There's a temptation, I find, to assume that just because one no longer works, one's weeks are suddenly devoid of all purpose and meaning. Ah HAH, I say to such naysayers! The last few weeks (three, I think?) started out a bit lazy, I'll admit, but my days are as much or more full now. I get up at 6:30-7am, get Elise up and ready for school. Some days I go with her, as I'm volunteering in her classroom to teach the kids about internet searching and research, and to get them look up a famous American they may be interested in.
I'm going to shoot off on a tangent here, but it's an important one, I think. The dynamics in Elise's classroom are pretty strange, and worth mentioning. I'm fairly sure these kids are worse behaved than most at the school, just so you don't think that the whole school is full of screaming ADD-heads...
There are three boys who represent the worst of the worst. I'll call them E1, E2 and M1. By no means do I believe these kids are just bad kids and that's all there is to it. Nope, they've all had a very rough time growing up - one boy spent the first five years of his life floating through different foster care settings. His mother's been forbidden to have any contact with him, and he's never had the slightest idea who his father is. M1 (and I have this from his father) has a psycho mother, and the father now has custody. He's raising this boy and his sister by himself, and it's a struggle.
I don't know the situation for E2, but he's like the other two: so desperate for attention that he'll do anything, including really naughty stuff, to get it.
I started out in the classroom a few days after I left my job. I'd promised the teacher, Mrs. A. to help her set up the computers in her classroom, but then I got swamped at work, and she finally got them setup. I then asked what help she could use, and she suggested I teach the kids the module about internet searches, and have them search for information on a famous American, thereby killing two birds with one stone.
I love kids, and I'd been on a field trip with Mrs. A and the class earlier in the Spring. I'd already met all the kids in our group, and every time I'd come to pick up Elise, on the days I could, everybody would say "Hi, Elise's Mom!"
Now everybody gives me a hug when I walk in, and I'm gaining a bit better rapport even with the difficult ones, who are starting to do what I ask without too much argument. They all seem really anxious to get my attention, and I find it really is true that you can catch more flies with honey than you can with vinegar.
By way of example, E1 started out the day just full of angry rebellion - every single thing anyone asked him for, he did the opposite, and he did it looking us straight in the eye.
At first I used my serious angry mommy-voice, but then I started to think about him the way I used to think of young horses: you can yell when they get something wrong, but the only way they know how to do the right thing is if you immediately praise them as soon as they stop doing the wrong thing. I also remembered that the only way to get a young horse to go the way you want him to go, when he's decided he doesn't want to go where you lead, is to push him sideways, and then as soon as he takes that sideways step, you lead him forward. You can spend your whole life and all your energy trying to push a horse forward, but let me tell you, it just don't work. Ever.
Example: E1 had some word puzzles he was working on. He WAS supposed to be working his journal with everyone else, but he was sitting at the back of the room, doing these puzzles, and ignoring the teacher when she asked him to join in.
So I went back and stood next to him, and watched him doing his word puzzles. Then, when he got all interested in showing me how he was doing them, I sat down in a chair, patted the one next to me, and he sat down so we could work on the puzzles together.
When he'd finished the last puzzle, I made a big fuss out of how well he'd done (and it wasn't hard - he has quite a fine mind for puzzles) and then I patted him on the back and said, "Great work. Now go grab your journal and we'll work on that together."
(Push sideways, step forward, walk ON...)
He grabbed his journal and showed me some things in it, and drew a star for me to show me how well he could draw a star. Then I drew one, and asked him how to make it look like Patrick. (Okay, so you gotta know Spongebob to know who Patrick is). Then I told him I wanted him to write me a journal entry on Spongebob. He wrote out a nice entry and showed it to me. I told him it was wonderful, but could he write a bit more? He came back with an entry about the Bubble Band, and pictures of Sandy, Spongebob and Patrick, colored in and everything.
Okay, so it went on like that. I found that he could do the work, but only if I spent every minute working directly with him. Mrs. A does not have a teacher's aide because no one gets a teacher's aide in these days of thin budgets. E1 will probably wind up in jail someday unless someone intervenes right now, and I do mean right now, while he's still a child and willing to listen. Once he hits puberty, if no one does anything for him, he's doomed. I could just cry.
Anyway, back to the original topic. I got up at 7am, got my shower and got Elise ready, and then we went to school. I worked with the kids until 10:30am, when I had to take off for a meeting with my career counselor. THAT lasted until 12:15pm, at which point I hurried off to get some lunch, and then hurried to Elise's school to pick her up. THEN I sat with her while she played in the play structure with some of her friends who were in the afterschool program. Then we went to the post office to get stamps, and then off to Safeway to get fruit and some snacks. From there we went home, where we had just enough time to get a snack, and for Elise to get changed for gym class. After gym class we came home again, had some dinner, and now it's 7:20pm, and we're off to my best friend's house to talk story (she's a writer too, and I ask her to read all the stuff I'm working on).
Tomorrow, I'm taking Elise and her friend Wynter to McDonalds to play in the play place and get some lunch. Then I'm driving my niece Brianne down to the in-laws in Morgan Hill, where I will then hole myself up in my trailer to get some writing done, and she'll go off with Grandma Doris to pick out yarn for the blanket Grandma is going to crochet for her.
I have an end-of-July deadline for having my portfolio finished and off to the first agent, and that's coming along well, and I have to write up the beginnings of a website and the corrections to my resume that I discussed with my career counselor today, and THAT has to be done in the next two weeks.
Da-YAM...
Unemployment is so much more hectic than I thought.
:)
Friday, June 05, 2009
Monday, June 01, 2009
Not a bad little Monday, all things considered
My weekend, sadly, was not as productive as I had hoped. I got stuck slogging through the rank molasses of writer's block, and instead of getting up and taking a walk or something, I sat there trying to force blood to come out of my eyeballs or something. How annoying.
But I did do one thing that was productive: I discovered part of why the trailer was getting so hot. I've got a tarp over the roof, because it leaks and has needed fixing for at least three years. The tarp does the job just fine, although traveling with it like that is out of the question, unless I go to the desert or someplace equally rain-proof.
So, anyway, I've had the skylights open, thinking that would help to cool down the trailer, but on Sunday, I put my hand up by the open skylight, and felt the air coming in, which was like an oven. I realized, this had to be because the open skylights were creating an airspace under the tarp, which was being heated by the sun. This really hot air was then leaking down into the trailer, and contributing to the outrageous heat problem.
I know this because even the roof didn't feel as hot as that air (and it was barely 80 degrees outside) when I put my hand up to feel it.
I don't think this has solved the problem, but I do hope it's helped. The next step is to get an evaporation cooler that I can run inside the trailer. If I close the windows, and run the fans, that should make the trailer proof against the worst heat (and Morgan Hill has some astoundingly hot days) without costing a million bucks for the cooler, or a million bucks to run the cooler. I'll have to see.
On to today. I took Elise to school this morning, and then went home to get ready for my Monday morning career development meeting. I dyed my roots, which had the happy secondary affect of dying my scalp. For those who don't know, I've been having a problem with my hair going into hibernation mode all over my head. Translation: my hair is falling out. I think a lot of that is about the stress I'd been under at my last job, and the fact that I'd had two surgeries in the last year. Okay, anyway, dyed my hair...
I got ready, climbed in the truck, and headed out to the meeting, but as I was on my way, I just completely lost heart in going.
I turned the truck around and went to the Starbuck's near our house. I got a mocha latte and a breakfast sandwich, and spent the next several hours belting out some good work on my "witch" story. Lesson to be learned here: I've always worked well in college student unions, where I could get something to eat or drink, use the restroom, and have a decent bit of background white noise. I studied well, was able to concentrate better, and was almost always productive.
In all fairness, Jeff has been telling me for months to check out Starbucks as a place to write, but I thought that it would be nearly impossible to get a seat there in the evenings (and I still think I'm right about that). Now that I have time in the day, however, I think it'll work well. Tomorrow, Tuesday, I'm teaching in Elise's classroom again, so I won't be able to go back until Wednesday, but I'm going to plan on spending all the time Elise is at school doing my writing at Starbucks.
But I did do one thing that was productive: I discovered part of why the trailer was getting so hot. I've got a tarp over the roof, because it leaks and has needed fixing for at least three years. The tarp does the job just fine, although traveling with it like that is out of the question, unless I go to the desert or someplace equally rain-proof.
So, anyway, I've had the skylights open, thinking that would help to cool down the trailer, but on Sunday, I put my hand up by the open skylight, and felt the air coming in, which was like an oven. I realized, this had to be because the open skylights were creating an airspace under the tarp, which was being heated by the sun. This really hot air was then leaking down into the trailer, and contributing to the outrageous heat problem.
I know this because even the roof didn't feel as hot as that air (and it was barely 80 degrees outside) when I put my hand up to feel it.
I don't think this has solved the problem, but I do hope it's helped. The next step is to get an evaporation cooler that I can run inside the trailer. If I close the windows, and run the fans, that should make the trailer proof against the worst heat (and Morgan Hill has some astoundingly hot days) without costing a million bucks for the cooler, or a million bucks to run the cooler. I'll have to see.
On to today. I took Elise to school this morning, and then went home to get ready for my Monday morning career development meeting. I dyed my roots, which had the happy secondary affect of dying my scalp. For those who don't know, I've been having a problem with my hair going into hibernation mode all over my head. Translation: my hair is falling out. I think a lot of that is about the stress I'd been under at my last job, and the fact that I'd had two surgeries in the last year. Okay, anyway, dyed my hair...
I got ready, climbed in the truck, and headed out to the meeting, but as I was on my way, I just completely lost heart in going.
I turned the truck around and went to the Starbuck's near our house. I got a mocha latte and a breakfast sandwich, and spent the next several hours belting out some good work on my "witch" story. Lesson to be learned here: I've always worked well in college student unions, where I could get something to eat or drink, use the restroom, and have a decent bit of background white noise. I studied well, was able to concentrate better, and was almost always productive.
In all fairness, Jeff has been telling me for months to check out Starbucks as a place to write, but I thought that it would be nearly impossible to get a seat there in the evenings (and I still think I'm right about that). Now that I have time in the day, however, I think it'll work well. Tomorrow, Tuesday, I'm teaching in Elise's classroom again, so I won't be able to go back until Wednesday, but I'm going to plan on spending all the time Elise is at school doing my writing at Starbucks.
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Roughing It...
I've spent the weekend writing in my trailer, which is parked at the in-laws' place in Morgan Hill. It's been a really productive time.
I left my house late Friday night, stopped at the grocery store in Morgan Hill and got some fruit, some bagels and cream cheese, some sourdough, some juice. I got here about 10pm, and watched a movie on my laptop, which is how I get myself into the groove.
I managed to get some work done on my "witch" story, and then went to bed about 4am. I work best in the early hours - there's something about the silence and the dark that lets me plug into my worlds so much more completely than any other time.
I woke up at 11am, spent some time alternating between watching a movie and writing until about 3pm, when it got really hot - it was probably about 80 degrees outside, which is hardly uncomfortable, but the trailer has no insulation, so when the sun shines down on the roof, which is still covered by a tarp, the whole thing heats up like a sweat box. I have fans going throughout, the door and all the windows are open, but it still does no good. I wound up sleeping from about 3:30 to 6pm, at which point the air outside was getting cool enough to let me concentrate on working again.
I've been thinking about how to increase the insulation or decrease the heat, or whatever, and I have a few ideas. I read a study once on the lifestyle of the Bedouin. One of the sections was about their tents and how they survive in one of the hottest places on Earth. Bedouin tents are always black wool, and it turns out that inside the tent, it's an average of 10 degrees cooler. You'd think that a reflective surface would be preferable, wouldn't you?
My hypothesis about this is that the black tent does absorb a lot of the sun's energy, but it holds on to it, so that there's relatively little energy to transfer to the interior of the tent. I had the thought that perhaps I could try stringing a black tarp over the trailer, but not touching it, and see if that had the same affect. The back end of the trailer is already under a tree, and I know that it's always cooler in the bathroom, say, than in the front dining area, where I work, which is under full sun. I'm not yet sure how to get a tarp up like that, but the trailer is parked next to my father-in-law's workshop, and it might be possible to attach the tarp to that somehow.
Anyway, just a thought. I'm going to have to come up with something soon, however, because it can get to 110 degrees here in the summer, and I can't imagine it would be even possible to be in the trailer without an air conditioning unit at that point.
I got up this morning at 9am, and I sat down to do some writing in my blog first - my brother-in-law set my laptop up to be able to access the in-laws' encrypted wireless network, so while the cell phone can't work this far up into the hills, I can now get to the internet, which has got Jeff feeling a lot better. He hates it when he can't get hold of me.
Ok, that's it for this morning. Back to work on the "witch" story now.
For your viewing pleasure: Rather like the "Super Stooges" of a few days ago, here's "Killer Horse Saves Baby", courtesy of some strange Indian movie from the 80's.
Toodles
I left my house late Friday night, stopped at the grocery store in Morgan Hill and got some fruit, some bagels and cream cheese, some sourdough, some juice. I got here about 10pm, and watched a movie on my laptop, which is how I get myself into the groove.
I managed to get some work done on my "witch" story, and then went to bed about 4am. I work best in the early hours - there's something about the silence and the dark that lets me plug into my worlds so much more completely than any other time.
I woke up at 11am, spent some time alternating between watching a movie and writing until about 3pm, when it got really hot - it was probably about 80 degrees outside, which is hardly uncomfortable, but the trailer has no insulation, so when the sun shines down on the roof, which is still covered by a tarp, the whole thing heats up like a sweat box. I have fans going throughout, the door and all the windows are open, but it still does no good. I wound up sleeping from about 3:30 to 6pm, at which point the air outside was getting cool enough to let me concentrate on working again.
I've been thinking about how to increase the insulation or decrease the heat, or whatever, and I have a few ideas. I read a study once on the lifestyle of the Bedouin. One of the sections was about their tents and how they survive in one of the hottest places on Earth. Bedouin tents are always black wool, and it turns out that inside the tent, it's an average of 10 degrees cooler. You'd think that a reflective surface would be preferable, wouldn't you?
My hypothesis about this is that the black tent does absorb a lot of the sun's energy, but it holds on to it, so that there's relatively little energy to transfer to the interior of the tent. I had the thought that perhaps I could try stringing a black tarp over the trailer, but not touching it, and see if that had the same affect. The back end of the trailer is already under a tree, and I know that it's always cooler in the bathroom, say, than in the front dining area, where I work, which is under full sun. I'm not yet sure how to get a tarp up like that, but the trailer is parked next to my father-in-law's workshop, and it might be possible to attach the tarp to that somehow.
Anyway, just a thought. I'm going to have to come up with something soon, however, because it can get to 110 degrees here in the summer, and I can't imagine it would be even possible to be in the trailer without an air conditioning unit at that point.
I got up this morning at 9am, and I sat down to do some writing in my blog first - my brother-in-law set my laptop up to be able to access the in-laws' encrypted wireless network, so while the cell phone can't work this far up into the hills, I can now get to the internet, which has got Jeff feeling a lot better. He hates it when he can't get hold of me.
Ok, that's it for this morning. Back to work on the "witch" story now.
For your viewing pleasure: Rather like the "Super Stooges" of a few days ago, here's "Killer Horse Saves Baby", courtesy of some strange Indian movie from the 80's.
Toodles
Thursday, May 28, 2009
I feel like 20 miles of bad road, but that's a good thing. Today was a lot of fun, and I'm tired and achy as a result.
First, you have to know that my last job turned me into a cubicle zombie. The glassy stare, the shuffling feet, the gray-pallored expression, the complete inability to either get or make a joke... yup, I had ALL the symptoms. I plugged my brain into the company's network and they took over from there.
As a result, I ceased to have a life outside work. When I came home every night, Elise would ask me to play, and I had to tell her, "Nope, honey, gotta work."
It's actually a bit disturbing how I keep meeting people I haven't seen in a long time, and the first words out of their mouths, generally, are "Wow, you look really happy".
So... Today I went to Elise's 2nd grade class, fixed a couple of computers for the teacher, and taught the first kid how to do basic research on the internet. I helped the teacher, and played with the kids, and now all my muscles ache and my face is a bit red from being in the sun at recess.
I need to get through the whole class of kids, and there's only eleven days of school left, which means I'll probably have to start taking them two at a time. I'm going back tomorrow, and then I'm going to take off early for the trailer, and spend Friday night, Saturday night and part of Sunday there as well. I've got a bunch of work to do to polish the pieces that are going into my portfolio.
I'll leave you with a song I really like - oddly enough, one of two that Marilyn Manson has done that I've enjoyed: This is Halloween
Toodles
First, you have to know that my last job turned me into a cubicle zombie. The glassy stare, the shuffling feet, the gray-pallored expression, the complete inability to either get or make a joke... yup, I had ALL the symptoms. I plugged my brain into the company's network and they took over from there.
As a result, I ceased to have a life outside work. When I came home every night, Elise would ask me to play, and I had to tell her, "Nope, honey, gotta work."
It's actually a bit disturbing how I keep meeting people I haven't seen in a long time, and the first words out of their mouths, generally, are "Wow, you look really happy".
So... Today I went to Elise's 2nd grade class, fixed a couple of computers for the teacher, and taught the first kid how to do basic research on the internet. I helped the teacher, and played with the kids, and now all my muscles ache and my face is a bit red from being in the sun at recess.
I need to get through the whole class of kids, and there's only eleven days of school left, which means I'll probably have to start taking them two at a time. I'm going back tomorrow, and then I'm going to take off early for the trailer, and spend Friday night, Saturday night and part of Sunday there as well. I've got a bunch of work to do to polish the pieces that are going into my portfolio.
I'll leave you with a song I really like - oddly enough, one of two that Marilyn Manson has done that I've enjoyed: This is Halloween
Toodles
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Another Wonderful Day in LaLa Land
Not a lot to report today. The job hunt is going well, and the portfolio moves along. I have two novella-length stories and one short story completed and ready to go, the first 20 pages of a full-length manuscript, the first 20 pages of a creative non-fiction work, and I have two more manuscripts that still need some development and polishing before they're ready. If the muse continues to smile down on me and I'm diligent, that's about a month's worth of work.
I'm really enjoying getting to be a mom again. I'm going to be teaching keyboarding skills to Elise's 2nd grade class beginning on Thursday. I still need to find a giant keyboard map, and do a bit of web-searching to come up with the best approach for kids that age, but I'm really excited about it -it's going to be a blast.
I'm having lunch today with two of my tech writer friends, people I really liked and have missed: Colleen, a now-ex-coworker at Atypon, and Joanne, who used to work at Atypon and moved on to something better a while ago.
What I'm listening to today: The soundtrack for Angels and Demons. I loved the soundtrack for The Davinci Code, and Hans Zimmer has done it again with this one. My favorite track so far: "Science and Religion". I personally believe that anyone who has truly studied any of the physical sciences can't help but believe in a higher power, and this track kind of sums that up for me.
Actually, this may give you a laugh: I'm sitting here listening to Angels and Demons, writing my blog, and painting my fingernails and toenails black. Sometimes I can't believe I'm actually 45 years old...
Okay, last but not least:
Super Stooges vs The Wonder Women
For sheer mind-numbing WTF-ness!
Ciao!
I'm really enjoying getting to be a mom again. I'm going to be teaching keyboarding skills to Elise's 2nd grade class beginning on Thursday. I still need to find a giant keyboard map, and do a bit of web-searching to come up with the best approach for kids that age, but I'm really excited about it -it's going to be a blast.
I'm having lunch today with two of my tech writer friends, people I really liked and have missed: Colleen, a now-ex-coworker at Atypon, and Joanne, who used to work at Atypon and moved on to something better a while ago.
What I'm listening to today: The soundtrack for Angels and Demons. I loved the soundtrack for The Davinci Code, and Hans Zimmer has done it again with this one. My favorite track so far: "Science and Religion". I personally believe that anyone who has truly studied any of the physical sciences can't help but believe in a higher power, and this track kind of sums that up for me.
Actually, this may give you a laugh: I'm sitting here listening to Angels and Demons, writing my blog, and painting my fingernails and toenails black. Sometimes I can't believe I'm actually 45 years old...
Okay, last but not least:
Super Stooges vs The Wonder Women
For sheer mind-numbing WTF-ness!
Ciao!
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Gray Skies Are Gonna Clear Up...
Put on a happy face
