Tag: summer

I may need school to start

On By Luther M. SilerIn life1 Comment

I think “malaise” is the right word to describe my last few days. I’m not in the mood for anything, I took a five-hour “nap” this afternoon because despite a cup of coffee and a Mountain Dew I was falling asleep every time I sat down for more than a few seconds, and my stomach and head hurt. I know this is my third day in a row with a nothing post, but Christ, I can’t get my brain moving to save my life right now. I emailed my boss just now to find out when the building was going to be open again. I have enough stuff changing this year– a new curriculum, just for starters, and I’m seriously thinking about going permanently back to pencil and paper assignments and saying to hell with the iPads entirely– that I really ought to start heavy thinking and planning, and I may as well do that in my classroom if I can.

But … man. Right now I just want my head to turn back on.

NVM

On By Luther M. SilerIn lifeLeave a comment

Granted, the thermometer outside the window in my kitchen is in constant direct sunlight, but it says 108 degrees. Yesterday I was out of town. Today I have spent a significant amount of my time awake attached to the toilet. I haven’t had a Mounjaro Day in months, but that’s really what this feels like, and one way or another, it’s 8:06 PM and I’m done with today and going to bed.

I gotta get my shit together

On By Luther M. SilerIn idiocy5 Comments

As you might expect, I follow a lot of teachers on my social media accounts, especially on TikTok. And one thing I see a lot of this time of year is teachers who are being really defensive and insisting that we Don’t Really Get Summers Off, because of … I dunno, planning and continuing education and a bunch of other stuff.

I have been teaching for over twenty years, and large portions of my job are muscle memory by now. I very much have my summers off and I’m not going to pretend otherwise. If you think that’s unfair you are absolutely welcome to become a teacher, and if you’re not running to do that, well, you must not be that upset about my summers.

I’m a week into summer break now, and y’all, I am seriously in need of a routine or a project or some shit like that. I cannot just stare at my phone and take naps all summer long, and I am dying over here.

This has got to be Find a Project week. I’m going to a Counting Crows concert next Saturday, so that can be my reward for having a productive week, right?

Sure.

Nothing tonight

On By Luther M. SilerIn BlogwankingLeave a comment

Been doing all my usual shit today– cleaned up and organized around the house a bit, read a book and a half, put together part of a Lego set, played some video games. Y’know, nerd shit. But hell if I have anything to say about any of it. I’m rooting for injuries in the Trump/Elon thing. Trying really hard to not complain about being bored. Christ, I’m not even a week into vacation yet.

Fully expecting to have things thrown at my head the next time I go into public.

In which that was the right move

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My CPAP still isn’t working properly, so last night I stuffed earplugs in my ears, took three Tylenol PM and slept so hard that somehow at some point during the night I pulled the hose out of my mask and didn’t wake up. I would have called that impossible before yesterday, as it’s both loud and suddenly even more difficult to breathe than normal, non-CPAP-assisted prone breathing is. And I slept until nine, which hasn’t happened in long enough that I don’t remember the last time I slept in that far. And then I spent the entire day hanging out with my son and reading, and I’m currently at peace enough with the world that my district sent out the internal transfer list and I only very briefly glanced at it, which I would have done anyway, because that type of thing is always fun.

We need way, way too many math teachers in my district right now, and I have a sneaking suspicion I’m going to end up with another Goddamned overload next year. Which I’m of two minds about. It means another year with no breaks– remember, I walk into my classroom at 8:00 AM and I’m supervising kids until 3:20 with no pauses of any kind– but it also immunizes me against getting asked to cover anyone else’s classroom on my prep period, which I absolutely hate doing.

But whatever. There’s six weeks of school left– and the next two ought to fly by, since we’ve got state testing– and then I’ve got summer break to recenter myself. I needed today. Hopefully I can go into Monday with a better attitude.

What I did today

On By Luther M. SilerIn GeekLeave a comment

This little bastard isn’t much to Puzzle People, I imagine, and it’s not a ton of pieces or anything, but it occupied a couple of hours of my afternoon and then immediately got photographed, torn apart, and given to my wife. If you look carefully there are a bunch of nautical-themed pieces in there which was a cool little touch. Also, a lot of those pieces don’t really lock together all that well so I kept accidentally shoving them out of place and having to put everything back together.

Other than that? It’s Wednesday. Comic shop. Tomorrow, I get to go to the dump. I’m super excited.

Not a lot today

On By Luther M. SilerIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

Let’s see. I didn’t manage to accomplish much with my Monday; anytime I’m considering bragging about putting my laundry away and beating the final boss on a video game, it wasn’t much of a day. But whatever; the pool is almost ready, and finishing off Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown has genuinely been on my nerves lately, and I got both of the spelling challenges right today in one of my Arabic programs, so fuck it, I’m gonna call today a win and go sit outside and relax.

In which I haven’t failed yet

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I was able to successfully get myself up out of bed and showered before 8:30 this morning. I had a cup of coffee and screwed around on my phone for a while, then spent an honest to goodness solid hour studying, and managed to successfully regain at least some of my knowledge of trigonometry in the process. I think what I’m going to do this week is spend the next couple of days filling obvious holes in my knowledge (“obvious” meaning “I remember knowing this, and now I don’t,” as opposed to, say, calculus, which is an entire domain of knowledge that I never really had a grasp of) and then take a practice test on Thursday. (Why Thursday? It’ll take a while, and Friday’s going to be busy. I’ll have time to study but not for an entire practice test.) If I do okay on the practice test, I may go ahead and take a shot at the real test next week and see if I can just knock it out. I only need like a 60% to pass, I think? If I do crap on it, I’ll stick with the original plan and study through June or until I can pass a practice test solidly. I don’t want to have to pay for this thing more than twice, and ideally, only once. I’ve also literally never failed a standardized test so I have some pride on the line here too.

In other news, school is out, and I’m finding that I don’t have a lot to say about that. This was a pretty good year, all told; it had its moments, like they all do, but my honors class was awesome enough to carry through the rest of the year and even my most annoying kids continue to pale in comparison with what I’ve had to deal with at previous schools. That said, I think I’m due for another round of reevaluating classroom procedures; everything I’m doing right now is still very COVID-informed and I’m seeing signs that certain policies may be starting to bite me in the ass a bit. I didn’t really try to reinvent the wheel when I changed districts, but I’m comfortable enough in the new place now that I think I can tweak some things. We’ll see.

I’ll end on a question: certain sectors of American society have been claiming that attempting to impose any sort of penalties or punishments for the obvious criminality of certain individuals was going to cause widespread civil unrest. Locally, I am aware of one (1) house that is now flying a very small (comically so, in fact) American flag outside their house, upside down. Is anyone reading this aware of any civil disobedience or protests literally anywhere other than the tiny little group that’s been outside the courthouse in New York since the trial started? Any downtowns flooded with fash lately? Trucker rebellions? Anything at all?