one tutor signup whom I'll meet tomorrow. Thursday. Yes. Tomorrow is Thursday.

Meanwhile, I'm enjoying the extra free time. Today, I went to Discount Tire and had a set of new tires installed. Ever been to a Discount Tire? The entire staff is so dang nice and courteous, it's almost weird. Like Stepford Wives, but Stepford Tire Shop Staff. I'm not complaining, since human interactions become less and less these days.

Speaking of human interaction, of the jobs that have been replaced by AI, I fully expected tutors to fall away years ago. But here we still are. In fact, both my jobs at the college are being performed by AI, but there are still those who want real-life tutors and real-life test administrator/ proctors, and I guess I can understand that. 

AI tutors won't genuinely sympathize when hearing, "as if I'm ever gonna have to [insert annoying math concept here] when I get a job!"

AI test proctors won't compliment your cute shoes or empathize at how worthless women's pockets are when checking for cheat notes.

And speaking of unplugging, I'm enjoying these late springtime days. I caught some goose babies and a curious horse on my morning wanderings yesterday.

That was Tuesday. Which makes today Wednesday.

I think?

nieve seis de mayo

We're having us a snow day. First one for the whole school year, and it comes in May?

But we'll take what we can get after our long, dry winter.  Poor awakening trees, welcomed by drought only to get dumped on with heavy, wet snow. Their roots are loving it, but their branches, not so much.

So, I'll be zooming with the tutees today. No complaints from me or them. I have an easy commute to campus, but remote sessions mean I need only be presentable from the shoulders up. 

 I took a soggy walk-about the neighborhood this morning. Pretty quiet out with all the schools and colleges closed - a precursor to summer break when many of the university students go away. 

Monday is the last day of our semester. Then it's a couple of weeks until the summer session begins. I've made myself available for summer tutoring. There are less students in the summer, but also less tutors, so it seems to balance out. 

Welp, time to try to make myself a quarter presentable.

proms, snow, and dopamine

We made it to May. Snow in this coming week's forecast after a whole lotta nothing all winter. 

I'll take it, better late than never.

But this weekend's been lovely. I went out to take care of a couple of easy errands yesterday via bicycle. At one point, I rode through a picturesque part of the university campus. It was teeming will well-dressed folk.

It's too early for graduation, I pondered. Plus, graduation would bring out caps and gowns, none of which were present. As I got closer, I noticed the well-dressed folks were a bunch of kids - broccoli-haired boys and gowned girls. 

Ah... prom.

Apparently, that location on campus is a popular place for prom pics.

I thought back to high school prom days and to how oh-so-important it seemed at the time, and how oh-so-unimportant it actually is/was in the grand scheme of things. But I hope they had fun - didn't get too drunk, and no one got pregnant.

Speaking of almost graduation, one week remains of the semester. Do-or-die for some students heading into finals. One of my tutees has very long, decorative acrylic fingernails. They can be cumbersome to deal with when she's doing her online homework - needing to use her chunky knuckles instead of fingertips when using her laptop touch screen.

"These nails make it difficult to do my math homework", she acknowledged, to which she added, 

"but I need the dopamine to do my math homework"

Hey, it's a balance.

cancel, campaign, commute

I'm in the computer commons at the college killing some time before my next tutoring appointment. I got to campus just in time to receive a text from my earlier tutee...

"I'm really sorry to do this so last minute..."

Okay, fine. She had to late cancel - health issues. So here I was in vagabond mode. I was in the student center for a while, having a snack. A guy walked up to me,

"Excuse me, are you a student?", he asked.

Heck no, what?? was what I was thinking, but to be fair, there are a few from my generation who decide to take college classes, for whatever reason.

So I said, "Uh, no. Sorry"

He approached the girl sitting not far from me. He's running for student government, getting signatures. I have no idea what the student government does here. As for me, I reached into my bag and put on my nametag so as to not look so student-y.

In other news, the Pelicans are here. They come every spring to, apparently, breed. Why Colorado, I have no idea.

I'm sure there are pelicans breeding in other places, too, but I always see a flotilla of them on my commutes home this time of year. 

And with that, so endeth todays loitering. 

bunnies, books, 'n' beavers

Happy Easter to those who revel!

It's a lovely sunny spring day here. We went for a coffee bike ride this morning. A happy Easter Bunny waved merrily to us from outside a church, possibly muttering quietly at the bicycle-riding infidels.

This past week felt a little off for some reason. Tutor students struggling more than the usual. On Wednesday, I commented to one, "is it a full moon or something?" Lo and behold, it was. And now we've got the Artemis crew stirring the pot.

In 2026 Reading Challenge updates, I am now 16 books into my goal of 26 books on the year, so a bit ahead of the pace. Here are my latest that didn't end up in the DNF pile. Descriptions mine:

Shy Creatures - a single 30-something art therapist in the 60's tries to help a man who'd been "hidden" for decades and her teenaged niece while having an affair with one of the doctors. ⭐⭐⭐⭐

The Coworker - Typical Scooby-Doo type mystery from Freida McFadden. Audiobook while doing mundane things around the house. ⭐⭐

Flashout - some weird "artists" doing weird things in the 60's, not all that comparatively weird to other things from the 60's. ⭐⭐⭐

The Raven's Nest - Memoir from a woman who went to Iceland, fell in love with an Iceland man, married him, became an Icelander, divorced the Icelander, wrote a book ⭐⭐⭐⭐

I'm currently reading a couple of non-fictions. One is Cheap Land Colorado - interesting book about off-gridders living cheap in Colorado. I happened to see it while loitering around a bookstore. I've been through the area, and the book reminds me a lot of where I grew up.

The other is this book about beavers, recommended by my Step Mother-in-law during our recent visit.

SMIL is a retired chemical engineer, and loved learning about nature's engineers and recommends this book to anyone who will listen.

Beavers are pretty badass, I've been a fan for a while.

BUC-EE

progress

Last weekend, I had that PEO "come to Jesus" meeting to get people to fill the two officer vacancies we have for the upcoming year. The discussion went well, although no one stepped forward right away to take either office, including President. So that remains as still me.

But it was a good talk, and to my appreciation, a few other past Presidents who were at the meeting chimed in and helped throw down. I ended up contacting the state board for advice, asking what the deadline was for getting all the offices filled.

They responded back, not with a deadline, but rather a "those lazy members need to get off their asses" (I'm paraphrasing)

So I sent out an email to the chapter, quoting the state board, and reiterating that "you lazy members need to get off your asses" (again, paraphrasing). 

It seems like we're going to live for another year. The Non-Lazies are pitching in to get us through, although they already do a lot. Typical. Looks like I'll be stuck in the President's chair, but will have someone to share the load with. Another Non-Lazy has already committed to taking over in one more year, so that's a plus. Sheesh, things I gotta do.

Speaking of language, it seems I've crossed a threshold with a couple of tutees. I've mentioned how I consider it a sign that students are comfortable with me if they start comfortably swearing during our sessions, no longer overly cautious about their words. I mean, if they were elementary kids, that'd be concerning, but these are all adults.

They always start out very respectful (probably because I'm old), but the ice is soon broken. I see swearing as a breakthrough.

One guy came in grumpy, then began dropping f-bombs left and right, mad at himself for silly mistakes he'd made on a test. I agree, he knew better and should've scored higher. By the end of our session, he'd calmed down and was more optimistic. Language back to PG.

Another girl often responds with "What the heck?" when her laptop glitches or something. Yesterday, something happened, and there it was, "What the fu..?" Aha!

My words, however, are always pristine, of course

I was assigned another student this week, and I happened to notice that she'd worked with a different tutor the week before. I figured the change was due to a schedule conflict or something and mentioned that to her.

"So does this time slot work better with your schedule?", I asked

She looked a little confused and then replied, "Uh, yeah. Well, I just didn't like that other tutor". 

Then I was all paranoid. Certainly it can happen, a little personality conflict or just wrong way rubbing. I know the other tutor, not that well, but wondered what's not to like? I'll admit it threw me off my game a bit. 

But she hasn't dumped ME yet.

eats and hunger

December has arriveth. Looking out my window, I see actual snow on the rooftops. Not much, but I say it still counts.

I had all of last week off from work and tried to make the most of it. During that time, I...

... shopped, enjoyed family time, climbed a mountain, had a tarot reading, shot a gun, napped, ate lots of good food, walked dogs, (reluctantly) learned a little about plumbing...

along with the other day-to-day stuff. All in all, a good week with a minor annoyance of a slow leak in one of our bathroom sinks. The silver lining is, we should have a nice new faucet when all is said and done. We (translation: Magnum) think we can DIY the fix before having to call in the professionals. Fingers crossed.

This week is the last week of the college semester, so it's prep for finals before it all comes to a crashing halt. Along the way, I lost a few tutees who dropped their courses after falling too far behind. 

Of those who remain in the fight, I think they're all going to make it. It feels like The Hunger Games around here sometimes.

make like a tree

 Wham! This week went by fast, although I can't put my finger on anything in particular that made it so. Oh well, here we are, Saturday. Not complaining.

The semester is winding down at the college. Less than one month to go, and one of those weeks is fall break. I've had a few tutees jump ship from their math classes already, realizing they can't pass even if they pull wizardry on their finals. I'm a little mad at the advisors who allowed them to sign up for classes they clearly weren't ready for, but sink-or-swim seems to be the strategy.

We survived the first week back to standard time. It is now dark on my bicycle commute home, and I'm decked out with lights and reflectors again. There are three busy roads I must cross to get to and from the college, and I found a route that uses the lesser of the evils for all three crossings without being too much of a detour. 

A little photo dump from the week:

• One of my fellow paint-n-sippers shared some pics she took of our get together a couple of weeks ago. Here's a group photo:

Our artistic leader is 4th from the left, next to me, in case it's not obvious from her Best-In-Show painting.

• I came across a few deer during one of my early morning jog arounds this week

There were about five of them hanging around together, but the others went and hid in the trees as I got my phone out. These two seemingly couldn't care less. 

It's gotten chillier, and we've definitely had our first freeze, but still no snow for the season. Any day now. I avoid politics on the blog, but I gotta say, this government shut down is getting old. 

Rant over. 

 

hunting and pecking

I was on a darkish walkabout this morning - a lazy fog making things seem somewhat middle earthy. 

I didn't come across any hobbits or elves that I know of, but did encounter this gaggle of turkeys. I've seen them around before, as have others who chime in on Next Door, Reddit, etc. Is it the same wild group moseying all over town or is there more than one gang?

They look healthy and happy enough, to my untrained eyes.

I recall a boy I knew many years ago, a country boy, who told me how difficult it was to track and nab a wild turkey at hunting time. He told me this while showing me, with pride, one of his turkey feather trophies.

So my first experience of spotting these wild turkeys had me thinking back to that, making the event all, "Wow, a rare sighting!". But now I'm starting to wonder... is it really that difficult?

Recall a while back I admitted to having the odd thought that I would enjoy birdwatching. Now I'm thinking about that again after coming upon this group in the business park. The real appeal to me is to be out in the boonies with a purpose. Hunting has always sounded fun to me - all except the killing part. THAT doesn't appeal to me at all, despite my being a failed vegetarian.

I feel in need of a nature fix, anyway, in the midst of another semester of dealing with students barely keeping their heads above water (how did they even meet the prerequisites?!). I mean, it's only the strugglers who sign up for tutoring, so it's the nature of the beast.

So no nature getaway today. But at least I had wild turkeys by the dumpster.

captured

This week seems to have *WHOOSHED* on by. Maybe because it was a short one, starting with a holiday?

Things are back to business. My tutor schedule has filled - almost to the brim - with another batch of fun students. The mathing commences.

I mentioned that I would start sometimes bringing my bike cam along on bike rides, to possibly catch a hooligan or two. I'm glad to say that I've taken a few lovely rides  with no captures of crashes or criminal activity.

On Sunday, I did see the cutest thing I've seen all week. Yes, it remains in the top spot.

This little boy was on this teeny recumbent, hitched to (I assume) Dad's bike. I'd never seen such a small hitched tow-behind. Usually kids that small are in those little trailers.

But there he was, pedaling away, I'm sure providing no power whatsoever.  But as we passed each other, his eyes trained with mine the whole encounter, he had the cutest smile. Very proud of himself, being part of the fray, as if saying

"Hello, fellow bicycle rider!"

 Now it's off to work for another morning of testing... testing... testing.

spies and lame ducks

Happy Winter Solstice, y'all. We're "celebrating" by watering our trees? Really, we're so hardup for precipitation around here, had to fire up the hose.

I worked my last day of the year in the testing center yesterday. We're closed now until Jan. 2nd. We had an unfortunate turn of events this week in that we're pretty sure we got busted by a secret shopper.

These companies we administer professional tests for will occasionally send secret shoppers posing as test candidates to make sure we're doing all the security things properly. Someone got into the testing room with a cell phone.  Oooh, that's baaaaad.

I wasn't there, just heard about it after the fact. At least my coworkers noticed the cell phone at the testing workstation during the test, but by then, the damage was done. 

It's just really awkward to ask some stranger why the metal detector is going off near their crotch, and then, to investigate further! Apparently, this is what happened, and it was explained away with, "Oh, must be my belt buckle", and that was that. 

I recall a time I was scanning a woman candidate. She was a rather "stout" woman, and my detector went off at her mid back. I let it go without question because I assumed she had on a hefty bra with some serious hardware holding it shut, and I didn't want to go there.

I mean, if she was gonna hide something, she wouldn't hide it in her back bra strap, right? Right?? 

From now on, I'll just ask. And yes, take off the belt, let's do it again. 

On a happier note, I also had my last tutor session with my one high schooler. I mainly just tutor the college students now, but "D" is a holdover from about a year and a half ago when her mom contacted me because I'd tutored D's older sister. 

D is now a senior, and when we gathered online this week, she started the session with a sheepish, "So... some exciting news...". Really, she said it so shyly, I wasn't sure if she'd actually said anything at all. 

But then she continued, "I got early acceptance into my first choice university this week". Oh, goody!

I'm very happy for her, such a nice kid and hard worker. Her big challenge now is to make it through her lame duck semester of high school.

fork yeah!

Another busy week down. I feel I've neglected the blog and blog reading (as well as housework, but that's allowed) this past week. BUT the semester is now finished. Onto the next thing.

I had a PEO thing yesterday. Fun, but yet another obligation. I look forward to a relatively obligation-less week ahead. 

As such, I was over at the site where I do my other tutoring. There's a questionnaire for setting preferences and such, and I noticed some strange wording:

Forks yes, I have access to a car? I have no car, but use forks as a substitute? I'm interested in online tutoring... with forks?

So I sent a non-urgent message to the helpdesk informing them of the forks. Right after clicking "send", I thought, "hmmmm, what if the problem is at my end? Some weird glitch in the cache?". So I cleared my cache, then logged in again.

Yep, the "Forks" have been replaced with "Yes".  Aw, Fork.
Now, the helpdesk is going to see my weird issue and roll their eyes. Thankfully, I included the screenshot shown up there. I swear I wasn't hallucinating. 

So happy December. On a recent night, I awoke around 2am, realizing it was December already. And I thought, "*GASP*, Oma's gonna send her annual box of diabetes!"

Every holiday season since forever, my step-mother-in-law has sent us a boatload of cookies, candies, etc. They're store bought, nice quality, but SO much. Especially in recent years, even after offloading much of it to our now adult kids, most of it goes to the landfill. 

I decided to head her off at the pass, emailed acknowledging her thoughtfulness, but pleeeeeez, no more box of diabetes. She responded promptly, thanking me for my "honest feedback".

I was, however, not able also to ask her not to send me another desk calendar, which she has traditionally sent and which goes straight to the thrift store donation - while the year is just beginning. 

Baby steps.

a little psycho

 

Hey, how's everyone's week going? 

Better than Lillie's I hope!

Tutor Boss asked all us tutors to double check with our students to confirm their sessions since this is the last week of the semester as they head to finals. 

It's a mix. Some are raring to go, some just want it over. 

I have a vague recollection of finals time during my undergrad years. One year worked out particularly nicely because my roommate made hella messes when she was stressed, and I fell into clean freak mode when I was stressed. Perfect combination! 

She studied while trashing the place, I studied while cleaning. We rocked those finals, and our apartment got a sort of makeover.

We're busy over in testing as per usual this time of year. Then, after Monday, things will quiet down. I'm on the lookout for a white elephant gift for our party scheduled for next Wednesday. We looked up the meaning and origin of "white elephant"

"white elephant \WYTE-EL-uh-funt\ noun. 1 : a property requiring much care and expense and yielding little profit."

Well, that covers a whole gamut. 

I'm on a mission, much like this goose friend I encounted on a recent morning.

I don't know the goose's mission, but it was on it like a boss.

says there's room for maybe just one more

Yay for Saturday! Sheesh, this was a busy week. I'm glad to have survived.

The students have all of next week off at the college. Testing is running through Wednesday, but my tutor schedule is happily empty.

Don't get me wrong, I do typically enjoy tutoring. But as can be expected, the students who sign up for tutoring are the ones who struggle, not only with the coursework, but with stress and anxiety in general, and I'm no therapist.

But really, it's kind of an odd mix. Some are older students who haven't been in a classroom for a while, so just need some extra guidance. Then there are the younger ones who were academically abandoned by the pandemic and other "systemic failures" during their high school years. 

It's a bit of an old story here - I'm sure I blogged about it as I went through it. But in a nutshell, my degree is engineering, I was a happy engineer for several years, we had kids and I became a happy mom and former engineer, and I picked up tutoring along the way.

About 10 years ago, I enrolled in a program at the university that was a pathway for people with STEM degrees to become high school math and science teachers. Seemed like all paths led me in that direction, except...

I learned that I have NO desire to teach at a high school. I mean... the education classes I was taking felt lame to me, for lack of a better word. The atmosphere at the schools we observed didn't gel with me. I even took a non-teaching job at a "nice" high school and couldn't stand it more than one semester.

But hey, it's not them, it's me. I know! I do know wonderful teachers who love their jobs and their schools, and more power to 'em. It's just not my bag.

I shared that summary with one of my tutees this week after she asked me about it. She was enticing me to take on a next level class that I currently don't tutor, but she will be taking next semester. 

"Do it, we need you!", she implored. Seems the only tutors for that course are retired instructors who only tutor online, while I'm okay meeting in person.

I'll probably do it. I'm reteaching the subject to myself to slough off the dust by Spring semester. As we talked, she asked if I'd ever want to teach a class at the college. People have asked me that before, and it seems like there's always openings for math teachers. But... ew. I enjoy tutoring. Teaching is a whole 'nother can of worms. It really has very little appeal to me.

Part of that is likely because... I turned a ripe 60 years old this week. *ock, my bones*. Ain't got no time nor patience for BS. Teachers put up with a lot of BS, while tutors show up, wearing halos.

In true old lady form, here's a coupla pics of a cat. Wolfgang's cat Maisey, whom I've visited daily this past week while on food duty.

I'm happy to make it to 60. Let it be known, I have no desire to do 60 more.

ground control

Happy November! It's a beautiful fall morning here. I partook of the popular pastime known as rake-all-the-damn-leaves for a while. Now I'm sluggishly chilling. Sluggishly because maybe allergies combined with the flu shot I got yesterday. Plus, apparently, my dependence on caffeine, which I've not yet had today.

I'm not a fan of changing clocks, but I'm feeling rather appreciative of the extra hour we get this weekend. But, let me wrap up the week, bullet style

• At the testing center, we underwent required "de-escalation" training. Out of curiosity, I'd asked Boss why we were required to do this, as it had never been part of the plethora of other required trainings. His answer, "Something happened at one of the other testing centers, and I've already told you too much"

Well, okay then. Bring on the training. Presented by a couple of our security guys (Work Study loved it), it was good common sense reminders. We all felt pretty good about how well we work together to de-escalate such situations.

The VERY NEXT day, dude bullies his way in, gets all upset because he can't keep his cellphone with him (?!) while taking his test. Spends 9 minutes failing a test he was given 2 hours to complete, flings a chair (it was on wheels, so it just went for a fun roll, not hitting anything/ one), and storms out with a parting, "F*CK Y'ALL!!"

Not gonna lie, my calming strategies from the prior day's training took a back burner to my inner seething. Same for my coworkers Blossom and Sarge. But we kept it together enough to, at least, not escalate things. From his parting salutation, I was reminded of the pride banner hanging over the disabilities services office:

And I thought, "Well, how wondefully inclusive of him"

• On the tutoring side of things, I was talking with one of my tutees. He's majoring in mechanical engineering and told me he's interested in becoming "an agricultural engineer on Mars". Whoa.

Apparently, there's a fair amount of research going into the colonization of Mars. Still, I think it'll be a while. But hey, he's young, and it's nice to have a focused goal.  

Meanwhile, I struggle to grow a decent garden here on Earth.  

gone fishin'

"Find something beautiful to look at, and spend a few minutes contemplating it. You already know how to create beauty, and that's a start"

So sayeth my horoscope app for today. Yes, I have a horoscope app. I don't know squat about astrology, but heard of the app and downloaded it just for grins a few weeks ago just to see what it would say.  It gave this advice after "telling" me that I'm over-identifying with other people. What?

I had two tutor appointments this morning. Appointment number one showed up and informed me she's withdrawing from the class because the teacher can't teach and she's over it. Appointment number two showed up stating he has to pass his test today, or he's withdrawing from the class - then he opened his backpack to realize he didn't bring his class notebook or his notecard he's allowed for the test. 

An unproductive day for me so far. I should find something beautiful to look at, already.

In the meantime, I will contemplate these tutees. I know Tutee1's teacher. She seems okay, but then I've never taken a class from her. Tutee2 is a nice enough guy, a little impatient with things in general, but not a hopeless case. 

I suspect, as I'm only hearing their sides of the stories, that their struggles are not solely due to their instructors. The pandemic didn't help this generation, academics-wise.

I have three more appointments today, hopefully things will become more productive.

In the meantime, I had some playtime. I'm not inktobering this year. It became not as fun after instagram changed their algorithms, and my interest lagged. But I saw the prompt for today was "Camp", so partook of a getaway.

A  depiction of a thing originally created by someone else. 

Now I'm off to meet with Tutee3. What's in the stars?

babies and baubles

Another tutor day ahead. Tuesdays and Wednesdays, I only tute. The other weekdays are some combo of testing and tutoring. 

One of my students is a mid-30s single mom. She's got a toddler and has been breaking free of the baby dad for the last few months. She moved to a new place last week, changed her phone plan, life is good.

So she was telling me how she's taking a chemistry class online. This is allowed probably as a by-product of covid. Because chemistry classes include a lab component, she's able to do her labs at home. The equipment - whatever it is - is sent through the mail.

She'd signed up for the class while still living with baby dad, now she's got a new address. She told me how she called the lab gear suppliers, told them the situation, and explained, "When it arrives at my previous address, that f*cker will likely just throw it away..."

No worries. Happens more often than you'd think. Sadly.

Another late 30s tutee is returning to college after many years out of school. She's sort of this zenny, (that a word?) spiritual type. She told me she teaches yoga and is into numerology. She's very jangly when she arrives - as in she wears various jewelry that jangles. Bauble-laden earrings and bracelets. She does have a rather calming presence about her. Makes me wonder what Steffie the Good Witch of Best Buy would say about her aura. 

Anyway, we were working on her math homework when I informed that "ten to the zero is equal to one". She stared at me

I went on to say, "any number raised to the zeroth power is one". The staring continued, so I did too.

"100 to the zero is one, ten bazillion gajillion to the zero is one, pi to the zero is one..."

At this point she burst out laughing. She thought that was the most hilarious and wonderful thing. When the concept came up again, she burst out laughing again. I'd never realized how joyous that little math tidbit could be.

Or maybe she was a bit high?

Speaking of which... our Colorado recreational marijuana smoking room screen house is pretty much done. Outdoor lights and required outlets have been installed, the city will come for the final inspection probably today.

It's already so much nicer back there - no longer the surface of Venus in full sun. I won't miss shoveling the snow off of it either, I bet.