The Last Weekend of Brandon

Countdown to Spring Semester: three days

The final schedule has been released to all of us for the spring. As expected, none of my classes changed times or locations, and I now have access to all three on Banner and Blackboard. I have nine students in my 102 class, four of which I had in my 101 course last semester (and who I knew would be in my 102 this semester anyway) and I currently have eleven students registered for my 011, none of which I've had before, and eight in my 210. That's a grand total of twenty-eight students spread over three different classes. This in itself, of course, is remarkable -- I haven't had so few total students in about three years, not since spring 2011 when I had 14 students in one class and 11 in the other. I've created printable rosters for my first day of attendance for all three classes,  and I've already emailed all of my 102 students with pertinent information for Tuesday's class, letting them know about the books and approximate prices and the like.

Daisy slept until noon or so yesterday, when a squabble between the cats (fairly frequent in this household, actually) woke her up. I had been up since around 9:30 or so, and I made her breakfast and helped her gather/pack up her things before she left for home. She got back to Omaha with plenty of time to spare before she had to go to work last night -- where, apparently, she dealt with difficult and frustrated people all night long due to a host of technical issues she and her team had to work on for the duration of her shift.

Thursday was a fairly lazy day for us; it was warm, but there were high winds -- whipping winds, even, much like today -- which made it cold outside when we went to the Dollar Tree in the afternoon. Between our shopping trip to Walmart and the Dollar Tree trip, I have replenished my stock of food and supplies in the house for the foreseeable future..for the most part, anyway. In doing so I put about another $200 or so on my Discover card, but again -- as I've mentioned many times -- that cannot be avoided right now, as all of my actual money must be used to pay bills for the rest of the month. Two of those bills I paid today, actually, just to get them out of the way. I'm dreading the Discover card bill when it comes, obviously, but eh. Unless it arrives today, it won't be due until after I get paid again anyhow. I'm more concerned about the electric bill for the month, which won't arrive until sometime next week (it always comes around the 23rd or 24th, sometimes a little later).

Anyway. We made Boca burgers and a massive "veggie bake" with all sorts of vegetables, vegan Daiya cheese, and cumin. I probably ate 3/4 of it -- had a second as well as a third helping -- and there's still some left in the fridge to eat tonight or tomorrow. We also tried to watch a movie -- she picked The Butterfly Effect -- but half an hour in it became too violent and disturbing for her to watch, so I stopped it and put it away. Daisy, as you may know, can't really stomach that sort of stuff, and as I hadn't seen the movie myself in about, oh, eight years or so, I forgot how disturbing it really is. Once I cleaned up the kitchen, ran the dishwasher, and put all of the food away, we turned on the electric blanket (it got really cold last night very quickly) and went to bed.

This weekend is what I call "The Last Weekend of Brandon" because, really, it's the last weekend of fully, completely free downtime I'll have until...well, after the wedding, more than likely. Probably at least until after the wedding. Yes, I'll have some weekends where I won't have a lot to do, but they won't be true downtime/free time. Therefore, this is my last totally responsibility-free weekend for the foreseeable future that I will be both unmarried and unoccupied by work or work-related things.

And what am I doing? Why, the same thing I do every weekend, Pinky -- sit here and drink coffee in my bathrobe with a cigarette hanging out of my mouth.

I am, ironically, remarkably unprepared for the upcoming semester. I mean, usually by the weekend beforehand I have my outfits all laid out and pretty, ready to go. I usually have my satchel stocked with the books and handouts I'll need for the first day of classes so when I get up, I can grab them and go. Aside from the basic lesson plans themselves, I don't really have much else done. I've been teaching for so long at this point (entering my fifth year of it now; 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, and now 2014) that most of it is like second nature. As you know, I take pride in my teaching, and I'm at ease in a classroom when many are not. Because of that I do tend to have this natural ability to "wing it" even when I don't have a lot to go on, or when lesson plans fall through. This doesn't happen a lot, mind you, but when it does I can (and will) have a "tuck and roll" backup plan I put into action.

I should spend at least some of my weekend taking care of the odds-and-ends stuff around the house that I won't really get a lot of time to do once classes start back up. I need to clean off my fan and change the furnace filters, for example -- things I've needed to do for weeks. I need to put away my laundry and clean the cat room/litter box, even though the garbage/recycling pickup will be delayed a day this week because of MLK Day. I need to shave. I need to clean my coffeemaker. Stuff like that. Little things that don't have anything to do with school, but will be things I won't have a lot of time for and/or will slip my mind once I get back to the daily grind of teaching, coming home, eating, and sleeping.

As you may know, my sleep schedule when I return to teaching for any given semester becomes a complete wreck. I've been trying to regulate it at least somewhat over the course of the past few days so that I can get into a good cycle of sleeping at night, fairly early, and getting up in the morning fairly early, but my apparent inability to stay on that pattern is what really messes with me. I almost always have insomnia during the semester at least one or two nights a week, which is why last semester I had to resort to using sleeping pills semi-frequently in order to force myself to get some real rest when I needed it and not when I wanted it -- when I wanted it, it was almost always between 1 and 4PM. I can't tell you how difficult that can sometimes be for me, especially when I'm stuck awake all night (or most of the night) when I know I have to be on campus for twelve hours straight, or more, the next day, with no opportunity to sleep before then. I credit the dollar-aisle-at-Walmart sleeping pills for helping me get through the semester without passing out during my long days of teaching/grading, and even some days I still took a nap in my office on West campus. I apparently need much more sleep than I will ever be able to get, even in my downtime, and I don't know why.

"Are you sure you want to have kids, then?" Daisy always asks me when I bring up the fact that I'm almost constantly tired to some degree or another. "Because that means getting up in the middle of the night for feedings when they cry, changing diapers, calming them down when they have nightmares at 3AM, etc."

"Yes, I'm sure," I always reply. "As for feedings, you're the one with the boobs."

"What if I pump? Will you get up in the middle of the night and give the kid a bottle?"

"Well yes, obviously. There's a good chance I'll be awake anyway."

This is true. Of course, we don't know what our financial/job/living situation will be when we have children, but if everyone else can figure out children, I don't know why we can't. We're both really intelligent people.

Anyway.

Because they've been shorthanded (one of the sister offices for the company had to reassign a bunch of employees, or something) Daisy has been getting a lot of hours at work, and many of them are overtime hours -- this means she's pulling in a substantially larger paycheck now, for the time being, than she was before. It's not glamorous work, of course, but it is good, good money for what she does, even if it means she works an extra day every week. She doesn't really mind it that much -- the financial upside is more important than the irritating downside. I feel the same way about teaching as an adjunct professor. I've been told many times (and it is, to a great extent, true) that adjuncting is little more than slave labor with no real benefits and long hours. And it is -- I don't get any automatic benefits, no sick days or vacation days (my "vacation days" are the time off between semesters, and I don't get paid for them) and I don't get paid a lot. But, I get experience to add to my CV. I get paid enough, when the paychecks roll in every two weeks, to cover my bills and my expenses, as long as said bills and expenses aren't extravagant. No, I'm not driving a new car or living in a massive mansion with a big-screen TV, but I get by just fine on teaching three classes a semester, and while it may not be completely ideal, it is for the most part at least comfortable. Yeah, I have debts. Yeah, I'll have to spend a few months paying down my credit cards again. But at least I don't have to sell my belongings (ahem, anymore) to be able to keep the lights on and feed myself and the cats. Yes, Daisy makes more than me in her job -- something like 4x more than me -- but that doesn't bother me. I know that I won't always be an adjunct professor, and when the time is right and the opportunity presents itself, I know I'll move up to something better, with a thick and glorious CV/resume to show for it. Daisy feels the same way about her current position as well, and depending on our financial and living situation after the wedding, she may be leaving her job before I leave mine.

As mentioned before, it's really windy today -- they've clocked wind gusts at 51mph here in Newton. It is, however, 55 degrees outside, and I've turned off the furnace and opened the windows to air out the house a bit while it's warm and the wind is blowing. It is cloudy, however, and this irritates the cats because the sun on the floor of my Man Cave keeps disappearing, making them shift their positions around the room almost constantly to be able to lay in it. I've had, as alluded to above, a relatively lazy day -- I've done little more than recharge/reload my mp3 player and drink coffee for the past three hours. Oh, I made my office hours sign for my door on the main campus as well. I forgot about that. I don't technically have to hold "set" office hours as a professor; only the GTAs have to do that, but I do it as a courtesy during the times I'll be on main campus simply because the department wants to know when and how often we'll all be in our offices. Nobody came to my main campus office hours once last semester, though I did have many students come to the "informal" hours I held on West campus in the corner office they stuck me in. I was only in my office twice a week last semester, on Monday/Wednesday mornings, for only a few hours at a time. This semester I'll only be on main campus once a week, on Tuesday afternoons.

On that note, I'm going to get off here now and take care of some of that "around the house" stuff. I got new toilet bowl cleaner/scrubber when I was out at the Dollar Tree, so that's the first task on my agenda. Then I'll probably shower, shave, and eat at some point. I'll update you, of course, on anything new that comes up.

Groceried

Countdown to Spring Semester: four days

Daisy arrived last night as planned, and we did our grocery shopping at around 1AM. I now have a refrigerator and pantry fully stocked with foods and food-making commodities, at no small expense to me -- another $129 charged on ye olde Discover card. Again, for the moment, it can't be helped; even though I start teaching again on Tuesday, I won't be paid for the university for another two weeks. It's hard to believe that it's (still) been less than a month since my last paycheck when all of the bills start piling up, demanding to be paid. My Citi card bill and my cable (read: internet) bill both came in the mail yesterday.

In addition to our shopping, Daisy's mother sent a big bag of groceries and stuff out of the fridge/pantry with her so that we could cook even if we didn't really do a lot of shopping. This included several heads of lettuce, potatoes, carrots, tomatoes, and a few other little things, as well as some oranges. She also sent a loaf of bread dough for us to bake while Daisy was here. Again, I adore Daisy's mother. I love her whole family.

We have a few little errands to run today; Daisy is showering before breakfast, and then we're going to go to the Dollar Tree (as I usually save that trip for when Daisy is here). We also have to briefly return to Walmart, as last night when we were there, they were waxing the floors around the dairy cases, which means I couldn't get the almond milk I need in order to make her/us waffles. Tonight we're having a "veggie bake" for dinner, though I'm not sure exactly what that entails (she's going to do it) and Boca burgers. Mama sent some spaghetti and sauce as well, and I was going to make that for us last night when we got home from shopping (as Daisy was hungry) but instead she had black beans and salsa with chips and lettuce. I myself am not hungry at the moment, even though I haven't really eaten anything since yesterday afternoon. So, tonight when we make dinner, it's going to be good.

Once we get the almond milk, of course, I'll be able to make Daisy some waffles and she'll be able to have breakfast in the morning before she leaves for Omaha again. She works tomorrow night, as tomorrow is Friday. I don't think she even gets Monday off for MLK Day -- unless she gets holiday pay or holiday time off that night, she'll work straight through 'til Tuesday morning, when I begin teaching my classes for the semester.

As for the other stuff I got while shopping, it was all necessities and the like not just for our cooking today/tonight, but for the next week or so. When I go shopping, I can't just do it for a day's worth of food and groceries -- I have to plan ahead, and plan ahead even more so when I'll be returning to work and won't have time or energy to make a Walmart trip at 3AM anymore. This means I had to get cat litter, toilet paper, cigarettes, bread and rolls, and stuff for rather quick, easy meals for the foreseeable future -- like $1 "rice sides," Hot Pockets, steam-in-the-microwave broccoli, a bag of potatoes (I can make a baked potato in the microwave in five minutes), etc. That's why the shopping trip last night was so expensive -- if I'd just gotten stuff for today and tomorrow when Daisy is here, it would've been much cheaper. However, as I was basically out of food and necessities in the house, it couldn't really be avoided. I have to eat, wipe my ass, and be able to plan out meals while I'm teaching, and the cats have to be able to use their litter pan.

I still don't have access to my classes' rosters and the like, but I'm guessing a big part of that is because there was a posting yesterday that said the English department was closed, as both administrators had migraines. However, as I wrote last night, all of my class prep stuff is done now but the printing and copies of the syllabi and lesson plans. To be sure that I wouldn't lose all of my new work from the past week or so (regarding those lesson plans and new syllabi), I made a backup of all of it this afternoon. I'd want to kill and/or destroy something if, after spending hours plotting out the first half or so of the semester, I lost it all. I probably won't get the chance to check up on my rosters again until Daisy goes home tomorrow. We still haven't gotten the finalized teaching schedule either, though I would imagine if there was any problem with it (at least for my own classes) I would've been contacted long before now.

Ritual Cleansing, Part II

Countdown to Spring Semester: five days

I slept until almost noon, when I heard a car's tires driving over the ice in the driveway. This woke me out of a dead sleep, and I sprung out of bed to dash to the window to see if it was Daisy. I'd overslept (by a long time) and if she'd left the house right after work, it could have been her.

It wasn't. It was my neighbors coming home from work (they work really odd hours at Walmart, and all three of them work there on different shifts).

By the time I gathered myself and went upstairs, I was fully awake and no longer confused or jarred by the swift punch of reality that greeted me upon my awakening. I checked my messages to see when Daisy had left...and found nothing.

Odd, I thought, but not too odd, considering it's Daisy.

I'd messaged her last night before I went to bed to tell her that I needed to sleep, and that I didn't know when I'd get up. This was shortly after 3AM, as by that time I'd exhausted myself enough to try to sleep again. She'd responded telling me she'd gone out to lunch with friends (because, yes, there are places in Omaha that are open all night), twenty minutes after I'd gone to bed. But I had no further messages from her.

"Okay....well...eight hours later and no ETA, no updates, dunno where you are or when you're getting here, etc..."

My message was met with no response.

"Helllooooo"

No response.

"HEWWOOOOO"

No response. 

An hour later: "Okay, I must make the assumption that you are either 1.) sleeping, 2.) driving, 3.) dead in a ditch somewhere. I'd rather you weren't dead in a ditch somewhere, obviously, but where the hell are you?"

An hour after that, she responds and tells me that she took a one-hour power nap when she got home from work, and didn't wake up. So, really, her one-hour nap turned into six hours of sleep. She said that she was awake and would be leaving the house soon. I told her that she should probably get something to eat (she usually stops at Subway in York) because since she would be getting here late and we wouldn't be able to do any of our shopping until after she does get here, I have nothing in the house for her to eat. I don't even have anything else in the house for me to eat, really -- not even sandwich stuff. I ate the last of most of my foodstuffs yesterday and the day before, as I knew we'd be making a shopping trip once she was here. 

I have since gone out to the gas station down the street and purchased a pack of cigarettes and a fountain soda. I'm not doing any real shopping until she gets here and settles in -- there's no point to it, and grocery shopping with her is one of my little pleasures in life. It's fun. Plus, until she's here, I don't know what we plan to eat or what she wants, as we tend to plan our meals when she's here around what she'd like to have. This is, of course, because she's vegan. We cook and make good, healthy meals when Daisy is in town, and I love planning out those meals with her. 

So there's nothing left to do, really, but wait. As usual. Again, I know at this point that I should always add about eight to twelve hours to Daisy's original planned arrival time, as this is who she is. I keep hoping she'll one day prove me wrong and show up at the time she originally told me she'd be here, thus proving that the woman does indeed have the capacity and ability to keep a schedule, but that hasn't happened yet.

I can't blame her, of course -- it's a long drive, she worked all night, and it's not like she gets a lot of sleep when she is off work. Daisy is one of those people who work nights but also tries to have a social life and spend time with her family...which doesn't really work, but she tries. She ends up sacrificing a lot of sleep and downtime for it. I, on the other hand, found that when I worked night shifts for years on end, all I wanted to do was eat and sleep when I was done with work, and accepted that I wouldn't have this thing called a "social life" or see that big glowing ball in the sky they told me was "the sun."

In the time until she arrives, I am taking care of the stuff around the house that I've needed to do -- I mean, I'm awake and have to stay that way (the four or five "energy boost" syrup shots I squirted into the soda at the gas station fountain is helping with that, believe me), so why not? I have washed all of the sheets and blankets, which I meant to do last night but forgot, and while I wait for the water heater to give me hot water again so that I can shower, I have gone about reconstructing the syllabus for my 102 class, as well as creating the first unit's daily lesson plan. Both are ready for printing and copies. With that, all three of my classes are about as "prepped for" as they can be at this point, and all that remains is to create my rosters and send out welcome messages to my classes...once I have access to and can do those things, of course. I guess I could create handout folders and the like as well, but as most of that stuff is at work locked up in my office, well...

Ahem. Anyway.

Daisy and I have no real plans while she's here, which I mentioned before. The weather's nice, at least. Not too cold, but not in the 60s like it was last weekend. The house is comfortable. We'll do our shopping and probably relax -- and sleep. I know she needs sleep. There aren't any movies playing right now that are at all interesting to me; about the only one playing I'd be remotely interested in is Frozen, and she already went to see it over New Year's with her nephew. January is a terrible month for movies, apparently. I did, however, ask her if she wants to go see the Robocop remake when she's here over Valentine's Day, as that will be the next time she comes down. She hasn't given me an answer on that yet, by the way. She's never seen the original (and hadn't even heard of it, which tells you the kind of media she consumes) but I sent her a link to the trailer for the new one a few nights ago to see if she'd be interested.

When I went to the gas station earlier to get my cigarettes, I had to... sigh... I had to put product in my hair. Product. Mousse, specifically. My hair is getting to the point where it'll have days it looks fabulous, and then it'll have days when I get up looking like a gnarly hobo meth addict. The only thing that'll solve that problem is a shower, and as I wasn't going to shower before making a ten-minute trip to the gas station, mousse it was.

I sigh because I'm not a "hair product" person. In fact, I hate the term product in reference to hair, and I hate anything being in my hair. It's a last-resort scenario. 

You may be asking why I even care what my hair looks like for a ten-minute trip outdoors to the gas station for cigarettes, a gas station that I've gone to while wearing pajama pants and slippers before. It's because I do, despite all appearances to the contrary at times, have a modicum of class and self-worth.

A few weeks ago, I told Daisy I have some class. Her response? "Psh, yeah, and I have a skinny ass."

Said in jest, of course. Daisy would never seriously insult anybody, least of all me. Daisy is the kindest, most positive person I've ever met. And she's marrying an evil, spiteful, insults-are-funny man. Opposites, apparently, do attract.

As for the "ritual cleansing," most of that is done. I vacuumed the upstairs quickly, including my room, and did a once-over of the downstairs that I now have to do again as the cats decided to tear more stuffing out of the box springs on the bed last night (which they do all the time). And I'm sure, if I scavenge enough around the house, I can find something to make to eat so that I won't be staaaaaarving when Daisy arrives. 

So that's been my day, folks. I'll update you on any and all happenings later.

Ritual Cleansing

Countdown to Spring Semester: six days

I slept from around 8AM to long after 5PM tonight. It was already getting dark by the time I awakened from my slumber -- which, for once, was actually restful sleep. Today seemed to be one of those days where the neighborhood was actually really quiet, for once, and I wasn't awakened by barking dogs or screaming kids or people coming and going. The cats slept with me all day, with the exception of Sadie, who slept upstairs in my chair (which she likes to do during the day).

I have received the syllabus and weekly lesson plans from the 102 director, and can now begin slight modifications and retooling of it for my own purposes for my students. We're using the newer version of the grammar textbook (Writing Matters), so that will be a completely new text for me to get used to. I don't know if we're using the newest version of the actual textbook or not, as a new edition was released this past year. I emailed her to clarify. It doesn't really matter one way or the other, as again, I haven't taught a normal 102 class in two years. But, now that I have the template syllabus and lesson plans, I can dive right in and begin plotting out my weekly schedule for that class. I will probably begin work on that tonight, actually, in hopes that I can cruise through a bunch of it in one sitting.

However, the next 24 hours are going to be a bit odd for me overall anyway. Daisy comes down in the morning after work, which means that even with my messed-up sleeping schedule, I must perform the ritual cleansing -- which is more ritual and less cleansing than one would imagine. I have three cats and all of them shed and puke and have bodily functions in their litter pan. My kitchen is somewhat of a mess. My floors, regardless of the last time I did so, could always use another good vacuuming. My bathroom is consistently a wasteland that cannot be cleaned without purchasing cleaning products I don't have on hand in the house right now.

Additionally, I don't know when Daisy will arrive (I always have an "approximate" estimate, of course, but that always depends heavily on how tired she is and/or anything else that changes said times), and with my sleeping schedule being weird I don't know if I'll sleep again before she gets here or if I'll have to go out and make a shopping trip beforehand -- we plan to shop when she's here, to get groceries and the like, but I don't know if I have enough cigarettes to last me through then, and I'll have to clean/refill the cat box as well, which will make me use the rest of my litter.

So, between lesson planning, cleaning what I can, and a possible short shopping trip before she gets here, I've got a busy night/morning ahead of me.

After talking to one of my close friends in the department, I've also found out that apparently none of us have access to our classes/rosters yet, so I'm not alone there. Again, barring any sweeping changes (which, from my years of experience in that department, never happen), all of us already know what we're teaching, where, and when -- we just don't as of yet have that "instructor of record" access. Knowing that I'm not the only one waiting calms my nerves a little bit -- as an adjunct, I've learned that it's easy to be overlooked and forgotten about unless you stay on top of things, as you are no longer a source of income or cheap/nearly free labor for the university (as GTAs are) but you are now an employee, which means you are a drain on their income. Little things -- such as the slip-up with the payroll/background check forms at the beginning of last semester -- will mean major hold-ups unless you're on top of those things from the get-go, and because 90% of that stuff is out of your hands, you have to pay attention and make sure it's all going smoothly.

"Are you going to stay awake until I get there?" Daisy asked me a few minutes ago.

"I don't know," I replied. "I have to vacuum, clean the kitchen and stove, and empty the cat box. I may have to run to Walmart in the night, depending on whether I need cigarettes or not, and I'll probably spend time working on my lesson plans and syllabus for my 102 class. But I don't know. I just got up like two hours ago, so it's not like I'm tired now, but six or seven hours from now? Who knows."

That's me being completely honest, by the way. I've had a fair amount of coffee, and I have work to do around the house, but I have no real clue when I'll sleep again as of right now.

Patient Zero

It's 5:19 AM. I went to bed around 7PM, fell asleep for good around 9:30, then got up and have been awake since around 2AM.

My sleep schedule is wrecked. I haven't been getting satisfying rest. At least not truly satisfying rest. I'll sleep for a few hours at most before I am awakened by something (or by my own body/mind for some reason) and then I'm up. Just, well, up.

Last night, before bed, my ear started bothering me again. Congestion and popping a lot, pain, etc. Sinus-related, I'm sure. Allergy-related, I'm even more sure. It went away when I went to sleep, but when I woke up I had (and still have) a rather nasty headache. The weather is changing again, I suppose -- we're under a "wind advisory" for the majority of the day, and wind gusts are supposed to be 35-50mph. Apparently, anyway. I mean, I doubt I'll be awake for a lot of it. I don't plan to be, anyway.

I'd like to be able to explain away my sleep issues and allergies and the like to stress, as I am usually able to do during the semester and when I'm having a lot of financial woes, but right now I really can't -- because of Daisy's help, my bills are taken care of (or will be) for the rest of the month. I don't have any true responsibilities for another week, as I won't start teaching again until the 21st. Daisy is coming down tomorrow. I don't really have any stresses right now. Life is, for most intents and purposes, pretty good for the time being. I don't know if I'll be saying that in another six or eight weeks, as the semester's work will be in full swing by then and I'll be consumed by it, but right now I can't explain things away by using the blanket term "stress" because I'm really at the least stressed I've been since before Christmas. Hell, since Finals Week, really.

Am I getting sick? Doubtful. I finished my run of Bactrim for my sinus infection several days ago, and physically I've been feeling much, much better since I started them two weeks ago. I've also only left the house twice in the past two weeks, both times for groceries. It's not like I've run into anyone who could be carrying diseases. I haven't even seen another person face to face in well over a week. And it's not like the cats go cruising about the town, bringing home plagues or other illnesses. They mostly just sleep on my lap or on the bed with me, eat, meow, and be sweet.

I read a news story about an hour ago that said the hospitals in Wichita are currently at or nearing capacity because of the flu. Capacity. Meaning, they're full. Doctors are urging that instead of people coming to the hospital, they go to their primary care physicians for treatment regardless of illness (unless it's an emergency, of course) because there's no room for them.

Yeah, apparently the flu is bad this year.

I've had the flu maybe three or four times my entire life. I'm 31. And I mean real flu, not "a bad cold" or "stomach flu" or anything like that. Those are different. No, I mean aches-and-pains, can't-get-out-of-bed, high-fever flu. I got it at the end of my first semester of grad school, and it led to a sinus and ear infection afterwards (as most of my illnesses do). Yet, in all of my years, I've never gotten a flu shot. Not even as a GTA or professor. Not even when I teach classrooms full of patient zeroes and vectors for disease several times a week. My immune system, generally, is pretty good. Yes, I get sick sometimes. The sinus infections I get are sometimes brutal. I'll occasionally get a chest infection or what feels like bronchitis, which I'm sure isn't helped by my smoking. I'll occasionally get a really bad cold or stomach virus that will knock me flat for a few days. Everyone gets sick. I usually only get really sick once a year or less. There's a reason I had a perfect attendance record for my entire high school career, after all. No, that's not a joke.

Daisy, as you may have gathered from previous posts here over the past eighteen months or so, is almost the exact opposite. If she's around anyone who's sick or has been sick in the past several weeks, she gets it. Quickly. Being around her (our) nieces and nephews so often, she's exposed to more sicknesses than most. She gets sick at least once a month for a few days, whether it's a cold or her sinuses or stomach issues or what-have-you. I always worry that she's going to give me something, or that the family (kids included) is going to give me something when I visit, but so far I've been immune to their illnesses -- remember that everyone in the house had been sick within a week's time when I was there for Christmas, and I was around and spending time with all of them, yet I was fine and remained fine once I returned home, with nothing bothering me but the sinus infection I'd then had for over a month. Daisy, of course, got sick for a few days after I came back home. Why am I detailing all of this? Because knowing me, I'll be the guy who is the carrier of viruses in our household, but won't get sick from them -- instead, me going to teach 75 students a week and bringing home their germs will make Daisy sick.

Or, y'know, it's possible that I've just been lucky thus far, and now that I've said this, I'll get a crippling superflu in the next few weeks. Again, tempting the fates rarely goes well for Brandon.

So, I'm awake, and now it's 6AM. I think forward to this time next week, when I'll be getting up right about now for my first day of classes for the semester. We're in the single digits now of vacation days I have left of winter break. 2.5 of those remaining days will be spent with Daisy, and the rest will be spent prepping for classes and trying to turn my sleep schedule back around. I've been trying mentally to prepare myself for the semester, to ready myself to re-enter the world of academia and all that entails, including showering on a daily basis and dressing nicely, keeping myself groomed, re-adjusting to a schedule of things to do and days/times to do it, etc. The first week or three back is always difficult, but it's difficult on a physical and psychological level as I need to get used to my rhythms again. I have trouble sleeping enough as it is, but when that sleep deprivation is bookended by responsibilities, things to do, and places to be, I either adjust rapidly or I crumble until I can adjust. The one thing I miss the most during any given semester is time -- it moves rapidly, moves even more rapidly in the spring, and seems to fly by when I have more decompression time between classes (as I will this semester). That's good on some levels and terrifying on others -- time flying by is a bad thing when some of that time must be used to help prep for the wedding, the travel, and the monetary issues involved with it and its aftermath. It's good when I don't have time to hand-wring about finances and other issues because I'm preoccupied with work and paychecks are coming in which rectify those issues.

The wind outside is picking up a bit now; I can hear it whipping through the trees. My plans for the rest of the day are to bring the garbage cans back up and to get the mail from yesterday (since I went to bed early last night and forgot to do either of those tasks), to get a shower, and to go back to bed for a few hours. I've already taken sinus/pain pills for my allergies and headache -- I did so hours ago -- and if they don't really work and I feel like I can't rest, I'll drink NyQuil to clear out my allergies and pass out for a good chunk of time, as I seem to need it.

As for the stuff with my classes, I still don't have access to my other rosters in Banner or in Blackboard, though I would imagine that will, again, soon be rectified if for no other reason than payroll issues. My 102 class currently has eight students in it, four of whom were my 101 students last semester. I don't know how many my 210 or 011 classes have. 011 is capped at 20, and 210 is capped at 25. If all three classes fill up, the most students I'll have this semester is 70 -- which, of course, will never happen. Aside from the fact that 70 students would be a lot for me personally to handle, the 102 class on West campus will probably not get much larger than it is now, if at all. And the 011 class is a night class, which means it'll either be empty or it'll be completely full -- there's not really going to be a middle ground there. The 210 classes are almost always full. Regardless, I'll find out my "magic number" of total students within the next few days, and I'll be able to better plan lessons and the like around those totals.

Okay. Off to the shower and bed now. More updates soon.

The Coming Weeks, Part II

With one week left before classes begin (not counting today, of course, as a week from today is MLK Day) I've gotten my affairs, so to speak, in about as much order as I can get them in preparation for the semester. I have created/retooled lesson plans for the 210 class as well as my once-a-week 011 class, and the 102 Director has told me she'll get a copy of the syllabus and the weekly lesson plan to me by tomorrow -- the date, I assume, she'll be sending them out to everyone who teaches 102 this semester. Once I get it, I will shape and modify it to my own ends, and I will be proverbially "set" to start teaching next week.

I have not yet been listed as the instructor of record for my other two classes on Banner or Blackboard, though that will happen within the next two or three days at most, I assume -- and I doubt it'll even take that long. I expect the finalized schedule to be sent out to all of us sometime tomorrow morning so that we do have a full week to prepare for everything. Sometimes this is how it works, sometimes it's not, but I'm guessing everything will be proverbially "set in stone" within the next several days. As for payroll, I don't know how that works, though I should still get a check on the 31st -- though whether it will be for all three classes I'm teaching or just the one I've had on the docket for well over a month remains to be seen. That all gets sorted out by the second administrator of the department, and it's usually smoothed out pretty quickly. There are set dates for payroll reporting before checks are issued, and I believe the cutoff for the 31st would be this Friday -- though I, of course, could be wrong.

As weird as it may seem, I am looking forward to getting back to work. My schedule isn't as soul-crushing or draining as it was last semester, even though I'm teaching the same number of courses. Yes, it's still three different classes with three different lesson plans to follow, but it's much, much more manageable this time around, giving me time to eat and sleep and actually relax somewhat. This is good, as I'll need the extra downtime/decompression time as the days 'til my wedding are continually counting down.

Because of my financial situation and not getting paid for six weeks, as you know, it's been difficult for me to be able to cover my bills. Daisy helped me with that, a few days ago when she got paid, by wire-transferring some money into my bank account. Both of us are scraping by right now, which is tough on us. However, the good news that I've gotten three classes this semester and her ability to pick up extra hours/days at work (for overtime pay) has helped power us through this rather shitty situation. The money she gave me she'll be able to make up for in a day and a half working the extra hours she was offered -- if it even takes her that long. She was originally supposed to come down here tomorrow morning to stay until Friday, but because she was offered this overtime and given an opportunity to make more money, she'll be working tomorrow and then coming down here on Wednesday. She's not doing it because she has to; she's doing it because she wants to and because her offices are shorthanded -- it's mere coincidence that she was offered this opportunity at the same time she wired me money to cover my bills. Also, without her help, I wouldn't be able to get through the rest of this month's expenses -- so, apparently, luck sort of shines on us again.

Over the past several days, because of recent developments, I've been trying to stay as positive as possible about everything in my life. The teaching schedule was very helpful in that, obviously. I have a renewed vigor and energy to take care of tasks in and around the house. To those ends, I've tried to clean most things I can, have taken care of all of the laundry, dishes, and vacuuming, have taken out the trash and recycling for the first time in three weeks (snowstorms, cold, and ice prevented me from taking the cans down to the road for the past two weeks), and I have paid the bills I've had come in the mail -- including the ungodly-high electric bill. Thankfully (read: finally) it's been in the 50s and 60s this week -- yesterday it was almost 70, setting all sorts of high temperature records around here for the date -- and I've been able to turn off the furnace a few days in a row now in favor of opening my windows and enjoying some fresh, not-recirculated-and-dry air. It's not supposed to get really cold again for the foreseeable future, and this means I can once more only run the furnace when absolutely necessary. I can already see my electric bill being high for January -- this, perhaps, will lessen the blow a bit. I know I'll have to run it in the overnight hours at least sometimes, as it's still winter and that can't really be avoided, but the change in temperature and outside weather will definitely save me a bit of money. It's 55 outside now, even, according to my weather app on my desktop.

When Daisy comes down later this week, I'll have to do some grocery shopping with her. Aside from the fact that I love grocery shopping with her, it's not something that can be avoided even if I wanted to avoid it. Since my last grocery trip about a week ago, I have managed to run myself out of most household essentials again, and when she comes down I actually, y'know, have to cook stuff for us to eat, which isn't something I generally do on a regular basis unless I have the time to do so and the materials to work with. Because of this, my refrigerator is pretty bare. I have some bread, cheese, and lunchmeat, along with some beer and the 3-gallon jug of filtered water, and condiments in the door...but aside from that, the fridge is almost completely empty. There aren't really any vegan foodstuffs in the freezer, either, unless she brought them down here herself. I don't have any vegetables, any pastas, sauces, or other cooking supplies, and I've basically been eating what I have in there and have ready to go (soups, ramen, sandwiches, etc). That's just how I live on a very small food budget -- usually one meal a day, and something small at that. The money she wired me isn't for food or anything like that; it was to be sure I could cover my bills. I'm still functionally broke until the paychecks start coming in again in a few weeks, and any groceries have been purchased with my parents' Visa gift cards or with my ungodly-high-limited Discover card. I don't really have a choice there until I can start getting paid again for the semester and can use my money for things other than bills, which will probably take me until at least the end of February, if not longer.

Still, it's not like I'm starving or anything. People always seem to worry about me when I make statements like that. I have enough to eat, believe me. My current situation is far from ideal, of course -- I'm not eating steaks and twice-baked potatoes every night while sipping chardonnay or anything -- but I'll live and I'll be fine, and so will the cats. Everything is straightening itself out; it just takes time.

Over the course of the next week I have a lot to take care of; most of it's little things, of course -- get gas in the car when necessary, do my shopping, ready teaching outfits/folders/handouts, etc -- but it's enough to keep me busy and occupied, and as you know I thrive when I'm constantly occupied and have tasks to do. When I'm on a schedule of some sort, any sort, it tends to regulate my body and mind to the point where I can focus, think clearly, and get the things done that need to be done when it becomes necessary that they be done. I know full well that the next several weeks are going to be challenging for me on multiple levels, but I also know that I'll be able to rise to the challenge instead of being crushed by it.

The spring semester this year runs very similarly to last year -- Finals Week is at the same time, Spring Break is at (roughly) the same time, graduation is a day before it was last year, etc. It is also no secret that it's much easier to teach and navigate through the spring semester compared to the fall semester, which feels like a long, brutal slog by comparison. Spring is light and fluffy -- all of the bad weather is usually gone by about a third of the way through it, and it's replaced with warm temperatures and lighter evening hours (so I can actually see in the dark when I'm driving at night, which is a plus). The workloads seem lighter. The days begin and end more freely. Everyone seems to be in a much better mood and more social than in the fall. Soon, I won't have to dress in multiple layers anymore, and will be able to begin breaking out the t-shirts, shorts, and sandals again. Almost everything about the spring semester is better than the fall.

Now that I've said that, we'll probably receive a brutal, crippling snowstorm about a month from now. That would be right around Valentine's Day. Mark your calendars, folks -- since I've now taunted/tempted fate, I'm sure there will be swift retribution.

Of course, remember that not all spring semesters are like this -- last spring, for example, it snowed right up until Finals Week in May...and then a week later it was 90 degrees.

I won't even see the main campus next week until Tuesday afternoon sometime; I will teach my first class of the semester without books because I'll be teaching it on the West campus, and won't be able to pick up said books until after that class is over. Since that's also the 102 class, I don't know what books to tell my students to get -- there's a new edition of the textbook we've been using for 102, and I don't know if we're using the new one, the old one, or another one altogether (as there have been maaaany complaints lodged against that one over the years). I do know that they have to get the normal 102 workbook, and that said workbook has been retooled and modified to contain almost everything they need for their assignments since the last time I used it. I will get more details, of course, on everything they'll need in the next few days -- though it's not like I'll have any of those in my hands regardless before that afternoon.

Tuesday is the only day I'm on the main campus this semester -- Wednesday and Thursday I'm on the West campus exclusively: Wednesday night and Thursday morning. While I could, conceivably, go back and forth between campuses on the latter days, there's no real need for me to do so and it just makes me use more gas in the car -- and, more than anything else, it would make those days that much longer. Wednesday I'm there for my night 210 class and nothing else. Thursday morning I'm there, in-and-out for my 102 class. I have to do what I can on main campus on Tuesday afternoons when I'm there between my two classes. Doesn't leave a whole lot of time for dilly-dallying around, no, but it means I get more time at home.

So that's where things stand right now. I haven't eaten anything today, so my plans for the evening hours are to make something for dinner and, eventually, go back to bed. The temperature is starting to drop a bit as the sun sets, so  I'll probably turn the furnace back on in another hour or two. Daisy has to work tonight (and tomorrow night, as mentioned above), so I'll not get a whole lot of socialization time with her until she gets here on Wednesday...at which point she'll more than likely just go straight to bed. I wouldn't blame her if she did, as she doesn't get a whole lot of sleep as it is, and she will have just worked an overtime shift before driving down here.

I will, of course, update you when anything else happens or changes, as always.

The Coming Weeks

Well, I finally had one of my wishes granted this week -- as of last night, I now know what I'll be teaching in the spring, at least preliminarily anyhow. I have a schedule very similar to last semester's schedule, though with a lot more downtime and "resting hours," so to speak:

Monday: OFF
Tuesday: English 102 (mornings, West campus); English 011 (night, main campus)
Wednesday: English 210 (night, West campus)
Thursday: English 102 (same class as Tuesday, West campus)
Friday: OFF

As you can see, the two other classes I've been given are night classes, and Tuesday will be my only "long day" of the week where I'll be out of the house all day from morning until night. Teaching on both campuses on Tuesday may be a little trickier than originally planned, but as I will teach on West campus early that morning and not have to be back on Main campus until 7PM to teach the 011 class that night, it shouldn't be too difficult at all.

The 210 class above is the one I basically volunteered for last semester anyway; I knew they'd be teaching it on West campus, and as it was a Wednesday night class and a full semester class (as opposed to the eight-week class I taught last semester) I had already told all of them that if they needed someone to do it, I was their guy. The 011 class is basically the same, as well -- they know I like teaching 011 and find it fun, and they can't really schedule GTAs to teach night classes unless said GTAs don't have any classes at night. As most GTAs will almost always have a Wednesday night class at 7PM, and I don't, well...there you go.

It also means that if I don't want to, I don't have to leave the house on Wednesdays until, oh, 6PM? Ish? Something like that. I can sleep in and/or sleep all day if necessary before making the quiet, don't-worry-about-traffic-or-parking drive to West campus that night to teach that class.

The 102 class, as you know, is the one I knew I'd have waaaaay back in November, and it contains more than half the students I taught for 101 last semester. I can also turn around and come home on Thursday mornings again when I'm done, to start my weekend at 11AM that day (roughly, anyway).

This is, really, a very ideal schedule for me. I'm teaching three classes again, so I'll be making about the same amount every paycheck that I made last semester, give or take (depending on any updated tax stuff and the like; it can fluctuate a little here and there between semesters). I won't have to teach on Mondays this semester, so it's an extra "weekend day" for me. I'll be on the main campus in my office, for a few hours every week, and only on Tuesday afternoons/evenings. I'll have plenty of time to sleep and grade without becoming too stressed out and/or frazzled. I'll be able to piece my budget and finances back together, and get myself back in the black in about another six weeks or so. The schedule is even good in case of really nasty weather -- because two of the classes are evening classes, if we get a nasty snowstorm or something like that, the university will cancel evening classes for the evening first before deciding whether or not they're closing campus the next day, depending on when the weather is supposed to hit. If I have to cancel a class of my own for weather-related issues (even if the university doesn't close), because of the schedule and the fact that I have all sixteen-week classes, I have wiggle room. I have even more wiggle room because I still have the lesson plans for the 011 and 210 classes that I used last semester, which I will only have to modify slightly for lessons and due-dates based on class meeting times.

I actually hope that we do get some crippling snowstorms at some point; it'll give me mini-vacations if school closes down for a day or two.

Unfortunately, it's not all good; this schedule, while it gives me a lot more free time and breathing space for the semester, also cuts into my time with Daisy again pretty harshly and creates a veritable minefield to navigate when it comes to her visits and our wedding planning. As you may know, Daisy works weekends -- Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday nights. Those are my days off. All of them. Her schedule won't change; we're on completely opposite schedules again. When my weekend starts, her work week starts, and when my work week ends, hers starts up again. It basically looks like we'll be getting most of our time together on Thursdays/Thursday nights, as that's the only time we have real overlap in our schedules. She's taken Valentine's Day off so that she can come down here during the week beforehand, but even that is going to be a tough workaround as she'd be coming down on that Wednesday night (when I teach 210 until 10PM) and she'd have to sleep during the teaching of my 102 class on Thursday morning just to be able to get Valentine's Day with me. It's all do-able, yes, but the travel and the little time we have together is far from ideal, especially as we get closer to the wedding.

My mother keeps asking me about wedding planning stuff, and I don't have a whole lot to tell her; most of that planning has been on hiatus because of not knowing what I would be doing for money/survival over the course of the next few months. Now that I know, I can more easily help Daisy plan things and I won't be so constantly hand-wringing over impending financial doom. Looking ahead to the future is all fine and good, of course, but it's really hard to do that when you don't know how you're going to be able to eat and keep the lights on in your home. That sort of overshadowed everything else for the past several weeks since Christmas.

I emailed the department administrator to give her my thanks and tell her that my schedule looked great. I'm guessing it will all be finalized by tomorrow or Monday at the latest, and I'll have access to all of my classes on Blackboard and Banner shortly thereafter. She sends out the "preliminary" schedule so that if anyone has any conflicts -- especially GTAs who are taking other classes -- those issues can be quickly rectified and taken care of before everything is officially entered into the system. If there are no issues, that schedule is finalized and entered into the system ASAP afterwards. This afternoon, I redid the syllabus and updated the lesson plan for my 011 class, as it's gone from a twice-a-week to a once-a-week course (meaning I basically have to cram an entire week's lessons into one day), and I'll have to email the 102 director to get an updated syllabus/lesson plan from her as the 102 course parameters have been changed since I last taught a normal, non-Engineering version of the course. Said director adores me, so that shouldn't be a problem. I'll mess around with the 210 lesson plans last, as they're the ones which should require the least amount of true modifications to them, and I still have most of them ready and edit-able for the coming semester.

As for the deep freeze I've been under for the better part of the past week? It finally lifted about two days ago. Yesterday it was 41, and today it's been in the 30s and cloudy. By the end of the weekend -- right about the time when Daisy will arrive in town for a few days with me next week -- it's supposed to be in the upper 50s/near 60 again, so all of this snow and ice on the ground and on my driveway should melt off fairly quickly. I took the car out yesterday and went to Walmart to get some essentials, essentials I purchased with the Visa gift cards my parents gave me for Christmas, and it was pleasant outside. Most of the roads are clear and/or dry, with the exception of some of the side streets around my neighborhood that still have ice/slush/snowpack on them in spots. It's also now warm enough consistently to where I don't have to keep the car in the garage for days or weeks on end. I've driven maybe ten miles in the Monte Carlo since the fall semester ended, all of them back and forth on shopping trips. There's still over half a tank of gas in her. On the plus side, I'll save a bit on gas money over this coming semester, as I'll be driving 50 miles less every week than I did before. That's a good thing.

My plans over the next few days are to do what I can to ready myself for the semester, as well as finish what I have left of Breaking Bad and pay my bills, slowly, as they come in. Now that I know what's coming up, my stress levels have finally gone down considerably, and I can finally begin to relax a bit and enjoy what's left of my "winter break."  As mentioned above, Daisy is more than likely coming down here on Tuesday for a few days so that we can get a little more time together before the semester starts up, and I have but one pill left of my Bactrim, which I'll take tonight before bed. I would imagine that I will, from this point forward, sleep much more easily now that all of the pieces are falling into place.

Deep Freeze, Part II

It's still really, really cold.

I've sort of gotten used to the cold at this point, honestly. No, I don't like it, per se, but I have gotten used to it a bit. I've set the furnace to 52 -- it's about 60 in the house, and I can manage that with the layers I'm wearing and shall continue to wear. When I take a hot shower in a little while, I will make it hot enough to where it basically scalds my skin, which will keep me comfortably warm for a few hours. Currently, it is 7 degrees outside, and feels like -9. This is ten degrees warmer than it was when I awoke this morning, so at least that's something, right?

Neither Daisy nor my parents have it as, ahem, lucky as I do right now; in Omaha, it is -4, and back home in West Virginia, it is -6; this should give you some idea of how far-reaching this arctic blast of cold stretches across the country, for it's over 1,000 miles from here to West Virginia. I'm not sure exactly how cold it got last night before I went to bed; I went to sleep relatively early and slept until long after the sun was up this morning, and even then when I awoke the house felt freezing until I cranked the furnace for a bit.

True to my word, I have not ventured out into the icy tundra, not even to get the mail today. It's supposed to reach 41 tomorrow -- I'll go get the mail then, and will mail my water bill at the same time. Until it's warm enough to move around without my joints freezing up like the old man I am, my ass is staying inside out of the nastiness. I've got enough groceries and supplies to last me until probably Friday or so before I'd have to go shopping again...not that my finances can really support much more shopping until I get paid again and I can start to get back on my feet somewhat. Again, it's not like the cold is really helping that, since the longer it remains cold, the longer the furnace has to run, and the higher my electric bill goes for next month, when my financial future is still uncertain. As it stands, right now for necessities and foodstuffs I have to live on my credit cards, because I cannot spare a cent from my bank account for anything but bills.

I didn't hear anything today about my classes for the spring, though I didn't necessarily expect to; while today was the first day the university has been open since around Christmas, it's so cold that who knows if anyone actually got in to campus to mess with the scheduling stuff. I would imagine, as I mentioned before, that I'll hear something within the next few days, as everyone will need their schedules (especially the adjuncts) with enough breathing space to get everything plotted, ready, and have lesson plans put in place before the semester starts on the 21st, which is two weeks from tomorrow.

Still, until I know what I'll be teaching -- aside from the one class I know I have -- I'm going to be a bit stressed out, understandably. On the off-chance that I get nothing else, which is unlikely but still extremely possible, I will immediately need to get some sort of a second job doing something, somewhere, in order to simply be able to pay my bills. I will have reached the end of my rope on that, and what it is won't matter -- I will have no choice. It's either that or homelessness, which would be a bad thing in the final months counting down to my wedding.

Truth be told, these next few weeks will shape, basically, the rest of the year of 2014. If the right cards fall into place at the right times, everything should be fine. If they don't, or someone/thing throws an unforeseen wrench into the gears, my life will be a life of great upheaval and probably more than a little terror.

Daisy and I had a long talk about this tonight. I made sure to make it clear to her that when I say things like "I hate my life," it doesn't include her, us, our relationship, or any of that -- those things are about the only things in my life right now which are actually going right, the only things which are good. It's everything else that worries and stresses me, like being able to pay my bills and eat. Those things are the stressors; those are the things that I thought, and hoped, would be much different than they are at this point of my life. I'm one of the least entitled people on the planet; I've worked for everything I have one way or another, whether it was physical or psychological work, and for the most part I am very proud of the path I've chosen in life and the work I've done to get to where I am. I just thought I'd be a bit better off than this when it was all said and done, you know?

I've often said that it is really difficult for outsiders (meaning, people other than me, who haven't gone through what I've gone through over the years) to understand fully where I'm coming from. Especially when I see people with the same degrees as I have -- and sometimes less job experience than me -- getting good, stable jobs where they don't have to worry about bills so much, and they can drive a car that doesn't have 230,000 miles on its odometer and isn't almost 20 years old, and they can "level off" and be happy. It's not a jealousy thing; it's more of an awe and frustration. As I told Daisy tonight, I've been skirting by on the bare minimum of luck for a long, long time -- long enough to where sooner or later, it's going to run out one way or another. The fact that my car hasn't died yet is remarkable. The fact that I was able to get a few classes to teach last semester was due to a few small openings in the schedule and because Parker intervened to help out with the scheduling and get it done on time. The fact that I got forbearance on my loans was because I fought through four different sets of paperwork to get everything sent off to the servicers on time, and was still barely lucky enough to make it in before the deadline.

Overall, though, am I happy? Like, as a whole? I suppose. I mean, I'm happy enough given the circumstances. I can only control and take care of so much. Unless Daisy and/or I win the lottery, there's never going to be a time where I'm not stressed and/or worried about something going on. And unless I get a $60k a year tenured professor position where I only have to teach one class a semester, or I fall ass-backwards into a book or screenwriting deal (neither of which I'm lucky enough to have happen), I'll probably never be satisfied with my life -- but that doesn't mean I'm ungrateful for what I have. I'm not; I am incredibly grateful. It's just that I need more than what I have -- more than what I can do, it seems -- to make my problems go away.

In the past 90 minutes or so that I've been writing this, the temperature outside must have dramatically dropped off again -- it's gone down three degrees in my room over the course of the past hour (currently 59.8 degrees) and the furnace, set at 52, just kicked on again. My joints and muscles ache from the cold and I haven't even been outside in it. I really can't wait until it warms up above freezing tomorrow.

Aside from the above mentioned items, there's not a lot going on. It's really quiet here in Newton. Because of the cold, the neighborhood has been almost deathly still, and the only noises I've heard around the area haven't been people coming and going, but the honking of flocks of geese as they fly back and forth at all hours of the day and night. There's a lot of Canadian geese here in Newton; there are many ponds/lakes/low-lying wetlands in the area, and hearing or seeing massive flocks of them at any given time is common. Seeing geese back home in West Virginia was a treat, similar to seeing a hawk fly over. Here there are geese and hawks everywhere, and (amusingly enough) there are a fair number of bald eagles that live out here as well. My point is that when the weather is this cold, I think most humans have the same idea I do, and hole up in their caves until it warms up.

I read stats last night that said the last time it was this cold here was February 2011. I remember that. It was the last terrible winter we had (until this past spring, anyway, where we got two two-foot snowstorms back-to-back, and it snowed all the way into May). It was also (probably) the last time my electric bill was as high as it is this month, due to the furnace. It's not been in the single digits more than once or twice since then, let alone below zero. I don't even run the furnace in the winter most of the time unless the temperature is going to dip well below freezing; I may run it in the mornings to warm myself up when I wake up to go teach, but I turn it way down or turn it off if it's going to get up into the 40s or 50s that day. Again, I may not like it, and I may not really acclimate well to a rapid temperature shift, but after dealing with it for a few days I learn to live and deal with it, and stop feeling so cold or shivering all the time. I think it's a survival skill. At the very least, it's a coping mechanism.

Daisy told me that her car did indeed have trouble starting this morning when she came home from work, and it had a little trouble turning over tonight when she went back in. She's planning to get the battery checked and to get an oil change over the weekend, and said she needs to get more washer fluid as well. I recommended to her that, because she has to park outside 24/7, she get one of the de-icer bottles of washer fluid so that she won't have to scrape and scrape if her windows ice over.

I read a news report that said the flu is bad this year and is widespread around the area, and (in an unrelated report) someone in Pittsburgh has apparently died from swine flu, with another 8 hospitalized because of it. I can take comfort, at least, in the fact that I probably won't become ill with any sort of flu as long as I remain here in the house in my self-imposed quarantine. I often have fantasy scenarios about nationwide pandemics and quarantine orders, because it would mean that I'd suddenly no longer have to worry about going to work and paying bills or rent, since I would assume most of that stuff would be forgotten about in the instance of a terrible pandemic that kills millions. It's much like the "an asteroid is coming to kill us all" scenario -- my first thought would be woohoo, I don't have to pay my bills anymore!

It's probably sad that these are my go-to solutions for solving my problems, isn't it?

An alien invasion or zombie apocalypse would work too. Or fast, dramatic weather/climate changes like in The Day After Tomorrow. Or an apocalypse scenario like This Is The End. Those things would be sort of ideal as well, I guess. Well, except for the zombie one, since I'd probably have to fight for my life every day, but, y'know, small price to pay for freedom. Anything that would keep me from having to pay bills and go to work would be nice. It can't be one or the other; it has to be able to do both.

It's probably more statistically feasible that Daisy and/or I would win the lottery.

On that note, I'm going to bed. I've still not been sleeping well -- last night was terrible, and it wasn't due to the cold -- I just couldn't sleep. I couldn't get comfortable, the cats were always in the way (to the point where I had to move them several times) and I had aches in my muscles and joints, an arm or leg would fall asleep, etc. I don't know if it's the Bactrim giving me some weird side-effect, if it's my allergies, if it's just a general state of restlessness, or what. I just know I'd like to be able to sleep normally, soundly, and comfortably again.

Deep Freeze, Part I

I made the joke yesterday that I didn't think Kansas would get the arctic cold temperatures and snow predicted in the weather forecast, because I was pretty sure it was impossible for Hell to freeze over.

Well, Hell has frozen over.

By dark last night, it was snowing. Hard. A relatively fast-moving system swept through (much as it did last weekend) and dumped another three inches or so of snow on me just as some of the other stuff was starting to melt (meaning I could see parts of the driveway and/or road again). At some point this morning, before I got up at 1PM, the neighbor on the farm next door to us plowed out the street with his tractor, and plowed out paths on both sides of the driveway as well, though I didn't hear him -- makes me wonder just how deeply I was sleeping, for once -- and while I am indeed appreciative, it doesn't help a whole lot. I don't plan to leave the house again until at least the middle of next week, as I won't need to venture out for shopping or anything else until then, I'm guessing.

As for the cold, it is 11 degrees outside right now. And it's going to get colder.

 

Yes, that "feels like -11" in the small print? It's accurate. The -4 tonight is going to be actual temperature, not wind chill. 

I've lived in Kansas for almost five years now -- it'll be five years in June. Before that, I lived in Missouri for three years. Even when I lived in West Virginia for a little more than the first twenty-three years of my life, the temperature rarely got this cold. Yes, there were mornings in high school where it was colder, but not by much, definitely not for extended periods of time, and not almost nationwide. That was on  top of a mountain, too -- not in the flattest part of the country. 

The temperatures themselves are less of a problem than the wind chills are. Along with this cold comes some terribly whipping winds, which will apparently drive wind chills into the -30 to -40 ranges tonight and tomorrow. I weep for my electric bill -- already super-high for December and currently waiting to be paid because I'm so poor right now -- which will almost certainly be the same amount or more when I get the next one. It can't be helped; I need to be able to stay un-frozen, and I rarely turn the thermostat above 62. If I do, the furnace will never stop running, as in the winter, especially in this cold, there's no way to keep the temperature above 65 in this house, ever, without it running nonstop. That's how old and drafty my house is. I can't really do anything about that, either, as I don't own the house and couldn't afford to fix it if I did. 

I'm okay right now, honestly; the temperature in my room is 64.2, which is partially because the sun comes into my room in the winter and warms it up a bit, and I'm just sitting here in a hoodie and yoga pants (because, yes, I own yoga pants -- don't you judge me). I'm comfortable enough. The cats are fine, it's tolerable inside, and I keep the inside of the house, even the downstairs, warm enough to where the pipes won't freeze or anything like that. The Monte Carlo is in the garage, where I put her on Friday night because I knew the snow was rolling in yesterday. My car is a tank, but there's no way I'm leaving her outside when the temperature is below zero -- who knows what would freeze and/or stop working on/in said car if I did. Cold temperatures drain car batteries like crazy, and even though my car had a new battery put into it the day before I bought it, that was still almost three years ago now.

Of course, the garbage needs to go out tonight for tomorrow's pickup, but I'm guessing that won't happen, much like last week -- last weekend we got the last snowstorm, and this weekend we got another small one as well as these terrible temperatures. I don't want to mess with it. Translation: I'm not going to mess with it. As a single guy living alone with his cats, I don't really create much trash aside from cigarette butts, cat litter, and used coffee/filters, and all of those things can sit outside in the can and wait until I won't freeze body parts while trying to take it the fifteen yards down to the road. I'm not putting on boots and dressing in multiple layers just to spend three or four minutes taking out the trash. It's not worth the effort, especially when possible frostbite is involved.

It's worse in Omaha, of course -- it's almost always hotter/colder up there than it is here, depending on the season. It's supposed to be -11 there tonight, and it's only in the single digits there right now. Daisy has to work tonight, and even with her Hyundai's extreme reliability, I'd be surprised if the car starts either tonight or in the morning when she has to come home, since she parks outside both at home and at work.

[Edit: she made it to work just fine.]

I'm at least halfway through the Bactrim for my sinus infection; I don't remember when I started taking it, but it was several days ago, and I've never missed a timed dose of it. The infection is now completely and totally gone, though (as with most antibiotics when I take them) I have been in, ahem, intestinal distress since I started the run of them. My allergies have kicked back in as always, as I mentioned before, but on the plus side they're not anywhere near as annoying -- or painful -- as the sinus infection was. I feel perfectly fine and normal otherwise, which is good.

Last night I was up until shortly after midnight; I went to bed rather early. I got up once this morning around 8 and went to the bathroom before coming back to bed until 1PM. I needed the sleep, desperately; I don't know why, but I've not been sleeping well for the past few days. I have weird cycles like this on occasion, where I'll sleep for about six hours at a time and then be wide awake again, unable to go back to sleep.

As the day/night goes on, the temperature is slowly dropping more and more. As I type this, it's dropped to 3 degrees outside, and ironically I keep turning the thermostat down a few degrees every few hours so that the furnace doesn't run continuously to counter the dropping temperatures. The house is indeed getting colder, though again, it's not like I can do anything to change that. The cold is supposed to last two more days before the temperatures vault into the will-comparatively-feel-like-summer middle 40s later this week. For now, however, it's the deep freeze. Wearing layers like an eskimo is about all I can do until I go to bed and sleep under three heavy blankets with the electric one maxed out at level 9.

As an aside, when I was single and living here alone in the winter (so, two years ago? ish?) I would close the vents in other rooms and open the one in the spare room to maximize furnace airflow, and would sleep on my air mattress up here so that I didn't have to deal with the freezing cold downstairs. Now with the electric blanket, I don't have to do that anymore.

Plus, the cats hated that because they couldn't sleep with me.

Anyway, when news outlets start reporting things like "cars frozen solid to the ground" it tends to get my attention, yes. Another reason why the Monte Carlo is in the garage.



Yes, that's Canada, but it's not exactly much different here.

I'm holing up inside the house like the hermit I am until it gets warmer. There's probably a good chance that I won't get out of bed tomorrow until I absolutely have to, simply because I'm not covered by a heat-generating electric blanket if I leave the bed.

It's also possible that I'll learn tomorrow, or at least sometime this week, what classes I'll be teaching in the spring, though if nobody in Wichita can get their cars started in the morning to make it to work at the university, it may take a little longer than expected...

Strange Vehicles

For something a bit different in this post (as I've been watching a lot of weird TV and movies as of late) I thought I'd go down a list of vehicles I've always wanted but will more than likely never own. I was inspired to do this mainly because of Breaking Bad -- not only have I always wanted a Pontiac Aztek like Walt drives, but I always loved the old-school design style of Skyler's Jeep Grand Wagoneer. Yeah. I have weird tastes. They get stranger, trust me.

1. 1975 Oldsmobile Starfire.

Basically the same as that year's Buick Skyhawk, I always had an affinity for this little car for some reason. I like its design. The '78 Starfire Firenza looked even more awesome. Neat little European-styled late-70s cars. Speaking of which...


2. 1982 Ford EXP.

 Pretty similar to the Starfire, I think. According to Wikipedia this was the first two-seater coupe that Ford made in 25 years. I used to see these everywhere on the roads even into the 90s, but now they've all but vanished. I love that hood/headlight design, along with the low-profile grille.

3. 1980s Honda CRX.

I always thought the CRX looked really cool. Compact possibly to a fault, and I'm guessing it probably didn't go well in the snow, but I loved its style and wheel designs. I had friends who drove CRXes and maintained them -- as you may know, Hondas are tanks and will run forever if you treat them right. However, there was one huge drawback to the CRX (that will forever be the reason I'll never own one) -- none of them were automatic. All of them were manual transmissions. I never want to own a manual-transmission car. I can drive one (badly), yes, but it's too much of a pain in the ass. I don't multitask well when driving -- I can't even smoke and drive at the same time without burning myself. 

4. Early 1990s Subaru SVX.

The SVX was such a cool car and waaaaaay ahead of its time. It was Subaru's "sports car," so to speak, and was only sold in the states for a few years. They go for pretty high prices these days because people like to trick them out and race them. I just wanted one because it looked futuristic, and because it's a Subaru, it has standard all-wheel drive just like all other Subarus do. And look at those scalloped windows!


5. 1984 Chevrolet Camaro Berlinetta.

Okay, there's a bit of a backstory behind this one -- when I was a kid, my aunt had this exact car pictured above -- silver, speedy, and gorgeous. A new kind of Camaro for a new age of American muscle. She totaled it in an accident after a few years, but going for rides in this car is one of the reasons I have such an appreciation for 80s designs and "muscle cars," so to speak, even after its muffler fell off on a shopping trip. Plus, have you ever seen the dash on one of these things? They called it Starship Camaro, for fuck's sake:

And I thought Knight Rider was cool. This was real.


6. 1988 Pontiac Fiero.

Okay, yeah, the Fiero had tons of problems (such as, um, catching on fucking fire) but it's such an awesome design that just screams mid-to-late 80s, especially with those wheels.


7. 1989 Toyota MR2.

Similar to the Fiero. Smaller. Boxier and more angled. Also rear-engined. One of my regular customers when I worked at the grocery store had one of these and told me what fun it was to drive it. I believed him.


8. 1997 Pontiac Bonneville (with Supercharger)

Basically the Pontiac counterpart to my Monte Carlo, I knew a guy in Missouri who had one of these decked out in black with red trim (like my Monte Carlo, ironically) and had spared no expense upon its purchase, getting every option including the high-end supercharged engine. I always really liked the design of the 90s Bonnevilles -- all at once a luxury sedan, a sports car, and a daily driver.


9. 2001 Chevrolet Impala SS.

As the Monte Carlo over the years changed its styling, I began to like its design less and less. The Impalas from this era, however, took most of the design cues from the Monte Carlo's revamp (including the low-to-the ground front end and the rear spoiler) to basically create the next generation of what my own car is. Chevrolet made tens of thousands of Impalas, and many of them were (and still are) used as police cruisers/interceptors. I've said for ages that my next car will more than likely be a Monte Carlo several years newer than mine is now, or an Impala from this era. There's something about those designs that speaks to my sensibilities.

Speaking of Monte Carlos...


10. 1988 Monte Carlo SS.

There really is something about me and 80s American muscle cars, isn't there? As well as black-with-red-trim paint schemes. And/or chrome wheels. I don't know. I can't explain it. I just know that when I see one of these on the street or in a parking lot, I tend to drool over it. The Monte Carlo SS models of the 80s looked much different than their normal counterparts, which totally looked like senior-citizen-mobiles:

Well, at least to a certain extent, anyway.


11. The Subaru BRAT.

Because if you lived in the 80s, please don't try to tell me you didn't want one of these things.


All (well, most) of these cars are probably attainable; none of them are so rare that I would never be able to find or afford one or all of them at some point, but finding one in a decent-enough, drive-able condition without needing extensive repairs before it goes out on the road is probably a different story. When was the last time you saw a Fiero, or an early-to-mid-80s Camaro (like the Berlinetta above) on the roads? Or a BRAT, for that matter? For me it's been many years, since almost all of them have rotted/rusted away or literally fell apart over the years.

You'll also note that there aren't really any "classic" cars on this list. While I'd like a 1966 Charger or Toronado, or a 1977 Trans Am as much as the next guy, it's not like I'll ever be able to get one of those on a professor's salary, and they're also not all that...well, unique. Most of these are cars which have either been forgotten or are at least somewhat attainable in one condition or another, possibly. They're designs I've found interesting, designs that I've particularly enjoyed and/or are pleasing to the eye and to the road (for me, of course; your opinion may differ).

Why did I write this post? Dunno. I was bored and wanted to write about cars. My Monte Carlo is in the garage (I put it there this afternoon to keep it out of yet another small snowstorm hitting tomorrow) and while it's running fine, I keep thinking about different vehicles. Maybe it's nostalgia and I'm remembering how cool the 80s was when it came to cars. Couldn't tell you. But here it is. Enjoy.

The Cold

It was 7 degrees when I got up this morning. When the sun came up, it dropped to 5 (how does that even happen?) and now, it's 10.

It's cold. Just in case you didn't gather that. And I have to go out in it.

Over the past few days I've slowly begun to take care of little errands I've had to run around the house, things I've been putting off for weeks but now finally have the time to do. I've been living, basically, off of the food I brought home from Omaha, the pizza I froze before the trip up there (which there's still a bit left of) and the snacks and other foods my parents mailed me in my box, and that totally has to stop or I'm going to gain thirty pounds over the rest of this winter break. So, I've been trying to cook a little here and there. Today I plan to make steamed broccoli and rice, for example.

Normally I don't care about gaining/losing weight -- my weight has always fluctuated greatly over the years, but generally I remain about the same size and weight that I've been since I lost a ton of it in 06-07 or so, with maybe 10-20 pounds' difference one way or the other from year's start to year's end. I don't spiral out of control and balloon up, nor do I shrivel and shrink to nothingness. I told Daisy last night that I think I've gained a little weight since we've been together, but it's probably because I'm actually eating now, and eating more heartily -- especially when she's here or I'm there, and I don't have to pay for/cook/eat my own food. As odd as that may sound, I eat what I can afford to eat, and my grocery trips consist of little more than what I need to survive on for another week or so.

I've slowly started to watch through the movies I've collected over the past year or so; I mentioned yesterday that I watched Wreck-It Ralph for the first time. The day before that, I watched The Hangover Part III. Tonight I'll probably watch The World's End, which should arrive on my doorstep via UPS this afternoon thanks to April's Amazon gift card. Before leaving for Omaha, I systematically went through my DVD rack in the living room and packed away everything that didn't need to be sitting out anymore -- stuff I've collected and have already watched over the course of the past year or three -- and boxed it all up to make more room in said rack. I also need to put away my Sega Genesis (which I haven't even turned on for a good eight months or so) and box up my VCR as well. So yes, little things, little chores/errands around the house, things I've been meaning to do for a long time are slowly getting done.

I mentioned before that I had to go out today, and this is true -- as mentioned in my previous post, I do have to go shopping this morning, venturing out into the cold in order to get the essentials I need for another week or two. I'll more than likely put it, once more, on my Discover card, as it has the smallest amount of charges on it compared to my other two cards, but a much higher limit. The money I have in my bank account right now must be saved, as much as possible, to cover bills with over the course of this month until I get paid again. I'm also mailing two Christmas checks to my parents today so that they can be dropped into my bank account back home ASAP to help bring up my total in there a bit, but when it comes to bills they're a mere drop in the bucket -- the total of the two checks is $40 less than what my electric bill is for the month. Luckily, said electric bill isn't due for about another three weeks. This doesn't necessarily matter, though, as in another three weeks I'll have another one that's just as high because of this biting cold.

I suppose it could be worse -- one of my friends from high school who lives in North Dakota posted on Facebook this morning, saying that the actual temperature there is -21. I don't know how people can live in climates like that. I can't fathom it. The coldest temperatures I've ever experienced myself were around -15, when I was in high school and living on top of the mountain back home, and when I first began grad school here in Kansas there were some mornings in the winter where the temperature was -10. I've become less tolerant of the cold over the years -- this morning, for example, by running the furnace near-constantly I've finally gotten the temperature in the house to hover around 65 or so, and I'm still sitting here wearing layers because I'm cold. The only two tolerable seasons in this house are spring and fall; winter is way too cold to keep comfortable and summer is way too hot.

My sinus infection has been basically eradicated already, as I wrote last night, though swooping right back in to replace it in my freshly-cleared nasal passages were my allergies. I'm pretty sure I blew my nose thirty times this morning. I'm allergic, as you know, to changing weather patterns (read: the cold and snow of yesterday), and the dry air being circulated by my electric furnace doesn't help matters any -- it just stirs up dust and dries out my skin. I sincerely long for the days when I can turn the furnace off and open all of the windows again because it's 65 outside.

My hemorrhoid has mostly gone away as well. I'm hoping it completely disappears within the next day or so, especially because the Bactrim I'm taking for the sinus infection seems to have me, ahem, using the facilities more than usual.

Then again, that could just be my terrible diet over the course of the past several days, too. I'm sure it's not helping much.

I checked the road conditions online, even though I'm not driving too far back and forth to go to Walmart. Most main roads are clear, as they've been treated, but as I have to drive 90% of that trip through neighborhood streets that get no plowing or treatment whatsoever, it's more than likely going to be a very slow, hairy drive. I really don't have much of a choice in the matter, though; there's stuff I need and the cats need litter and food.  There's only so long I can wait before I run out of everything important. I plan to take the "easy" route there and back, and hopefully the roads won't be too snow-packed or icy. As you know, the Monte Carlo handles well in snow, as long as it's actually snow, not snowpack. It'll also be the first time I've taken her out of the garage since finals week, as well.

So. Let's get to it, shall we?

Blizzards

This is a good approximation of what it looks like outside right now. Minus the goofy animal, that is:

Whatever that thing is, anyway. Mink? Weasel? A white otter? Who knows.

It began snowing as the sun set this evening, and hasn't stopped. Everything is covered and coated again in about two inches as of right now, roughly. The temperature also dropped by about twenty degrees, making it feel as if a new ice age swept in for 2014.

Oh yeah, it's 2014. Happy New Year. There, I've said it, so we can move on now.

At some point in the next day or so, snow or no snow, I still have to go out shopping. Not that I really have any money for it, mind you, but I'm out of things I can't go without. I made a mental inventory in my head last night upon going to bed, and most of the stuff I need could be put into the category of "small essentials." Meaning, in case you couldn't figure it out, that they're all small things, but they're all vital and quite necessary. It only figures that it would snow, making the roads suck regardless of when I go out. It is only about three miles to Walmart (and three back, of course) but eh. The car's not been out of the garage in almost three weeks now, and I hate being out in the cold anyway.

Whine whine bitch moan, I know.

I really did relatively little today. I ran the dishwasher and got a shower. In a little while, I'm going to go downstairs and run a load of laundry, since I need to. I ate dinner and watched Wreck-It Ralph for the first time. Even though it's still snowing, if I weren't so tired, I'd probably make the Walmart trip tonight, simply because once the roads get snowpacked in the morning, it'll probably suck more to go out in it. The only other reason I'm waiting is because I'll be able to see tomorrow, when I can't see now in the blowing snow.

On the plus side, the Bactrim is working, and it seems as if my sinus infection is finally kicking the bucket. Operation "Go Away, Snot" is a success. I have to take it every twelve hours, which basically means when I get up in the morning and again in the evening a few hours before bed. I've only had two days' worth of doses of it (it's a ten-day antibiotic) and already I feel good as new. Of course, I have to take the entire run of it regardless.

I've always been wary of antibiotics; I don't like taking them except only when extremely necessary. I have allergic reactions to some different ones (such as clindamycin), and other basic ones I became immune to early on as a child with the amount of ear infections I used to have. For example, I don't think amoxicillin does anything for me anymore. For ear infections, most of the time I've been given Zithromax. I know I've used Bactrim before too, for something. Perhaps it was for an ear or sinus infection ages ago. I'll never be one of those people who sees antibiotics as a cure-all, only as a last resort sort of measure.

Anyway, the pain and discomfort of everything yesterday as it dislodged and drained wasn't pleasant at all; my throat was incredibly sore and my lymph nodes felt like swollen plums as the Bactrim kicked in and started clearing all of that stuff out. My throat was still sore until this morning from all the drainage until, finally, most of it was gone.

Aside from venturing out tomorrow to go to Walmart, I have no real plans for the rest of the week. I'm still resting up from the trip to Omaha, I think -- while Daisy has been sick off and on, and Mama has been really sick, I've just been really fatigued and out-of-it. Part of that may be due to the antibiotics, yes, and a large part of it has to do with the cold/snow as well, I'm sure, I just find it hard to concentrate and stay awake and alert a lot of the time.

I shall update you folks again soon, but for now, I need to go to bed.