One of my favorite college professors passed away this morning - Dr. Richard Warren. He taught humanities for the college for many years. I had his Introduction to Humanities back in 1988, just out of high school. One of my favorite memories from class is of him doing an impression of "Papa Haydn" telling the story about how Haydn would place LOUD INSTRUMENTS in the middle of quiet sections of his symphonies to wake people up. Dr. Warren would start the story in a quiet voice (the music of the symphony could lull audience members into sleep...), then he would talk really loudly saying "boom boom boom" or some such, then go back to his normal voice to finish the story - all with the happiest expression on his face, marching back and forth pumping his arms and beating the air as if he were playing a drum.

He also told a story about when he and his wife moved down here in the sixties. At a laundrymat there were signs on the machines saying "whites" and "colored," and his wife who had never seen such blatant discrimination pointed to the signs and said "Look, they make you presort your laundry before coming to the shop." I don't know why, but that story really stuck with me.

Finally, I remember loving him because of his views on the Gordon Rule. In Florida we have a law called the Gordon Rule that requires all AA degree seeking students write a minimum of 24,000 words over the course of their degree. Colleges can decide how this is accomplished. When I was a student I had to write 6000 words in each of my English composition classes and 6000 words in each of my humanities classes. Dr. Warren must have thought the same as I still do - if you are adding extra words to your research paper to pad it out, that is not good writing. Conciseness is a virtue in writing. Admittedly, it's one I lack, but I know it's admirable. Anyway, Dr. Warren let us count the words in our class notes in addition to the words in our papers. If we still didn't have the 6000 words, he let us write a word over and over again (Gordon Rule, Gordon Rule, Gordon Rule, Gordon Rule) until you finally reached 6000. It felt rebellious.

He retired ages ago, but just this past year I happened to bump into him at the post office. I got to tell him how fondly I looked back on his class and how much I learned from him. He was really pleased, and he talked at great length about what he'd been up to lately. He was in great spirits, he was being recognized for some sort of award, and he was all smiles. I'm glad that's my last memory and that I got one more chance to see him.

Something that made me happy today:

One of my favorite instructors dropped off a giant stack of grade change requests today. It's not uncommon for him to drop off a giant stack of grade changes, which means he has spent a lot of time chatting with me in my office while I process the requests. I've talked about him before - he breeds rabbits and has a million fascinating stories. Anyway, as he was leaving he casually mentioned "By the way, the dog we named after you is having puppies." I didn't know he'd named a dog after me! Of course, once I found that out I asked him a billion questions. Apparently they got her in April and she carries a recessive redhair gene, hence the namesake. I think it is incredibly sweet, although being a breeder he has named loads and loads of animals, so it probably doesn't mean as much to him as to me. Doesn't matter, I'm still tickled pick that I'm thought of outside of the office. Sometimes you feel like a little unappreciated automaton in enrollment services office.

No, I'm not getting one of the puppies. He breeds dogs, too, and these are purebred and quite costly. But he's promised to take pictures for me. :)

I did not have a good day today.

When I opened my office door the background paper for my decorations snagged and came loose so that my Winterland came toppling down on my head. I couldn’t get to the only non-wheeled chair near my office right away because of the Toys-for-Tots bicycle currently residing in my office, so it took some finagling and moving things around before I could repair the damage to my door. Immediately after fixing the door, I picked up my bags and attempted to move them to my desk whereupon I dropped my (empty) coffee cup. It skittered across my entire desk before whacking into the printer. I almost caught it, but the trajectory change sent it to the floor, where the handle broke off into several pieces. The distraction of the door and coffee cup made me forget to take my keys out of my doorknob, so about an hour later I got reprimanded by a coworker and lectured about the dangers of leaving your keys out for students to steal. She also questioned me in a what felt like at the time an accusatory tone as to why I didn’t have the Jabberwocky doll hanging from the door like I had originally planned on doing. Unfortunately, I was on the phone, so when I didn’t answer her questions she left. After I got off the phone I tracked her down to explain the morning’s events, and she was perfectly normal and not at all huffy, so I don’t know what was happening earlier. The Toys-for-Tots frustrations continued today, to the point where I actually gave what felt like a “I cannot believe this” expression to someone and walked out on the conversation. I am never volunteering to help with Toys-for-Tots again. Next year I'm just going to donate $$ and stay out of it. ((If I go to each team member and ask for a preference/opinion and everyone in the group says "Whatever the group wants." then it means THE GROUP DOESN'T WANT ANYTHING and either NOTHING WILL BE DONE or else the other team members are unfairly forcing one person to have to make the decision instead of doing a democratic vote. This is especially unfair if said person IS NOT THE GROUP LEADER and EXPRESSLY SAID in an earlier email "I would like to help with the wrapping" and "I do not want to be in charge.")) Grrrrr. Also, it was just plain busy today. I had several “I cannot believe you are actually asking these questions” moments, where people honestly do not seem to realize they are asking something off the wall or impossible and get upset when it can't be done. And I had another student who instead of reading the letter sent to him calls in to have me read the letter to him over the phone. I swear, that is all I did. He had the letter in his hand. I read the copy we have on file. I did not explain it, he didn’t ask for an explanation. That was it. Does that make any sense? No. The weather seemed to be working in concert with the day's events. It was foggy and rainy, so the drive in and the drive home was unpleasant and at times scary. Our parking lot has bad drainage which, when coupled with the construction of the new community center, led to a GIANT mud puddle covering 90% of the lower parking lot. I had to go to my car to pick up some Christmas bags for the Toys-for-Tots gifts, so I had to make a wide detour to start at the high ground and walk back down the lot between the car hoods using my umbrella as a brace to pole vault from cement blocker to cement blocker in front of each parking space in an effort to get to my car w/o soaking my new shoes. When I returned to my office after loading up the gifts I left my umbrella and my keys in my coworker's office. My back hurts. My stomach hurts. I accidently stayed 45 minutes late, forgetting Sears was coming by tonight to discuss a new A/C. Dealing with them actually lifted my mood because they joked around a lot. Doesn't change the fact I just spent a bunch of money and delayed dinner two hours (my fish was dry & my broccoli soggy), but I did laugh a lot, which means I'm smiling as I'm typing this whine.

I recognize it could be worse - my door decorations could have been destroyed when it fell, my coffee cup could have been full of hot coffee, someone could have stolen my keys, my coworker could have not noticed my keys and umbrellas and not returned them to me leaving me frantic when it came time to leave work, I could have soaked my shoes, and I could have gotten into an accident/trapped in traffic due to the inclimate weather. Even though I got frustrating questions, I've certainly had worse. I'm still irritable over the Toys-for-Tots, but the cause is good, so I just need to get over it. Plus, I'm sure the other group members are probably thinking "That MLR is demanding, why does she keep asking me the same question over and over." or "Darn it all, why can't MLR just make a decision." w/o realizing 1) how incredibly hampered I feel by the fact that I'm not the team leader so I don't feel justified in making a decision and 2) how when the times earlier that I expressed my opinions were questioned it destroyed my confidence in my opinions, so as much as I'm feeling taken advantage of I also recognize they may be feeling the same thoughts. My back hurts, but it's certainly hurt worse. And my stomach is feeling much better now that I've eaten.

So I wouldn't call today a Terrible Horrible No Good Very Bad Day. It just kinda sucks a little.

And we're under a tornado warning right now.
And they keep cutting into the show I'm watching.

But if the news reports are to be believed, people in the areas just above me have it a lot worse, so once again I should shut up with the whinging.

And even with the tv cutting out for weather notifications, I still got to see the party where Felecia Day was singing "White Lie", which was adorable.

I sullenly declare the glass half full. (Possibly due to all the rain.)

EDIT: I won for best theme. :) Also, one of my mentor teachers told me I should research turning my Tenniel captions into Christmas cards; she really thought they would sell. :)

Last year I won our office Holiday Door Decorating Competition with my Beatles Chirstmas Time Is Here Again Door. This year my theme is Alice in Wonderland. (Alice in a Winter Wonderland.) I'm not completely done yet, but I'm nearly there. I'm taking the Tenniel illustrations and redoing them as if they were part of Christmas/holiday story. I admit that I am not artistically talented, so the coloring looks like a three year old did it, but I'm happy with the concepts. :)

( Pictures of my awardwinning Winterland creations - it's okay to call me brilliant. )

As in, you answer someone’s question, and instead of saying “thank you” they say “okay” and hang up.

I can almost see it if they were getting bad news or unpleasant news -- it’s still rude, but I’m sure they aren’t thankful for the answer so not saying thank you makes sense even though it would be polite behavior to say it. But if it were just a normal answer to a question it seems weird to not say “thanks.” That's the usual and accepted and polite response, right?

Multiple times today, to me and to others in my office, we've gotten "okay."

Caller: "When does registration start for new students?"
College employee: "November 30th."
Caller: "Okay." *click*
Correct response: "Thank you."

Caller: "What's the phone number for advising?"
College employee: "123-4567, and I can transfer you."
Caller: "Okay." *silence/waiting for transfer*
Correct response: "Okay, thank you."

See, you can still say okay.

I found a folder for one student and some paperwork for another student that had been eluding me for two weeks.

I found a folder for another student that had eluded me for two months.

I found a solution to a student’s bizarre transfer problem. (She went from a semester school to a quarter school back to a semester school and the differences in how English composition is handled plus the mathematical conversions of the hours between systems initially caused her to appear one credit short. I found a solution for her unique situation.)

I got unexpected and extremely high praise from the educational advisor who was trying to help said transfer student – "Great news on this one!! The communications was a worry – I am indebted to you once again for your tenacity to resolve issues and your quick communication with us. You are my hero!"

W/o going into details about why this is such a big deal – one of the seven students I’m tracking resolved herself completely today. Three should be resolved at the end of this fall term. Two worked with the Registrar who has her fingerprints all over the registration and at the end of next spring they should be completely resolved. One I think has “left the building.” So I’m really excited!

I didn’t snack today and even managed a slow walk despite a backache and sore legs.

I’m sure other good stuff happened, too, but I can’t remember it offhand. It’s registration, and I’m not crying yet – that’s good. Even though I’m sorting the mail for a coworker who’s out of town, it’s not putting me behind in my priority work and I’ve managed to collect a few cute stamps for my philatelist uncle. (WOW – I spelled philatelist correctly!) While not clean by any stretch of the imagination, my desk is not awash in paperwork either.

I am going to have to remember this moment because in December it is going to get bad. It is going to get bad and ugly and I’m going to go absolutely mental.

If the Incredible Hulk and the Thing from the Fantastic Four got into a fight, who do you think would win? Mr. Duggins said his friend who worked for Marvel Comics would describe attending cocktail parties full of conversations that began along those lines. That was how Duggins transitioned to describing the conversations engineers were getting into at the 2005 NASA meeting at Disney’s Contemporary Resort Motel when they were asked to create a new kind of space ship. They were told that it could have wings, it could have tanks, it could have anything – just throw what you have against a wall and see what sticks – so they were coming up with all kinds of scenarios. But in every scenario imagined Batman beats Superman. Just saying.

Pat Duggins, NPR space expert and newly hired something or other with Alabama Public Radio, gave a lecture on campus today based on his book Beyond the Final Countdown: NASA and the End of the Space Shuttle Program. I am curious if this is the same lecture he gave on CSpan’s Booknotes. I watch that show –that’s where I discovered Simon Singh and AJ Jacobs – but I haven’t seen Mr. Duggins there. I have heard him on NPR. His lecture today was a bit meandering and his powerpoint presentation minimal and slapdash, but I think his actual book will be really good. I think he must have liked the subject so much he hopped around a lot in his talk, but he probably couldn’t do that when writing a book. He has a great voice and is very personable, so it was pleasant just listening to him talk.

My favorite story from the presentation was centered around Challenger. He opened with asking us to share our first memories of NASA and the space program. From the memories shared, I think I was the youngest person in the room by about twenty years. Cosmos would be my first “real space” encounter, but my first actual memory of the space program is the Challenger explosion. _{Well, unless you count the MTV commercials with Buzz Aldrin.} So I was particularly interested when he got to that portion of his presentation. He said in the 1980’s the news programs didn’t really cover the space program. When Coke and Pepsi sent up zero-gravity dispensers it was on the news, but other than that the space program was mostly ignored, which I guess is why I don’t have many memories of it. Reporters didn’t cover the space shuttle’s flights because it would be like covering an airport – they took off, they landed, back to you Jim. So he wasn’t covering Challenger when it exploded; he was in the production room with another story when he noticed people scurrying about and asked what happened. Upon hearing the shuttle exploded he grabbed his tape recorder and a company car and sped to Cape Canaveral barking on a CB radio to arrange press passes be waiting for him when he arrived. While waiting outside the security office to pick up his badge he noticed a school bus and a group of 3rd graders with hangdog expressions, so his first interview regarding the Challenger was with those kids recounting their experience watching the shuttle explode. He kept the tapes and 20 years later when he began writing this book he tracked down some of the children, now in their 30’s, to get their reflections on the shuttle program. I found it interesting that for the kids the scariest part of the Challenger explosion experience occurred when they returned home later that night. The bus ride was three hours and no one had cell phones back then, so by 6pm their parents had watched the shuttle explode over and over on television without knowing for sure if their children were okay. What if they’d been hit by some debris?!?! When the kids disembarked they were grabbed in a mad scramble by frightened parents.

He also told a great story about the invention of WD40 . He showed a street sign in Cocoa Beach called “I Dream of Jeannie Lane” and said astronauts really did hang out at Bernard’s Surf as mentioned on the show. And because I was in the audience he mentioned Steve Jobs.

I didn’t realize that when the Shuttle program shuts down it will spell the end for Cape Canaveral. Duggins thinks Huntsville, AL will pick up the torch. As a Florida native, I’m saddened by this.

This made me feel special. Geeky, dorky, and strange, but also special.

Normally on Halloween I dress up at work. I’ve worn my various pirate costumes from Dragoncon (occasionally with giant plastic swords); I’ve worn various Renn Festival outfits (occasionally with horns); I’ve dressed as a witch; I’ve dressed as the Doctor. Once I talked my coworkers into dressing as “the plague” where we were all to wear our pajamas and bathrobes and give ourselves lipstick measles. Despite everyone saying yes, I was the only one to follow through. I taught class in said pajamas and bathrobe later that evening, although I did wash the measles off my face. The last few weeks have been very busy and very stressed (good stress is still stress), so emotionally I couldn’t psych myself up to dressing up today. I was planning on wearing one of the Salwar Kamishes, but 1) I don’t think of them as costumes and 2) I got sick last night which collapsed any ambitions I had. So today I wore an orange sweater, black jeans, black and orange striped socks, and orange Converse hightops, all of which I have worn to work before – just not at once. I also wore my fox hat – which I
hadn’t worn to work before but have worn just about everywhere else as you can see from my Wisconsin pictures, my New York pictures, my Dragoncon pictures, or ask any of our local gas stations. So in my mind, I did not dress up. I dressed down. And more importantly, I felt down until something happened to cheer me up some.

People have been coming out of the woodwork to see if I’m dressed up. I mean, they’ve come from other buildings, even. And they are crazy about the hat. Everyone seems to think I’m a tiger (Tony the Tiger, Tigger, etc.) because of the socks, but that’s okay because it keeps the Come to Kenya song running through my head. I can’t understand why they think I’m so festive since I feel incredibly mundane, but I’m glad they aren’t seeing it as mundane. The best moment was when the Registrar and her assistant heard my voice at the copier, and they excitedly called and called out to me to come into their office because they wanted to see what I was wearing like they had really high expectations. I actually apologized because I wasn’t dressed up, but they disagreed and actually raved about my outfit. Someone else came in and said that I looked more like a tiger than a fox, but I said my husband called me a fox and I was sticking with that. Also, one of the groundskeepers stopped at my window and signed to me how much he liked my hat. He recognized it as a fox hat, and he mimed me chasing down and attacking a rabbit. I signed back “chocolate rabbit,” and he applauded.

Also in the vein of "it’s a good day no matter how awful I feel", the assistant registrar called us all into the vault and had us pose looking overworked and stressed out so that they could have a picture to use in a PowerPoint presentation for the registration meeting. We crammed eight of us on stools and ladders in the vault, using folders and buckets as props. Those with glasses cocked their glasses, and all of us tried to make over-the-top overworked expressions. Our college has grown by leaps and bounds since it's construction in the 1960's, so the once-spacious vault designed to hold admissions files is now crammed to the gills making it hard to file or retrieve files. I think this picture was done in comedic protest of how our many requests for more storage have not been fulfilled. I cannot wait to hear the reaction to the picture at the meeting.

First off - remember months ago when I posted about being found by my old high school friend? For a while there I was actually dressing nicer in case he showed up. Kind of like when you are going to your high school reunion, you want people to think you improved or haven't aged or at least not embarrass yourself. But months went by w/o emails or anything on either of our parts, and honestly I got so busy in my own life that I kind of forgot about the whole thing.

Secondly - it's been a really stressful two weeks. Between the road trip return (which was awesome but tiring), the bathroom renovation (that is a giant story in itself), company visiting from NY for two weeks, some bizarre stressful work stuff that somehow just disappeared thank God, preparing for a Halloween party, sudden day trip visits from friends in Tallahassee, Virginia, and Mississippi, and other stuff. It's almost all good things, but I'm tired and sick and overwhelmed, and it's showing in my face - partly cuz I'm scowling and partly cuz I have a HUGE HUGE HUGE MASSIVE GIANT POSSIBLY GLOWING bump right in the middle of my forehead. It's like a third eye. It's hideous. Today it yelled at one of my coworkers.

I am guessing you can see how these two items relate. Yep. He showed up yesterday. At least I had a nice outfit on to counterbalance my toxic head. When I spotted him roaming around the lobby peeking at doors like a lost freshman looking for homeroom I told him he would have to pick today to show up and to go away and come back when my face was clear. Other than that, I had a nice visit! He's really funny, so we spent as much time actually catching each up on our lives as we did making up goofy stories about people passing by outside my windows. At one point he was telling me about how on his way in to C1 he passed some random guy flossing his teeth in the parking lot. He wasn’t entirely sure, but he thought it was the mint floss. He questioned the idea of a person walking around college grounds flossing, clearly something was wrong with this person – we went on the theorize what was behind the odd behavior. Perhaps the Flosser was just crazy or perhaps he was up to something nefarious and the flossing was some sort of decoy… And there were jokes about D making it safely to his car if the Flosser were still out there. So he promised to send me an email to let me know he made it safely to his office...

> From: D
> Sent: Monday, October 26, 2009 3:29 PM
> To: MLR
> Subject: Made it
>
> I took a wandering path to my car, in part to throw off pursuit and to a
> lesser degree that I forgot where I parked. Suffice to say, I made it
> back with no floss marks.
>
> Beware Big Headed Babies,
>
> D

I wrote back, but he never answered - so I got a little nervous my response was more stupid than silly.

> From: MLR
> Sent: Monday, October 26, 2009 4:14 PM
> To: D
> Subject: RE: Made it
>
> Well thank goodness! Most people don't realize how deadly floss can be.
> It's unexpected tensile strength and teflon composition
> (possibly not the mint kind) means it has all sorts of nontoothy
> applications. According to one website I read, just 18 strands braided
> together can support the weight of a small sea bass. I'm not entire
> sure, but I believe most Nisson vehicles are equivalent in mass to fish,
> hence their amazing gas economy, therefore it wasn't unreasonable of me
> to worry.
>
> Anyway, glad you are safe!

Maybe I can blame the crazy on my forehead.

THREE DAYS!!

Today was a really good day at work! It was perhaps the easiest last day of registration I've ever experienced. Finished my graduation checks, too. So yay! Also, had lunch with my parents since our normal day is Thursday and we'll be out of town! In my attempts to eat all the perishables in our frig, tonight is Tiramisu night! Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. Otherwise, I'm doing laundry, making lists, and listening to Monkeys recite what he's bringing as he packs.

Tomorrow I'm hoping to get a major BSE project done before leaving for the trip, but I may end up proofreading diplomas. We'll see. I'm resolved to knowing there will be a big pile of stuff waiting on my return, but I'm at least trying to get everything cleaned out for now. Then, one more load of work clothes to wash tomorrow night.

Wednesday I have off for running pretrip errands and last minute "oh noes! i need spam!" Then early to bed and early to rise!!

So excited! Even more so after watching the Cardboard Troopers. :)

What am I not doing that I ought to be doing?
I feel a shoe drop is looming...

TWO MORE DAYS OF REGISTRATION!!! SIX DAYS TO DRAGONCON!!!! TOMORROW IS FRIDAY!!!! SUNDAY IS MONKEY'S BIRTHDAY!!! MONDAY IS CHARLOTTE'S BIRTHDAY. MONDAY WE CLOSE OUT GRADUATION!!!! SOOOOOOOOOOOO MUCH GOING ON!!!!!!!!!!!!

Monkeys baked an amazing chocolate cherry cake for Charlotte's birthday. My coworker was the person who fixed us up AND baked our wedding cake AND catered our wedding as a wedding present to us. (After much arm twisting she finally agreed to accept $500 and a homemade quilt as a thank you for the amazing food she prepared for us because you just can't do that much work on catering a wedding for nothing.) Oh, she also did half the reception decorating. :) Yeah, she rocks. So anyway, tomorrow I'm attempting to bring the cake in w/o destroying it or eating any of it.

I am more disorganized this Dragoncon than any other in the past. I don't know what's up with me. I did just dig out my Rutles DVD on the off chance of having Neil Innes autograph it. I have done nothing else in prep for that. I need to take down the MST3K film reel - sooooo excited about them being there!!! Monkeys asked me today if I knew where my Dukes of Hazard lunchbox from 5th grade is - LOL!

I wore one of the Shalwar Kameez to work today! My mom usually refuses to take things, even things I've bought for her specifically. She won't even let us buy her dinner for her birthday!!! So today when I told her that now that I'd worn the yellow SK out, I was going to give it to her I fully expected her to protest ("Raven gave it to you, not me" "I don't need any more clothes" "You look so pretty in it, you need to keep it" and many other similar comments) and that I would have to arm wrestle her into agreeing to take it, pointing out that I can borrow it back at any time, so it wasn't a hardship. Nope. Her eyes lit up and she said "okay!" almost before I got the entire sentence out of my mouth. I was kind of stunned. I was actually silent for a bit afterwards. Then I giggled. So anyway, I'm giving it to her on Saturday. Ha!

A very irate woman called today to ask about a computer program issue she was having. She was not one of our students. She was not interested in taking a class with us. She was at work, she was having a computer problem, and she wanted to talk to someone about it because she was certain that the college had someone (a teacher or employee) who worked with that program and could help her. When I tried to verify that she was not wanting to take a class about the program, she snapped at me and demanded to speak to someone who could help her. I transferred her to the Computer Technology and Business Education department so they could have a laugh today, too.


XKCD: http://xkcd.com/627/
I should have sent her this.

Okay, I'm really glad I didn't know about this until after it happened. Apparently someone was so upset over whatever s/he was told (I think by the Financial Aid Office) that s/he broke the door to our building when s/he slammed it shut. I heard the sound of the door breaking, but I didn't know what it was. I thought someone broke a table, not that that is much better, but at least then it would have been an accident. (Often students leave their kids climbing on the furniture in the office while they are at the counters, so I thought the sound was a kid falling through a table.) When I didn't hear anyone crying after the kablam, I went back to what I was doing and by the time I finished with my student I had forgotten about the sound. A couple hours later as I was leaving the office, one of my coworkers called me over to help with the door - that's when I learned it was broken. We couldn't shut it. Any time we touched it, it started to fall on us. So four of us gathered by the doors to warn students away for their safety and tell them we were closed for the day. I had to leave to go to a dinner party, so I don't know what they ended up doing to secure the building.

( must have been the same thing )

I hope they know the name of whoever did it. I hope s/he is punished. Somebody (employee, student, student's child) could have hurt themselves if the door had fallen on them. IF the vandal did qualify for financial aid, they should deduct the price of the door from their grant!!!!

I can do the full Thriller dance now!!! The Vincent Price version, not the 3 minute radio version. Yay! I still need to play the video with the spoken dance steps; I can't do them completely on my own, but I'm getting close. I can do the radio version even without the spoken words, so now it's just a waiting game - some day I'll be in a Walmart or a McDonalds when the song comes on over the radio and SURPRISE!! Don't think I won't, either. I worked hard for this.

Work has been busy but not painful. So far people haven't been yelling that much, and I'm no longer adverse to pointing out that if they had put in their application, sent away for transcripts and filed for financial aide earlier (as opposed to the week before classes starting) they would have access to classes and free money by now, but there is nothing I can do to speed up your other college sending out a transcript or the federal government processing your pell application AND even if both did arrive tomorrow we can't guarantee they will be entered into our database before classes start on Monday considering how many other people are asking us the same questions about *their* late applications. I am friendly about it and phrase it in a way to point out this is a lesson for them to make life easier for them next semester. It's true. It's a lesson I had to learn myself back when I was a student. Meanwhile, I'm actually optimistic I may finish one major project tomorrow despite all the interruptions AND today was our employee appreciation luncheon (which most of our office didn't get to attend because we had to work) so I got a free meal. I brought it home for Monkeys and me tonight, and it was actually really, really good though crazy high in points. (Country fried steak, mashed potatoes, white gravy, green beans, red velvet cake.) We split it 75/25 in a vain effort to control points. Well, I lie. I ate all the cake. But I didn't get lunch today, so I'm hoping I stayed under points...

Tomorrow is lunch with parents. Friday is dinner and a movie with the old Reading Group. Saturday is Gathering. Sunday my parents are coming up to our house for lunch - we're going to watch the 2nd season of the IT Crowd (my parents love that show!) and I get to show them my Thriller dance and the headboard Monkeys built.

Now I ought to get of and work a bit on Dragoncon prep and at least one strand on my cross stitch project, darn it.

Monkeys practiced with me tonight!! Just the first two of the eight sections. I am up to six of the eight sections!

( names of the various sections and order of performance, if you are interested )

Anyway, my favorite is the "Wuz Up" cuz it's just fun to shamble around. I actually attempted doing the bits that I've been practicing to the real video instead of the slowed down version, and Monkeys said I did okay! I still get mixed up a bit on the order of things, but I'm much better than I was. I have two more new sections to learn, which I hope to get to tomorrow night as I've been tackling two a night, then it's just remembering the order of the sections.

The power went out today at work for no reason, so of course I set to dancing the steps I'd learned to that point for various people in the building. When I got home and checked myself, I actually remembered every step and that I'd only messed up which hand did the up/down movement in the Ha Slide bit - so go me! I still do too much pausing between sections and have to get a lot faster about this, but it's a real hoot!

Also, I signed up for tap dance again this fall. Trying to learn the Thriller choreography reminded me how much fun it was trying to learn the tap choreographies from last year, so I'm in. HEY! I should try Thriller with my tap shows.

WE HAD THE BEST STORM EVER TODAY!!!

I love my new office - my windows kick ass. I can't describe how beautiful the rain was as it flooded our parking lot and bounced crazily off the cars. Plus, serious lighting flashing all over. Oh - and best of all, it was funny watching the students gathering around the edge of the breezeway looking for the moment to run to their cars. When the thunder crashed I could see them JUMP. Ha!! I thought I even saw a branch break, but I think it just was bending funny in the wind. Then, around 3 or so the power went out. I was able to keep working by the meager light from my windows, which was a relief because I cannot afford to lose any time right now. Around 4 we were actually allowed to go home, despite our advertised hours being open until 6. Thank God I had printed out transcripts and degree audits on all the "AA No's" earlier in the day, so I was not dependent on computers or access to records.
( Good, Gooder, and NotSoGood )
Crazy: This is good and bad. For some reason I've been selected to sit on a hiring committee! I don't know what all I'm allowed to say about it, but this is a really big honor for me. Also, it's something I have never done before, so it's exciting. Unfortunately, all the meetings and interviews and reviews will be going on in the next couple of weeks - during registration, graduation, and admissions to the bachelors programs craziness. Everything happens at once, right? I already warned the BSE advisor that I would be away from my desk for significant amounts of time over the next few weeks, and I will be warning the other two program advisors probably tomorrow after I get my desk in better shape so that I at least feel like they are in good shape before I tell them how things will probably be falling behind. :) Friday is our first committee meeting, so I'm looking forward to meeting the others on the committee and finding out what on earth my responsibilities will be.

So all my optimistic posting from yesterday is done.
Today sucked.

I went in 30 minutes early and had a fairly okay day until the afternoon. Filling in at the counter during lunches left my inbox full. While I was not thrilled, I could have gotten it done if it weren't for those meddling kids. I mean grades.

( This isn't technically whining. Okay, yes it is. )

Anyway, it's already 8 pm. I have next to no time to relax, and I can't stop thinking about work. Noises are bothering me. And tomorrow is too soon. It will be even worse than today because I'm starting off the day with a full desk and no end in sight.

I need a mantra: "Next week, it will be almost gone!" Usually it takes us about a week to get through graduation. It's an terrible, horrible, no good, very bad week, but we just have to survive it. Then the BSE stuff, probably another week, and I should be above water. Then we just have to survive to the end of registration. So mid to end of September and this will all be a dream. Until December when it comes back even harder... But then there's the Christmas break.

Now I'm humming Turn Turn Turn. Maybe tonight will be all right.
I really need ice cream.

Today was busy busy busy!! Despite that, I had a good day.

It was the first day of open/in-person registration. Until today, there were limits on who could register, and they could only sign up online. That means it was mostly returning students or those who had planned ahead with their applications/placement testing/advising, so they had a clue. Better yet, we didn't actually register them, we just provided tech support over the phone *if* they had problems, which most of them didn't.

So today there were some fairly long lines and constant handling of people or phone calls. It was nothing like the old days before web-registration when we had lines of over 500 people, some of whom camped out overnight for better spots in line - I don't think at any one point today we had more than 20 people in a line, but it was definitely steadily busy. Of course, having worked the craziness of old-skool registration where it was ten hour days, no lunch break, no bathroom breaks, and never-ending lines that wrapped around the building and outdoors, I occasionally felt like the cranky grandfather spouting out "in my day we registered people barefoot walking up hill in the snow."

Despite covering the counter during lunch breaks, answering phones, and occasionally coming out of my office to weed down the line when it had more than ten people - I still managed to get most of my work done. I was used to coming in at 7:30 anyway, so I came in early to start the day with an organized and empty desk. Also, since I was used to working until 6 pm anyway, I stayed an hour later to get everything prepped for tomorrow. I didn't clear my desk, but I only have four tasks for the morning. Woot!

I also was an amazingly nice person and helped out one of my coworkers with some of her stuff (which basically was doing my old job -- I really miss evaluating transcripts) so that she doesn't get overwhelmed. This is the busiest time for incoming transcripts and I remember how it felt enduring calls from students complaining that they couldn't register for classes because their transcript wasn't evaluated and why hadn't it been done yet. We're not allowed to say it was probably because people kept calling and interrupting our work to ask why we weren't working and that if they had bothered to submit their transcript more than two days before trying to register for classes perhaps there would have been time to evaluate it.

I did have a few OMG DO YOU HAVE A BRAIN/ARE YOU FROM THE PAST moments dealing with some people, and I fear for the future based on their career choices. Maybe they will get weeded out once they start taking classes. For the most part, everyone was very nice/competent and paid attention. Possibly that's why I'm still cheerful and optimistic about tomorrow. :)

GRADES ARE DUE OMG!!
ADMISSIONS TO THE BSE PROGRAM PHONE CALLS WILL START ONCE GRADES POST ARGH!!!
GRADUATION !??!?!?!?! SO NOT READY WITH THE CLAST CHANGES!!!!!
But I'm not going to panic. I may unplug my phone, but I'm not going to panic.

Is there something up with Facebook? My enter button doesn't seem to be working. Also, the comment fields are acting funny. Or maybe it's my technofield.

This week our microwave broke. OMG the sparks! That part was actually kind of cool, except it was a bit scary. I love that microwave. It's a tiny little red thing called a Half Pint. Not a powerful microwave, but it's adorable. We put an apple sticker on it. We've had it for about ten years. So Mom has offered me her old microwave until we can order a new one that's almost as cute as the discontinued Half Pint series. So far we haven't found anything nearly as cute.

Our TV is spotty. It stared with one spot in the middle. Monkeys did some research to discover our brand of Samsung has a defect on the motherboard blah blah blah once you get one you will soon get more blah blah blah out of warranty blah blah blah class action lawsuit blah blah. We are up to 17 spots now. This sounds a bit weird, but I kind of like them. I feel like I'm watching tv with Orion and several of my other favorite constellations. I feel bad for other people watching our tv, however. To buy a new one it will be about $700 or so, which we can't really do right now.

Today at work our network kept going down! So it's been technical issues all around. Very frustrating. What is more frustrating (but also amusing in a "can you believe people" kind of way) was the student lecturing me about getting her electronic transient student request. If the internet and mail server are going up and down all day, that affects if and how we get our email. I never received the FACTS email saying there was a pending request. Also, if our internet connection is down, there is nothing I can do to access a transient form delivered by the internet. Not to mention the fact that even if we did have internet access there is nothing that says K, me, the Registrar, and the VP should immediately stop everything else we are working on to move her request ahead of everyone else. There is no academic equivalent to the Disney Fast Pass. (Really and truly, we do process those things super quickly when the system is functioning properly. I've always been impressed with how prompt and capable our office can be. But when people demand, argue, or expect special treatment instead of being grateful ... grrrr.)

Two cookies.
A scoop of banana pudding.
A slice of Mud slide pie.

Registration.

Today was an up and down day.

I have to say my coworkers are awesome. The Restock the Kitchen party was phenomenal. Everyone really stepped up (with the food and the gifts). Plus, we managed to actually surprise her despite her walking into my office before I could hide my bags, into Charlotte's office with three coworker's gift bags on the floor, and then back into my office while Karyn was showing me what she brought. She didn't even notice - ha!

Considering my lunch (in addition to all the deserts I also had broccoli salad, green salad, and fruit salad, so there was a bit of healthy food consumption) I am trying to subsist entirely on coffee and dance dance revolution tonight. Except it's SYTYCD night - so I'm on a break.

LOOK - I swiped a SYTYCD icon and the creator even agreed not to disembowel me for my thievery.
I'm missing the RetroModern's recap posts.
The opening dance tonight was beautiful. I would so buy this show if they sold it on DVD.
I am so glad Ade didn't go home.
I'm 75% sure I will get to take tap dance this fall. :) Monkeys said we probably won't do pottery, so that leaves me open. If I can get my courage up, I will at some point try ballet or modern.

Tomorrow my parents are coming up and we're going to P'cola to hit the World Market, a Greek restaurant my coworker raved about, an international food market my coworker also raved about, and Hobby Lobby so that I can try to replicate a painting I saw at Target. I took a million pictures of it with Monkeys' phone. Then we're kidnapping a friend who was in a car accident. She's been homebound for weeks (we've been periodically bringing her pizza and forcing her to watch Black Books) and has finally been cleared to ride in a car - so we're taking her to our favorite restaurant. It's the place the three of us always went to to eat when she was home visiting, so we're really excited about it - tradition and all. OMG THE FOOD. We've mimicked a few of their dishes. I should post recipes. SO GOOD.