Final's Week---Deep Breath

Greetings:

Thanks to sleeping from 4:00-8:30pm, I am wide awake at 1:00am.   Whoops.   The last few days have been a whirlwind of visiting my student teacher and grading unit plans for HS 275.   Between the two sections, I had 66 unit plans to grade.    Most were done very well so they weren't difficult to review, it's just the quantity and the hassle of bringing boxes of them between home and ISU.   I finished the last box last night/morning at 3:30am.   I had to be able to start handing them back today as today was the scheduled final exam time for HS 275.   

I still have plenty of grading to complete in the next days/week.   I have to switch gears and focus on DMACC for a bit as final grades are due by Monday.   I have until next Wednesday to turn in grades for ISU.   I now have 35 PE unit plans to grade.  I also have final exams (electronic and hard copy) too.   Tomorrow is the last meeting day for my personal training class at DMACC.   They are presenting information about a project and then taking their final exam.   I have mixed feelings about that class.  I feel I did OK with it considering I had no prep time and didn't always feel competent teaching some of the content.   I'm not sure what I'll say if they offer it to me again next spring.

The weekend will be busier than usual too as I am going to a family gathering with Dan and his family on Friday evening.   It's a game night since his sister and her family are going to be in Central Iowa.   I am spending Saturday by myself so I can keep working on grading tasks.  I hope to submit my DMACC grades on Saturday.   On Sunday Dan's mom and her long time companion are getting married after a church service.    They've been together for 25 years.   They've considered marriage before but now with him retiring and their health status, they've decided to finally tie the knot.   I'm assuming Sunday will be busy even though the marriage is scheduled for the morning.

Next week I need to finish my ISU grades and jump into more work with the summer program.    I still need to hire about 8 more people and several of them are group leaders.   I had a pitiful amount of PE majors apply to work for the program.    They typically fill leadership roles.    I submitted my first request for background checks today too.   I also need to set up someone online materials for a few students.   I am doing two independent studies during the summer.  One is for a couple PE majors that need to become Red Cross instructors before they student teach in the fall.   I'm doing it mainly so I keep the Red Cross happy as I need to train instructors so often.   I'm also doing an independent study as all of our classes for elementary ed majors were canceled for the summer due to low enrollment.   One of the students needs to student teach in the fall and has to have either health or PE methods before she can do so.   Considering that most of my materials are online already, I figured I could help her out and she can provide lessons for the summer camp kids.

I'm excited to go to the Shinedown concert next week.   I'm not excited about the venue as getting their early seems to be essential if you want to get a good place to stand and watch the show.   Yes, stand and watch the show.   They don't have seating.   Bleh.    I'll have to double up on meds for my foot so it doesn't make me miserable all night.   I also bought our tickets for the Jim Gaffigan show at the end of July.   It's going to serve as a birthday present for Dan.   It will be a nice way to celebrate the end of Summer Youth Fitness too.   LeAnn and Tony are joining us too (as well as Gavin).  

I'm also excited to do some much needed cleaning both at home and at the office.   I need to sort through so much paper at work to decide what can be recycled and what needs to be shredded.   I want my office to look better and function better.   I'm sick of piles of paper sitting everywhere.    I need to clean my desk in the apartment too and need to do a major clean-up in my closet.   It looks like a bomb went off in there.  

I also need to invest in a tennis racket for the summer.   My orange and black one disappeared a couple years ago.    The other one I have in the trunk is in bad shape.   I want to buy a mid-grade racket this time around so it will cost more but hopefully last a long time.  

Hallelujah Summer is Almost Here

Been meaning to blog for weeks but had to keep my priorities in mind with work.    I typically have no intent or energy to turn the computer on at home and I never have time to do anything personal at work (at least lately).  

The big part of the past month has been my trip to Minneapolis for professional development.   I haven't been able to attend a national convention for my professional membership in years.    11 years actually.   It was OK in a professional development standpoint.  I learned a little bit more about some health-based activities and technology sources.   The keynote speakers were pretty decent.    My coworker did all the driving as she's familiar with Minneapolis.   We stayed with her mom in a super nice condo.   It was nice to swim in some evenings.   The only downfall was the fact her mom had no Internet/Wifi so my plan to do work in the evenings failed.   The Internet at the convention center wasn't super consistent either.   Either way, I don't when I'll go another national version of the convention because the next is in Boston, then Florida I think.  

The other big news is that I did receive my promotion.   Starting July 1, I am a senior lecturer.   Longer contracts and more pay.  I'll take that.   I didn't get an award I applied for but compared to other applicants, I'm a novice faculty member.

The highlight of this weekend was the hours of tennis I played yesterday.  I've been dying to play tennis all winter and during the early spring.   I'm hoping it's something Dan and I can do after work some days as well as on the weekends.   Surprisingly he didn't win all the games either.  

And now for the 101th time...I am excited to make some healthy changes as this semester is ending and the summer is beginning.   The first thing I will be doing is buying a scale.   I need to look at the ones we use for research at work because they are consistent and easy to calibrate over time so they stay consistent.   Would like to weigh myself once a week.    No plans of using Weight Watchers.

Things have also been quite different with Gavin driving.   I don't have to race home from work anymore so I've stayed back late more regularly which is actually helping with all the grading I have on my plate right now.   He's doing well with it and my anxiety of him driving in Ankeny has dropped a lot.   He's pretty mindful about how much gas he's using too.  If you do the math, he's still on the first tank of gas put into it after we arrived in Ankeny with it at Easter.  

Things are going very well with Dan too.   This week marks 9 months of blissful dating.   (Sincerity not sarcasm)    He met Alissa on Friday after work.    We don't see each other as often anymore due to schedules and I'm trying to work in things to do that aren't eating out.   Playing tennis yesterday is a key example.   We are considering the idea of going to a Steeler's game in October as they are playing his favorite team (Dolphins).   It's only a consideration at this point.  

Back to grading!

Mediocre Productivity

Greetings:

I'm catching up on some Netflix movies and was sick of grading assignments so I figured I'd write out a blog entry.  

Our visit, although brief, was nice earlier this week.   I got to see Grandma Stika for a bit as well as a chunk of the Smith clan.   The St. Patrick's Day parade wasn't in the cards due to the weather.   I even got to ride along to Caledonia.   Gavin didn't get to lay his eyes on his car but he'll see it soon enough on Easter weekend.  

Speaking of him driving a car, we took time on Wednesday and he got his license.   The wait was ridiculous.   Then again that's quite normal for the Ankeny DOT location.    In hindsight, we should have gone to the station in Decorah when we were in NE Iowa or to the location in Ames.   We were seen right before 5pm or else we would have been told to come back the next day.   We had more than a two hour wait so being told to come back the next day would have not gone over well.

We spent time yesterday visiting with our State Farm agent, well actually her assistant.    His car now has insurance coverage.   And finally today we bopped down to the Treasurer's office in Des Moines and had the title changed over to Gavin, received license plates, and registered the car too.    He can now legally drive the car when it needs to be brought back to Ankeny.

I took my car in to the dealership yesterday for some basic maintenance and to figure out what the rattling noise was under the hood.   My dad thought it was the incline pulley which made sense.    Turns out the clutch in my air conditioner compressor went to crap.    The dealership states they won't only replace the clutch because the repair usually doesn't work well.   They'd rather replace the entire compressor.   Mighty pricey.   It will have to wait or I may not fix it at all.    It seems silly to spend over $1,000 on a repair when I do want to trade in the car within the year.

Now for some movie reviews:

"Orphan":  holy cow good horror movie!   Family adopts a 9 year old girl.    Bad things start happening and they find out she actually has a hormonal disorder and is actually a grown woman.   A mentally ill grown woman.    Lots of thrilling parts.

"Hellraiser III and IV":  one of my favorite horror movie series.    I own the first two movies thanks to Michael and decided to watch more in the series.    I think there are like 10 total movies.   I expected them to get worse as I went further into the series but so far they are still decent.  

"Cake":  Jennifer Aniston is the main character that is dealing with grief and chronic pain.   It's actually a really good movie and an interesting role for her.    I highly suggest it.

"The Constant Gardener"  A decent cast of characters and a plot that does keep you interested.   A politician's wife is murdered in Africa and he decides to investigate to figure out why.   Rachel Weiss is the main female character.    Quite the scandal is recognized by the end of the movie.    It relates to the AIDS epidemic in Africa and a pharmaceutical company.

"Life of Pi"  I was quite confused by the end of this movie.   I can understand why it won so many awards as the effects are awesome throughout the movie.    The boy is telling the story throughout the movie (well he's a grown man) and I was confused if the tiger actually existed or if he manifested the tiger to represent a cruel human he had to share the boat with.  

"Fed Up"  Fantastic documentary.    It relates to the sugar industry and how after the fat-free/low-fat craze hit in the late 80s, the amount of sugar skyrocketed in many products to make food taste better when it was lacking fat.   It's a movie I plan to show to college students.   I wanted Dan to watch it but got impatient and sent the DVD back to Netflix so I could move on to the next video.

"Wild": Reese Witherspoon is the main character that decides to walk the Pacific Crest Trail.    She decides to change pace with life due to her drug use, failed marriage, and poor choices.   It was based on a true story and they mentioned details at the end of the movie.   Overall, a pretty good movie.

"Horrible Bosses and Horrible Bosses 2":  A very funny pair of movies.  I found the first to be better than the second.  Crude humor with an interesting cast.   Seeing Jennifer Aniston play a sexual harasser was unexpected but she did it well.  

"The Age of Adaline"  A woman has an accident in the 1920s and it doesn't allow her to age any longer.    She has to live a secretive life and move a lot so people don't notice her perpetual youth.   She bumps into someone from her past though and things get messy.

"Little Miss Sunshine"   This is a weird movie centered on a weird family.   It was Steve Carrell's first major film I believe.   The family is traveling to California to take the daughter to a beauty pageant.    Lots of surprises along the way, including a death which made it feel like National Lampoon's Vacation.   It was an OK movie.

"Left Behind"   So this movie relates to the "Left Behind" book series.   I loved the book series.   The movie was 'meh'.   Nicolas Cage was assigned the lead role which is horrible casting.    I figured they would cover the entire first book but they actually only covered like half of the book.   The ending was not great even though it was accurate for the book.   It was a crappy spot to end the story though.  Basically the reaping occurs (think Revelations) and all of the good people are taken to heaven suddenly.   All the sinners are left behind and deal with the chaos.   Car crashes, planes falling from skies, mass confusion, the works.

"Little Children"  I rented this movie years ago when it was a new release.    It features Kate Winslet as the main female role.   It has screwed up story lines for most of the characters and most of the issues are sexual.   Definitely 'R' rated.  I like it though because is shows a lot of human nature.

"Perks of Being a Wallflower"   I think it was OK.   I honestly cannot remember much about it so it wasn't a movie that made me go "wow".  

"Interstellar"  Now this movie made me go "wow".   I don't know why I waited so long to watch it and wish I would have seen it in the theater.   It was an interesting story line with Earth becoming inhabitable so other planets and galaxies needed to be explored.  

"What Dreams May Come"  I remember being more freaked out about this movie when I first saw it as a kid.   I think it's ironic that the movie involves suicide and Robin Williams killed himself.   It was still good as I remembered though.

"Babel"  Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett play a married couple in this movie.   It's another movie that has more than one story line running through the movie.  Cate's character is accidentally shot and kindness in a foreign country saves her.   While they are dealing with that issue overseas, their children are being watched a house keeper/babysitter.    She is an illegal from Mexico.   Since the parents cannot get back in a timely manner the babysitter has to take the kids into Mexico so she can attend her son's wedding.   On the way back into the states, her nephew does something stupid at border control and the babysitter and children end up wandering in the desert and almost dying.   Lots of thrilling parts with both stories.

"Rendition"  Reese Witherspoon and Jake Gyllenhaal are the married couple.   Due to a terrorist attack, Jake's character is pulled off a flight since he was recently in the country and held for questioning (and torture).    His wife goes nuts trying to figure out what happened to him and becomes aware of improper tactics of our government when it comes to holding suspects.

"Selma"  Fantastic movie about the Civil Rights Movement.   It's fairly accurate and shows a lot more about Martin Luther King Jr. beyond the famous speech he gave.   It shows more about the marches and the violence that took place in the south.   Highly recommended.

At Last!

I've been wanting to blog for weeks.    I usually tell myself when I complete A, B, and C I will take time to blog.   Well I usually don't get through my list (work-related) or by the time I'm done with C, I have no more energy for writing an entry.    Plus I've been staring at my laptop or desktop computer screens a lot lately due to my grading workload.    My eyes onto of my brain are shot.   My popular phrase lately has been "my brain feels like mush" and it's quite accurate.

We held our semesterly health fair event at a local elementary school today.   I am quite pleased with this semester's effort.   Out of the 20 booths, I only had drama from one group.    Even though they were all pissed at each other today, they put on smiles and did well with the children.   Group work always seems to start a World War with 1-3 groups when I have a health fair in my class.  We had a 'first' today with the health fair.   I could tell a little group looked upset in one of the groups.   I went over to her, asked if she was OK as I figured she had an issue with another student or something.   She said she was fine and like three seconds after I walked away she blew chunks everywhere.   Oddly enough vomit doesn't bother me much because I deal with it enough at ISU but I was surprised that more of my pre-service teachers weren't helpful.   Out of the 8 or so that were in the direct area only one stepped up to help me with her.   Sigh.

I am thrilled that next week is Spring Break.   It will be nice to have some downtime.   Sadly one thing I'm looking forward to is having time to catch up with grading.   I'm going to spread it out so the week isn't a drag but it will be nice to start the following week with less of a workload.   In all of my ISU classes, my students start teaching lessons to their peers so I have to get into lesson plan assessment mode.    Great lesson plans are easy to grade.   Crappy lesson plans are easy to grade.   It's the middle ground lesson plans that take more time than I like.   It sounds like we'll bop up to Waukon for the first part of the week and come back down to Ankeny in the middle of the week.  

Let's talk health.   I have felt so worn out and tired lately.   It's to the point again where it's affecting my work so that's irritating me.   In the past few days I cannot think straight at times.   Luckily it happens when I writing an email or doing something in my office rather than in the middle of teaching a class.    I'm hoping that I catch up with rest next week even though they say that's impossible to do.   I am rarely taking my melatonin or prescription sleep med.   I was hoping to wean myself off both and get back to sleeping naturally.    About 1-2 nights a week I can easily fall asleep on my own.   Other nights I can feel completely exhausted but I just lay away usually thinking about work.  

I need to get moving more too.   The weather has been gorgeous and I'm not taking advantage of it often enough.   I need to use the walking paths around here more often.   My main complaint is how often my right foot hurts with my plantar fasciatis.   Some days it's nothing and is fine to walk on and my pain level is very low.    Some days I can hardly put weight on it by the end of the day.   Especially on Tuesdays and Thursdays when I've been very active all day with teaching and Swim & Gym.   The fun part is that I'm sure weight loss would help with pain relief but I can't do much of what I enjoy for activity because it makes my foot act up.   Lovely cycle.   I haven't tried tennis yet.    Assuming the great weather continues, I want to play soon with Dan (or anyone else that is game) since all of our snow is gone down here.

Speaking of Mr. Dan, things are still going very well.   Both he and I have been working like mad people lately so there really isn't much to report on.   I haven't been going to Newton much because I've been working on weekends (thanks DMACC).   This month marks 8 months of dating.    I think we are going to use the Jim Gaffigan show in July as a celebration for our one year anniversary.   I will admit it is starting to feel odd that hardly anyone has met him yet.   I'm hoping he can be present for some/all of Alissa's graduation celebrations as well as come up for Nicole's wedding in July.   Fingers crossed.

Time to switch laundry and hit the hay!  

Happy February!

I'm pretty pleased with my productivity this week.  I didn't have anything scheduled for this afternoon so I've spent some time with prep work (I am weeks ahead) and also did some inventory duties for my coordinator job.   I'll be heading to Boone soon to meet with my accountant.   I've had to reschedule twice due to the weather so it's nice to get this done finally. 

ISU is going well.    Swim & Gym started and I'm really happy with the group of employees I have this semester.   No one is taking it as a class.   I also hired new aquatic personnel and I really like their energy and passion for teaching.   We have 41 children enrolled which is quite high.   At the moment is seems manageable but I'm irritated I didn't keep track better.   I teach the same class twice in the row on MWF.   (Health methods for elementary teachers)   My tricky class is a fundamentals course for PE majors.   The focus is on individual sport and fitness aspects.   Scheduling has been a struggle as we do not have ample gym space or weight training space in our building.   About four classes need the same spaces at the same time on Tuesdays/Thursdays.   Pain in the butt.  

DMACC is going OK too.   My Sports Diversity class is cake as I made major changes last semester when we updated the edition of the book.    I'm also pretty pleased with my Personal Wellness class too as I've made changes to better help the high school population that takes the course.   I've recorded my lectures so they can hear my explanations and better process the content.   I think it also helps them understand my scope of knowledge since I cannot cover every single detail in our book.    My tricky class at DMACC is Personal Training I.   I still don't feel 100% about teaching the content.   I met with the past instructor and she helped my confidence a bit.   It sounds like I have much easier students.   She's had self-proclaimed personal trainers take the class in the past and constantly argue with her about content.    My students aren't as knowledgeable or just too shy to argue with me.   I still need to contact a local fitness facility to see if they'll let us use there site for fitness testing and workouts.   The Ankeny campus has no fitness space due to construction.   (Why offer the class then?!?!?!)

Dan and I exchanged gifts already for Valentine's Day.   He's made it clear that he likes to give jewelry which will be different for me.   He got me a ring.  It has black diamonds which is something I've always liked even though I really don't have a certain style with jewelry.  

Tax time!  

Reflections

So sixteen years ago, I had been in like 15-16 hours of labor by this point of the day.   I have the motherly amnesia in that I don't remember major details, primarily the pain and discomfort, but it's interesting to think about how different life is now.   It would honestly feel weird to have a child at this point of my life and work around a career and such.   It would be normal but weird.

Sadly I cannot get my hands on the Xbox that Gavin wants; I had planned to give him that for his birthday since it wasn't possible for Christmas.   He may have to pick out a different version too because I don't think they are making the Xbox bundle he wants any longer.   I gave him a gift card to Buffalo Wild Wings and I'm going to renew his membership on Xbox live.   We are going to try and go to the local Japanese steakhouse place too with Dan and his boys.    It would be fun to go tomorrow night on his actual birthday BUT I have to work at night thanks to DMACC.

Speaking of DMACC...I am not thrilled with my workload.   I'll likely feel better when I get my first full paycheck from them but right now I feel like I'm scrambling to keep my head above water.   My wellness course is taken by high school students and holy cow they are needy.   My diversity class isn't too bad since I made a bunch of adjustments last semester with the new edition of the book.   The personal training class is going OK.   I still have a lot of prep to do before tomorrow night.   I feel a little better because the students work out but aren't very knowledgeable.   I only have a couple that make me nervous.   One male student is more knowledgeable than the others.   Another male student seems to have kind of an attitude and I cannot pinpoint why yet.  

ISU is just as busy as I'm still hiring for Swim & Gym so that's getting a little hectic.   My health classes (two sections) are going well since I've taught that class so much now.   The other class is so-so since I'm still planning how to teach it.   The main issue is the lack of space.   Several classes need the gyms and weight room at the same time so it's kind of a mess.   And the class size is huge.   I have almost 40 students.   Sigh.

On a more positive note, I've been seeing Dan now for six months.   It doesn't seem that long but on the other hand it seems like I've known him longer.   It also seems odd that things are going so well.   I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop.   It took three years for that to happen with the ex so I'm still worried something will change for the worse.   It helps that our personalities are so similar.   It feels pretty nice to be with someone for months and not be consistently angry.   I've barely been angry at all.   I may have stumbled into a healthy relationship...crazy.

I unfortunately had to take a sick day today because I was up most of the night with horrible abdominal pain.   I felt funny in the late afternoon and into the evening yesterday.   I fell asleep for a bit after 11pm but woke up around 1 AM and felt really bad.    I calmed down and thought about my symptoms and realized it was an ovarian cyst that likely ruptured.    Hard to explain as I don't want to call it pain, more like pressure.   I thought I could still function and go to work this morning but I was A) too tired and B) still in some decent pain.   It was hard to drive Gavin to school so I figured driving all the way to Ames and trying to teach may not be in my best interest.   Luckily by this afternoon I felt quite a bit better so I was able to tackle my email and do some online grading.   I'm sure my students were distraught that class was canceled today too.   *eye roll*

OK, that's enough for now.  

Bring on the Spring Semester

I've been meaning to blog for days but have legitimately been busy due to prep for next week.   Usually when I get home, I have no motivation to turn on my laptop so it's been a slow process.   I'm still at work (shhh) and figured I'd finish this entry. 

My first piece of excitement is the fact that I bought a piece of furniture.   When talking to Mom, I realized that I never really purchased any furniture in the past.   It was either used/handed down or someone else bought it.   Captain Dipshit bought our bed, new living room furniture, and dresser so I'm actually surprised with how much furniture came with me to the apartment.   Anyway, I got a graphite colored loveseat.   I fell all adult-like making a big purchase like that.   We don't get it til January 16 though. 

 

Some day I hope to buy another nice lounge chair of some sort for the living room.   We'll never fit a couch but then again I'm not sure how many more years I'll live there anyway.   I'm hoping the color and style will easily match to other furniture if I buy more things in the future.

I'll note that I'm not really listing my points of excitement in any order.    In December, Dan and I decided to change our relationship status on Facebook.   It was discussed in the fall  but didn't take place and I guess I was surprised it happened in December.  I unfortunately had a couple "friends" act negatively when they saw the announcement so that was interesting.   Can't say I've communicated with them much anymore.   In theory I should have mentioned this before the loveseat but oh well.  I don't want to copy and paste. 

Let's talk the spring semester:

• I'm teaching two sections of HS 275 back-to-back.  Fairly easy as the content is repeated but the amount of grading skyrockets since I have about 70 students between the two sections.
• I'm teaching KIN 236 which is the Fundamentals of Individual Sport and Fitness.   It's the first time the class has been taught as we've merged two classes into one.    I have to include weight training, which makes me nervous as it's not my fortay.   
• Swim & Gym will start on February 2nd.   Just reminded myself to complete background checks.   Sigh.  
• I'm overseeing the grad students again.   We have a start to the semester meeting tomorrow.   In my head I have an agenda.   I'll organize things better in the morning.   
• I have an all day meeting on Friday and was asked to present during it about my teaching style and strategies.   I'm focusing on how we've added online components to our physical activity classes.  
• I am supervising two student teachers.   Both are located in the Des Moines area.   Both are strong students but it will be interesting to see them in high school settings, especially in the area of Des Moines they are assigned.
• I am teaching PEH 110 (online) for DMACC again.   It's only for high school students.   I still need to record some video and audio to try and better the class.   I learned a lot about high school students last year...they need more hand-holding so I'm hoping some audio with my presentations will help them.   If they bother to listen to the audio....
• I am teaching PEH 178 again for DMACC (online).   It's a sport diversity class.   I made a buttload of adjustments and changes last semester.    It should be easy to implement since I did all the hard work in the fall.   
• And sadly I'm teaching PEH 120 for DMACC.    It meets on Wednesday nights.   Everything else is online.   It's a personal training class.   Yea...I know maybe 25% of what I should to teach the class.   I'm helping my boss out since the instructor for the class is leaving DMACC.   Just irritates me that I'm going to look less than competent.   Sigh.   I haven't even done the syllabus or prep yet because I'm beside myself.   There was a chance it would be cancelled but no such luck.    I shouldn't complain because I'll be teaching 8 credits for DMACC which should pay very well.   It should help me save up money to survive the summer when I don't have full time work.   

I guess not working for the Red Cross is sort of a godsend because I'll have plenty to do between the two institutions.    (Ya, I just taught CPR for ISU an hour ago so it's not like I'll have a break from teaching Red Cross content.)

I was scared to death this past weekend because my back gave out.   It was the same sensation that I dealt with in 2011.   All I did was walk out of the bedroom and when I stepped into the hallway, BAM my legs gave out.   Luckily it was much better within 24 hours.   It was weeks of agony back in 2011.   I kept moving even though it hurt like hell and I think that helped a lot.   My only complaint now is that my left leg is super tight.   I think my back is back to being fine but may be out of alignment so my lower back is pulling on my left hamstring.    It could be my I-band too.   I'll take that over my back giving out though.   And thanks to all this crap, I'm barely noticing my plantar faciatis.  (Not spelled right but too lazy to fix it.) 

OK, time to pack up and work from home.  I want to record some lectures for DMACC and I have to use my laptop.   It would probably look more professional if I did them from my office but oh well.

Happy 2016!!