Minus Eleven!

When I wrote the post below, it was just before eight, and I had not checked the weather station readouts since their six o'clock (A.M.) recordings. According to the airport weather station, it was minus eleven (-11) farenheit at their seven A.M. reading. Durn cold. Spent most of the day today snowblowing the elderly neighbors' driveways: the widow Lilly next door, the widow Craun across the street, and Mr. and Mrs. Kay next door (she has cancer and a broken hip, and he has a heart condition and a bad back, and they are both in their seventies, I think.) Oh, and I did our driveway, also. I sure wish they made a snowblower that wouldn't break every time I use it, requiring me to spend an hour or two with tools in the cold wet mess outside. I've got it back together, except that now I'm completely out of shear pins. Kitty is not doing well. I put a box on our bed with a towel in it, located in the sunshine. I put a pile of birdseed on the balcony railing on the deck outside our bedroom. Hopefully the birdies will find the seed shortly and will give the kitty some visual entertainment through the windows in the french doors. Man, it's cold outside.

Minus Seven...

It's 7:45 a.m., and I looked at the outside thermometer, and it said it was ZERO. That can't be right, I thought, because the weather service said the low was supposed to be about 15. Obviously, they missed it. The airport weather sensor on the web says it is Minus Seven, as in -7! WSVA News radio station's website says it's minus siz at their studio right now, with a low recorded of -8 at 5 a.m. The "weather in Staunton" webpage says it is -7 too. The "weather in Weyers Cave" website says -9! Fairbanks, eat your heart out.

Snow A'comin'

According to the weather report, we're gonna be on the northern edge of a major snowstorm. Aunt Becky is on the southern edge, where it'll probably be an ice storm, and Grandma Arline is in the middle. Supposed to start precipitating here Saturday morning, with anywhere from 1 to 5 inches by Sunday morning. Time to go get the fixin's for some of my classic beef stew. I been tryin' to eat right. Oatmeal with raisins for breakfast, with an occasional morning with pancakes, eggs, and bacon. Burger King or Wendys -- only one or the other -- only one day a week, not five anymore. No more Cokes or even Sprites... I gave up Dr. Pepper months ago, to no effect. Water only. Lunch is limited to peanut butter and jelly, or tuna salad, deli roast beef, or today, egg salad sandwich, with a half-cup of mixed nuts and some Fritos corn chips. No more afternoon snacks. Dinner is one helping of meat, one or two helpings of vegetables, and a (big) potato or (big) helping of rice. No dessert normally. I've had only one batch of popcorn in the last week, two batches in the last three weeks. No bedtime snack normally, but once or twice in the last two weeks, I've had a couple of graham crackers with peanut butter. A cup of green tea or chamomile at bedtime to get to sleep (it really does help, I'm really amazed at how well it works and how good I'm sleeping). And finally, a multivitamin, a calcium tablet, a vitamin D3 megadose, and now, some kinda B-vitamin Dubby wants me to take. Okay, I've deviated from the above a couple of times (a dinner buffet with Dubby, a pizza one night, and two nights that I had helping of key-lime pie on graham crackers), but nothing like what I used to do. I've been on this regimen for about four or five weeks now (essentially the entire month of January). The result: I'm feeling about the same, but I'm sleeping a whole lot better, ... oh, and I've gained four pounds and my pants are significantly tighter and my shirt collars are tighter. Go figure. I'll give it a couple more weeks, and then it'll be back to skipping breakfast six days a week, Burger King for lunch three days a week and Wendy's two, back to the Cokes, Dr. Peppers, and IBC Creme Soda's, popcorn with 1/2 cup of butter every night of the week, seconds and third helping at dinner, corn dogs as snacks, and at least one meat-lovers pizza every week with two or three of the garlic butter dipping sauce packs. As Will Rogers said, "if at first you don't succeed, try try again. Then quit, 'cause there's no sense in bein' a damn fool about it."

Validation.

There's a really powerful message here, but you have to watch all the way to the end to get it... -- or at least to the start of the credits.

As if anyone cares anymore...

I guess blogging has seen its day in the sun come and go... It was nice while it lasted I guess. Kitty is still hanging in there. I got the tax statements from church printed and distributed. I got all the year-end stuff filed and new files set up for 2010. Got my mom's checkbook records all updated and balanced. Got the MARA club's books all caught up and membership renewals deposited. Paid my own bills, too. Gave a talk in church today, taught Sunday School. Took Dubby to dinner last night. And my dresser is still clean. Not much else to report.

Last February's Snow...

After reading a couple of posts about snowblowers on my accounting professors' national listserv, I thought I'd modify an old Opinionated One article (to relate more to accounting professors than ham radio), and post it on the web, along with Mom's response. http://cob.jmu.edu/fordham/snow1.htm I don't know. Should I post any of my other articles on the web? Like maybe the one about the tower party? Or Sniffie's dad's convertible? or the Liar's contest?

New Post

I've been really, really, REALLY busy lately. I haven't had time to blow my proverbial nose. Getting up at 6 in the morning, working solidly till 11 at night, driving to and from Florida, working on my mom's bills and living facility application, handling treasurer duties for the ham club and clerk's stuff for the church, participating in my academic conference, etc. For example, just listen to what I did TODAY. Yes, just today: Got up at 6:30 (late for me this semester). I fixed some oatmeal for breakfast. I dropped the green Camry off at Van's for a state inspection. I went to the Hburg post office and checked the PO box for MARA. I went by the president's home and picked up some membership checks he received at the last meeting while I was in Florida, I finished making out the deposit, and dropped it by the MARA bank. I then went to campus. I had to go over to the parking services office to register the gold Camry. I then parked and went to my office, called the DMV to report the sale of the van to Bry last week, but didn't have the VIN number, so that was a wasted 10 minutes listening to the menu guy tell me to press 7 if I wanted him to speak Indonesian or something. I called the Registrar's office to find out how to enter grades for a course that ended last week (it's not the end of a semester, but this is an on-line course and didn't follow the semester schedule, so there's no procedure for entering grades -- assuming I get the exams graded later this week!) I then wrote a check to pay for the printing of the MARA newsletters, after calling the printer to get a billing error straightened out. During the day I met with six students who were trying to get into my over-full classes, was able to squeeze three of them in because of drops. I spent about 15 minutes on-line registering for seven required seminars on distance learning being taught for faculty by our Center for Instructional Technology. These seven 2-hour seminars are being required of all graduate faculty by the MBA director. I spent three hours setting up course material on my three class "Blackboards". (Most college students will know what the on-line Blackboard application is). I went out at lunch, spent a few minutes at Burger King with the ham radio guys, and then dropped of some shirts at the Chinese laundry. I went by my bank to deposit a reimbursement check, and dropped off some bills at the post office. I returned to campus and spent 20 minutes looking for a parking space, since the university has closed two parking lots due to construction on the new stadium, my parking lot is always full with a waiting line now. I spent the afternoon preparing reading notes for students for next week. I prepared class handouts, created 2 hours of PowerPoints, made up my professor's class notes, printed PDF's and put all this stuff in the correct folders of the three Blackboards. I also spent an hour meeting with a graduate student for whom I'm supervising an independent study, and also filled out some paperwork for four other students who want me to supervise their honors project. I responded to about 21 emails from colleagues. I called the dermatologist to confirm the appointment that Debbie made for me last month, and clarify the date since the email said Friday Jan 19, but Jan 19 is not a Friday. I returned a call to my dad's funeral home and found out that the problem had been handled by my mom. Next, I spent an hour re-engineering my class assessment reports from last semester so that they will match a brand-new format being required by the accreditation organization (fools-- what a waste of time!), and emailed the six new reports to my department chair and the director of the MSA program. I stopped by the department secretary's office to pick up the departmental proficiency exam copies (to give the students in tomorrow's class periods), and also picked up a travel reimbursement form to fill out hopefully tomorrow or Friday. I picked up my mail from the mailroom and of course promptly threw out about 90% of it (as usual). I came home, ate a nice dinner with Debbie, made a shopping list, then went to the church where I entered data to complete the quarterly report for last quarter and transmitted it to Salt Lake City. I delivered to the church the four final boxes of the branch curriculum order (back ordered last month and just delivered to my home last week), and sorted it by auxiliary to distribute Sunday. The Primary, YM and YW presidencies were there tonight for activity night, so I got that part delivered, and then printed rolls for their classes. While I was transmitting the report, everyone left the building, so I had to go around and turn off the lights and lock up. I then went to Wal-Mart on a hunting expedition with my shopping list, a real safari since they've moved everything around, and was able to find about 90% of the shopping list. I came home, put away most of the groceries (Dubby put away some too), made sandwiches for my lunch tomorrow. (I'm in class all day long on Tue/Thu, and while I do have time to go out for lunch, I don't have the time to hunt for a parking space when I get back -- so I can't really go out for lunch on Tue/Thu this semester). I next "pilled the cat", and gave her the leftover tuna salad bowl to lick (she politely refused, turning up her nose and making clear that it was beneath her dignity). Now, I'm finally checking email once more before bed and decided what the heck, I'll spend ten minutes updating my blog. Whew. Tomorrow promises to be just as busy. The green Camry wasn't ready to be picked up yet, so that has to be done tomorrow, I have to be in class tomorrow morning, giving the proficiency tests, which I then have to grade. I still have to grade my grad class's projects from last semestser and get their grades calculated and entered. I have a meeting with a colleague on a manuscript we're working on. I have to set up a conference call with five other professors who are serving with me on a national publications committee. I have to write another check for MARA and mail it. I have to reconcile the church bank statements at some point, probably not tomorrow, but probably before Sunday. I have to return four calls, answer six emails left over from today (along with more that will come in tomorrow), issue overrides to at least two more students before classses tomorro, balance my mom's checkbook, find time to pay my own bills, and call the Toyota dealer about a problem with my new car (slippage in the accelerator pedal -- a notorious problem on the recent Camrys) and schedule an appointment to bring it in to be fixed. I've got to create a make-up exam for an "Incomplete" for a student from last semester who is coming back on Friday to finish her work. I have to remember to schedule a room to give the exam in, and schedule a different grad assistant to proctor it. I've also got to... Well, Dubby just reminded me its after 11:30, and it's time for bed if I'm going to teach tomorrow. Nite-nite.