Author Archives: DELively

Waiting for That Thing Then Putting That Thing Off

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The main problem with being able to track deliveries is that, despite what the software tells you, you’re still subject to the vagaries of the delivery service.

I’d planned to go out today, but had to wait for a delivery. As fate would have it, the delivery (a new printer) didn’t arrive until the evening. Of course, if I’d decided to go out, I would have been greeted on my return by a note saying I’d missed the delivery. (Yes, I am convinced that the delivery man is watching me.)

When the delivery finally came it was actually two deliveries–I’d ordered something this morning that arrived the same day. However, by then I didn’t have the energy to 1) disconnect and move my old printer; 2) connect and install the new printer and 3) figure out what the heck to do with the old printer.

Instead the new printer is sitting in the living room taunting me. (Yes, I’m convinced it is taunting me.)

Tomorrow, I plan to finally go out. If the printer lets me.

 

Field Notes Snowblind–End of Book Review

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One of the joys of a Field Notes subscription is you get a variety of notebook styles as the designers unleash their madness and their visions on the notebooks.

One of the horrors of a Field Notes subscription is you get a variety of notebook styles as the designers unleash their madness and their visions on the notebooks.

In the case of the Snowblind, you have a cover gimmick in desperate need of better paper. It’s more of a toy than a notebook, but even as a toy it has its advantages.

The paper in the Snowblind is 60#T paper that looks great with its light gray grid. However, it bleeds almost every ink that touches it. This doesn’t bother me as much as it probably bothers other fountain pen users, but it is noticeable. The paper feels excellent with ballpoint pens and gel pens, though.

The main gimmick of the Snowblind is the cover. It is a white cover treated with photocromatic blue ink. Once the notebook is exposed to sunlight it quickly turns blue. After you step back indoors, it quickly turns white again.

The Snowblind inside.

The Snowblind in sunlight. You can see some scuff marks near the spine.

It’s even possible to make patterns by putting items on the cover and removing them in sunlight. The effect, for a few seconds, is like one of Man Ray’s photograms.

Part of the annoyance of the Snowblind, though, is the effects of the change fade too quickly. It’s like pointing a flashlight at your little sister’s eyes to see her pupils get really small. (Oh, like you didn’t.) The effect lasts only as long as the flashlight is pointed at her eyes.

The gimmick is cool, or at least serves as a conversation starter, because nothing attracts people more than forcing them to stand in the sun whilst you hold your fingers over your notebook and say “Look now! Look now, quick!”.

That said, even in its white form, the cover looks good. I especially like the white staples holding it together. Also, the cover is durable.

It’s a good looking edition that I think people would be a good introduction to the Field Notes world for those who’ve yet to discover it. This is especially true if they like ballpoint pens.

In fact, the Snowblind is the kind of Field Notes edition you hand out as gifts as you probably never intend to finish them. It looks great and is kind of a fun toy, a few seconds at a time.

This may have been part of the diabolical plan: create a limited edition that subscribers will be in a hurry to give away.

A Reversal of Actions

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My bad classes were kind of good. My good class was kind of bad. It was one of those days. Well, one of those mornings.

As we are in entrance exam time at the school where I work, schedules are a bit odd. This makes the students odd. My first year junior high school classes are usually bad, but today I appeased them with a spelling tournament that got competitive enough that one student openly sabotaged another student. I let it pass because my judgements are biased, arbitrary and final. (Note to self: never seek advice from competitor.)

In my final class of the day, my third year junior high school students took an odd amount of time to get settled. They took the starting bell as a mere suggestion and students who weren’t even in my class sort of hung out and chatted for a minute.

I struck a pose. This involves holding up my arm and staring at my watch and counting off the minutes. Once they hit one minute of delay they get homework. Once thy hit two minutes, they get a lot of homework. They also got to stay two minutes into lunch, putting them toward the back of the lunch line.

Some didn’t copy the homework assignment. I guess I’ll be having lunch with them next week.

 

Field Notes Lunacy–End of Book Review

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For some reason, this song seems appropriate:

The Fall 2016 Field Notes Limited Edition looked really cool, then I started using it and things changed slightly. I liked the paper, but the gimmick is annoying, at least on the one I used.

The Lunacy, released about the time of the harvest moon, is a moon themed edition. The unique feature is covers cut in ways to reveal different phases of the moon. The three-packs available to the public contain the full moon, last quarter, and crescent moon. Subscribers received a fourth, uncut version representing the “new moon”.

Bad, so to speak, moons rising? #fieldnotes #notebooks #penaddict @fieldnotesbrand

A photo posted by DL (@d.e.lively) on

The covers look great, and have an interesting texture, but I found that with the full moon, as I flipped through the pages, my finger slipped through where I usually press. Or, it would flip at first but then the cover would bend and it would slap closed. It’s not a big deal, but it disrupts what should be simple process. I also don’t like the glossy end pages, even though they are necessary to pull off the gimmick and provide lots of interesting information. I’d rather have more pages I can use.

Detail of the cover showing the nice texture and the hole for the moon. (Also a Pen Addict Edition Retro 51 Rollerball.)

Some of the information. I would be 14.85 kg (32.73 lbs) on the moon and would rather have extra page.

I  like the embossed dark side of the moon on the back and would rather have seen the full, half and crescent moon done that way on the front.

I used it as my mini-planner for a couple months. The 60# paper was excellent and handled every pen well and almost every ink. (Wancher Matcha is the heart breaker. It breaks hearts.) I liked the gray reticle dot pattern, even though I generally prefer blank pages. The paper has a gray wash to it that I was worried about at first, but it didn’t cause any problems except to my eyes when they tried to adjust to what they were seeing.

I wouldn’t mind getting more copies, but I’d probably give away the full moon version and since my favorite, the new moon, isn’t available, I’m not sure getting only two notebooks for the price would be worth it.

More or Less Formal

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About the only form of writing I hate doing is formal letters as they are the written equivalent of trying to do complicated business over the phone (something I also hate). The language is stilted and artificial and I always feel uncomfortable writing it.

This is especially true if the formal letters are recommendation letters for students.

I don’t like that my students’ futures possibly lie somewhere beyond my typo-ridden fingers. For example, I was almost done with the first letter today when I realized I was misspelling the name of the school.

I hate starting letters with “To Whom It May Concern” as this is horribly impersonal and makes me appear to have done no research whatsoever on who to apply to. Granted, I had done no research whatsoever, but it would have been nice if my students had, just to make me look better.

Since certain details are the same for different students, I have to be careful about any material I recycle from one letter to the next. He becomes she becomes her becomes his.

(Random But Slightly Related Aside: since it is trendy to adopt a gender/sex neutral method of being addressed, I will no longer be Mister Lively or Sir. Instead, please refer to me as “You Sexy Thing Lively” or just “You Sexy Thing”.) 

Complicating matters today was that I wrote a letter for a student who didn’t actually deserve a recommendation because he had a habit of plagiarizing on assignments. Instead I wrote a tonally neutral missive describing the course and how he enjoyed doing internet research as part of his writing process.

Now they’ve been sent off to someone who will probably, if it’s even possible, make them better.

 

Gathering Dust and Growing Cobwebs

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We all stayed home today, which was kind of fun, but we were all lazy. Well, technically I worked, but I didn’t move much.

With our oldest down with the flu but every now and then she wakes up to eat a little food and huff a bunch of Relenza from a device that looks like it should be holding mints.

Luckily, this evening I had to tell her three times to go to bed and all of those were met with a grunted “uhyah” which is her way of simultaneously acknowledging and rejecting the instruction and calling the instructor an idiot. That said, she went to bed pretty quickly, which means she’s not 100% yet.

I spent the day finishing final marks and putting off writing recommendations. (I don’t enjoy writing formal letters, especially when other people’s futures rely on it. More on that in a future post.) I was busy, but didn’t have to move very far.

Our youngest didn’t do much. She Who Must Be Obeyed did some running and got mad at our youngest for not doing much.

Tomorrow I have a little work to do (or to put off) and then I’ll be done with my university classes. If we’re all home together again, it could be interesting.

Remember, Remember the 26th to 27th of January(er)

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Any careful consideration of the facts will indicate that I am mostly likely cursed in 2017.

Not doomed, mind you. Cursed. Or maybe I’m just getting the cursiness out of my system early.

In the past 24 hours I’ve lost a job along with a couple thousand dollars and our oldest has been diagnosed with the flu.

Then, this morning, my long suffering Epson printer died (it has been promising this death for a few weeks but today it was really REALLY serious about dying). (Note: the printer is older than our youngest.) My computer has been acting up and our car has both been acting up and been recalled. (Well, actually parts of it were recalled a long time ago, but, well, She Who Must Be Obeyed.)

I then had to sit down and finish one last assignment for my fourth job, but discovered that my memory stick had been corrupted and that the only thing that had been corrupted was the folder I needed to work on. Luckily I didn’t need the past grades and was able to download the students’ paragraphs again. (My procrastination actually worked in my favor as I hadn’t actually done any marking yet which meant I didn’t have to mark anything twice.)

Oh, then I got a migraine. Now it’s bedtime. Luckily we sleep on a futon on the tatami floor so I can’t fall out of bed.

Lots of stuff to step on and trip over, though.

 

 

The End of All That

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The end of a term is bittersweet, especially when you know you won’t be back next term.

Tonight was the last class of the evening class I’ve been teaching. Because I am, for all intents and purposes, a kind of ronin who doesn’t work for the company, I accept what I’m offered but always expect to be unoffered, so to speak, the next term. In fact, teaching two terms in a row is rather unusual so I’m grateful for the extra cash.

That said, my four jobs are about to become one (two are ending and won’t be renewed and one is, well, long story). I’m not sure if I’m relieved or not, but I’m kind of glad as I’ve been feeling the wear and tear of all this lately.

However, this means that the time I waste will be my own.

Filling up time with work is a nice way to avoid doing other things. Not having work means I’ll have to find another way to avoid doing other things. I call this “being creative” and I’m pretty good at it.

Don’t Put Off Until Tomorrow, What was Plagiarized Last Year

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Saving them until later was part of the plan, but now it’s caused a problem I didn’t anticipate.

I saved marking some book reviews from my night class until the last minute so that I can get a sense of how my students’ writing has improved over the course.. The results have been mixed. Some students have improved, some have not, and one’s writing is awesome because he just decided to plagiarize.

The student in question, who’s already been caught plagiarizing, decided to copy his book reviews from different websites rather than write them himself. This means he has also copied his way out of a recommendation from me. That said, I’ll chat with my Night Boss before making that decision (I could phrase it as “nice guy but has some problems following instruction”.) (Note: that pretty much explains my life.)

One other student plagiarized a paragraph, but everyone else seems to have gotten better.

Tomorrow, I’ll pass everything back, which means I’ll be breaking some bad news. There will also be some good news. There will also be a few things I’ll keep to myself, but that’s fodder for another post.

 

Shut Up Before You Say Something Useless

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I have a student in one of my classes who, inevitably, asks something stupid and useless, usually when I’m angry. It has become a tradition that my only answer is to tell him to shut up.

Last week, I let him and his fellow students choose their seats rather than remaining in the ones I assigned for them. I don’t usually do this, but this class needed a shake up and the new seating plan lasts only if it produces good behavior. If it doesn’t, they get up to three strikes before they go back to the old seating chart or to a new one that I assign.

(Note: the record for return to old seats is fifteen minutes, not counting the time I cancelled the change during the seating process because the students wouldn’t follow the rules.)

Today’s class got two strikes in rapid succession. Students to my right had formed a small conversation circle and students to my left followed suit. All were talking when I was trying to explain the assignment.

When I broke up the second circle I announced the class had two strikes and that one more would lead to a new seating chart they wouldn’t like.

As I spoke, the student I mentioned before started shouting “teacher, teacher, teacher” forgetting that I don’t respond to common nouns, only proper ones. Finally, even though I was still speaking, he figured out he had to call me by my name. I told him to be quiet because 1) I was talking and 2) I knew that nothing he would say would be useful.

He kept up the name chant until finally just asking his question: “Who got the first strike?” I told him I’d just told him. “Who got the first strike?” This conversation repeated a few more times until I told him to shut up, which he did.

Keep in mind, I do not think any of this makes me either a great person or a great teacher. It just means I’ll have to think up a new seating chart for next week.