|
I may have been disturbing Phoebe’s attempt at a nap. She might have been judging me for it.
She was definitely put out by my interrupting her sunbathing in the western window.
Poseidon, seen here purring while having his head carefully for the camera, got into a pot in the sink, and enjoyed a bit of sauce before I could stop him.
He is embarrassed we noticed.
The kitties are doing great, thanks for asking. Though they aren’t doing much of the school work around here.
This week I’m reading finals and final projects and doing so under deadline. Everything has to be submitted by Friday. I’ll have approximately 130 papers to work through between now and then. But before I get back to that, here’s a bit on the weekend.
We headed north on Saturday evening to see the in-laws and dote on my mother-in-law. My father-in-law made nice steaks on the grill for us Saturday. Sunday we attended her church. They’ve just gotten a new minister. He’d been serving there in an itinerant capacity, but this was apparently his first service in the full time role.
He did a youth service in the middle of things. It’s an old church and there aren’t a lot of kids there, but the minister said, since it was Mother’s Day, he would sing a nursery rhyme that his mother sang to him. And he wanted the kids, and us, to think about it. So he worked slowly through “Hey Diddle Diddle” line by line, leaving time for the youthful reaction to what is going on in this tale.
When he got to the “the cow jumps over the moon” part, a little boy yelled out, “THAT DEFIES PHYSICS!”
We had dinner at their favorite Italian restaurant. They did not have what I ordered, so I ordered something else. But that’s fine. We’ve been going there for years, it is always terrific.
Today, my father-in-law wanted to take us fishing before we headed back home. So we went to this very nice private club, where he has an in. He brought enough waders and rods for all of us. He paired up with his daughter, and his friend, who is a big shot financial guy and a member of this club, got stuck with me.
I say stuck, because there was a great deal of teaching going on. I’ve been fly fishing exactly one time. I’ve cast a fly on exactly two occasions. (The first time being a parking lot, and I’m not sure that counts.)
Anyway, the scenery at this creek is much, much better than that parking lot.
The full cast was a challenge. I figured out how to roll cast with a little coaching. Doing a sidearm cast was the most natural thing in the world. It seems I could put the fly wherever I wanted with that method.
Anyway, I had a very patient teacher, and I needed it.
I caught five or six fish. Each of them off the hook and back in the water, though I did stop for a moment to admire the two rainbow trout I caught.
So now I’ve caught trout. I think, somehow, everyone here thinks I’ve never been fishing before. Never caught fish before. I grew up on boats and on the shores of lakes and ponds. But fly fishing is new to me. And this was fun enough, but just standing out under the trees and listening to the ware would have been a great day, too. I’m pretty sure I remember the day that I didn’t have to actually go fishing to enjoy fishing. I was with my uncle on his boat, on the river he lived his entire life on. It was peaceful. I was probably in junior high or high school. I thought about all of those experiences a lot today. I learned how to catch small pond fish and catfish with my grandfather. I learned a little bit about bass fishing from some family friend, father figure types. I learned about trot lines and how to catch everything else from my uncle.
And they were all good teachers, too. Teaching a person to fish is more than a proverb. It’s a rite of passage, I think. But they didn’t know much about fly fishing, I guess. There’s not as much of that going on in the Deep South. But up here, in New England, toss out a line and you’re liable to snag someone, like Joe, who was helping me today.
You’ve never seen anyone so determined to help someone else catch anything before. It was kind of him to spend a coaching me up. Never put the first line in the water himself, but he was urging me on at every turn.
It’s a well-stocked creek. The biggest challenge, for me, was getting the fly where I wanted it to go. The biggest challenge for him was patience, and finding new ways to tell me to stop breaking my wrist. He was great, though. And it was kind of my father-in-law to make the arrangements and take us, of course.
But, really, I could have stood there listening to the water all day. He loaned me some new waders. State of the art, he said. They were comfortable and kept me dry and not at all cold. He said they cost $900, making them easily the most expensive thing I’ve ever worn.
And that’s how you know I won’t be taking up fly fishing anytime soon.
Now, back to grading.
Two years ago today, at 12:14 p.m., I took this photo. It was one of those moments where your life begins to change.
That was when we saw this house for the first time.
It was the first one we looked at on our house-hunting visit. The one that the rest got judged against. And it was a hot market. The sellers had put up a few teaser photos on the weekend, a promo of the full listing to come on Monday. As we drove over we looked at the rest of the photos, which were great, if over-saturated. We called our realtor from the road and told him to add this one to the list. We were, I think, the second people in, but we were not the only ones that wanted it.
Somehow, we won the day.
You’d like to think of these as happy moments, but house shopping and waiting out bids is a special kind of tension. But the place, itself, is just as comfortable and relaxing as a home should be.
Everything is coming due for my students, so my full time job is, this week, more than a full time job. One class submitted their finals yesterday. At midnight my other classes submitted some important work, a draft of their social media audits. The final is due next week. It’s a tight turnaround for some. If you’re on the right path, it’s just a few corrections or tweaks here or there. If you’re going the wrong way, there’s a fair amount of work to be done to get on the right track before next week’s final submission. I don’t envy them that, but the schedule is the schedule, and out of my hands.
What I can do, however, is get them feedback with time to spare. My goal is to get all of that in their hands by Thursday, because the final project is due next Monday night. Also, their final exam looms on the same schedule. A lot happens late in that course, and it’s an excellent primer for people headed into fast-paced working environments, but it can be a lot. So I am reading quickly, typing furiously, and then holding Zoom meetings about it with students who are interested.
Zoom meetings that students ask for, most of whom don’t turn on the video function of Zoom. So it is a phone call. How do I know? Because I’ve made phone calls before. (Haha, he’s old! — editor) Also, because they’re often doing that on their phone … except I’m on video … and that’s tiresome to contemplate.
Anyway, let’s quickly fill the space with the site’s most popular feature, our weekly check in on the kitties.
I invite you to take a moment to just look at this face. Fall into those deep swirling eyes and contemplate the vastness and the minuteness of the universe. And also the mischief he is dreaming up.
I tell him all the time, “It is a good thing you’re so charming, Poseidon. You should spend more time on that, as opposed to causing trouble.”
Because he can be one of those things, but he chooses to do the other.
Phoebe is, on the other hand, always charming.
So the cats are doing well. But they’re not doing any of this grading for me. So back to the salt mines I go.
Final papers are in for my international media class. I’m trying to get ahead of them so I can stay ahead of my other grading. While one class is finished, another has a tight turnaround on some important work. This week, from my perspective then, is about giving good feedback in a timely manner, so that it is useful to the students.
So this is brief. More brief than normal. (You’re welcome?)
Just riding around the neighborhood on Saturday, in reality is about six neighborhoods, gave me an easy bit of exercise, and a brief glimpse of the sheep and one of their faithful companions.
Sometimes that dog is sleeping as I go back. Occasionally I cruise through there and he’s working. Every now and again he races me — usually he lets me win. But, today, they were all huddled together and something behind me caught his interest.
We recently discovered the local creamery. My lovely bride says I found it, but I have absolutely no recollection of that. They have three flavors of custard, and last night, a night that was sticky and warm enough to make it quickly look like a potential drippy mess, I tried the creamsicle.
They only accept cash. And while I respect their stance on traditionalism at this creamery, that will limit my abilities to visit there. Who has cash? Probably this is a good thing. It is only four miles away, and I can’t always be lucky about eating it before it gets everywhere.
The local bike shop does a ride to the creamery in the earliest part of the summer. It’s a neighborhood thing, and we’ll join in. Because there is ice cream.
But, first, there is grading. So let me get back to that.
