Yom Kippur

A poem in the prayer-book I was using at Temple Beth El during Kol Nidre last evening:

Birth is a beginning
and death a destination
And life is a journey:
From childhood to maturity
and youth to age;
From innocence to awareness
and ignorance to knowing;
From foolishness to desecration
and then perhaps to wisdom.
From weakness to strength or
from strength to weakness
and often back again;
From health to sickness
and we pray to health again.
From offense to forgiveness
from loneliness to love
from joy to gratitude
from pain to compassion
from grief to understanding
from fear to faith.
From defeat to defeat to defeat
until looking backwards or ahead
We see that victory lies not
at some high point along the way
but in having made the journey
step by step
a sacred pilgrimage.
Birth is a beginning
and death a destination
And life is a journey;
A sacred journey to life everlasting

By: Rabbi Alvin I. Fine

very bumpy re-entry...

Tutors, too, have been known to sleep on the job. This is particularly a problem after returning from a trip to a place three time zones away...

Will Friday never get here???

Sphere

First Math Club meeting for this school year went well yesterday, for the most part. My porch has new screens now. The office is emptier (the porch furniture is back where it belongs at last!) and I'm getting through some backlog of paperwork. Progress -- something to be happy about!
Oh, and about the title of this post: there is a lot more information here.

Rock Hill makes the funnies!

Thanks to Marsha for giving me a "heads-up" about this comic. I'm a little behind on my newspaper-reading due to crazy/full schedule, prep for upcoming Math Club meeting, and other responsibilities...

Tomorrow I get to stay home all day (I think) and I hope to clean up this place and do some hard thinking about and arranging for next week, when The Schedule will be thrown into chaos by my mom's birthday celebration. And maybe there will be time for a nap in there somewhere... and the screen-fixing guy will be coming to replace the torn screens on my screen porch, which is almost useable now that the weather has cooled down to the low 90's! :)

Can't think what else to write at the moment...it's past my bedtime!

A not very productive day...

It must be past my bedtime... I just got through typing an e-mail that I had to get out, and my cursor disappeared while I was writing it and refused to come back. Annoying! Anybody know why that happens?

Two more lightbulbs went out this weekend. It's been an epidemic of lightbulb demise around here lately. That make four in the past week. I'm going to replace everything with compact flourescent as they go....

Cooling off!

Mmmm...it's down to a nice, cool 86 degrees F (feels like 87) here in Rock Hill this evening. If I get up real early tomorrow, it will be down to 69 overnight. Now that's walking weather!

There was another story about Trader Joe's in today's paper. Here's the link, for you TJ shoppers out there...

I finally saw Ratatouille today. It was good, though I think I need to see it again to catch everything. Some of those scenes are jam-packed with interesting stuff. While at the theater I noticed that the Susan Cooper book The Dark Is Rising has been made into a movie. I remember enjoying those books years ago -- I think my kids and I read some of them out loud to each other...?

Oh, oops -- I forgot the other thing I did today (well I did lots of things, but this was a standout): I finished the 7th Harry Potter book this morning. It is the best of the series, I think. Really, really good; a satisfying read.

Random thoughts and links...

***Sylvia : may I please have one of these Cokes next time I take a red-eye???? :-)

***interesting segment on Charlotte Talks this morning about herbs and spices:
Friday August 17, 2007 -- Herbs and Wild Edible Plants
It's our monthly food show with Chef Peter Reinhart and others. We'll discuss wild plants of our region that can be used in raw and cooked meals. We'll also talk about the importance of herbs and spices in cooking.
Guests: Peter Reinhart - Chef-In-Residence, Johnson and Wales University
"Wildman" Steve Brill - Naturalist, Environmental Educator, Author and
Broadcaster [He was very interesting, and funny, too]
Deborah Moore Cook - Master Gardener, Herbalist and college instructor
[She had a great tip about how to save basil if you grow a lot of it: make a slurry in your blender with basil leaves and olive oil, then freeze it flattened out in a ziploc bag, and break off pieces when you need basil in a recipe.]
Find links to past Charlotte Talks episodes here.

***Mission Organization: a TV show that Susie D., who called me this evening, put me onto. I'm checking out the website, since I don't get HGTV, but those of you who can get this channel might enjoy the actual show...

***For all you jazz fans out there, this is a great segment of Talk of the Nation that was on yesterday. It isn't just talk, it's delicious music, so enjoy!

***last, but not least, two new stores opened in Charlotte this week: Earthfare, which already had a store in Ballantyne (south of Pineville) opened up a second store Wednesday very near Southpark Mall, and Trader Joe's opened up a store today off Rea Rd. between the Pink Monstrosity and Stonecrest/I-485. (I think Trader Joe's has another store near UNCC but I don't know if it's open yet or not.) Here's an enlightening story about Trader Joe's from Wednesday's Charlotte Observer. (and another...and some recipes -- this story's a little goofed up--look for the recipe titles at the end of the previous recipe...)

video game music in the news

For those of you who like music and/or video games (I think there is a lot of overlap in my readership on these two interests!) there was a segment on Weekend Edition this morning about the Video Games Live concert tour. It includes a full orchestra and choir combined with synchronized lighting, video, live action and audience interactivity. A quote from the NPR story about Video Games Live:
“If Beethoven were alive today, he would be a video-game composer. ... He was always ahead of the curve. His whole thing in music was to control the emotions of the person listening to it.” -- Video Games Live organizer Tommy Tallarico
I think this tour has been going on for awhile, so maybe you-all already know about it, but I thought it sounded very interesting!

btw, speaking of Beethoven, there was a Beethoven Extravaganza yesterday in New York that I am sorry I missed. Hearing the story made me want to head over to the library (oops, closed on Sunday) to check out a pile of Beethoven cd's....

humor and [unrelated] science news...

Talk of the Nation-Science Friday is one of my favorite radio programs, and today they have had several good segments. Here's one that caught my attention in particular today -- it was about the placebo effect. Really interesting research. btw, another story earlier in the program was about voting machines, a topic of interest to some of you.

Also, I have been wanting for some time to post a link to Jeff Elder's "Glad You Asked" column in the Charlotte Observer. Yesterday's column (8/2/07) really struck my funnybone, but there have been a couple of other recent ones that I think the music aficionados in my readership might enjoy. (These are "Straight up: Can You Name That Tune?" and "Oh Girl, You're Killing Me Softly.") One other recent funny column for the music buffs is here...

(I revised this later to include some missing links...)

styrofoam

I had choices: either I was going to have to do something like what is pictured in the link above, or I was going to have to get rid of the massive amounts of styrofoam that were piling up in an ecologically sound way: reduce (been doing that) re-use, or recycle. I had found a place to recycle the stuff in Cherryville, which is almost an hours' drive from here, so I was waiting until I had a big load. But then I figured if I was going to Cherryville, I might as well go the rest of the way to Asheville, so made arrangements to visit with Cindy and Marti, and planned to attend a family reunion/party in W. Asheville the next day. To make a long story short, during a conversation with Cindy just prior to my leaving home, I mentioned that I would be dropping off the styrofoam to be recycled, and she got all excited because she has been needing some styrofoam for a project she is working on. So I ended up with the "re-use" option instead of the "recycle" option. (Thanks, Cindy!) And none of it ended up in the landfill. Hopefully the next place it goes people will find ways to re-use it as well.

I had a good time in Asheville, and came back not quite so discouraged by the boxes that are still ubiquitous...

"Ivy Alert!"

I'm thinking about maybe planting some ivy (see above link) right inside my new abode, to cover up the boxes, which are everywhere. It would be a whole lot prettier...probably wouldn't get enough sunlight, though.

Lots has happened in the past month; the fun part is documented here and here and also here... I'm going to try to post some photos soon, too. I finally got mine back yesterday.

I don't have photos of my move (who would want to look at photos of sweaty 50-somethings toting a lifetime of stuff around, anyway?) but rest assured the move did happen, and I am daily dealing with the aftermath. I'm trying to spread the "joy" around as much as possible by loading up my car with stuff to recycle and dumping it various places, though I did the first part of that today but didn't get to the dumping part because I was working too much with students today and ran out of time. Maybe -- hopefully! -- tomorrow.

Oh, by the way, the title of this post was because I thought of our "kudzu alerts" of years ago when I saw the ivy photo. And then thinking of kudzu reminded me, with sadness, of the untimely death a couple days ago of Doug Marlette, who was a wonderful political cartoonist and worked for the Charlotte Observer for many years as well. He also had a comic strip named "Kudzu".

further searching for humor...

...turned up the following:

Factorials were someone's attempt to make math *look* exciting.
(I can add this to my post a few days ago on math humor)

And click the title above for a link to, finally, a moving story!

moving is sometimes funny but mostly just a lot of work

Major accomplishments today so far:
Called moving company and scheduled the move
Packed nine boxes so far with lots of help from Marsha
Threw out a bunch of papers
Discarded about a dozen AMC complete results booklets
Called Dzidra to make sure she is still taking students (she is)
Listened to Car Talk (that counts as "learning about cars")
Attempted but gave up on a sudoku puzzle (giving up was the accomplishment)
Read some funny jokes* (click on link above)
...and it's only 1:21 p.m.!

*I was looking for jokes about moving but couldn't find any.

funny math lists

To prepare for the last meeting of this year's Algebra 2 class, I printed out a few lists from this site for my students. The ones I printed -- my favorites, at least of the ones I had time to read -- are Top 10 Math Homework Excuses; e and Pi -- Top ten lists; Murphy's Law and Mathematics; and Ten Commandments of Mathematics (this last one I'd seen before but I figured they hadn't.) I also shared some xkcd humor with them -- this one in particular since we'd been studying functions all year and doing lots of graphing... The handout was very well-received and ended the year on an upbeat note. I loved teaching this class. They were a really great group, well-matched in ability and hard-workers. I'm going to miss them!

End-of-school-year blitz almost over...

I've missed writing, but it's been a little crazy in my life between preparing to move (the closing is this week)and having a lot of students on my schedule (which is in an even worse state of flux than usual because of exams) and having company this weekend (though that doesn't excuse the previous almost three weeks of silence...)

I did get on the web a bit this morning to read postings to a new blog and browse a bit... also uncovered this interesting article, but now I have to go work on the list I made for myself at about 2 a.m. before the day gets away from me. As I said, the closing is this week but I will not be moving until near the end of the month because of other plans

more freebies

Does anyone need a small portable tape recorder with an AC adapter? I have one I'm going to take to Goodwill if no one wants it...

Roy Blount, Jr. on Talk of the Nation

I enjoyed hearing Roy Blount, Jr., on Talk of the Nation last Thursday. I like to listen to Roy anytime, but this was especially good, as Neal Conan is a very good interviewer and gave Roy lots of opportunity to just be himself. Click on the title above for a link to the show.

National Breastfeeding Week...

...in Britain! And why can't we do that here in the USA?! (Click on the title above for more info)

Mother's Day

Having a slow, take-it-easy kind of day... I've been meaning to write a new post but other things, like packing and helping people understand math have taken precedence. Time flies...
I've been finding a lot of interesting things while packing. Also am managing to unload some of my books -- yay! Let me know if you want any of them... Here's a partial list:
Green Dolphin Street (Hardcover),Towers in the Mist, and The Bird in the Tree, all by Elizabeth Goudge
Bring Me a Unicorn, by Anne Morrow Lindbergh
Growing Up Happy, by Bob Keeshan ("Captain Kangaroo", whom I used to watch on TV every morning when I was a kid)
Legends of our Time, by Elie Wiesel
Understanding Media and The Medium is the Massage, by Marshall McLuhan
Compulsory Mis-Education and the Community of Scholars, by Paul Goodman
C. G. Jung, by Anthony Storr
A Bag of Marbles, by Joseph Joffo
On Learning to Read, by Briuno Bettelheim and Karen Zelan
The Red Tent, by Anita Diamant
I'd Rather Laugh, by Linda Richman (mother-in-law of Mike Myers)
Ellen Foster, by Kaye Gibbons
The Story of the Trapp Family Singers, by Maria Augusta Trapp
Father Joe, by Tony Hendra
Gilead, by Marilynne Robinson
Irons in the Fire, by John McPhee
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time, by Mark Haddon
Dancing at the Rascal Fair, by Ivan Doig
Neither Here nor There, travels in Europe, by Bill Bryson
Flying Visits, an irresistible guided tour of just about everywhere, by Clive James

...and various math textbooks...

Anyway, I'm making some progress, but every time I look in the boxes of books I have second thoughts, so I'm going to put the lids on these boxes until I hear from people that want the books therein... I won't be getting rid of these (and hopefully they will be joined by many more!) until mid-June or so. Let me know if you want any...

Joshua Bell, street musician...

I know some of my readers are big Joshua Bell fans, and I love to hear him anytime, too. Anyway, just in case you missed this article about him, here's the link... It's a must-read!

Changing domicile - for sure!

Just a quick post to let those of you who have been following my quest for a place to buy that I signed the contract on a condo (the one I found Monday) this morning! The closing will be June 8 and I'll move the last week of June. I'm so excited! Thanks to all for your support through this process!

rain

Tonight it's been raining all evening, one of those steady rains that soaks the ground and helps to make this city such a lush and green environment...

As usual, it's also "raining" good news stories... this morning's Charlotte Talks was an excellent discussion about how people are working to effect change in the local public schools... I heard that there was going to be a segment this morning on NPR's Morning Edition about breastfeeding, but I haven't gone to their site and listened to it yet (I was tied up during M.E. time)... even the comedians on Fresh Air today were funny and interesting.
Anybody else out there heard any good radio lately??

speaking out against torture and war

Frs. John Dear, Steve Kelly, Louis Vitale and many, many others continue to speak out as Christians against the practice of torture and against the war and weapons of all sorts. Go to this site and read about their efforts to stop torture and war and to raise the consciousness of all about what is really going on in this country w.r.t. war, torture, weapons, etc. The lack of outcry about the inhumanity of all this is beyond comprehension.

More radio...

I caught the last part of this interview with Jonathan Cohn on yesterday's Fresh Air on the replay of the show last night. This was the clearest analysis of the problems with health care in this country that I have ever heard.

Polar Bears

This comic would be more amusing if it didn't ring so true!

Random gleanings from lots of radio listening...

I've been listening to the radio a lot lately, and came across a few things that were interesting and enlightening enough to spread around:

A fascinating story about physics that was on NPR's All Things Considered tonight. I was fascinated by it -- the way they told the story, as well as the story itself - it made me feel like I was right there. I'm sure a lot of people I know, some of whom read this blog, will not consider this story "news", but it was the first I'd heard of it and it sounded pretty cool. My favorite bit was the response of German safety engineer Christoph Schaefer (sic) when he was asked, "What would happen if [the 200-ton magnet] were to fall on your foot?"

One of our local morning programs, Charlotte Talks, fortunately has an encore in the evening when I am usually able to tune in. Today's guest was Dr. Phil Goscienski, a proponent of a "Stone Age Diet". I had not heard of this before, and it was intriguing, though I wasn't converted. I agreed with a lot of what he said, like eating a variety of fruits and vegetables, and lots of them, is important, and that physical exercise is one of the best things we can do to avoid health problems in general and diabetes in particular. But one of the oddest things I heard was about a restaurant in Washington, DC. (The reference to the restaurant is near the end of the article. I'm sorry to report that it sounds as though it is long gone...) This info was sent in by a listener in response to Dr. G's prediction that the next generation will find a certain kind of creature to be common on restaurant menus.
Anyway, the talk got a little weird at times, but lots of what was said was right on the mark.

Here's something I didn't learn on the radio, but just researched on the web and found out about: it is possible to recycle styrofoam coolers and the styrofoam pieces that are used to package electronics securely. These types of styrofoam, which are really Expanded PolyStyrene or EPS, are recycled all over the country. I found this website that lists all the places in the US to take EPS for recycling. Check it out! (I might head out to Cherryville to take a load one day this week...)

Those are all the stories I remember right now, but I hope to put up some more links soon to some other interesting things I have heard about or read about.

Links of interest...

...some found serendipitously, some searched for...

Carolina moon photos

Jeff Elder's column today in the Charlotte Observer (esp. for Jenny and Curtis)

the making of some really great chocolate

Room to Read

Just touching base briefly between trips... Tomorrow is the State Mathcounts Competition so I'll be heading up that way this afternoon, and I still have one client coming in less than 15 minutes so I'll have to make this short.

I've been reading Leaving Microsoft to Change the World, by John Wood -- a very exciting book! Please check out their website and give this wonderful cause some serious attention... If you are reading this blog, you are very privileged, not because my blog is so special, but because you had the opportunity to learn to read. This opportunity is denied to many millions of our planet's present inhabitants! For years I have been reading about how reducing illiteracy helps to solve a lot of other problems in poor countries, but I have never seen an organization until now that works so hard, with such great results, to eradicate illiteracy. Please let me know if you are interested in helping me to sponsor a school, a library, or a girl's scholarship. I am seriously considering making the effort to do this, hopefully with help from my friends, family, and clients. The only thing that remains is to figure out how to go about it -- I'm going to read the pertinent info on the Room to Read website as soon as I get back from Durham and hopefully that will get me started.

Please wear your seat belt!!

Yesterday my daughter, Emily, was a passenger in a car that was broad-sided and flipped over. I realized, as she was telling me late last night about how it happened and how she got out of the car, that wearing her seatbelt definitely saved her life. She was apparently injured the worst of the four people involved in the accident. As it was, she has some lacerations on the bridge of her nose, a swollen forehead, and a terrific headache, but x-rays turned up no broken bones in her neck and elsewhere. I am so grateful she wasn't more badly hurt, and I am ever so grateful that she and the others in the car had the good sense to wear their seatbelts!
Please keep Emily and the others involved that wreck in your prayers as they heal and rest up from the trauma of the experience. And never be in too much of a rush to fasten your seatbelt!

Another post about the wreck is here

wanting to post...

...but not having the energy, or any great ideas. The photo linked above almost makes me want to see Italy someday. It is not (and has never been) on the top of my list, though -- Scandinavia (especially the fjords and the aurora borealis) has had that honor for years. Scotland and Greece are way up there, too, and talking with S.K. about her upcoming trip to Africa makes me want to see Africa, too.

Anyway, in this fried state I just don't think I can write more. I'll do what I always do when the Feb.-March crunch hits: keep on putting one foot in front of the other, and take each day as it comes, finding pleasure in the little things. And I'll try to write about some of those later....

I hope it snows a little in Evanston next weekend!

being back home feels so good....

It's great to be home, and such nice weather, too!!! Usually I don't like to have spring so soon, but after yesterday's rain it's great to have the deep blue sky and warm temps.

Click here to find out how the team did this weekend! (We won the Computer Programming contest, and had an individual who placed 2nd in Level 3 and a team that placed 2nd in Level 3.)

On the other hand, it seems like there is no end of students who are having trouble with math.... Can we add a few more hours to the day? My schedule is sooo full....

I'll try to post more later...in the meantime, check out Daily Dose of Imagery -- he's had some great snow photos lately, like this one...

Charleston

Things have been so crazy lately I almost forgot I had a blog! One of these days I'll get back to writing on it. I miss reading everybody else's blogs, too.

I don't have any big news to report, but I did give up coffee again. It just really does awful things to my body... I'm trying hard to stay away from sugar, too. So far so good. I feel a lot better already.

Also, I figured out how to make my RealPlayer play random selections from my library of music (a "Playlist"), so I've been enjoying good music while making up worksheets to prep the Mathcounts team and replying to e-mails from Charleston contest participants.... I will be so glad to have this weekend behind me. Preparations have not gone smoothly.

Blessings!

Math counts, but it's only part of the equation...

The past month has been so packed full of things happening, building to a crescendo of sorts. I've been posting regularly through the past few months, and I know I haven't mentioned anything catastrophic, but it's the little things that add up, as well as the more personal stuff that I don't write about here (there's been a lot of that!) So today's a stay-at-home-in-my-nightgown day, at least until I leave for Mass this evening. I need time to process all the stuff that's been going on.

The latest event in the series of recent happenings was yesterday's CHEA team win in our Mathcounts Chapter Competition. The team came in first and we had the first place individual, and as if that wasn't good enough, the team had a perfect score on the team round!! I'm reasonably sure this is the first time a team I've coached has had a perfect team score in competition. Anyway, this means the team goes on to the State competition on March 23rd in Durham (yes, it's a Friday, that isn't a typo.) It's kind of like Groundhog Day all over again: I saw my shadow yesterday and there will be seven more weeks of practice. :-) But I'm very happy to work with this exceptional team -- they are great kids, and obviously work very well together -- so that will make the workload lighter.

Call for Help

You just never know where websurfing will take you. I was checking out one of my favorite websites, daily dose of imagery, and because of a photo there eventually linked to the site for the TV show Call for Help. Looks interesting. I thought some of my readers (do I have any readers?) might be interested, especially in this segment, which is sort of musical. I didn't actually watch the segment, but I read about it and it sounds interesting. Another link off Call for Help: with all the current interest in climate change and what we can do about it, the Carbon Zero Calculator can be a real eye-opener.
Okay, now I leave you-all to your own websurfing... I've got to quit putting off the office organizing job...

SNOW DAY!!!

Those of you who don't live in the South might not really appreciate the power of the phrase "Snow Day" in the hearts and minds of our local residents -- children and adults alike! All day yesterday as the snow predictions became further, my students' faces lit up with excitement at the mention of snow. Adults I talked with either rejoiced at the prospect of a snow day or pooh-poohed the idea as a real long shot -- but the latter had a wistful tone in their voices. And now it is a reality. The snow is still coming down, although it is gradually getting finer and finer, and will change to sleet. I didn't need to turn on my radio or open the blinds this morning to know whether it had really snowed or not -- the joyous shrieks of the three little kids who live in the nearby apartments woke me up. Not that I am complaining -- it was music to my ears!

I was looking forward to having a snow day so I would have time to organize and clean up my apartment, but I think first I will have to go for a walk in the snow :-) :-) :-) :-) :-)

9:37 am UPDATE: The snow is coming down in really big flakes now!
1:54 pm UPDATE: I guess we're going to have to rename it a "SLUSH Day"...

Grass-roots campaign to end genocide in Darfur

A ray of hope in the Darfur situation. Read this article!!!

Okay, everybody can move back to Charlotte now...

It looks like we are going to get an IKEA store here! It won't be until 2009, but that will give everybody time to find a suitable place to live...with lots of room for furniture, bookshelves, picture frames, etc. Then we can all start learning interesting Swedish words. (Well, okay, some of you already had a head start on that!) The store will be in the University City area, and it will be the only IKEA between Washington and Atlanta. (Atlanta has an IKEA?)

In other news, it is precipitating here: sleet and freezing rain, what they daintily call "a wintry mix". It doesn't matter; we all know what they mean... we can hear it falling outside. It makes a whole different sound from rain as it bounces off the trees and roads and sidewalks, kind of a clicking/shushing noise. We always hope that isn't followed by the sound of tree limbs breaking under the weight of accumulated ice, but that isn't predicted to happen...this time. I'm missing my morning walk -- don't want to break any more limbs -- but will be working my usual Thursday schedule. Schools are in session, except for a few of the private and church schools.

NEWS FLASH (7:20 a.m.) -- there's a 12-vehicle accident on the ramp from I-77 to I-485! And I think they just said Independence Blvd. is closed because of ice. Things are sounding worse.

MORE NEWS FLASH!!! History in the making: "Laundry Math" is invented in Charlotte!

Conflict resolution

Continuing the theme of this week (with the exception of the Fly Guy blip), I woke up early this morning thinking about conflict resolution, especially on an interpersonal level. This has been an interest of mine for a long time. I grew up with a not-very-healthy "non-exposure" to healthy marital conflict, and went into my marriage with the really odd idea that married couples, if the marriage is really good, don't ever fight or argue or experience any conflict. This notion didn't work too well for me. Thus began an interest in learning more about healthy conflict resolution w.r.t relationships. I can't say I've become an expert on the subject or anything, but I have read some enlightening works over the past few years. One of them is Words that Hurt, Words that Heal, by Rabbi Joseph Telushkin, which came out awhile back but is still very relevant. The way we talk to and about one another really matters. This book was first brought to my attention by an FLT friend who told us about "National Speak No Evil Day." (She also told us about this resource.)

Deborah Tannen has made a career out of researching and teaching about the way people talk with one another. She has several relevant and accessible books on this topic. Her website also has references to a lot of articles and essays she has written on the same topics. (Hmmm, I'm thinking I need to read her latest book, You're Wearing That?! Here's a link to her conversation with Diane Rehm about the book. I love Diane Rehm's show...but that's a topic for another day.)

All of this can be extended to the wider view: how people -- politicians, interviewers and talk show hosts as well as individuals -- talk about one another in the public discourse, how leaders of one nation talk about other nations and their leaders...it all matters. I'm not saying no one should ever express anything but niceties to one another, what I'm after here is learning how to express ourselves and our feelings in ways that are constructive and building up or at the very least not destructive and hurtful. I'll be the first to admit that this is not easy, and I am not always able to pull it off, but it is still worth working on, on every level of discourse. Come to think of it, that includes how we talk to ourselves, our inner language: we can learn how not to be so self-critical. That's something I am actively working on, too. Which reminds me, I'd better go get on it!

yet another thing to do in one's spare time...

Thank you, Daragh, and Mairenn!

Honoring MLK

I forgot to mention in my post yesterday, that we now have a street named in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr., here in Charlotte. Also, here's a link to a local group that annually responds to the call to volunteer on MLK Day (and the rest of the year as well!); a link to its parent group; and another link to how this year's event went in Charlotte...

"I Have a Dream"

For this day that marks the anniversary of Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., I wanted to do something special (hence the link above.) Please go listen to this speech, certainly one of the most important and moving speeches ever given in this country! And I'd like to issue a challenge to those of you who, like me, had to work today: think of a way to honor the memory of this great man, whether it be by prayer, or helping somebody out, or by spreading his message, or by making a donation to an appropriate non-profit organization in his memory (some examples below)...or all of the above. Each one of us can and does make a difference in the world every day; let's try to make it a positive difference!
The King Center
Network
Nonviolence International
Atlanta Women's Foundation
NC Peace and Justice Coalition

Other organizations that promote non-violence

Goodbye to my Christmas tree

Well, I figured it was about time to take the tree down... it was getting a little brittle, and I won't have another chance to do this until a couple weeks from now, and by then it will probably not have any needles left on it. So, I've been playing music (Claire Ritter, Joshua Bell, Yo-Yo Ma, Adiemus...)while exploring the wonders of having a big new Christmas Ornament Box (Thank you, Daragh!) to put the ornaments (and almost everything else) away in. The only difficulty now will be finding a place to store the box, but I think that is a solvable problem, and a problem worth solving! There were a few candy canes left on the tree, amazingly enough, so I will offer them to my students this week -- comfort food as they tackle their final exams...

A beautiful, amazing view

daily dose of imagery is one of my favorite sites. I don't get to travel as much as I would like, so going to this site every day or every few days satisfies a little of my wanderlust. I like the picture linked above (click on title) because it almost feels like I am there, looking all the way to the river from the top of St. Peter's. Anyway, ddoi originates from Canada, which is someplace I have always wanted to travel in and perhaps even live in. (I could almost live there now -- I got a new coat today which is about the warmest coat I have had in a long time!)

I hope it's been a good week for everybody. I'm tired -- it was a long week for me -- so I'm not going to write much tonight, but get some rest and somehow get prepared for helping out at the Math Club meeting in the morning.

long time gone

Hey, it's been too long since I last wrote here... A lot has happened: the holidays w/ lots of wonderful visits with family and friends, a trip across country with more visiting and roller coaster rides, an old year ended and a New Year started, and a week of re-entry punctuated with various episodes of illness...(I'm much better now.)
In addition to savoring many happy memories of the holidays (and of course I'm still enjoying my Christmas tree, candles, etc.), I'm currently...
a. wishing I was in New Orleans at the Joint Math Meetings (MAA & AMS)
b. trying to get on top of prep work (for classes and students) I ought to have done last week
c. napping whenever I can find time (especially easy now that Em taught me about "virtual napping")
d. enjoying a new headset for my cell phone provided free of charge from Verizon (yay!) (they may not be able to tell dollars from cents but they do keep on supplying me with free headsets)
e. rearranging my schedule (similar to nailing jello to a wall) since most of my CMS (i.e., public school) students will be finished with their math courses in a few weeks (translate: a week of exams is coming up!) and I might (or might not) get a few new ones. (I was going to put up a link about the crazy 4x4 schedule, but curiously the CMS website doesn't seem to have any information about it. I scoured this resource for more info but no luck.) A few new students from other venues have already found their way onto my schedule; I probably ought to put a stop to this before things get crazy again!
f. working lots of Mathcounts problems; the Chapter Competition will be on February 3. The team looks good so far!
g. listening to lots of good music (including beautiful Joshua Bell violin music from Joseph & Lorian) on my new stereo, both Christmas gifts of which I am very appreciative.
h. planning more trips... so far Baltimore and Evanston are on the schedule.
i. watching season one of Numbers, thanks to a loan from Jonathan & Frances -- just what I needed, another distraction!
j. trying to figure out what to do with all this Christmas wrapping paper (really, I didn't need anymore, I have plenty of my ever-fashionable green-and-yellow...)
k. continuing my efforts to exercise more, eat better, sleep enough, and, last but not least, pray "at all times"!

Happy New Year to all!

Dad

Driving down the road early this morning I noticed a sign I'd not seen before... It read:

Honk if you love NAPA... unless your horn is broken!

If you knew Frank Lackie,this sign might have reminded you of him and brought a smile to your face, as it did for me. He made a lot of people smile with his offbeat humor, in humorous speeches and in conversation.

I'd write a whole lot more, but I've got to run. If you remember my Dad, please say a prayer for him today, the 24th anniversary of his death.
Also, if you have a memory you'd like to share with the other readers of this blog, post it as a comment. (Don't worry if your posted comment doesn't appear right away -- I have the comments' parameters set so that I can look at them before they are posted to avoid spamming problems.)

VerizonMath

Just in case anyone missed it, there's a math furor going on this weekend on the web (click on post title) over possible false advertising by Verizon. The timing is great -- I'm in the middle of a chapter on "Unit Analysis" with my problem solving class... I hope somebody asks me "why do we have to study this stuff", but I know they won't -- they love the course. So I'll just bring the transcript for show-and-tell.

We have the best time in this class -- last week someone asked me to explain my t-shirt so we got into discussions of primes (front of shirt) and binary numbers (back of shirt), and they hung in there with me to the end. A great bunch, mostly math phobic but I think that is changing!

btw, anybody have a digital photo of the shirt they could share? Please send it on!!

Thanksgiving adventures

I'm just back from visiting family and friends in Baltimore and Virginia... Great trip, I had a wonderful time! One of the things we did this weekend was eat good food at several venues.... Most outstanding, of course, was the bountiful blessing of Thanksgiving dinner with the L's! A great visit.
The link above will lead you to the delightful restaurant where Frances and I ate lunch Wednesday. They serve lots of in-season, locally grown food. The Afghani restaurant we went to last night, The Helmand, had a quite varied menu of vegetarian food, very delicious.
Aside from the food -- that's just an easy thing to put links to -- I just can't say enough about how good this weekend was, but I don't have time to go into detail now. It was great to be with the newlyweds in Baltimore; they are settling in nicely. And a special bonus: I learned some math in an area I never understood before....

Book Crossing

Another link that's been sitting around waiting for me to write something about it... I came across this site through another Charlotte Observer article recently, and was intrigued with the idea. I have a number of books that I'll probably want to get rid of soon, and I'm wondering if this might be a constructive way to do it. Anybody have any experience with this?

Raising adventurous kids...

I found this article awhile back and thought it was great. Read and enjoy!

Peanut Butter, Math Fun, and an Honorable but Humble Prof

Click here for the link to Sally Kneidel's excellent post about peanut butter. (It's dated Nov. 9, 2006.) I totally agree with everything she says about it -- I've been eating organically grown/no additives peanut butter for years and it's great. (Although now I am more likely to eat almond butter, as peanut butter makes me sleepy.)

Okay, so beyond that, other things have been going on...
Yesterday was the Math Club trip to the Duke Math Meet, which was fun for most of us. Highlights of the day were:
**the congenial and lively group of Math Club students
**lots of interesting math problems
**a visit with Anne T., who came by around lunchtime and visited with us for awhile
**reconnecting with various people from other schools around NC and beyond
**beautiful, warm fall weather all day
**a torrential downpour on the way home
**a performance of the Davidson Dance Ensemble added on at the end of the day -- absolutely wonderful! (I wish I'd been able to see the whole thing!)
...and last but not least a bit of wonderful news that I found out about yesterday -- I wish I'd known awhile ago!

e-mail and other distractions

Well, I'm not making progress too fast here, but little by little I'm chipping away at the piles by "chunking" -- trying to put the work into manageable chunks instead of getting overwhelmed by how much there is to do and leaving it until some imagined day when I have 26 hours to work with :) That really isn't going to happen anytime soon.
Thanks, Lorian, for putting such useful links on your blog! I always learn new things when I go there...
No progress yet in setting up a website for my resource list...

All the news that fits...

Well, since I promised a friend I would be napping in preparation for a night out tonight, I am going to make this very short. I have been reading the newspaper very sporadically the past week or two due to lots of other things going on, but I managed to find a few articles of interest. Two of them were on the editorial pages of today's newspaper: a refreshing perspective on the Kerry incident (sorry, I can't get a working link to it -- it's Insulting Our Troops, and Our Intelligence, By Thomas L. Friedman, Published November 3, 2006) and a piece by an excellent local writer, Kay McSpadden, on the latest Harry Potter tempest-in-a-teapot. (Apparently the subject of the latter editorial is unaware of the writings of Connie Neal, a Christian writer who has a more balanced view of the Harry Potter books.)

Another article a few days ago gave me one of those belly laughs that are so important to good mental health.

talking about math

Okay, it's really too late for me to be posting anything here, especially since it's a Friday night with a full day ahead of me tomorrow, but... I just have to share a little of the joy of my evening. I had the wonderful opportunity to give a talk tonight on Math to a group of eleven homeschool moms and one "homeschool grandpa"! It's been about two years since I have given one of these talks, and it was nice to have a chance to do it again. I opened the talk by reading the book, Hippos Go Berserk! to the group, and I think they enjoyed the experience. Anyway, it kind of broke the ice. It was great to talk once again about homeschooling and math and little kids and how they learn and how delightful they are. My audience was very responsive; I talked until after nine and then we had a great conversation that lasted until around 10:00! I had brought piles of books and other stuff, and was able to give them a lot of good information.

I would like to be able to put my Math Resources booklet on a website, to make it more useful for people and to keep from having to make copies of it whenever I do talks like this. It's up to 12 pages now (including the title page.) I have other material to put on a website, too. Maybe that will move higher on the to-do list one of these days -- perhaps a task for the Christmas break?

Anyhow, I had forgotten how much fun it is to do these talks, and to reconnect with my homeschooling roots. I miss those homeschooling days; they were a lot of fun most of the time. Even though I got a little crazy once in awhile and threatened to send them all to school, I was grateful to have all that time with my dear kids, and I wouldn't trade those days for anything.

grocery shopping

Okay, now I'm having one of those "what next?!" feelings.... I was babysitting tonight for a family I regularly sit for, and when they got home we were talking and somehow got onto the subject of grocery shopping. It seems that Harris Teeter has a service now where people can shop online and just pick up their groceries at a scheduled time (or later) for a fee.... The mom I was talking to has been using this service so regularly that she has avoided taking her baby and toddler to the grocery store for the past 7 or 8 months! I'm trying to get my mind around this -- what would life have been like if I had not taken my kids to the grocery store, and indeed not had to do any grocery shopping in person, for all those 25 years I had kids at home? It's something to think about....

On break

Well, I am on break for a few days, but a laptop was calling my name, so.... Today was so beautiful, the leaves are at or just past their peak here, and the sky was a brilliant, crisp blue, as only fall days can be. I listened to The Kalahari Typing School for Men in the car today; it is the fourth in the No.1 Ladies Detective Agency series, and it is just as good as the others. Then a very pleasant evening with Ron and Deborah... now I am the last one up, enjoying the fire in the fireplace and writing a little bit.

I had a bit of a shock yesterday when I noticed a story about Joan Martin in the paper. Joe Martin, her husband, is a well-known Charlottean, or was, as it seems he died while I was away over the summer. He had battled ALS for about 12 years, but was all the time active in civic affairs and made a great effort to bring people together and try to make Charlotte a better place for all its citizens. He wrote a book about his experiences, On Any Given Day, which needs to move up on my reading list. Anyway, I was sad to hear of his passing, as this is a great loss for Charlotte and I am sure he must be sorely missed by his family and friends.

A full Saturday

I am determined to keep writing even if I don't have much to say and it's almost 11 p.m. (i.e., past my bedtime...) I just got back from the monthly Saturday evening Vigil at the Oratory -- a unique liturgy with lots of silence built in and Taize music and a theme, always always good. The Oratory has become such a part of my life that I can close my eyes and imagine myself there in prayer, and it brings me into a peaceful/prayerful frame of mind. The people in this community are caring and so grounded; I love them and love spending time with them. There is often a drop-in or pot-luck before or after the liturgy at The Oratory, and tonight there was one, so that was an extra bonus, to get to be with everybody awhile longer.

That was at the end of my day. Near the beginning of my day was the monthly Math Club meeting, and that went very well. We had a small group, probably in part due to SAT's being this morning, but the ones who were there were into the math and had a lot of energy. Also today was the inaugural meeting of the Teacher's Circle, a group for teachers that Harold has started. It was much better attended than he thought it would be, so that was exciting! Another exciting thing that happened was that one of our former math clubbers came to the Teacher's Circle meeting, now a teacher in one of the local schools. I always love to see former students, but this was especially good since this person was looking so well and happy.

Meanwhile, driving to and fro, I am listening to the fourth book in the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series, The Kalahari Typing School for Men, and already on the first tape I'm hooked. Tomorrow I'm going to a play and maybe a math talk. Life is good :)

Peter Pan

Last night's activity was a trip to Matthews to see Peter Pan. Especially good were the goofy pirates -- almost every time they came on stage they did one kind of dance or another at the bidding of Captain Hook. One time it was the can-can, another time it was something else...I don't know all the names of the dances. (One pirate was Matthew R. He was a tipsy fellow with a parrot on his shoulder and hat that wouldn't stay on, but despite his drunken antics he managed to never miss a beat; every movement was perfect!) Hook was played so well -- the man who played him was appropriately cowardly and comically arrogant. The children in the audience screamed with delight. Smee was terrific, very squeaky and hammy, and size-wise exactly the correct proportion to Captain Hook as he should be.... The crocodile was so wonderful, we all hooted and hollered every time it crawled across the stage, ticking menacingly. And of course, the audience clapped loudly and enthusiastically to bring Tinkerbell back to life... Of course all the rest of the cast was terrific, too, and the dancing by Indians, boys, etc. was amazing. The children really flew, thanks to generous sprinklings of pixie dust and, last but not least, the music, played by a small but very lively orchestra, was wonderful.

another late night...

A Friday, without so many students as the other days... but plenty of catching up to do... I got some of it done, but there's always more. For some reason I feel like I am in a holding pattern of some sort -- stuck at an intermission or something. Maybe it will all come clear soon.

busy-ness

It's been a very full week already. Lots of students, and still more calls every day. Every time I think my schedule is set, it changes: new people added, others moving their times because of one reason or another (all good reasons....) I'm thinking about jettisoning one or two that don't seem to appreciate the help -- ones that almost never prepare for their weekly lesson. That would open up some time for the students who desperately want help but can't fit into the schedule yet.

I've been looking at photos on the web tonight, just to unwind a little. Emily picked out some great photos for her folder on F&J's wedding photographer's site I haven't had the time or energy to do that yet, but hope to one of these days. Picking out a few to have made into prints seems like an impossible task, given the large number of photos and the generally great quality. Not to mention the ever-so-photogenic subjects :-)
(drop me a line if you don't have the password for the wedding photos website...)

back online!!

It's been a long, sloooww month (esp. w.r.t my internet connection), but in some ways it has sped by. My work has picked up almost to the point where it was last April! As usual, students have been coming and going, and my schedule is like nailing jello to a wall... That effect seems to be the result of a combination of some students trying to find the right tutor and others coming out of their "denial" (as in, "I think this year I'll be able to do the math without help even though I really didn't get math from about 6th grade on and had to have a tutor last year in geometry/algebra2/pre-calc just to keep my head above water....") Anyway, it has made for some interesting weeks for me. The ratio of new students to returnees is about 1:1. (Speaking of ratios, I have this bumper sticker [thanks, Linda and Tommy!] posted on the wall across from my tutoring set-up, right where the students can't miss seeing it, that says, "4 out of 3 people have trouble with fractions", and the students love it -- well, the ones that get it do anyhow... the rest probably think it's just another boring statistic!) Charlotte Mecklenburg Schools has helped my business a lot by going to a 4 by 4 schedule (also click here) for this year, which means that students who were having trouble with keeping up the pace of a year-long course are now taking their math courses at twice the speed, and crashing and burning in September rather than gradually falling behind and calling in late October like they did on the old schedule. I'm also teaching four classes this year (last year I had one class) and so far that's looking like a good move.

Yesterday one of my youngest students walked me through a program to multiply binomials that he wrote for his graphing calculator. I struggled to keep up with his explanation -- obviously, he is not with me for remediation! -- but it was great to be witness to such mathematical creativity. Another student required an etiquette lesson: "How to properly address adults, especially one's teachers." Spending an hour with this fellow reminded me of an observation I once made that my girls and their friends at age 13 would, in exasperation, eschew the company of their male agemates, only to sing the praises of the same guys three or four years later. It will be interesting to see how this both these 8th graders change and mature over the next few years. A few days ago a student I was working with on SAT prep had an "aha" experience that was just wonderful, giving him a renewed confidence and motivation: the joy of that moment was written all over his face, and we both cheered out loud! I'm working with a couple of homeschooled students who got behind in their math and are playing catch-up, and it has been great to see how they have picked up all sorts of new skills over the past eight months that we have worked together. Lots of other interesting things have happened recently, and others are about to happen, including Frances and Jonathan's impending move to Baltimore! More about all this in future posts. I hope to be a more regular blogger from now on.

Problems, and they aren't the mathematical sort...

I had some rather unpleasant moments late this afternoon.... For one thing, I found out that I won't be able to continue with Earthlink DSL. I am too far away (21,000 feet, to be exact.) I can't explain this, it doesn't make any sense, but there it is. The search for a new ISP begins. Your ideas and suggestions are welcome.

Also the NC dept of revenue still can't find the money that I sent them to pay my taxes last year. I don't know where it is. I sure don't have it. The back of the form they sent this time (which lets me know that in addition to the interest they charged me in the last notice, now I owe a $166 penalty and additional interest as well) advises that one of my two options is to pay the money I "owe" and then sue them to get it back. Fat chance. I'm working on my response to this latest waste of my time and the taxpayers' money...

A good friend told me that bad things come in threes. The third thing was I found out that I missed Annie Proulx, who spoke at Davidson last night. I was very sad about that -- I loved her Shipping News and would have loved to hear her speak.

The redeeming experience of the day was seeing Little Miss Sunshine tonight -- what a great movie! Some really good laughs, and the final scenes are absolutely perfect.

Click here to get an inkling of my plans for tomorrow....

more about Sister Simone

Today the Charlotte Observer published a column about Sister Simone Campbell's talk/workshop at St. Peter Catholic Church in downtown Charlotte last Saturday. (See my post entitled "Network" below, for more about Sister Simone.) This is a good author (Mary Curtis) and an informative though brief article. The link is here.

Network

Probably the most bloggable thing that I've experienced in the past few weeks was attending Sr. Simone Campbell's talk at the Oratory on Sunday. Sr. Simone is the national coordinator of Network, the national Catholic social justice lobby. She spoke about politics and contemplation and how they relate, and of course about social justice, and the themes of social justice that shape Network's vision of a just society. Sr. Simone is a terrific speaker, very engaging and down-to-earth, and she knows so much about what is going on in our country and the world. I highly recommend the Network website and the organization.

In general, my life has been rather full of activity for the past few weeks. I haven't had DSL up and running since August 27, so that's a drag, but otherwise things are going well. I'm too tired to write more right now, but hopefully tonight I'll be able to catch up on sleep a little. Blessings!

Trader Joe's

News flash: This stodgy city will be getting a Trader Joe's in the near future!!! It was announced in the business section of the Observer this morning. The article also mentions that we really are getting a Whole Foods - actually, 2 of them! - and another Earthfare. There's going to be a natural foods store glut around here, at least in the 'burbs and the Southpark area. (As usual, the people on the north, west and east sides of town are being ignored....) The Trader Joe's is going into a former Harris Teeter location at Piper Glen, which is not terribly far from where I live. The fact that it's going into an existing building is good news -- we don't have to wait for a whole new building to be built, as is the case with the other places I mentioned.

procrastination

Click on the title above for my latest [successful] attempt to find something to do that is not on my list, so as to avoid getting started on the list. I can't look at the flash part of the indicated web-page since my DSL is down and I am limping along on dial-up these days.
Sometimes I think the wrong electronic device in my house is broken -- my cell phone (and the other one, too, when I am off the computer) has been ringing off the hook (though I don't think that euphemism has any meaning w.r.t. cell phones -- it will probably got the way of the oft-used simile, "...like a broken record" one of these days.)
Anyway, rather than procrastinate any longer by writing more unnecessary drivel, I'll get back to work and leave the rest of you to continue your net-surfing.

Blessings!

memories

Mary Newsom, a columnist for the Charlotte Observer, had a column yesterday - Capturing the Elusive Milestone Moments - that got me to thinking about photography (and other types of recording of events) and memories. I enjoyed her article and her subtexts of children growing older and the passage of time surely resonate with me. But the whole photography thing has been on my mind anyway, what with there being over 1500 photos up on the web from the recent wedding, and stacks of photo albums behind me on the floor of the office waiting to have something done with them... For this reason, one thing that Mary Newsom said in her article especially struck me:

That's the thing about taking pictures. They fool us into thinking we're capturing the moment with a freeze-frame. But the real moment is 3-D. It's round. It has background noise and air currents and hearts beating and you can smell the sun on baked dirt, or maybe the cat's dusty fur or last night's fried chicken.
The photos in the albums are splotches of color on flat paper. You haven't saved the moment at all. They're like those insects that get trapped in blocks of amber. They're interesting to look at, but they're relics, not living insects.

In a sense, especially with really old photos, and ones that were taken by someone else at an event that I wasn't present for, that is true. But when I looked at the photos of the wedding, it all came back to me: the smells of flowers and food and the sounds of people and music and the heat and the flavors -- Yum! -- and especially the many and intense feelings of that day, that week... In fact, when I first started looking at photos of the wedding, the experience was almost too intense. A photo can spark so many memories.

When my children were little, I took lots of photos of them and of the places and people and events in their lives and mine. I kept albums with these pictures in chronological order so we could look back at the photos and talk about our experiences, in the hopes that this would enhance our memories of their childhood. We did spend many happy hours looking at these picture books as they were growing up. (I can remember times when I would come upon the children sitting quietly, slowly turning over the leaves of the albums and poring over the photos. I always wondered what they were thinking, and what meaning the photos had for them.) I was not very good about writing things down in those days, so I figured this, at least, would give us a record of some sort, someplace to start our remembering at. Now I wish I had written more down, but I am glad I at least have these photos.

I am in great admiration of Lorian and Brenda, who spend time and effort in making scrapbooks with the photos and write about the times they had -- in years to come, this will be a wonderful record of the past that they can enjoy and share with their children and grandchildren and other family members. My brother Dan also has been making a scrapbook over the years with the help of various family members on his visits. (This scrapbook floats around to various members of the family -- I don't know where it is at the moment!)

All this holds for other kinds of recordings, too -- audio, and even the "recording" that our other senses do. Chris Stewart, in his book The Almond Blossom Appreciation Society, talks about memory and the sense of smell (w.r.t a trip to Morocco):

The sense of smell is one of the most immediate and tactile we have -- and surely to perceive the smell of a thing we must actually ingest microscopic particles of it, whether it's the heady smell of camellias or that of a long-dead dog n a ditch. A smell revives the memory and transports you to a time and a place more powerfully than even music. If I ever need to return to Arzou, all I would have to do is mix together some mint, cedar, diesel, and a hint of drains, and take a good long sniff.

Our society currently places such a strong emphasis on the visual that we tend to minimize the importance of the other senses. Jerry Mander writes about this with respect to TV in his book Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television. He talks about the inherent biases of the medium, especially in a section titled, The Bias away from the Sensory, noting that "Television cannot transmit information that comes in the form of smell, touch or taste...." He has a lot more to say on the topic, but I don't have room or time to quote more here, and it's a little off-topic anyhow. But I maintain that it is the same with photos, and I think this is what Mary Newsom was getting at in her commentary about our propenstiy to try to capture a very emotion-laden moment on film: there is no way we can really have a photo that is as rich as our memories of that moment. But I look at a photo as a jumping off place into the world of memory, an aid or accessory to memory, rather than as an end in itself, and there is where its worth lies.

"Laugh and the world laughs with you..."

One more word on photos -- this time humor: check out the Cathy strips for about August 10-19 for a hilarious look at digital photography and how we deal with it (or don't!)

Getting Organized

It's Saturday afternoon. I spent the morning on errands, a little work, and visiting, plus a few minutes on library browsing (one of my favorite distractions), so now I'm just about to start in on getting ready for next week. Another favorite distraction -- reading blogs -- kicked in when I sat down at the computer, and I found the article linked above. I sooo need to organize and clean up my desk!!! So that goes on the list, after I prepare the lesson for my Tuesday class, and get some other urgent work out of the way. When prioritizing, I try to think about what tasks, if not moved to the top of the list, will worry me most later, and there are a few of those. So I'm off to get started... will try to post more later, but in the meantime, check out the desk organizing article, and let me know if you have other tips to add or links that relate to this topic. I'm open to suggestions -- especially time and space organizing ideas for people who work at home!!

Prayer

Just gotta make this quick -- I've got packages to mail, copies to make, and the ever-present piles of STUFF to chip away at. Oh, and I think I'm ready to make a trip to the recycling place -- the car is full up. Meanwhile...phone rings... I'll finish this later...

...well, I didn't get to the recycling center, but I am sort of ready to teach my class *today*. Meanwhile I can't seem to get to sleep...

I had hoped to put something interesting up on my blog, but haven't had any ideas about that. So at least I can alert my readers to an nifty gadget to enhance the capabilities of a digital camera, allowing it to do time-lapse photography. (I've always been fascinated with time-lapse photgraphy.) The gadget is described here, in the August 22 post. The author includes a little demo. Check it out!

oooh, here's another little link*, this time to humor... hmmm, does this mean the blocks I have been saving for grandchildren will be obsolete?

*make sure you link to the 8/22/06 comic

The wedding

I know I still haven't written much about the wedding, but it isn't because it wasn't a terrific day or lots to write about... I just haven't figured out how to write about it yet, or whether to. It would take a long time!!! Meanwhile, here is one of the few photos I took that day.

still weeding out

Well, I couldn't sleep last night, so I went back to going through boxes of stuff. I found a pile of magazines, some of them about math, from the mid-90's; a few books that I bought on impulse, mostly from the library (very cheap!); some old issues of Liguorian and St. Anthony Messenger, also mid-90's, a fairy tale book from my childhood, inscribed, as most my old books are, with "Reading Room, MHL"; a pile of La Leche League magazines and my long-lost '83 edition of The Womanly Art, and a few New Yorkers from last year and the year before. Hardly worth going through, though I saved the LLL stuff and a few other things, and several articles to read later. (Like I need more reading material!)

The weather here has been very pleasant the past few days, really fall weather. It can't last, but while it's here I have the windows open and fans going (and a/c off -- yay!!) It's almost like being in Burlingame, except that there isn't an ocean 20 minutes away... and a few other differences.

I was thinking some more about the book I posted about a few days ago, The Summer of Ordinary Ways. The way it is written is unusual: it is written ostensibly from the child's point of view, but also is tinged with an understanding of why-things-happened-the-way-they-did that can only come from long years of experience. In the end, it is clear that the author has made an effort to understand her parents, to get her mind around who they were and what they were dealing with in her growing up years. I have done that, too, so this book resonated with me in a deep way. This book also made me realize in a new way how my own children must have experienced the intermittent craziness that would overtake me -- how scary it must have been for them at times, and how confusing. I know I've thought about all that before, but I've never read an account that so clearly illustrates it. The author is one of six siblings, all female (a totally foreign experience for me, having had all brothers) and they all took such different paths, in a sociological sense (at least the ones who were adults at the time the book was written.) That sort of thing is always interesting to me, how people who grow up in the same family can end up with such very different lifestyles and ways of dealing with the world. I know it is really normal for that to happen, and I know about a lot of the reasons why -- how a person is hard-wired, birth order, experiences and influences outside the family and so on -- but it is still amazing. I think there are some families where the children grow up with more similar interests and lifestyles, but I don't see that so often.

blogging again

I feel like I'm talking to myself here...but that's what I get for not blogging for a few months, and not being so frequent even before the hiatus. Oh, well.

It's taking awhile to get myself back in gear after the busy-ness of the past couple months. But work is starting to pick up, so I'm being forced to think about math, tutoring, teaching... and in the meantime I'm also trying to sort through years and years of stuff, hoping to get rid of a whole big huge lot of it. The sheer mass of papers, books, cards, photos, bookmarks (it seems I have a collection of bookmarks) and other paraphernalia and memorabilia is just getting to be too much. The little flood that occurred while I was away this summer convinced me that I really don't need to keep all this STUFF so this time it will go. If any of my readers want any of it (or don't!), please let me know. Hopefully my work won't pick up totally until I have done with this latest round of purgation....

In the meantime I'm going to distract myself with blogging, hopefully on a more regular basis than before. I thought I'd turn over a new leaf, and write a little about what I've been reading lately.
**I read a whole book (albeit not a long one) last night and this morning: The Summer of Ordinary Ways, by Nicole Lea Helget. It was a very interesting book for me -- it's a memoir, and the author grew up on a farm in Minnesota, my home state. This is not a book for the faint of heart -- some of the things that the author experienced were pretty crazy and brutal -- but it gave me a lot to think about, and there were a lot of ways I connected with the author.
**Politics Lost, by Joe Klein, which I have just started. I'm still on the Prologue, which is rather long, but I think it will be a good book.
**I've also started Anne Tyler's A Patchwork Planet, which I think is a re-read, but I can't remember it at all. If you haven't read anything by Anne Tyler, I highly recommend her books. They are lots of fun, very interesting & unpredictable. She is great at thinking up really interesting characters.
**I'm about to start The Light Fantastic, by Terry Pratchett, the second book in the Discworld series. I finished The Color of Magic this summer while on my trip, so I'm looking forward to continuing the journey. I'm going to try to read this one faster, so it might make more sense than the last one. (I kept losing the thread of the story in the first book when there would be weeks between the times I would have time to read during this past spring.)
I also picked up a few books at Mathfest last week, so there are a few waiting in the wings...not to mention a few books on tape and CD from the library, including The Game by Laurie R. King. I think I need to stay out of the library for awhile!!

cool blog

Sometimes upon leaving my site I get caught up in looking at the names of other blogs scroll by, and this one caught my eye...check out the entry for August 13 titled Someone Has Talent -- it's pretty amazing! I'm thinking of trying out some of these moves next time I go to the YWCA :-)

Ideastorming while eating well...

One of the things I thought about while on the Mathfest trip was about restaurants -- how much fun it would be to have my own or work in one (which is something I've never done.) This idea probably falls into the realm of pipe-dreams, I'm afraid, but it gave me something new to think about and explore. On the way home from Knoxville last night, my friend Anne T. and I stopped at a tiny restaurant in Black Mountain, Cafe Bijan, which had wonderful food and eclectic, rustic decor. We split the Fish Tacos (four small handmade tortillas with tilapia, mango chutney, pineapple, etc.) and Montreat Salad (delicious fresh salad greens with herb-crusted goat cheese, walnuts, dried cranberries, and other goodies with I think a homemade raspberry viniagrette dressing) and cheesecake with caramel sauce and blueberries for dessert. All of it was scrumptious, but I especially loved the goat cheese/salad combination. The owner would love to have a partner or some real help -- she does all the cooking and waits tables besides -- so if you are looking for this sort of a work experience, or know someone who is, get in touch with Michelle. (I have her phone number if you need it -- I don't know if the one at the Cafe Bijan link above is good, but she gave me another.) Another great restaurant from the trip was Tomato Head which is located at Market Square in downtown Knoxville. It's a very busy place, with sturdy utilitarian oak tables and chairs, college student waiters with no-nonsense attitudes and white aprons tied around their jeans, and decor that seems almost an afterthought. The food was great, with so many interesting choices we regretted not being able to try more of them. We ate there twice, and sampled such things as the Kepner Melt (a vegetarian sandwich), Salad with Tuna, and Bean Quesadilla (with spinach - very tasty - check the Tomato Head link above for more descriptions, as well as some very cool graphics.) A carnivorous colleague enjoyed the Pizza Number 3, which was piled with lamb sausage, capers, black olives, and herbed tomatoes. This restaurant reminded me of one I frequented in St. Louis in my brief college stint there. I think it was called "Grandma's" and served mostly soup and bread, and had the same kind of atmosphere as Tomato Head, though a little less refined :-)

Back from Mathfest!

Well, I'm back from what I think will be my last "major" trip for awhile (it was real short in comparison to the one to CA...) Mathfest was a lot of fun, and I got some new ideas to use in my teaching this year, as well as a boost to the breadth and depth of my understanding of mathematics...and a healthy dose of humility-restoring experiences (as if the CA trip didn't have enough of those!) One of the most interesting sessions I went to was about a really strange kind of multiplication that had results like 4 x 3 = 18 and 5^2 = 100. It made sense once I got used to it, though it took a few minutes since I missed the first bit. Other good sessions addressed issues around teaching proof to high school and college students (several different sessions), continuity and differentiability of functions in two variables (with some really great graphics!) as applied to teaching beginning calculus, the inquiry method of teaching, and math anxiety. I reconnected with some friends there whom I don't get to see very often -- that's one of the best things for me about going to these meetings, the other best thing is just being around a whole lot of people who enjoy math as much as I do! (A couple of the friends I ran into were Pat Kenschaft and her husband Fred. Pat is the author of Math Power, and she has a new book out which looks to be an excellent read, Change is Possible: Stories of Women and Minorities in Mathematics.) I also found some new and interesting resources in the exhibit area, some of which I brought back with me.

One of the things I thought about while on this trip was about restaurants -- how much fun it would be to have my own or work in one (which is something I've never done.) This idea falls into the realm of pipe-dreams, I'm afraid, but it gave me something new to think about and explore. On the way home from Knoxville last night, my friend Anne T. and I stopped at a restaurant in Black Mountain, Cafe Bijan, which had wonderful food. We split the Fish Tacos (four small handmade tortillas with tilapia, mango chutney, pineapple, etc.) and Montreat Salad (delicious fresh salad greens with herb-crusted goat cheese, walnuts, dried cranberries, and other goodies with I think a homemade raspberry viniagrette dressing) and cheesecake with caramel sauce and blueberries for dessert. All of it was scrumptious, but I especially loved the goat cheese/salad combination. The owner would love to have a partner or some real help -- she does all the cooking and waits tables besides -- so if you are looking for this sort of a work experience, or know someone who is, get in touch with Michelle. (I have her phone number if you need it -- I don't know if the one at the link above is good, but she gave me another.) Another great restaurant from the trip was Tomato Head which is located at Market Square in downtown Knoxville. We ate there twice, and sampled such things as the "Kepner Melt" (a vegetarian sandwich), Salad with Tuna, and Bean Quesadilla. A friend tried the pizza (Number 3, which had lamb sausage and various other stuff) and enjoyed it. This restaurant reminded me of one I frequented in St. Louis in my brief college stint there. I think it was called "Grandma's" and served mostly soup and bread, and had the same kind of atmosphere as Tomato Head, though a little less refined.

Well, that's about all for now -- I've got to get to work on decluttering this apartment after a summer of neglect!!

back to "normal"...

Well, it's been a busy summer so far! Lots of events (one in particular), lots of visits with a whole lot of people, and a bit of sightseeing thrown in.... it's good to be home, and I need some quiet time now to process it all. I'll try to get a few photos up on this blog when I can, along with some stories, but in the meantime hit the link above to see a few photos from the wedding.

Note -- 8/13/06 -- If the link above doesn't work (the one for wedding photos) go to the Threads of Possibility link at right for some more up-to-date wedding links.

half asleep...

It's been way too long since I posted last... Let's just say my business has taken off at about the same time as I decided to get the carpets cleaned, and the combination of cleaning frenzy last week and long hours of tutoring these past few weeks have me snowed under.

I the meantime, I found this mathematical calendar of sorts that you can link to for quotes and whatnot, off a bigger site with all sorts of calendars on it... Enjoy!

I'll try to get back to blogging soon, when I have some thoughts in my head beyond how to do my job well and how to get more sleep, more exercise, and more hours in the day!

Recycling and bicycling...

A friend and I got in a long conversation last night about recycling, specifically my experience of recycling. How long have I been doing it, what do I recycle, etc. I had to think back to answer a lot of her questions. As many of my readers know, I am rather obsessed with recycling, though our conversation last night revealed that there is a whole 'nother level of recycling obsession that I haven't reached yet! Anyway, my response to my friend went something like this:
I began to recycle so long ago I don't remember how long it has been. I grew up in a home where we recycled newspaper at our school's paper drives. My dad brought home piles of used computer paper -- the old wide pin-feed paper with the green bars on it -- and we reused it for drawings, banners, and other projects. In my college years, I learned about waste reduction in very physical ways: I worked at a grocery store where various employees broke down the cardboard cartons for recycling and sorted the glass soda bottles for return to the bottling companies. The latter was a frequent assignment for me, and even though it was a dirty, sticky job, it struck me as a worthwhile effort.

Later on, when we moved to NC, long before there was curbside recycling, I began recycling in earnest. Used to be, the fire stations here would collect aluminum cans and recycle them, so I took can over there. I took our newspapers to the paper drives at local schools; later on, newspapers went to a collection site at a nearby high school. I reused paper grocery bags (before and after the advent of plastic grocery bags) as wrapping for packages that went across the country to friends and family (yes, folks, the box used to have to be covered in paper or the USPS wouldn't accept it!) I also used the bags to make newspaper-filled "blocks" for the kids to build with, and the kids cut up more bags to make costumes and other arts and crafts projects. I've always washed and reused plastic bags from bread and such and glass jars and other reusable containers, though I don't acquire as many now as I used to. Since the grocery stores started recycling paper and pastic bags -- that's been at least ten years -- I have recycled excess and worn out plastic and paper bags of all kinds that way. Recently, as I've found more opportunities for recycling, I've recycled more things: dead batteries, broken electronic devices...click the link above for a list of all the things that can be recycled!

Recycling has always been a way for me to do a small action that might help save the earth, to lighten my footprint upon this beautiful world that is suffering from so much trampling at the present time... I believe that the accumulated recycling effort of one person over a lifetime can have some positive impact, and I also have always hoped to provide an example to my children and others of how they can be effective in these small and personal ways.

So now, my readers, I have a request to make of you: if you can spare a moment, please share your experience of recycling either as comments on this blog or in an e-mail to me; my friend is writing a book that addresses some of these issues, and she welcomes personal stories to include in her book and to use for ideas. She would also like to know peoples' experience of relying mainly on biking or walking or mass transit to get most places (i.e. because of not having a car or as an attempt to minimize car use.) If you have expoerience of that to share also, write about that, too. Contributing to my friend's efforts can be another small and easy way of making a difference. Thanks to all!

friendship

I woke up early this morning (early for a Saturday -- 6:43 a.m.) thinking about friendship, thinking back over the years to when I first came to Charlotte (June '76) and didn't know a soul here. I missed my family and friends back home terribly, and we wrote letters back and forth and chatted on the phone when we could. (This was way before the days of cheap long distance, cell phones, e-mail, and instant messaging, so phone contact was not all that frequent!) I worked temp jobs to pass the time until I could find a teaching job, and I met good people there, but I wasn't at any one job long enough to develop any long-term friendships. I wasn't going to church at the time, so that wasn't an avenue for meeting people. I was taking riding lessons, but everyone at the barn was either a lot older than me or a lot younger. It was a really long summer. In August I started my first teaching job, and began to settle in. That first year teaching I made a really good friend, a science teacher, but at the end of that year she moved to Atlanta. I was devastated! The next year I got to be good friends with the teacher who took her place, but at the end of that year she moved to Raleigh! Then I got pregnant and quit my job -- and there went what I thought was my best avenue for making friends! I had met a lot of other people during those two years, and I kept in touch with some of them, but none of those friendships were of the sort that I had left behind in Atlanta... But lo and behold, other avenues opened up, and I subsequently learned much about friendship, especially the truth of the old adage: to have a friend you have to be one. Eventually, through those early experiences here, I learned to be grateful for my friends back home and to trust that I would find friends in my new home, and I discovered that the route to friendship was doing the things that make my life meaningful, letting go of worry about when and if I would find a friend, and living in the present moment.

I have friendships now with all kinds of people, and these friendships have sustained me through the proverbial "thick and thin" (both literally and figuratively!) Friendships don't appear out of thin air, they begin with a contact, an openness to learning about each other, listening during a walk or a meal or while working on a project together... So where did I meet all these people? Thinking back, I see that I met one really good friend on a walk around the block, others I met through my volunteer work (La Leche League, Mecklenburg County Literacy Council, Mathcounts coaching, Math Club...), some I met through my tutoring work (parents of students), some from church and support groups, lots were parents of my children's friends, or parents I met through homeschooling connections, or friends of my children, or friends of other friends... and quite a few fall into several of those categories. Some have stuck around and others have moved away, but some of those latter I am still in touch with. Some who I lost touch with I later reconnected with, a joyful experience for both of us! That's happened a couple times just in the last year. And of course -- last but not least -- some of my closest friends are family members, both blood relatives and "married-ins".

So, how to find a friend? The only way that has ever worked for me is to put myself out there, follow my interests, and keep my ears and my heart open all the while for the adventure and blessing of friendship. I act on this last bit by trying to remember to treat each person I meet as though they already are a friend. That, to me, is the meaning of the saying I quoted above.

My friends have taught me how to be a friend. Through their patience and care, I discovered over the years that it takes work and time to build and sustain a friendship -- friendships don't happen overnight, or by chance. Good friendships have a lot of listening built in, and I love to listen to my friends about as much as I like to talk...well, maybe even more. :-) For me, there is no better feeling than to know I have given support and encouragement to a friend... I am so grateful for the presence of my friends in my life, for all the love and forgiveness and laughter and sorrow we have shared.

(...and as she takes her sappy self off to breakfast, the strains of "Precious Friend" echo in the background...)

blogging, justice, peace, headaches

True confessions: I've been neglecting my blog while joining in discussions on another blog... among other things, on that blog we have been discussing justice, the existence of God & the problem of pain, what language the Bible was written in... it's been interesting. On the way to looking up the slogan (actually a quote from Pope Paul VI) "If You Want Peace, Work for Justice", I found this site which has tons of quotes on peace, justice, and related issues. It is quite thought-provoking to read through the quotes here. Also on my web surfing I found a site that sells magnetic ribbons with an unusual slogan...

It's been a real busy week (not that I'm complaining!) and it ain't over yet... the Math Club meets this morning. So it's not so good that I woke up 2.5 hours early with this splitting headache. I'm going back to bed, but I'll try to write again soon...