I’m catching up on things, obviously. Click on the picture for a larger version.
I’ve been away for a while, on a computer-light vacation, to Roswell for a while, and since I’ve been back, I haven’t felt like doing much of anything. I’m not sure what’s wrong, but I feel like I should send out a search party to hunt for my lost creativity.
I’m learning more and more about how to use my new camera. Although the composition of the above photo isn’t particularly fantastic, I do like the way the condensation on this water glass got captured. I wasn’t thirsty when I began writing this entry three seconds ago, but now I am.
It is raining hard right now. I’m not complaining, because it’s cooling things down outside, certainly, and listening to the rain fall outside the window is one of the more pleasant aural experiences I can think of. The rain as of late (we seem to have passed straight into monsoon season here, bypassing the first part of summer) has brought out a lot of greenery. I’ve seen things in bloom the last few days that I’ve never seen bloom before — sudden flower surprises.
I turned my grades in earlier this week. I was surprised by the results — out of 70-odd students, only 4 got As, and there were a couple of A minuses. This may be the smallest A yield I’ve had to date.
I’ve had some good students this semester, and one of my sections turned out to be the best one I’ve had to date, since the students in it were chatty, did the reading, and interacted quite well with one another, as well as with me. However, this was negated by the fact that I received a lot of lame excuses for not doing work or coming to class, students who did the bare minimum and didn’t seem to learn anything, and people who kept telling me, over and over, that they were going to turn things in, and then they didn’t. Plus, there was one particularly spectacular plagiarizer.
Each semester that I’ve taught discussion sections, I’ve felt like I have improved. Not this semester. I feel like I’ve reached some vast plateau in my ability to ask interesting questions, get students motivated to do the reading and come to class, and teach them how to do well on exams and papers. In some ways, even, I feel like I’ve regressed. For example, I’m pretty low-key about having students email me assignments. It’s not my first choice, but, in particular situations, it’s better than not having students turn in papers or other assignments at all. Usually, it’s pretty rare that someone has to turn in something via email, but this semester, there’s been a plague of students sending me things, for all sorts of reasons. This means, ultimately, that I have to print these papers out before I can mark them up and hand them in. This is a real pain in the ass, and I’m going to be more strict about this in the future. I also had more students this semester who neglected to hand in quite a few of the weekly writing assignments, and even forgot some of the major writing assignments. I don’t have the time or the desire to hunt these people down — they’re adults (or near-adults, in some cases), and it’s not my job to remind them over and over again that things are due.
The photo? Part of an ampersand, found on a sign on Nob Hill.
This is a picture taken outside the Bumble Bee on Amherst and Central. I had some shrimp tacos (I used to like their fish tacos the best, but now that I’ve had the shrimp ones, I’ve changed my mind) there for lunch while I was waiting for the box office at the Guild to open. The Bumble Bee is a little expensive (something that has never stopped me from going to the Flying Star or Zinc, also clear candidates for the “overpriced” category), but I still like eating there, particularly because of their salsa bar. They take tomatillos seriously there — if there’s one complaint I have about the predominance of New-Mexican Mexican food, it’s that the tomatillo gets little, if any attention, on restaurant menus or in salsa in this area. I’ve written about this Tomatillo Gap before, and a visit to the Bumble Bee is a quick, if not terribly inexpensive way, to satisfy any tangy green cravings I might have.
I like this photo because of the mix of colors and textures here. Yellow next to red, and shiny metallic red contrasting with rough, textured red.
The floor of the laundry room in my building is littered with roaches. Dead roaches, which are slightly better than live ones, but, still, that’s only a minor improvement. I’m not sure why, since I’ve never seen roaches in there before. Yes, it is Springtime in Albuquerque, when la cucaracha comes out to play, but trust me, here: there were a very surprising amount of roach corpses there. I wanted to my laundry this afternoon, but perhaps not, now.
At least they’re not in my apartment.
I am now done with school, more or less, even though I have a final to give on Friday and will spend much of this weekend grading exams. The part of the semester that required me to produce academic product is over, though, and that’s what really counts. I had a final this afternoon, which was much easier than the test I thought I was studying for. So easy, in fact, that I needn’t have studied at all. The question I answered was on a topic I knew quite well already (although I didn’t do the most artful job writing out my answer on it), which is one of the hazards of taking finals while in grad school. I celebrated this by going to Siam Cafe with H. and then going to Borders, where I briefly considered buying Postwar: A History of Europe since 1945, but then I didn’t, since it was a) too similar to the school-related things I just finished doing, and b) undoubtedly available used somewhere for less. I rode the bus back home, and now I am exhausted.
This is the second time I’ve ridden the bus to or from the Borders at ABQ Uptown in the last week. It’s a really easy ride, since I live pretty close to a Rapid Ride stop, and it, too, is located close to such a stop. The largest obstacle is crossing Louisiana on foot: even with the relatively long walk-signal cycle at its intersection at Indian School, walking across it is very unpleasant. There’s never been anyone but me crossing there the few times I’ve done it, now, and I always feel very isolated and exposed as I cross in front of the numerous idling cars waiting for the light to change. Most of the drivers seem surprised to see someone crossing there, honestly, and I can’t say that I blame them.
I’m doing this because I’m trying to cut down on using my car. I don’t drive that much, anyway, since I only live three or so blocks from where I work, and there’s usually plenty to do in my neighborhood. Still, I have a bad habit of driving around a lot at night, going to Target once or twice a week to buy things, going out to eat, etc, etc. I figure if I try to make all of the car trips I need to make in one day, I can not only save on gas and emissions, I can save money, as well. I buy less if I have to lug things home on foot or on the bus. I’m also thinking about buying a bike for trips that are too long to do on foot, but too short to really justify driving, such as to Wild Oats and such. I’ve been looking, though, and there are a lot of ugly, ugly bikes out there. There are a few out there I like the looks of, such as this one, but so far, it’s been an aesthetically depressing consumer experience. I know that looks aren’t the most important criterion in this sort of purchase, but really, is it so difficult to produce an attractive bike?
The photo above is of some twigs and a wooden block I saw laying in the gutter on Silver Street. It’s a nice found arrangement of objects.