See what had happened was, I was going to ride my bike. Then I didn’t, because I slept a little bit extra. And then I was going to ride my bike, but I didn’t, because there was reading, and then lunch. And then I was going to ride my bike, but I had a nice conversation. And then I was going to ride my bike, but the rain came down in great amounts once again.
So I did not ride my bike. Instead, I spent a few extra minutes getting ready for work.
Then I went to get gas, because that’s a requirement, just like driving right past that big glowing red sign that is our laziest indicator of economic health and foreign adventuring. That number is, as you probably know, too big and going the wrong direction. But, I said, as I saw my next eight meals go into the gas tank, I don’t have to buy gas that often.
Then I went to Lowes. We have a local hardware store. It’s small. The people are helpful. If you need precisely what they have, it’s convenient. We have an even smaller one. The people there are a little standoffish. Odds are they don’t have what you’re after. So, sometimes, you wind up going to a bigger store. My problem here is that the big stores aren’t especially close. They’re near work, but its a few miles off of that, and have you seen gas prices?
I bought a shower curtain rod, because I want to use more of the space in my closet. It’s a small walk-in, which is to say that on one wall there’s a row of clothes hanging. There are two shelves above it. There is also stuff below it. In the back of the closet, which is about three feet long, is where the clothes basket sits. But the ceiling is high, and so in this little space where I can walk in to pick up a shirt, look for a hat or some bit of cycling kit, or drop clothes in the hamper, there’s a lot of wasted space above me. There are also, meanwhile, a bunch of free hangers sitting on one of those two shelves above my clothes. Hangers, of course, just become a tangle and I’m sick of that. I’ve streamlined everything in my closet because nothing matters. I put on whatever is on the right side of the rod. Dress shirts, polos, t-shirts, each sectioned off, each waiting their turn. When the clothes get cleaned and put away, they go on the left side of their section, wait their turn, and move forward. I have done all of this to minimize my time standing in that small space. Now, the time I spend there is in dealing with those empty hangars. My genius solution was to get a high-tension rod, and put everything at about eight-feet. So I had to go to a store.
Then I had to go to campus. This evening we had the first meeting of the organizational communication in sports media class. It’s org comm in a sports context. On its own, org comm is important, but not always interesting as classroom material. This way, because of the sports angle, I can bring in whatever the controversy of the moment is and we can talk about things like imaging, branding, crisis management, internal and external comms, and so on. I like the class. I would. This is the second time I’ve taught it. Last year it was a twice-a-week experience. This time it is once a week.
My goal is to figure out which model is going to be the way we do it in the future, and then begin to change things up so that, hopefully, students will as find it as rewarding as I do. I want to do that because it is a valuable class, even if they’ve not yet realized that themselves. And, if they haven’t, they explain it to me before we’re done. We’re all here to learn, I say a lot.
Happily, the class was quite engaged on this first day. It’s pretty easy when there’s something to talk about, and there’s always something to talk about in sports. Next week I’ll put them into groups.
Anyway, I took no photographs today, but remembered that as I was waiting for the elevator after class. Here’s the building across the street from the building where my office is, and, of course more weather blowing in.
The drought monitor report comes out tomorrow. Surely we’re out of this dry spell by now.
I was eager to put up the shower curtain rod in the closet. (It’s amazing what you can look forward to.) I got greedy and wanted to hang some shirts on it, too, but the thing will only hold so much weight. It took me four failures to realize that. Eventually, I settled on just the hangers. It isn’t pretty. It’s a closet solution in a closet that no one but me is ever going to see. It doesn’t have to be pretty; it only needs to be effective. I’ll let you know. You’ve come along this far, you deserve that at least.
Tomorrow, we return to 1926.
