I think I am basically ready for the semester. Oh, there's a lot left to do, but it doesn't have to be finished by Thursday, which is the first day of classes for me. There are many things I like about Blackboard, but there are just as many things I can't stand, chiefly that I have to work directly on the Internet. (I know I mentioned that before, but I can't say it enough.) Also, the process of uploading audio files is awful. In fact, I cannot do it - I had to get my own site and upload, I was not able to do it to the university's server. So it is great to talk about all the wonderful features and exciting possibilities - but the reality is a lot less satisfactory. I should know better, and not get sucked in. It wastes a lot of time, being an early adopter.

I spent most of today trying to repair my mother's computer. I am not having much luck yet. Actually, I have not even got to the point where I can say that - it is taking me hours to download the necessary files so that I can burn a recovery disk. The lesson here: Be sure to make one when your computer is new, or at least working fine. (Will I take my own advice? No, of course not.) Bob went to Florida for a few days, just in time to miss the very cold weekend. Brrr!

I had another anxiety dream. The Blackboard and blended learning thing must be really getting to me! This one was more weird. I was in a classroom with a full class of students. The room had a glass wall on one side, across from my desk and behind the rows of student desks, that looked out on a courtyard. It was almost like a sun room. I'm thinking it was some strange combination of my high school (which had rooms that were on a center courtyard, although the wall and windows were institutional, not at all like a sun room) and a historic house. The room itself was a typical classroom, but smaller than usual. Some unknown professor came from the courtyard and opened a glass door that was on sun room side of the classroom. He invited my students to come and listen to his lecture - on something (he said, but I don't remember). It wasn't especially interesting sounding, but about a third to a half of my students immediately jumped up and left. They sort of looked at me to see my reaction on their way out. I didn't tell them it was OK, I kind of just stood there, helpless. The remaining students didn't go, although some were standing, hesitating, but you could tell almost all of them wanted to go, even the ones who were still sitting and facing me. Whether they were actually interested in listening to his lecture, or if they intended to bolt once they got "permission" to leave, was not clear. I turned from helpless into some kind of caricature of a school marm, angry, threatening, violated. The only thing I could relate to this experience was the occasional instructor who has the class prior to mine and continues teaching until ten minutes into my class, or the few who arrive ten minutes early and act like I should dismiss my class because they want the room. But even that isn't as bad as this dream was!

I found out that another of my former elementary school teachers has died. This is a woman I had for fourth grade. My recollections of her aren't really numerous or specific. It may be that the year she taught me was the only year she was at my school. I do know I thought of her as so old. I mean, it's natural for a little kid to think of a teacher as old, but in this case - I remember thinking that she was a lot older than my parents - if my calculations based on her graduation dates from high school and graduate school are true that isn't the case at all; she was only in her early 30s at that time. I even thought she was older than my second grade teacher when in truth she was young enough to be her daughter! She was the definition of an old school marm: hair in a bun, stiff, thin and bony, with plain attire that featured high collared shirts. I think she was a pretty good teacher in terms of conveying the material, though. She was old fashioned in her methods, nothing like the other "young" teachers. I remember all the kids hated her. I think we believed her to be pretty mean overall. Equal opportunity mean. Not warm and fuzzy at all. We were terrified of her. She wasn't particularly mean to me, but she wasn't exactly nice to anyone. Starting in third grade, I had two teachers per year. I had this teacher in the morning, and the other half of the day I had a different teacher. I remember how relieved we all were to go to his class in the afternoon. I liked my elementary school and believe my education there was decent but when I think back I realize for how many years I had teachers that were scary. Ones that must have disliked kids. It's amazing I didn't fake sick every day. I always wonder how people would react if you went to a funeral and stood up when they invite people to make remarks or wrote in one of the legacy.com websites your actual recollection! Of course I could never do that but it is a funny thought nonetheless.

Back from a weekend in Samsonville. It is snowing today, not a really major storm though. Saturday was my mother's 75th birthday, my sister hosted a nice little celebration (what is little for us is a bash for most people, though. There were 12 people there).

Yesterday I spent a big part of the day working on my mother's computer, which I believe has crashed. I wound up bringing it back to Castleton with me, and I hooked up her old machine in its place. The old one works fine, although it is Windows ME, which sucks. But with high speed internet access, the difference is almost not noticeable. Luckily, I had bought her a flash drive about a month ago, and backed up her documents. So it isn't that much of a big deal if I can't fix it. While I was working on the machine, my father worked on my portable dishwasher (from Castleton). My mother made eggplant for me as a payment for my computer work, and I joked that I should just hand it over to my father, as payment for his repair of my dishwasher.

The blackboarding of class is going OK. The slowness of working over the Internet is a pretty major issue, though. I managed to get the audio files to work by subscribing to mediamax, which is a place for hosting files. I hope to not have to keep paying for that space, though, since the university really should be able to help me with this.

I had one of those anxiety dreams about the semester last night. When I was a student, those kind of dreams took two forms: one was that I'd arrive at school dressed completely inappropriately. Either wearing pajamas, or just underwear or no clothes at all or something. I have heard that this sort of dream is fairly common. For me, they usually happened when I was younger, in elementary or high school. I remember the odd thing was that no one else in the dream ever noticed, despite the fact that I was in a panic, trying to figure out what to do. When I was in college, the anxiety dream more often took the form of realizing that the semester was almost over, and I had not been to class at all or done any work.

They have a new variant now that I am an instructor. Last semester I dreamed that I arrived at the first day of class without a syllabus to hand out, and with a bunch of disorganized papers on the desk that I was frantically flipping through, trying in vain to find my notes and the handouts. I had no idea of what to say to class. Last night I dreamed that I screwed up the first several weeks of class by doing the wrong things. I forgot what we were doing in class and did not do the things I planned. After a disasterous class I realized my mistakes but it was too late to fix the problem.

I thought I would do this meme this week because 1) I am waiting for an audio lecture to upload (Blackboard conversion is not as bad as expected, although working directly on the web is slow); 2) I am procrastinating on yard clean up (see here if you must know what that means) since the snow melted (I am not going to wait until it snows again and be forced to delay until spring); 3) I really wanted to answer question 3; and 4) since it is winter break, I am home on Thursdays.

Thursday Threesome: Kidney stone and herbal remedies:

Onesome: Kidney--beans? Lima Beans? Pinto beans? Which legumes do you like to cook with? Hmmm... A hot pot of chili sounds good this week!

I love all legumes. In fact, there is a pot of bean soup in the fridge right now. My favorites are chick peas (hummus! yum!) and white beans (greens and beans! yum!) but in the soup I made there are chick peas, red beans, white beans, and black beans.

Twosome: Stones?-- Monoliths? Pebbles? Do you use any of these in decorating? Heck, we'll even count marbles in vases!

Not really. I do have some great rocks out in the yard, though.

Threesome: and herbal remedies-- Hey, there's a good one: do you have any herbal remedies for us to try? Anything? I'm betting this bunch will have a trick or two to work with!

Yes, I am a great believer in alternative treatments, including herbs and supplements. Holistic veterinary care is how my animals get treatment, including Rudy, when he was dying from cancer. I take magnesium - and it works like a charm for the unmentionable problem that has plagued me for life. Bob has severe rheumatoid arthritis. He tried the medical model but it failed him miserably, but his regimen of sam-e, glucosamine, fish oil, etc. (too many others to mention, but they include non-herbal things such as not drinking coffee or eating beef) has put him in remission. He was told by the rheumatologist when he was diagnosed in 2000 that he'd probably be in a wheelchair in two years. He was in very bad shape at the time. Conventional treatment did not help - and in fact, the side effects were hurting him in a big way. So he did his own research in journals to develop a course of treatment. He has two physician's desk references for alternative therapies as well. Six years after he was supposed to be using one - there is no wheelchair in sight, and he can even do the stairs with no problem. The only negative is that there are a lot of people who refuse to acknowledge his approach, consider alternative approaches to be quackery followed only by nutjobs, and constantly suggest to him that he should try whatever miracle drug is being advertised on television. They can't accept that he doesn't even have to take Advil any longer and he feels great. There isn't anything all that radical about eating less or no refined carbohydrates, trying to exercise and pursue a lifestyle with less stress - but I guess to those people the presupposition that there is only one approved way is easier. To them it makes more sense to pop a Remicade.

Monday blues. Holidays are over. House is a mess. I have so much work to do and such an unrealistic deadline that any sane person would be having an anxiety attack. Bob's birthday was Saturday, so on Friday we went to see Juno (it was good; worth seeing), on Saturday we went to dinner at the marvelous Carolina House, and yesterday we went to see John Prine at the Troy Savings Bank Music Hall (which was great). The calendar page turns and as usual, there is a lot of reassessment. But right now the message is: get back to work!!

Happy New Year! The weather has been notable and so I want to mention it: we've had four medium sized snow storms so far this winter, and right now we are experiencing zero temperatures.

I am going to do something I never do, which is write about television. I watched Leno last night - and I think he is better without writers. I suppose a disclaimer is necessary here, so here goes: I have absolutely nothing against the striking writers, and although I am relatively uninformed about the issue, I feel sympathy for them and their cause. Now, back to my impressions from last night. What I noticed was that the show was a lot more real than usual. I like real. Audience participation bits on all the current late night shows are always scripted, and they are unevenly funny. Taking audience questions and ad-libbing responses reminded me of the Carol Burnett Show, which I always loved. The overall atmosphere felt warm and personal.

Christmas was wonderful. My mother's cream of mushroom soup outshines the finest chef's. But our holidays continue. Tonight it's back to Samsonville (kind of feel like we are on an elastic band like one of Ande's new toys, being stretched and snapped back on the Thruway). Tomorrow we are off to Long Island to see Bob's family; it's his mother's birthday today. We are going to meet friends and spend the night here. Yay! Indoor pool! Then back to Samsonville on Sunday. My brother is having a New Year's Eve party, and then on New Year's Day, we head back to Castleton. (So I'm not sure whether I will post, although I do have the resources to do it from Samsonville. But I rarely have the inclination.) Then, January is filled with birthdays so celebrations continue.

I probably won't post tomorrow so...

Merry Christmas

Christmas Eve! I have a short list of tasks to do today. Finish making a handmade gift that's almost done, wrap a couple of remaining gifts, bake two apple pies, and cook dinner.

For the first time in the 20 years I have lived in Castleton, I am going to be able to go to mass at Sacred Heart Church on Christmas Eve. The reason is that although we are going to Samsonville tomorrow (and then back here the day after), this year Bob decided to work today and instead of being on the road, we are traveling to Long Island to visit his family over the weekend. Usually, I go to mass for Christmas wherever I am - so that might be a church I have never stepped foot in before, or occasionally, to St. Augustine's, where I went as a kid, and where I go when I am in Samsonville. But since I prefer to go on Christmas Eve, usually I am either in Long Island, or we make a mad dash to be back in Samsonville by midnight, and I scramble to find a midnight mass somewhere (Occasionally, I go to St. Augustine's on Christmas morning - but usually they only have a 6 pm mass on Christmas Eve which I miss).

So I am so excited!! I don't consider myself "devout" exactly - although I do go to church every Sunday and it means a lot to me. I consider religion to be a private matter, and I rarely talk about my faith, or the beliefs of others. I don't judge or disrespect. However, I am turned off by what I consider to be the excessively materialistic focus of this holiday. It's hard to not judge or disrespect consumerism as God. Even movies that people consider Christmas classics such as Miracle on 34th Street have an offensively material message - yet pretend to be reverent.

Full disclosure: I am pretty anti-consumerist as it is. Separate from any religious discussion, I tell my students in Toleration class that a test of my tolerance is materialism. I disapprove of it, but I believe people have a right to that lifestyle if they want and so I must tolerate it. It is a good example for Toleration because students often get stuck by the idea that toleration does not equal celebrating diversity and that idea bothers them. I think this is because toleration has religious roots, and now is viewed as a sort of cultural/social concept. So my anti-material viewpoint is appealing to students and sparks them to consider that there are still many things in society that we may not like but should tolerate, although we do not have to "celebrate" them.

Anyway, back to Christmas Eve. Some years I am worn out, and go into the traveling and gift wrapping exhausted. It all seems like just one more chore. Oh, I still enjoy seeing family and going to church, but overall, the season doesn't do a lot for me. But this year is different. I got some rest. And I am psyched to go to mass here. The snow, the very modest but carefully selected gifts I bought, the lovely trees (I'll put up a picture of both after the holiday - we have a fresh cut one from the local boy scouts in Castleton, and a cedar from our yard in Samsonville), the wonderful cards (not a huge number, just enough for me to be able to exchange without it being an enormous task), the anticipation of seeing family, and most of all - Christmas Eve mass at Sacred Heart Church. It is really making Christmas extra special for me this year.

Those comments from my students helped too. I got two emails, by the way, from an A- student and a C- student, demanding a breakdown (which I always send, but I like to take a few days off, and wait until late in the month or early next month).

I am done with grades!! I finished at 8:30 last night (the deadline was 11:59 pm). Every semester I wonder why I have designed such complicated measures for evaluation. I know it works well, but it takes a lot of effort on my part.

One task at the end of the semester is that I tally up 11 peer assessment spreadsheets in my classes. I had 100 students between my 4 classes. Each student participates in peer assessment three times (for the online class, 19 students, it is twice). A couple of days ago - during a 14 hour stretch as I was power entering, looking up from the student's form to the screen (I am getting to the point in my life where I need reading glasses, after always having 20/20 vision, priding myself on it and considering the wearing of glasses to be a moral failing - I haven't a problem with grey hair, but glasses! I will forget them, lose them, drop them in the garden, sit on them, step on them, the puppy or kitten will get them, ...) I am wearing my glasses, and for paper with small type they are dandy, but they make it difficult to see the screen (my distance vision is still one of those 20s) after hours and hours of entry I am getting dizzy, nauseous, maybe even delirous. I try to not look through the glasses when I enter, but then I have to switch, because I can't see the numbers on the forms I printed out without them. The nauseous delirium turns into a touch of claustrophobia. This room is VERY small and it seems like it gets dark at about 3 in the afternoon.

So I decide to switch to a reading task instead. I don't accept paper from students and I don't print out papers or jounals, I read them off the screen. Don't need glasses for that. I start opening the journals and soon I find I can't see once again. I get to the end of each one, entry #14, and almost every single student has written nearly the same thing. They are gushing about how wonderful the class was, how they would take it over again next semester if they could, how they were sad on the last day, how attending it wasn't a chore, and thanking me in words so profuse and touching I am dumbstruck. Well, I am not talking to anyone at that moment, but you know what I mean. I have to blink away the tears, and I don't often cry. Could there be a better job on this planet? The assessment task got a lot easier after that. I think I will have to compile them in some way to read when I am feeling blue or frustrated in the future. I hope I can work the same magic next semester. With all the changes in the courseware arena, who knows? But I do have some new ideas boiling, so maybe!

Anyway, it looks like I am going to have to get bifocals over the break (with plain glass in the top) or else those tiny half-glasses like Marian the librarian.

Merry Christmas! I am feeling especially inspired this year. Maybe because my faith has been growing recently. Maybe because we are having wintery weather. Who knows?

I got the idea to do this from Elaine.

Well, he should have gotten the maximum (which isn't enough and should be increased), but I'm feeling pretty good about this outcome!

Two stories from the TU. First, this one is scary! That site always freaks me out when I see it. Then, here's this one, another example of how awful some people are to animals. Luckily, these dogs were rescued. But what's with the order forbidding this jerk from raising animals expiring? Does that make any sense?

Interesting set of coincidences yesterday. This is the last week of classes, and in my social foundations classes, yesterday was focused on educational technology. I spend some time talking about what it is, what are the pros and cons of the approach, and what teaching online is like. In all three sections, I solicit student feedback and thoughts on educational technology. Something I tell students is that afterwards, I remember the faces of on campus students, and the names of online ones. A student called me who took the evening section of the class in 2003, and later in the day he stopped by to talk to me about graduate school. Then, as I was waiting for the elevator, another student came up to me and asked if I was (insert my name here). She explained that she had taken the online section of the class during Summer 2006. I remembered them both. It was especially nice, because both told me how much they liked the class, and asked me if I am teaching any at the graduate level.

It snowed a little tonight. And it is supposed to be a cold weekend. I spent the day working on the courseware transition. One thing I've been experimenting with is recording audio files of lectures.

I had a nice Thanksgiving. My apple pie came out perfect. I used Honeycrisp apples (usually I use Granny Smith) and it was yummy! I learned something interesting about Honeycrisp apples recently; they were developed by the University of Minnesota (through a long process detailed here); introducted in 1991, and the parents were thought to be McCoun and Honeygold. But the discovered that neither is the parent! One parent is Keepsake, and the other is unknown. Read all about it here.

I took four days off, which was tiring! I think my regular routine is easier to manage than having fun. Now it's the push to the end of the semester. Only three days left on campus. Grades are due 11/20 at 11:59 pm. The semester just flew by!

Three posts in one day! Must be they were pent up or something. Something I have been meaning to remark on: all my life I have had to spell my name for people and tell them how to pronounce it, and still, it is often screwed up. As far as my first name goes, in some ways it is better in recent times, in some ways worse. My first name has become more popular (so people are more familiar with it), but on the other hand, similar names (such as Jenna) have become even more popular, so people often insist on putting an "e" in there as the second letter, rather than an "i," or they think maybe it starts with "j" rather than "g." The pronounciation thing of my last name is a lot better now - ever since the mayor became so famous. (Although one thing that means is that nearly everyone uses his "i" as the last letter of my name rather than my "o.")

But in the written word...I see the same atrociously wrong spellings of Rudy's last name that I have suffered for years on junk mail letters that I receive. As a kid, I once wrote a short story about the mangling of my name, as I recall. The Internet has perpetuated the problem even more, I think. I get a lot of hits on my various websites for people searching for information on "the" Rudy. Sometimes it directs them to something to do with me, more often it is all of my writing about "my" Rudy. (I don't mind that, but I'll probably regret this post, since it is sure to bring in the spelling challenged.)

Gui is the most common, but leaving out the "i" entirely is a close second (Gul). Sometimes there is a double "l" in there (Gull or Giull or Guill). Occasionally the second "i" is ommitted (Giula or Guila or Guli or Giulla or Guilla or Gulla). My fingers itch to correct these mistakes...don't you know that Julie in Italian is spelled Giuli? That Gui is pronounced Gwee? I am tempted...but I resist. My maternal grandmother Mimmie solved the spelling issue by writing the name in cursive - and throwing the dot of the "i" up in the air, so it could be interpreted to be over the "i" or the "u." But then at least she knew there was an "i" or two in there somewhere, and that there was only one "l." (This was before anyone thought our name ended in "i.")

Happy Thanksgiving, BTW. Now it is time for me to go and bake an apple pie.

Since I have grading done for the moment, today I am working on converting my classes to Blackboard. I decided to work on what will be the easiest of the four, and that's Toleration. It has the simpliest web component now, and I won't be making a lot of changes for Spring. There are some things I already like about Blackboard, but the biggest thing I don't like is the same as what I don't like in WebCT: it is slow, unreliable and cumbersome to work on the Internet. So far, that aspect is a draw with WebCT, but in terms of my fully online class: I am going to really miss Lotus Notes for its ability to work offline.

Something I forgot to mention: Maybe because it seems mean spirited? Whatever. The gym teacher from hell died a couple of weeks ago. He was so cruel to me that upon hearing the news, it was hard for me to summon up any emotion other than bad memories of elementary school. His lasting impact on me has been a lifelong aversion to competition, sports, games of all types, and even exercise. I guess it is appropriate that just two months before his passing from this Earth, sparked by the get-healthier lifestyle changes I started in January, I summoned the courage to blow the dust off the treadmill one more time and get on it. And guess what? For the first time, I have been successfully doing it every day!! To the point where the front roller now needs to be replaced (the replacement was delivered today). So take that, Mr. ------, you ---.

You might say I have been overwhelmed with work this semester. Pending changes in the courseware I use for my online and on campus classes is the culprit; that has been taking up a lot of my on campus time and as a result I am behind in assessment. So I really buckled down the last few days and I am officially caught up! Yay! Tomorrow I will focus on the courseware conversion - the clock is ticking, must be completely done by mid-January - and baking an apple pie (which must be done by Thanksgiving).

One bad piece of news though: I found another student plagiarizing. It has been a couple of semesters since the last incident, so I guess it was about time.

Ha. Good news. The cemetery sign post snapped - and the sign was laying in the weeds. I am not sure why the plot owner thought the post had been cut. And I guess the sheriff deputies never went to the driveway to look. The board had to do its own detective work! My mother and I risked tick infestation, but all's well that ends well.

I am on the trustee board of a cemetery. Two days ago a plot owner noticed that someone cut the post with our sign down and stole the sign. It was one of those beautiful hand carved signs that you see around. We paid for it with donations less than 5 years ago. We got it for $500 because the sign maker gave us a deal. It is a small cemetery with zero money, we sell maybe 1-3 plots per year and have a couple of burials, have no real way to generate income since our volume is so low. Who would do such a thing against a cemetery? Why would someone want our sign?