Semester Week 4

 The fourth week of the fall semester is typically when the first year students have their first exams, and it's generally a pretty difficult week for everyone. They don't know how to study, some of them have never needed to study, and yet they are all super anxious about exams. I had a seemingly endless line of General Chemistry students at my office on Wednesday and Thursday afternoons. On top of working with my colleagues to write questions and put together the actual paper exam, I volunteered to organize the alternate time for those students who had "unavoidable conflicts" with our evening exam time. It was challenging to get a list so I knew what size room to use and how many copies to bring. I asked for names by the end of the day on Monday, but on Wednesday at 7 pm I was still getting emails "please, please, can I join the alternate time?" So I ended up with eight students at 8 am on Thursday. Of course, that was the day there was a car accident on the road just in front of my neighborhood that delayed me getting to campus by over ten minutes. Then I had my normal day and finished by giving the exam at the regular time (6 pm) and then spending an hour scanning the pages and separating them into stacks for scoring. I didn't leave campus until almost 9 pm.

Monday evening I was able to come home and cook pork chops with glazed carrots for dinner. That would have been nice except I received a summons for jury service in the mail.

I've only lived here 13 months!

The report date is October 13, which is the Monday of our fall break. We only get two days here, not a week like Aquinas had, and I have mixed feelings about spending my break at the county courthouse. On one hand, at least I won't miss any classes. On the other hand, I wanted to do something fun! I did try to reschedule but the county will only allow you to move the date a maximum of 3 weeks. I even emailed the clerk and asked if I couldn't reschedule for summer, or even the first week of January. The answer was a flat "no". So now I have to find someone to cover my classes (luckily only General Chemistry since FYS doesn't meet that week and I have a co-teacher for STM-101). Worse, that week is the second General Chemistry exam, so if I am chosen for a jury I might not be around for that (which some would consider a bonus, but I feel guilty).

Tuesday I played cribbage and had the worst night ever. Only one win out of nine games. It was pretty awful. Things can only improve, right?

Wednesday I stayed late at school to prepare materials for Thursday and Friday, since I had so many student visitors that I didn't get any work done in the usual hours.

Thursday evening was the exam, as already described.

Friday I went out for lunch with my colleague C because it was her birthday. We went to Fox Brothers BBQ (my third time) and I had the pulled pork sandwich with potato salad. Delicious. I went to my first Faculty Senate meeting to make my report as Chair of the committee, which was fine. The best part was that the meeting was in the Juvenile Reading Room in the library, and the room is actually full of children's books and DVDs (leftover from an early childhood program that no longer exists, they told me). While I was looking around, I found the fifth book in The Dark Is Rising series by Susan Cooper that I've been reading this summer. The public library had the first four but not that one, so I checked it out on my way back to my office. I stayed on campus late again to get things ready for Monday. I stopped at Kroger on the way home, so it was even later when I reached my house. 

Saturday I spent the morning grading my page of the exam. I had Family Zoom which was just the parents and me. We discussed plans for Christmas at Katy's. I need to decide whether I'm going to drive or take Amtrak to Virginia. I'm attracted to the train trip: I would board in Atlanta at 11 pm and arrive in DC the following afternoon, so I could get the roomette and sleep most of the way (and it's less expensive than flying). But I'm also excited by the road trip opportunity. I've started a list of National Parks sites along the route and I discovered the Virginia only has 43 State Parks and there's a prize for visiting multiples of five of them (a checklist! hooray!). Plus, I might be able to visit Farmville and see friends there. But it is 650 miles each way, so I'd be driving for two days and need to stop overnight somewhere. Right now, I think road trip is winning. The parents are planning to get an AirBnB for the three of us, and it would be nice to have my own car while I'm there. I definitely want to take the Metro out to Reston now that I've seen Another Way of Living with the documentary film group. It's on the Silver Line that goes to Dulles airport; maybe I can get people to go with me to the Air & Space museum there and have a quick stop in Reston, too.

After that I had dinner and boardgames over Zoom with my GR friends. I made pizza. The crust turned out flat and hard again; I'm clearly doing something wrong. Maybe the flour is bad? Or the yeast? I let the refrigerated dough come to room temperature and it looked puffy and good until I rolled it out. Maybe I rolled it too much? I don't know why it isn't soft and bready like it used to be. I mean, it's still edible, but the texture isn't right.

Today I did other school work (preparing FYS for tomorrow and working on my portfolio) while baking banana bread and making vegan green bean casserole for the Sunday Assembly potluck. The casserole turned out very good; it's made with fresh mushrooms and great northern beans instead of Cream of Mushroom soup. I took Planet Unknown and played that with three guys. 

The other thing this week was I finally finished On the Spice Market. I did the bind off this afternoon while things were in the oven. I still need to weave in ends and block it, but today was really the first time I was able to spread it out and look at it. It took me almost exactly nine months and I think it turned out great!

Ta-Da! Finished at last!