- May 11: Day 56 -- One day behind
- June 12: Day 87 -- Two days behind
- August 1: Day 136 -- Three days behind
- August 17: Day 153 -- Two days behind
- December 2: Day 250 -- Eleven days behind
- December 21: Day 269 -- Twelve days behind
- January 6: Day 286 -- Eleven days behind
We're just about at the midpoint of the semester. Things are going well. Two classes had exams in the last couple weeks, and the other two have exams coming up. The grading went better than I had anticipated, which was good. I ran the first class' exam with the students submitting everything all at once, and then the second class' exam with individual problems. The latter didn't seem to cause any issues for the students, which is a good thing. The exam on Monday is like the first one, and the exam on Tuesday is little different from both. For the second one, I used individual "assignments" for each problem on the exam. For Tuesday, I'm using a "quiz" for the exam with each problem being its own submission. I want to see if there's any difference in how I work through that as the grader compared to the other way. After this, I'll start planning for the remaining exams based on the way that worked the best for me.
I feel like I ought to have more to say about the classes, but I really don't. At this point, I'm just kind of doing my thing with these courses. There's way less "personality" to the different sections, as my students are mostly on mute the whole time. I do get some live interaction with students at the beginning of some of my classes where I have one student each day present some work, and also some classes have "problem session" days that give more expansive opportunities for students to present. But those only happen once every three or four classes, so the majority of the days are fairly silent and I'm mostly reading questions coming in over chat instead of hearing student voices and seeing student faces.
Thor has found a way to make his presence known a few times during my classes and meetings. The other day I was lecturing and didn't know he was in the room, and he jumped on my lap when I wasn't expecting him. This surprised me, so I flinched a bit, which caused him to get scared and dig his claws into my leg, which led to me giving an "Ouch!" mid-sentence. So I then had to explain to the students about what happened. I imagined they laughed, but since they were all on mute it's hard to tell. Another time I was in a meeting with the webcam on. My webcam captures the window behind me. I usually try to pull the blinds up in the morning to get some natural light in here, and also there's a spot in the window where Thor can sit and take in the sun as well. He happened to jump up there and someone made a comment about it. Fortunately, he wasn't doing something impolite. The cat litter is in the same room as my computer, and sometimes he's scratching at the litter box when I'm teaching. I'm not sure that the noise is distinctive enough that anyone would be able to identify it (especially devoid of context).
The woodworking has begun. I bought myself a $20 hatchet and some 2x4s and have cut and glued some together to start to build a stool. The goals here are not very ambitious. When it's done, I want to be able to sit on it and not wonder whether it's going to break or fall over. It can be pretty ugly and uncomfortable, and I'm okay with that. I'm working with very rudimentary tools (a hatchet, wood glue, and a hand saw) and pre-rudimentary woodworking skills. I guess that tool list isn't quite complete. I have an old file that I used to sharpen the hatchet (which is a new skill), and I've been using a rubber mallet to help hit the back of the hatchet in certain ways to make some more "precision" cuts. The hatchet plays dual roles as a whacking device and a hand plane. I'm starting to develop "some" touch with it. I'm maybe putting in an hour or so most evenings for the past week. It's been a good change of pace to do something slightly more physical that the usual not-very-physical things of working on a computer. Here are a couple pictures. You can see how rough the corner of the seat is right now. I've been trying to smooth it out a bit, but no pictures of that yet.
And because I'm doing that, I haven't had time to play much piano. It's funny how I'm able to find an hour to go to the garage and hack away at some lumber, but I wasn't able to find time to do that. I'm sure I'll get it right eventually.
In other news, I'm soon going to be not the only one in my family to have left California for work. Duolingo has been happening for nearly a month and I'm feeling a little better about my Spanish skills. I'm not vaccinated yet and I don't know when to expect that to happen. I've been trying to clip Thor's nails, but he's pretty stubborn about it. I can handle his paws, but as soon as I bring the clippers over he pulls back and curls his paws inward so I can't get to them. I've been making a lot of chilaquiles and non-flaky green onion pancakes (basically, just a quick bread with green onions and sesame oil). It doesn't quite hit the spot, but for the amount of effort that goes in and the quality of the stuff that comes out, I'm okay with it. I can crank it out in about 5 minutes and only have one bowl and one pan to clean. I pulled out the old herbs, but I haven't planted new seeds yet. Life is good.
