After another busy day of errands and office work, we have the beginning of a long weekend. The fall study day is tomorrow and then the 3-day weekend for Thanksgiving follows. Tomorrow will involve some catch up grading and class prep for the coming weeks. We are at the midterm point, so planning to ensure everything gets completed becomes a central focus. Plans for the winter term need to be firmed up in the coming few weeks, too.
A long weekend often brings the hope of a day free of office-related work. I often have good intentions, but find that things take longer than expected to grade or prepare. Allowing myself to take a day to do nothing seems difficult when there clearly are piles and files that require attention <smile>. I do manage to get the better part of a day at the very least to do me things on long weekends, so I hope this one will pan out, as well. I would like to find some time to sleep well, feel better and find some moments of peace in the midst of the turmoil. Taking time for oneself could help with productivity by allowing one to refresh and see things in a different light. It should help with mental health by helping to re-centre our thoughts and emotions. Then why does it seem so difficult to just take that day?
Some lyrics from the selection today highlight the need to take time for a break. It is a song from earlier in the career of this singer. Enjoy!
Well -- there seems to be continued events piling on the anxieties and fears. As if there isn't enough in the immediate surround, the weather gurus feel the need to be excited about the potential for a big storm to hit Canada -- specifically Atlantic Canada -- over the Thanksgiving weekend. We are several days out, so the track that Matthew chooses to take is still unknown. Given other weather systems in play in North America, the track could go several ways and it seems less likely it will be eastern Canada right now. They are, though, only computer models -- models that become more accurate as the information unfolds.
Why is there a need to sensationalize this piece of news? Is there a reason to fuel fear and panic? Giving people the basic information to prepare for a potential problem makes sense. Hyping it up appears as a self-serving, ratings grab. My day at the office began by checking in with a friend from a Caribbean island badly affected by the storm to see if she had heard from her family. Even she felt the tone of the news and weather media was unnecessarily frightening. Sadly, this leads to the major discourse being about bad news stories being shared as a personal accomplishment, rather than having the appropriate sense of decorum. Like I've said several times today, people can be weird.
The song that came to mind today is one with metaphorical lyrics. I love the music and rhythm. They fit the complex lyric ideas well. Enjoy!
What a day! Seems there has been a pile up of days with too much to manage. Today I had two lectures and a committee meeting -- both brought further work, but that was expected. Between these tasks, I had to run to the lab with a requisition. I pulled number 21 just as the tech called number 8 and the receptionist called number 11. Needless to say, it was a bit of wait in a very full waiting room. That, too, seems to be a trend in the past several days. Anyway, I had been fasting and it was 10:30 AM when I left the hospital, so I headed home to grab a very late breakfast. Got back with about 15 minutes to spare before the next class. Once finished the meeting that began 15 minutes after class ended, I raced home to bundle the furry one off to the vet for a quick fix up visit -- another trend there with health visits to various practitioners in the past week. When I got home at 4:30, I thought it would be much later as I was starving. That is when I realized I'd only gotten to eat part of my lunch today.
It seems too early in the term to have hit this craziness wall, yet we are in week 5, meaning we are between 1/3 and 1/2 the way through the fall term. I still feel like things are just starting. No wonder I've been busy grading recently. Reading through past posts from this time of year points to these rushing around feelings being common at this point in the term. If it were just the work or just the personal stuff, it might feel somewhat better, but when every part of life seems to be overloaded, it leaves me feeling a bit overwhelmed and cranky. Days like this leave me disliking work and such. Why can't I see the positives? It was a fantastic sunny day -- not overly warm, but a great fall day. Trees have begun to turn colour in fits and starts as I drove along the streets. I am surrounded by colleagues who are supportive and have great senses of humour to keep me smiling and ready to listen when things go awry. Those things should outweigh or at least balance the crazy pace and activities of the day.
A few lyric lines from a song ran through my mind as I was pondering my crankiness today. The message the lyrics hold is a positive one, though I'd likely note that today should be important, too so not always focusing only on the future. love the rhythms and distinctive voices of this grouping. Enjoy!
I've been thinking a lot of my parents today. It is their wedding anniversary today. They were married in 1953 and were together for 52 years. Recently a friend noted a similar remembrance for her parents. Guess that got me thinking of mine. They met in high school and married a few years after graduating.
All those special event dates come by every year, yet some may seem more poignant. This is the first anniversary without my mom. Not that we celebrated it, but I always thought of her on this day for the decade when she was on her own. This year, it is me that is on my own. Perhaps this day has been special for me for as long as I can recall because it celebrates the day they were married and the nascence of our family.
The song for today is one that I recall hearing as a child. It seems to fit the day for me and is sung by one of dad's favourite singers. Enjoy!
Today was fairly productive. I finished a couple of household chores that began yesterday and completed the grading for one assignment also begun yesterday. I was feeling fairly perky after lunch and I made a big pot of beef stew with dumplings for supper tonight and several other nights once it gets packaged and into the freezer -- tomorrow's job. Still feeling a bit off and had a slight fever today to add to the weariness of having microbes fighting it out with macrophages inside me -- feels like world war III -- a cytokine thing <sigh>. Things should continue to improve, but the meeting with the MD tomorrow will help me determine if things are going as expected.
Interestingly, having stew for supper brought a lot of comfort. It was my dad's recipe -- he dictated and I wrote it down -- he didn't use a recipe from a book. The dumplings are my mom's recipe -- copied from her recipe card from her recipe box. It tasted good today, but will be much better after it sits overnight and the flavours blend. There are many comfort foods that I cook, often on a Sunday, that come from my family. -- dad's meatloaf and scalloped tomatoes: Mom's date squares (matrimonial cake for my fellow Canadians), biscuits, noodle casserole and lazy cabbage roll casserole; and Grandma's oatmeal raisin cookies and white dinner rolls. There are many foods that I don't make that often, but they also bring memories of family meals. Isn't it interesting how a simple food item can carry so much of us within it. Such foods tell the stories of our lives. They should be shared with others to keep those stories circulating. I've often thought we needed a family recipe book with the memories that went along with each recipe. Even if we wrote down our own personal recipes and stories, that would be a gift for other family members.
The selection for today deals with a family dinner and a food involved. Enjoy!
Woke up earlier than expected with loud music from the house down the street. This was soon followed by other houses and parties. Seems Homecoming is a time for current students to party. By afternoon most head to the football game, so things can seem calmer. When I went into the back yard a bit ago, I could hear the parties happening all around me -- none too loud, but there are oodles of people out there. The weather is warmer than it has been so a lot of big outside groups can be heard.
Perhaps I'm grumpy since I need to sleep to get rid of the infection that settled in yesterday. Meds make me very tired, too. I may also be a bit out of sorts since this weekend has tons of grading -- three separate short assignments from two classes -- 90 students in all. I'm never ready to do this task, but it just seems too early in the term. I do know that it is well underway, but it still feels too early. Concentrating was tricky with the tiredness. I did fall asleep a couple of times when trying to do other tasks -- at least I was sitting for those <grin>.
I heard a few lines from a song I enjoy as I was trying to do the less than exciting tasks today. It came from my visit to the MD yesterday, I suspect. <smile> enjoy!
Words for today -- long, tired, traffic. Work consisted of two classes and even more meetings. Am I starting to sound boring and stuck in rut yet? <smile> There were a couple of different activities involved in the day. The last minute visit to the physician's office meant an extended wait at the end of their day, but it seems to have helped with the malady that arrived this morning. Grocery shopping was next on the list. A group of coupons for extra points arrived this week and interestingly seemed to be for things that I had planned to buy. Not all coupons scanned correctly, so a supervisor had to be called to 'make it right' with their key scan. It is a great policy, but with a long line of people behind me in the 1-15 item line, I felt the need to apologize to the other shoppers for the hold up. A minor frustration occurred at the gas pump -- one of which seems to constantly shut off while I am holding the nozzle to fill the tank. I was running on fumes, so should have needed about 50 litres yet the thing wouldn't let me go past 35. After several attempts to continue, I decided maybe I was wrong and went in to pay. When I drove off, the gauge registered about 3/4 of a tank. Again, so frustrating since extra points were available for a purchase of the size it should have been. I was too tired and feeling yucky by then, that I just drove home <smile>.
Driving -- that has been a challenge for some time now in town due to construction on one of the bridges that crosses the brook running through the centre of town. This leaves two other options, but the one being fixed is by the high school and a major residential area. Very long lines occur as people go the long way around to get to work, school or home. This began in the summer and is slated to end in October. We have been assured by the mayor that it only takes two minutes to get from Main Street into the subdivision. Many of us have sat in the lineup for much longer than that. Getting out of my street into the one that leads to campus has been tricky some days, as has heading home at night. This week I sat for over 10 minutes waiting for an opening to get into the flow. I lost count at about 30 cars and there were many many more before there was a break. Interestingly, few drivers will stop to let someone into traffic. I notice this more when at the yield sign heading home at night. Where I lived on the prairies had a bylaw that drivers had to alternate at such confluence points around the bridges. I have also noted this in other cities, but it seems rare here. This can mean lines of cars many blocks long waiting to enter the next big long line. The latter line does seem to move reasonably well once one is able to get into it. This week the traffic seemed so much heavier than usual. There are more cars in town than in August as the students are now present, but this seemed greater than that increase. Last night while getting groceries I met a colleague at the grocery store who was working all weekend because it is Homecoming on campus. I'd lost that nugget of information as it isn't a major event for me. That explained all the extra traffic this week as many alumni returned to town for these festivities.
The frustrations expressed by many people recently seem to be well represented by a song lyric. The singer/songwriter performs with much soul and heart. With this song and lyric he expresses the frustration of traffic difficulties and includes some of his personal values about sustainability along the way. Enjoy!
NOTE: the song of the day is the first in this dual audio file.
