I became insane with long intervals of horrible sanity.
The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all.
Many people would sooner die than think; In fact, they do so
What I have been telling you, from alpha to omega, what is the one great thing the sigil taught me — that everything in life is miraculous. For the sigil taught me that it rests within the power of each of us to awaken at will from a dragging nightmare of life made up of unimportant tasks and tedious useless little habits, to see life as it really is, and to rejoice in its exquisite wonderfulness. If the sigil were proved to be the top of a tomato-can, it would not alter that big fact, nor my fixed faith. No Harrowby, the common names we call things by do not matter — except to show how very dull we are ...
May 17, 2013 - 9:50 a.m.
No time to fool around. I have finals to grade. I have to write. Yes I have to write, I can't skip that. If the world were ending I'd be blogging about it. It's my version of the band playing at the Titanic sank. It's me being me.
I'm listening to WfUV as I write this but I might have to turn it off. I've had complaints about the station but it's still my station. But the sub DJ is Paul Cavalconte is terrible. I feel like he should be saying "It's WFUV and we play all the hits." I switched to WQXR but they are having a pledge drive. the problem is that my CD collection is in storage or left behind at the Fort Green apartment. I just have what I've ripped onto this computer. I decided to listen to Goodnight Moonshine by Molly Venter and Eben Pariser. I always want to insert an extra "e" somewhere in Eben's last name. I guess it's fortunate I'm not sure exactly where it should go,
Yesterday started early by going to Costco to see if they can do something about my glasses. George told me that they should bend them and change the angle. The optician on duty seemed to think it unheard of but she did it and now I see much better! I'm not sure if the problem is in the prescription or the way they made them. But now I can see again.
I went straight from there to school to give my pre-calculus final. I had not taken it which is always a good thing to do before you give a test. I caught a bunch of things what would be better corrected. They weren't my usual typos. It was refining the instructions that forced the students to use the methods that I was trying to teach them. I had one substantial mistake. In one question I forgot to give them the units they were supposed to give the answers in. The question was given in meters and minutes but I wanted the answer in kilometers per hour. Word kept on crashing so making the changes wasn't easy. The kicker was that somehow in the process I lost that one substantial change. fortunately someone asked what units the answer should be in and I announced it to the class.
The crashing made it take so long that I didn't have time to take the old tests out of the blue books and insert the new ones. In class I had to tell them to first remove the old tests but to NOT open them and to pass them to the end of the row and when I collected all of them I'd give them the corrected test. I made things super clear. I made the class say, "I understand." I know that without those precautions someone would try and look at the test and get a jump on the rest of the class and someone else would just keep the test and not the corrected one. After they all said, "I understand" one student said, "We do that when we are done with the test?" Arrrrgghhh. I was very good. I didn't say "Arrrrgghhh." I calmly explained what was to be done again.
When that was done I entered the grades for the finite math class then gave then gave them their grades for the course. They did pretty well on the final, the median grade was a 75. My problem is that I know that people got things right despite not really knowing what is going on. It's the difference between being able to get by in a language and being fluent. They aren't fluent in math. If I changed things just a little bit they would not be able to answer questions.
I usually give a ton of quizzes but I didn�t in that class and decided to not include them in the grade. It just doesn't seem fair to count 10 short answer questions as much as a test. They didn't do well on them so it wasn't like I was being unfair to them.
The part of the process I like the least is entering the attendance. I have to enter the info from the sheets they sign into a spreadsheet. I make it easier by having the sheets in alphabetical order but it's still something of a pain. At least I did a good job of keeping the sheets in order this semester. I am proud of myself for getting the grades in by the technical deadline, two days. It isn't a big deal if we wait a bit longer. I asked and it's OK if I get the pre-calculus classes in by Monday.
What I didn't do is bring a package I want mailed to the post office. I might do that today. I can go to my office, do some grading, and stop at the post office and check my box. It's a block away. When I�m done with that I can go to the Museum of American Folk Art and see Michaela Anne,
I could complain more about students but I'm going to resist. I'll just switch a moment to blogging about blogging. As you might have noticed I write a lot about music. My own judgment is that I don�t know how to write about a concert but I'm good at writing about a musicians and their music. The writing makes me enjoy the music more because it focuses my mind. I listen for small things. I put things in context. I see not only that I like the music but why I like it or don't. One of the most satisfying things is when an artist writes me and tells me that I got what they are trying to do. It lets me know that I'm not spinning things out of whole cloth. There is a there there. In my heart I'm a scientist and I want things grounded in reality.
I signed the Pro-Truth Pledge:
please hold me accountable.
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Horvendile May 17, 2013
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