Aftermath

So my kids are mutinying and are demanding to stay with my parents. Mea is trying to arrange her social life in conjunction with the extended stay.

This puts me teaching Sunday School by myself on Sunday. Still with no curriculum-- at least no good curriculum. So I am looking up the beginnings of Methodism. At least I am interested in that.

Mom and Dad gave me tons of clothes & tons for the kids. Which is absolutely what we needed.

Dad is working on a synopsis & first three chapters for a book he wrote. The agent wanted him to re-cast the book as a juvenile. So I have been reading and editing this week.

I am heading back home after lunch. I have laundry to do and have been trying to get a chance to sew for a couple of months now.

Party over

The party that I have been anticipating/dreading for the past month went off without a hitch (well, with only a minor meltdown by my husband). The house looked presentable, after much work and much yelling. We got the living room rearranged, resulting in a net loss of storage in the living room and a gain in the kitchen.

Several people showed up (Jenn, Luke, Christie, Brad, and Carl) but not as many as I expected (Willie, Heather). We had plenty of food-- we mostly stuffed ourselves for four hours. Really lovely.

NaDean took the younger two to mass with her this morning, then to a Christmas party this afternoon. They came in just as everyone else was leaving.

I taught Sunday School this morning for the sixth graders. Wow, a couple of those were a handful. Sixth grade is not my favorite age, but I'll be working with them for a month or so until Lali finds a teacher for that age.

Panic

My house is not fit to be seen. And ten of my oldest friends are coming to my house on Sunday. Sunday! And my house still looks like one (or more) of my children exploded in here. How many days away is Sunday? Five?

And tomorrow, I have to go to a stupid meeting about how I can further donate my time. Aarg.

Grading

You would think I would be done by now-- but I am so not. I have submitted my grades for one class, so now only four to go. Could someone just sedate me now? So what should I be doing right this minute? Not blogging. And what am I doing instead? Procrastinating.

Pathetic, really.

Semester is finally winding down (thank God)...

Today I handed back the last of my Comp portfolios. I still have a short writing assignment to grade from them, though, before I can finish the grades. For Comp II tomorrow, I have to (grade &) return research papers.

Updating...

Meleah survived her allergy attack. She has had not other symptoms-- no other problems.

We got our heat pump installed, along with a second mortgage, but fortunately no co-signer.

No clue how my paper turned out, gradewise, but I was pleased with how it turned out given the constraints of the assignment.

I still have portfolios and journals to grade. And papers. Lots of papers.

I am watching Star Trek: Enterprise, which I totally and completely missed when it was out the first time. How I manage to miss these shows, I'll never know. I totally missed Dead Like Me when it came out, too. I *love* Dead Like Me.

W has been at work with me the last couple of days and will be with me again tomorrow. Fighting, this time. And yes, he did win, although I cannot understand why people continue to ask... He lost, in that he has to miss three days of school. Heaven knows he has enough problems turning stuff in when he is *at* school. I am dreading what he ends up doing after three days off.

Laundry took over my house while I was working on my paper. Now there is a ginormous pile of dirty clothes in the laundry room and clean clothes everywhere else. *sigh. I suppose I should stop procrastinating and get some work done.

Sigh of relief...

Relief-- I have submitted my last paper of the semester. And I went ahead and submitted my paper for my Burke class, about four months late.

Now, of course, I have grading to do. Porfolios to return on Monday and on Tuesday. Research papers to grade. Honors papers to grade. Honors journals to finish...

Suddenly I don't feel as relieved as I did...

Today, I actually need to go to my office today and get those portfolios graded and ready to return bright and early on Monday.

Nearing the end...

This semester has been long for me... I am not sure why. I am sure the test-driven curricula in public schools is at least partly at fault. Students seem so unprepared to do the amount of thinking that we ask them to do (not all students, of course, just the certain ones). Others, of course, are brilliant and wonderful and make me happy to be alive.

And the Vino is beautiful. Of course, what was supposed to be about civic engagement, showing that students care about what goes on in the world of politics, turns out to look like candidate endorsements. But the rest makes me happy.

I have a paper due on Friday. I am about half done, but have to re-tool part of what I have done to make sure that I include enough theory. Right now, I am short on theory. I do have an article that summarized the theory that I want to use, which is helpful.

A break from catching up

Grading is overwhelming me. So for a break, I checked the blogs of some of my favorite people. Tim had a great post on his observations from coming to a top-notch grad school from a working class background. He and I have really similar backgrounds in many ways. My parents were educated, but they were the only people in my family who were. Several of my cousins, who are my age, have degrees, but not any of my aunts and uncles (wait, Aunt Rebbecca has an associates degree, but she earned that within the last few years).

My experiences growing up were just different from that of many of my professors and of my colleagues. Add to that, I come from a culture that places a lot of value on orality. And as part of that, we tend to use additive construction rather than subordinative construction in our communication, which is largely narrative. Further, we offer example after example and let people work out their own conclusions as to meaning. Yeah, that was something to overcome in academic discourse.

The people that I am around do not look as these issues as classist, but they certainly are. What else *could* they be? In a world where multiple voices are valued, my voice, as it is, would be considered in the conversation. Instead, I, and many others who are outside the mainstream, must take on the voices of the prestige group.

I sound so cynical here. I should probably do some work and quit pontificating.