The Ice is Thin, Come On Dive In

Students are the worst

2017-12-18T21:54:26Z

Rant ahead. Feel free to skip.

This semester, after all tests have been graded and grades submitted, I've had the following complaints:

1. Student just asking for a B+ rather than a B to help their GPA.
2. Three students asking for extra credit now that the semester is over so that they can improve their grades.
3. Two students asking for a specific breakdown of how I calculated their final grades (even though it's listed in the syllabus, they just would have to do a little math).
4. One student who I kindly gave an Incomplete to a year ago suddenly trying to make up all of that work in the last three days of this semester before the Incomplete turns into an F on Thursday.
5. Another student asking for an Incomplete for heath reasons that she at no point in time informed me of even though all semester all she did was one quiz and one test (missing another dozen assignments and two other tests).
6. One student asking to answer the last essay questions of the test because he "forgot" to do so when he was actually taking the test.
7. One student asking to take the test late because her uncle died.
8. Another student asking to take the test late because he forgot when the test was due.
9. One student insisting she should be getting an A in class despite failing (by a LARGE MARGIN) two of two tests and the term paper which are 75% of her grade.
10. At least three students insisting that they turned in material despite there being a zero in the gradebook for those assignments for at least the past couple of weeks. (Two were correct and they had turned in late assignments that got buried in my inbox, but still! You need to remind me sooner! I did fix those grades without issue. The third student, though insisting he had turned something in, didn't turn in anything.)

This doesn't count the two students doing last minute make-up exams after missing the in-person exams this semester. This also doesn't count the departmental coordinator (who has even MORE students complaining at her) getting mad at me for something I can't help. She's a dear and I like her, but I swear I'm doing my best.

Guess who's going to be a real bitch about turning things in on time and grading next semester?

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Bitching about the weather

2014-02-05T18:28:43Z

Winter can eat my ass.

I am so sick of it. I actually almost broke down crying on the way to work this morning. The highway was not plowed and I pretty much just sledded in to work today. It was so bad that a car got stuck in a snow drift... in the middle lane. Or what I was assuming was the middle lane because the snow was thick enough that you couldn't see any paint on the roads where the lanes should be. I counted 9 white lines total in the 20 miles it takes me to get from home to school. All of those were under bridges where the snow wasn't as thick.

Semis bombed by me within 6 inches of my car because they thought they knew better than I did where the lanes were. Maybe they were right. I almost got rear ended by a bus who couldn't stop because of the snow and couldn't change lanes because a semi was in the next lane over. I nearly wet my pants at that one.

My little car is just too light to be able to sink down and actually hit pavement with this snow. It means that when I was going 32 MPH, I was sweating because I knew it was just too fast. But it does mean that I didn't have the false sense of security that the SUVs that I saw in the ditches and crashed into the center median wall had that they could handle the 3 inches of snow.

I did survive and it should be better on the way home this evening. If not, I'll just sleep in my office.

I talk about extremes regressing to the mean in my research methods class. That means that this awful weather has to let up sooner than later, right?

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Moving sucks!

2013-01-05T18:58:27Z

scribefigaro and I have officially relocated about 20 miles down the road. Moving sucks!

We're not very happy about the move, but it was necessary. Scribe's commute was terrible and this will save him about two hours of driving a day. He had to suffer through rush hours of two difference metro hubs, and now he only kind of has one.

But this move does mean that we're living in a slightly smaller apartment that's slightly more expensive. I had to say goodbye to the walk-in closet (*sniff*). I also have to figure out where all of the stores, vets, doctor offices, and gyms are in this new area that I've only ever driven by in the past. That's a pain. Finally, and most sadly of all, we had to say goodbye to our neighbors. We had a good set at our last apartment building and we all really looked out for one another. Even the "weird" guys in the building, though... off, stayed to themselves and were incredibly quiet. (One would even hide from me if he saw me coming.)

The move itself was about the nightmare we expected. Hard, hard work. My thighs are a-burning today after all of those stairs. We even hired movers that were expensive, but worth every penny. We've started making the place look like "ours" again, which is nice, but it's currently almost 2PM and we've not delved into a single box yet, today. Oh well.

Also, Comcast is the suck. It took 5 service calls and roughly 2 hours on the phone for them to figure out the cable box they sent us does not work for our zip code. *headdesk* So we'll have cable tv... probably never, the way things seem to be going.

Okay, enough complaining. Now is the time for more procrastinating on my work before the school year begins (on Tuesday)! Yay!

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Just venting

2012-12-06T04:04:16Z

God I'm so tired.

Last day of classes. yay.

'Tis the season and I just have to get this off of my chest.

I really don't like Christmas and all of December is pretty much the worst. I hate shopping, crowds, (most) holiday music, and travel. And grading, but at least I get paid to do that.

I've come to realize that since 1992, there have only been four Christmases (when I was in college) where I didn't travel more than 800 miles to be with family. Generally I travel anywhere between 12 and 20 hours (one way) to see family during Christmas. This is extremely stressful and I DO IT EVERY YEAR! This year is no exception. (Yes, I'm thankful for loving family who wants to see me during Christmas, but traveling during this time of the year is awful.)

This truly makes me dread Christmas every year. I seriously have almost never looked forward to it in the last 20 years.

I try not to be a Grinch and rain on everyone's Christmas parade, but dear God, I really, really, really hate Christmas.

I had to get that off my chest. I'll be happier about Christmas when I've done more grading and gotten other shit taken care of.

Carry on.

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Oh, Insomnia. How I didn't miss you.

2012-08-10T22:26:31Z

So, my insomnia has been back, going on about a week and a half now. It's definitely a noticeable pattern.

I fall asleep some time after midnight or so and sleep until 5:30 AM. Usually, I get up to go to the bathroom, and go back to bed to fall back asleep. Only I haven't been able to do that second part lately.

I'm up until scribefigaro's alarm goes off and he goes off to work. Only at about 8:30 or 9:00 (9:30 today) do I eventually get back to sleep. Then I sleep until 11:00 and my whole day is ruined. At least this is happening on my "vacation" and I have the time to sleep in. But there are things that I need to be getting done and it's starting to annoy me to sleep in so long.

So I'm still a little on the sleep-deprived side even though I don't get out of bed until 11AM.

Hopefully this will pass soon, but it's really annoying. It's happened before, about 8 or so years ago, and it eventually worked itself out, but it was total hell. Really, it just wears on you to keep thinking that you'll fall back to much-needed sleep at any moment just to keep watching the clock tick away for hours.

Bleck. I'm grumpy. :(

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