It’s a Simple Life…

Body hurts. Head…doesn’t hurt. Good. Parents are home from Ireland. Girlchild is on a plane down here. Boychild is presumably driving home from fire duty right now. I just need to survive a Friday and a 2-hour sex-ed curriculum meeting. Yesterday the only conflict was between the words ‘birth control’ and ‘contraception’. Fun talk. More today. Then takeout with the fam (I hope) and probably some school stuff, plus I have to pack a quilt up to be delivered tomorrow. And deal with school at some point. I have reached the point of ‘buried in grading’. It did not take long. I was doing OK. Now I’m not. Sigh.

Anyway, Back-to-School Night was last night and I talked until 6:20 PM. My throat hurts this morning and my body feels like a Mack truck hit it. Fun stuff. Today is a slightly longer lunch so parents can come eat with their kids (IDK if they will). So we also get a slightly longer lunch. One of my favorite teachers offered to order lunch out for us…not sure if it’s being delivered or what, but I’m in. Something different. Something that makes it easier.

I have managed to cut stuff out each night, despite arriving home feeling exhausted. I have almost made it through what looked like the week from hell on the calendar. All good. I think I’m at the halfway mark. Certainly last night, I was cutting out a lot of things in the 1000s, although some of the higher-numbered pieces are still showing up. Cutting out the robes is coming up. I did those all at once. Anyway, I can see progress, although slow.

And then last night, after all the things.

One box fills as the other empties. Maybe another week? Or just under? Although we are camping next weekend, so there’s that. But hopefully I’ll be ironing this together starting around the 25th? We’ll see. That’s my goal.

Here’s a couple of pictures from Saturday’s opening…

I love this one, where only Polly is smiling at the camera with her eyes open.

IDK what I’m looking at. The outdoors. Escape :-). Not really. I love these people. I just get weirded out at openings.

In other news, here’s my barely colored cover page for the next science unit.

I have too much to grade to color. Maybe I should have my TA do it? It’s a possibility. She’s a coloring force.

This is a local high-school district.

There’s a definite anti-LGTBQIA force wandering through our school boards and community members at the moment. School board voted in. By idiots. Parents of those students. I think my whole team is buying rainbow shirts at the moment.

Realized the other day that my stove drip pan was semi-nonfunctional.

Yeah. That’s impressive, Nida. Obviously paying attention. Yes, I replaced them.

This is EXACTLY how I felt last night.

and this…

Me today. Not just right after I wake up. For about an hour after.

OK. Get to work, set up demo/lab stuff, get some stuff done for next week, prep labs for the long-term sub, enjoy a longer lunch (10 whole minutes), stand at the light on the corner for 15 minutes after school (making sure kids don’t do stupid stuff like last week), go to 2-hour sex-ed meeting, come home and enjoy the kids, hopefully. Work. Cut things out. It’s a simple life. Ha!

Cutting of the Tiny Things…

Hey. This week. Yeah. I am in pajamas today for pajama day, but it’s a bit warm and I have a meeting after school and 17 errands to run, so if I’m smart, I’ll pack a pair of pants that isn’t flannel for later. Am I smart? Sometimes. I feel like this is a practical thing though, and I’m OK with those.

I’m not sure when I will get home tonight, but I do know I will be cutting things out tonight. Late. And tired.

I got the good news this morning that my newest quilt will be going to the SAQA Fierce Planets exhibit. Good news, since I made it for that one. Two for two! I make them and they leave.

OK. So this was Monday night’s cutting of the tiny things.

Top box, to do. Middle box, done. Bottom box, trash.

Then last night’s…

Flipped top and bottom. I still have a few 1300s to cut out, but mostly I see 1200s and 1100s. So maybe 700-800 pieces done? I’m definitely into Amy Coney-Barrett (her pieces, not the person…definitely not into the person), but I still have some of Ketanji Brown Jackson to go. I ironed pieces going from bottom to top; I’m cutting pieces from top to bottom. I’ve been cutting for 7 hours and 44 minutes. So yeah, it’s going to be at least 15 hours. That’s half the ironing time though.

Boychild left, Simba does not understand. He just barks and barks for the first night, every time.

The girlchild is coming this weekend, and he doesn’t understand that either. To his credit, he slept through most of the night, although I think everyone was awake at 3 AM for some inexplicable reason. I could do without that shit.

This is too true.

OK. Teaching, meeting, teaching some more, another longer meeting, then cat meds, watering the parents (they come home tomorrow, hallelujah), Home Depot for slats, trash out, cook dinner. Sounds like a lot. It is a lot. I could do with less. Then more cutting. I graded last night, a lot. I feel like today it’s not happening. I mean, maybe in class, but not at home. Not after all that.

Must Be September.

Apparently I woke up to the alarm this morning, exclaiming OH MY GOD. It didn’t feel like long enough. Also I didn’t sleep well, which often happens on a Sunday night. Pre-school Oh-Shits. Although I’m still adjusting to just one thing that I’m teaching, I need to often prep for two things. Like all last week. And this week. This week is meeting hellacious. Two hours today…thought it might run shorter, but no…literacy in the second half. It’ll go until the end of the 2-hour mark. Then union meeting on Wednesday (2 hours), sex-ed curriculum on Thursday AND Friday, plus Back-to-School Night on Thursday (many hours total). Not sure why this week has to be hell. And the girlchild is coming to visit this weekend, which is awesome, but her room is a disaster and it’s all my fault. And the parentals are coming home. It’s just chaos. Today after the two hours of meetings, I have three places I have to go to pick up mail, buy slats, etc. Art to deliver over the weekend, need to get it ready. And it feels like nothing got done this weekend.

Must be September. My brain knows that by the end of this month, routines will be better, all the extras that school likes to throw at you will have adjusted, and the weather will probably have calmed the fuck down. It was hot yesterday. However, the end of this month is quite a ways away and I’m not sure I will get there unscathed.

Did I mention I drove to LA on Saturday? Yeah, it was our California Fibers’ Influences/Influencers exhibit at Craft in America. I had one piece in the show and all everybody could say was, “That’s the smallest piece I’ve ever seen of yours.” Well, yeah, it’s 16×20″. But it has over 800 pieces in it.

Obligatory selfie…

Wall of pieces: Doshi on the left, Marilyn McKenzie Chaffee, then Charlotte Bird, then me.

So you can see it really is small. I gave her two or three other choices that were bigger. It’s OK…it’s a cool piece.

It was a busy opening eventually. It’s a pain driving to LA though. I left at 10:30 AM, sat in a cafe and graded for a bit, then after the opening, got home at 8 PM. Lost day, really. Felt exhausted by the end of it. I know the LA members of our group love shows up there and I can see why: all their friends and family can come. Ah well. It’ll be up for a while…through December 2. You should check it out!

Around all that, I cut stuff out. Not a ton, but an hour and a bit a night.

Friday night…doesn’t look like much.

Saturday night looks like more…

Two episodes of something instead of one. I’m rewatching the Sherlock series Elementary, because I don’t think I saw them all. I was watching Madam Secretary, but the real politics are too close and I needed a break after the first season. In the middle box are all the pieces I’ve cut out. The bottom is what still needs cutting. Because I put them in there in the order I ironed them down, they are pretty much in backwards numerical order. So I can kind of keep track of how far I’ve gotten. That’s the Supreme Court building I see there.

I got all of that cut out last night, along with most of Roberts. Not his robes…all the robes are further down. But that’s Sotomayor’s hair right there. So I’m somewhere in the 1400-1500s, but the robes aren’t done yet. So maybe 500 pieces cut out. Cutting out is usually faster than ironing. I don’t have to think deeply about cutting out…I just do it. Ironing requires thought. Well ironing to fabrics does…ironing it together, you just follow the pattern and the numbers.

I spent about 6 hours working for school yesterday. So yeah, things aren’t settled or pretty yet. Not sure when they will be. It’s my fault, because I could just copy shit the way it’s handed to me, but I know how my kids learn, and so I’m editing from that perspective. Which sometimes means retyping stuff. I did (not) have help…

Thanks Nova. I think she knocked down my very important post-it too.

Sigh. Feed me dinner, lady.

OK. I will. Get up off the couch and do the things (this was Friday night. I napped when I got home.).

Today. Long. Cutting things out sits at the end.

Fingernails and Eyeballs

Friday is here. It feels like it’s early and yet…not. I have earned this Friday as much as the others. Next week’s Friday will be incredibly well-earned. Sigh. I’m waiting for a call back from my insulin pen manufacturer, because I have a defective one and the pharmacy won’t replace it blah blah comes in a box of 5 blah blah can’t give you just one blah blah looks like a defect blah blah. So I’ve been on hold with one place last night that never answered (24/7 my ass) and one place this morning that gave me another number and I waited and finally left a voice mail, so they will inevitably call during school hours and I will never get this solved. I do have more insulin coming today, luckily. Otherwise this would be a bigger deal. Worst case, I’ll have the doc do a new prescription in time for the next batch that should mail. Such a pain how they regulate meds. I had one batch of meds get lost in the mail and it took 4 hours and 2 pharmacies to sort it out. My mom made some text comment about socialized medicine and I wanted to say, YAH, let’s do that, because what we have is idiotic.

Anyway. I’m OK. My blood sugar wasn’t too high this morning, considering no insulin. I’m pretty active during the day and tonight’s dose will arrive today. We’ll be good.

For school, we finally finished the longest 6 (7?) days of labs I’ve ever done…well, since last year…and things are almost under control for next week. Maybe. I’m staying after school today to try to put away this whole lab. I have most of the next 7th-grade lab gathered for delivery to the other building. My co-teacher pulled through a shopping save last night after I had searched the entire world for the rest of the aquarium rocks. I still need to buy stuff for 8th grade, but I need a point clarified first. Well. I think 4 points clarified. Today the kids take a test (assessment?), so hopefully they’re quiet and on task. Ha. Yeah. I know. This 8th-grade group is more challenging than last year’s, which makes sense, because it includes some of our kids from last year. I did see one kid who apparently wanted to be on our team again, but I think I said I’d quit if I had him for another year. Good times.

I have a cold, which complicates all this. It’s not COVID…I’m up standing (not upstanding) and just full of phlegm and my voice is a mess. I have an opening in LA tomorrow and have to drive up and back…I’ll just be drinking lots of tea and not talking much. Also this is day 5? or maybe 6?

I think I already talked about the opening. Welcome to my brain on the lesser coronavirus.

So Wednesday night, I finished ironing. Finally. Well, there are three little pieces of Wonder Under that I found that don’t match anything and/or I might have already recut.

So I’m just saving them until the end, in case I need them. I know one is the Swamp Thing’s chin hairs and I don’t know if I redrew it (I circled it on the drawing…who the fuck knows what I meant by that in mid-August?) or just ignored it. And I’m not searching through that box for the 100s, which is where it would be. I’ll just keep cutting until I get there.

The ironing took 33 1/2 hours. That is a record for me. It also used 212 fabrics…another record. I think.

It’s not like I keep a spreadsheet of quilt facts. Lots of black, gray, and white. Plus all the fleshtones in that box in the top left.

It doesn’t look like much in the box because so many of the pieces are minute.

Last night, I started cutting…late, because I sorted the fabrics first. It’s really pleasing to me to see the colors sorted like that. It also makes it easier to put them away. Which won’t happen until I start the next one. At the rate I’m going, it might be October or November before that happens. This isn’t even that big a quilt. I’ve made bigger. It’s just detail heavy. So is the one that is showing at Craft in America, starting tomorrow…a small piece at 16×20″, but over 800 pieces in it.

This is And Then There Was One…about the kids leaving for college. Survived that.

Anyway, I did start cutting the Supreme Court piece out last night…

That’s about 40 minutes worth. It doesn’t look like much, but there’s a bunch of tiny letters down there and they are a pain in the ass. Don’t ask how many of those there are in this thing. It’s OK, I have 5 more seasons of Madam Secretary to get through. I’m hoping it doesn’t take that long to cut this out though. Cutting is generally faster than ironing. Some of the smallest pieces I don’t cut out until I’m ironing so I don’t lose them. I suspect there will be lots of those in this quilt. Fingernails and eyeballs.

OK. My cold meds aren’t great. I need to clean up a huge mess at school. I need to make sure the sub knows how to use Google Forms (she needs to make a copy…and I know I said that, but I probably also said I’d help her). I need to deliver lab stuff and go talk to a staff member again about something she reacted badly to yesterday (why is this my job?). I need to give a test to 135 kids and hope they do well. I have duty at the light. I might need to go to Home Depot…AGAIN. And tomorrow, I’ll spend 6 or 7 hours driving. Podcasts! Tea! No hike tomorrow…probably I don’t feel up to it anyway. I hate these first few weeks of September. School really drags on you sometimes. But I am glad to not be standing over an iron for a while. I’ll be back there in 3-4 weeks, sure, and that’s the most exciting part, putting it all together, but the thought of just sitting and meditatively cutting for a few weeks sounds nice.

Finish Ironing Ruth…

Short weeks are weird. They’re rare too. Except in February, when they happen 50% of the time. I personally think they should do Back-to-School Night on the short week, but it seems they always pick the week after and fill it with all the things. Today and tomorrow are a bit rough due to early morning shit, which is not my favorite, but there’s no other meetings, nothing but pilates and my parents’ stuff, which might be enough. It’s good that it’s short, because I’m fighting off a cold. No fever, just snot and tired. And no, I didn’t get it from school. The Man is about two days ahead of me in snot, so I should feel fine in a day or two. Today, however, ugh. Not so much. Actually, now that I’m upright and drinking hot tea, I’m doing OK. Last night? Not so much. I was going to go to the gym and my body said no, take a nap instead, so I did. Then cooked dinner. Didn’t do any of the other stuff I was going to do. Finally came in here to iron. The end of the tunnel is right there, within reach, probably tonight. Depending on everything else. Today is a bit messy.

So Monday, I got about 3 hours of ironing in, which was delightful.

In the first round, I got the Supreme Court building ironed…at some point, I wanted a flag fabric, and I wasn’t sure, but I thought…oh yes…

Found it! I don’t have everything in my stash, but I have some things.

Then I finished all of the goddess around all the justices.

Seven bins of fabric at the moment. Crazy. It’s a lot. The goddess is all earth colors…not earth TONES, mind you…some bright greens and blues, with rocks and dirt below with the roots.

That sort of fabric choosing is much easier for me to do…faster than realistic faces.

Then I started on the stuff above the goddess last night…

When I researched the justices, I picked about 5 decisions that were important to me: climate change, reproductive rights, abortion rights, LGBTQIA rights, gun control, and education. I looked at how each justice voted and read their explanations. I also researched any issues with them, mostly ethical. So that’s how I drew what I drew. On top of the goddess’ arms are the rights I decided were important. So I ironed three of those last night, plus Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s face and hands and the shredded American flag. Because that’s where I feel like we’re at right now: a shredded version of what we should be, heading backwards into stupidity.

I finished the 1800s and most of the 2000s, and started the 1900s.

This is all I have left to iron…

It’s Ruth’s robe and wings, plus hands reaching for a diploma, an LGBTQIA flag, and a hand with a gun. I’m hoping to finish tonight. It’s been a trip choosing all these fabrics. A long and sometimes torturous trip. Worth it, but not easy. Next up? Cutting them all out, then ironing them together. It’ll take all month, easy.

Man, the next quilt should be smaller and easier. The quilt that is currently at Quilt National (which was not small or easy) was the piece to ease my brain after doing the abortion quilt that’s currently in Virginia. I needed a break from thinking about the politics and the attitudes. As I’ve been making this quilt, the court never stays out of the news, mostly for ethical issues, which should so not be the case.

Anyway. There we are.

This weekend, I’ll be at the California Fibers’ opening in Los Angeles.

I have one small but insanely complicated piece in the show. I’m not looking forward to the drive, but am looking forward to the show. LA on a Saturday afternoon…ugh. Ah well. Lost day.

Finally saw another caterpillar on my milkweed.

We have about 15 plants all together in the front yard. The plants have been doing well, and there have been lots of butterflies…I just haven’t seen many caterpillars. It’s possible the birds are dealing with them. I just planted more seeds this weekend, but native ones. We’ll see how they do and what they look like, because I’m not sure what I bought…as usual. The ones I’m growing are popping seeds all over the place, but they won’t do anything without the deep freeze ahead of time, so I could try to gather some of them and put them in the fridge for the winter, see if that works. Maybe if I remember to go out there and collect them.

OK. Second to last day of labs for 8th grade today, hallelujah. I’m done. It’s like they’re slowing down instead of speeding up, getting more efficient. Meanwhile, I’m trying to prep 7th grade labs for next week because all the stuff is in our prep room and long story short, sometimes it’s easier to just do the things (I’m only doing part of it, just gathering stuff and making the rocks) than to have someone come in there and try to do it themselves. Because they don’t. They send a kid and that means I still have to do it. I’m frustrated. My team upstairs says just let all of them flail and do it themselves, which I’m trying to do. Much as I can. But I need the other teacher to be ahead of the newbies, not behind. Sigh. Today is the 8th-grade meeting and I think it will be tense. I hope not; I hope there’s a good explanation for why nothing is where I asked for it to be, but I can’t think of one. And I’m going to have to really scramble to get shit ready in two days either way.

Anyway. Whatever. Do school. Go to pilates. Hope I feel better. Water the parental plants and gather all their mail and do all their things. Remember the damn green beans for the dog (yes, I said green beans). Maybe take another nap. Finish ironing Ruth. All good. Short week.

A Train on Steroids

Ah a Monday off of work. The sweet sound of children screaming in next-door’s pool. The delightful challenge of installing a dryer vent with at least two trips to Home Depot, plus the scintillating smell of cat pee (gotta wash the litter tray completely out and or throw it out and buy a new one). I finished (almost) all of my work yesterday so I wouldn’t have to do any today. I would’ve done more, but the (um WTF is another word for delightful but when you don’t really mean it) ENCHANTING trait of one of my co-teachers to NOT upload the things I need to plan ahead NOR to answer emails or texts means I can do no more. Lucky that, I guess, although I’ll pay for it later.

This weekend has been a lot of gardening and house stuff, trying to get things under control, because the next three weeks are a little out of control already. I see them barreling at me, like a train on steroids. No worries. Really. It’s like this every year. Adding in an opening in Los Angeles next weekend and camping two weekends after that. Because there’s nothing like a little crazy when it’s already nuts.

I did manage ironing. I’m about 4-5 hours away from done, I think. I don’t think I’ll get there today, but I will sometime this week. Which is good. I’m in the mood to cut things out for a while instead.

Friday night, I ironed the rest of Kavanaugh down…

And started Coney-Barrett.

Saturday, I was much more effective…got Coney-Barrett done, plus Brown-Jackson, and started Kagan…

I did some before we headed out for some art openings and dinner…

And some after all that.

It’s getting pretty chaotic in the fabric bins.

There’s a lot of black and flesh tones in this quilt…

I added more after this…but I also took some out of the far left bin. They didn’t work.

Last night, I ironed the rest of Kagan and all of Sotomayor.

Just Roberts left…and Bader Ginsburg. I’m in the middle of the 1500s. So about 500 pieces left, but I’ve done a few of them already, Roberts’ robes I think. What’s left?

The rest of the goddess, which includes the Supreme Court building itself, then all the things planted on top of the goddess’ arms. So like I said, I’m getting there. The next bits should go a little faster. Maybe. When it’s more about what’s in my head and less about trying to realistically match a skin tone or make a decision about eye color…might be faster. I’m 27 1/2 hours into the ironing. Epic.

So Friday after work, I headed down to the water for a friend’s mom’s retirement party.

It was delightfully cool and oceany, unlike my entire week.

And it was good to hang out with the other work team for a while.

Her mom had lots of smiles on, which is a good thing.

Saturday afternoon, the Man and I went to two related art openings, one at City College and one at Art Produce. I loved Bhavna’s piece at City College, I Found a River in My Body.

Some of her smaller pieces are available at Art Produce. There is an auction going on to raise money for more art stuff. You can find the link at the Art Produce site.

We had a drink while waiting for the second show to open, and then went back to the same place for dinner. There are more bars and restaurants opening in the area, which is cool, because Art Produce has been there for a long time, waiting for the rest to show up.

Lots of art in the area, including this Gloria Muriel mural…

Yesterday I planted all the succulents that have been lying around after being trimmed off something else. I think I need to water today too. Plus iron. Plus book club is tonight, rescheduled. I really just want to lie on the couch, drinking tea and reading my book. I’m feeling a bit off, not quite well. Drinking lots of Vitamin C and hoping for the best.

Kitten is overseeing the ironing like a boss.

Sometimes she is more demanding than others…

Ah yes, thanks for Labor Day all…someone posted this wonderful reminder by @ricardolevinsmorales…

Really, that’s all teachers want. Less of the work, more of the rest and what we will. It’s too hard with what has been put on our plates so far. Certainly, I’ve probably done 8 hours so far this weekend. Most weekends it’s 5-6. Plus all the after hours stuff. Ugh.

OK. So for the rest of the day, I am going to read for a bit, then look at the to-do list. I’m going to iron as well, get myself through the last of the living justices. School this week will be short but probably painful (two early morning meetings, not my favorite). There will be a lot of grading coming the end of this week and the start of the next, and I won’t have a good chunk of the weekend. The neighbor kids have hit an unreasonable noise level that probably won’t let up for 5 or 6 hours, unfortunately. Ah well. And tomorrow, back to work. No more days off until November. The long stretch of September and October is here. Not a fan, although October weather can be lovely. Hopefully. Bright blue skies with cotton ball clouds. A bit of a breeze but not so warm. It’s actually like that today, but not for long…warm days are coming.

Honeymoon Over…

Whoa. This week. Exhausting. Doing labs every day is one part. The second part is that we are two weeks in, so the honeymoon period is OOOVVVEEERR. Oh yes. First fight, first referrals, first inability to listen during a lab, then a helicopter and police shutting us down into secure lockdown right before class gets out. Mayhem, y’all, fucking mayhem. And that was just Thursday. We still need to get through Friday. I blame the blue supermoon and also well it’s middle school and this is how we roll until we don’t. During the secure lockdown, parents were calling kids because the school sent out a call and yeah, parents, could you NOT? Your kid is fine. They are locked in a room with a tired teacher and your patience is noted. Also some kids have a sense of entitlement with their phones that can only come from their parents. One told me it was “after hours” so she could have it out (we literally kept them 4 minutes after the bell…FOUR minutes y’all). I hope these kids figure reality out at some point. But since their parents haven’t, it seems unlikely.

Anyway. I also made about 25-30 short videos of everything we’re doing in the labs so the absent kids and the kids who didn’t finish CAN finish…I downloaded and ordered them last night, although iCloud was being a cranky bitch, so I didn’t get all of them, plus realized I’m missing some, so I’ll get those today. Last-year’s self wanted to do it but never found the time. Next-year’s self will be happy with me. This-year’s self is fucking exhausted.

That said, I did iron. I peeled myself off the damn couch, stopped watching cat videos, and walked my ass in here to iron. I think I got 49 minutes last night. I also didn’t cook dinner. We ate all our leftovers instead. Seriously, I do like food, but at some point, it’s just fuel and I could swallow a pill and keep going and I’d be fine.

Wednesday, I ironed Alito down and started Thomas…

Well I laid out all the parts and ironed his shoes and shirt and tie. I gave him red shoes. Each justice has their name on their robe, and I made the names in rainbow colors because I can and then matched the tie. So far, all the baddies are men. Amy will need something. Yes, I am just ironing justices for DAYS. One a day, to be clear. And also yes, that’s two cups of different kinds of tea. Don’t ask. It was necessary.

Close-up of box…

Seriously just adding about 50 tiny pieces each night to the pile.

So last night, I finished Thomas’ face and then laid out Kavanaugh.

Did the shoes, his name, his shirt, his tie. Didn’t get to the beer bottles because I was really tired at that point. And I realized I was gonna have to figure out what fabric I used for the previous beer bottles. Didn’t have the brain energy for that.

I gave him dirty socks. Seemed legit. I have 22 hours into the ironing so far. Slow. I keep saying that. I’m in the 1100s though. And some of the 1200s are done. And once I pick the 5 face/flesh fabrics, it’s easy to iron that down. I’d like to think I’ll get a goodly chunk done tonight, but I’m going to a social thing and that does not bode well for energy this evening. So assume Kavanaugh’s face will get done and Coney-Barrett’s stuff will get laid out. And I’ll do her shoes and her whatever is under her robe (let’s not think too hard about that). Then I have three days off. Yes, I have a shit-ton of work to do. Yes, I am tired. But also, yes, I want to finish the ironing so I can spend a few weeks cutting all these tiny pieces out. I started ironing down on August 13, right near the beginning of school. It’s time to be done. So that’s my weekend goal…about 800 pieces. I can do that. Can’t I? Ugh. Also, I can’t do a bunch of the school work unless my other co-teacher uploads all her shit so I can start making sense of things.

I visited Annie yesterday…

She’s still a spaz.

But I like her.

OK. Lab day. Probably will lose my prep to subbing a teacher who’s been out all week for a totally legit emergency, but they never got a sub for him. Then social thing. Plus dealing with parental stuff. Haven’t heard from them, so presumably they’re fine. Hike on Saturday…required! It’s been getting cooler, so that should be good. We could even do it Sunday with the Monday off. We’ll see. I’d rather do two if I could. Lots of yardwork. Wondering if spiders are smart enough to realize their web in a particular area (the middle of the damn path) gets knocked down a lot so maybe they should move it? Not sure if that level of natural selection and/or Darwinism works with spiders. It’s been real this week. Hoping a lot of kids are absent today for the long weekend so I don’t have to deal with the crazy level we’ve been at. It would be a plus. Some chill please.

Men’s Lips…

So I don’t think I slept a lot last night. I tried everything. I exercised, but not too late. I mediated…really badly, honestly though. I tried ambient night noise. Nope. That made me anxious. I took melatonin, which usually doesn’t work, but nothing else was working either. I hate nights like that. I mean, it was hot and I had to close the windows because the pup was growling and barking at anything in a 5-mile radius that made noise. Today will be slightly cooler, and then it will really cool off, hallelujah. And based on the sleep I didn’t do last night, I should be exhausted by tonight, yeah? I’m hoping.

School yesterday was stressful. I suspect a lot of the to-do list made it to nighttime post-meditation brain and that wasn’t helping. The overwhelm hit hard…but I have a plan that I’m going to try to stick to, assuming there isn’t more shit waiting to fall into my lap. Teachers are already losing prep periods to cover absent teachers. Today, I have an 8th-grade meeting that I really need to happen or I don’t know what I’m doing next week (minor issue), plus I need to go do the mail and watering for my parents…after pilates. Still need to get through three classes of grading last week’s assignment, which I would normally bang through before or just after school, but that time gets eaten up by new/sub science teachers needing me, which is fine, except it’s part of the overwhelm. I know it will get better. It’s just a long way away. At least I’m short on meetings this week, although I realized yesterday that there’s an informal thing I really should do tomorrow. Ugh. For school. Of course.

Anyway, so Monday, I managed an hour of ironing…mostly getting all those robes ironed down and then starting Gorsuch’s other parts. I did his shirt and tie, his shoes, etc. I left his face and hands and a single ankle for Tuesday night.

You can see all his hand/face pieces laid out on the left. Above the box are all the other hand/face piles for each of the justices so far. Last night, I ironed his face, hands, and that single ankle.

He’s a super pale guy. But I also found myself googling “gorsuch eye color” last night, which is beyond weird. It was hazel green. Couldn’t tell from the photos.

Then I laid out Alito’s pieces. He has a fish, so I ironed that.

I made it pink and purple. Because I could. I only got about 32 minutes of ironing last night. I had a contract to fill out for an art thing, plus I needed to get one class of that assignment graded. I tried to get home early to go to the gym, but got side-tracked by humans and then needed to make a video and a post, etc. Not getting a lot of help on that stuff, so yeah. But after being interrupted three times, I finally got the video done! Woohoo! Even though it’s blurry, because whatever the problem is with my doc cam, it’s still a problem after replacing everything in the room. I should bring a tripod today. I need to make some more videos for a kid who will be out of my class. His fault, but I want him to succeed. My fault? Huh. Sigh.

Here’s the box in its current state of not fullness.

I did go to the gym, mostly to read my book. I needed it. So home late, dinner late, everything late. Tonight will be the same. It’ll probably be 7 before I get home from watering. At least I’m not cooking tonight.

That might be my retirement dream job right there. Except I’m not sure I’ll want to be around kids for a while.

OK. Make videos today. Bring a charger because my phone isn’t holding a charge and someone stole the charger out of my classroom. Labs all day. Walk walk walk help help help. Then exercise, grade stuff, iron Alito’s face, move on to Thomas. The faces aren’t that hard. That’s a plus. I was freaked out about them, but it wasn’t bad. Men’s lips. Men’s lips are complicated colors for sure. Gonna leave you with that.

Everything Is OK with Everything…

It’s supposed to be very warm today. I’m hoping the A/C at school keeps up. I’m already sweating at home. I made dinner last night for Tuesday, which is the last supremely hot day…supposedly. For now. I wanted to be able to go to the gym on Tuesday and come back and just throw something together, and so we’ll see if that works. I have to really scramble sometimes to make sure I can exercise on top of all the other stuff, especially in the first few weeks of school, with my parents gone, trying to get back in a routine. Blah blah blah. I realized around 6 PM last night that I hadn’t actually made posts for this school week. They weren’t exactly like last year’s, so I couldn’t just copy from the old class. I still need to make a demo video of one of them. And finish setting up labs. I was at school on Friday until 6:15 setting up labs, after a remarkably useless meeting. Today is another meeting, but I think just one. Oh yeah, the dryer died again, so I gave up on it, even though it is just under 8 years old, and bought a new one. Good thing I did that extra work this summer. So I got home on Friday to a dead dryer and decisions about that. I also booked camping for the end of September. So stressful to pick the ‘right’ campsite. Luckily there weren’t many choices? Is that lucky? Probably waited too long. Hopefully it won’t be over 100 degrees that weekend. Our Fall looks a lot like Summer. Also dealt with a sprinkler issue at the parents’. Had to call Ireland for that one. Anyway. Hopefully everything is OK with everything now.

This quilt. Man. It’s because there are so many discrete little things on it, and each needs to be considered by itself but again as part of the whole in terms of fabric and color. It just takes forever. I snuck in a little extra time this weekend on the ironing, and still haven’t hit halfway. I think. It’s hard to say. So many tiny pieces.

I ironed Friday night, the umbrella I think…

Oh yeah. And I picked the justice robe fabrics for the three I like. They got black with color.

Then Saturday, I worked on the goddess’ legs and lower torso, finally.

A closeup on the box.

Sunday, I ironed three whole pieces to fabric. I had a late start because I was cooking two meals, had to run to Staples for toner cartridges (the printer’s like, ‘Imma run out of ink’ and then that was it…it was out. No real warning where I could order stuff. Just done.), then getting stuff graded and ready for teaching this week. I don’t have help on a couple of tasks, and I have a new task (well, we used to do it before COVID, so not REALLY new? But it’s been a few years.), so I’m not in the routine yet. I need to do more during the school week, but last week was a doozy. So this one should be better, and then the next one is OK too, but the one after that is a clusterfuck and a half. So there’s that. I didn’t even iron BIG pieces. I ironed an earthworm. It’s pink. See it?

Yeah, but I did lay out all the other justice robes, the bad guys. I used two runs of four black fabrics.

Kitten did not help. I didn’t iron any of these, because it was almost 11 and that’s a goodly chunk of ironing. So that’s tonight.

I pulled from all the boxes from the 800s to the 1500s, and then I left piles of the rest of the justices: what they’re holding, their feet and hands, and their faces. Watch the video for details.

So I still have to go back and iron all those faces. Complicated. Probably gonna need runs of 6-7 fabrics for each. I’ve got some runs of 4-5 in one of the bins from some other part of this quilt…that’s going to be the complicated part.

So I’m in the 800s, but I’ve done some of the 900s through 1500s. This makes it very hard to know where I’m at in terms of the whole thing. I might be halfway? Certainly close. And I’ve been ironing for 18 1/2 hours, just to give you an idea. This might be the most complicated, time-consuming thing I’ve ever ironed. It’s a marathon. So my revised estimate for finishing the ironing to fabric is this weekend, mostly because it’s a 3-day weekend, so I have some extra time. I also have nothing planned (I blew off one of the things I was supposed to do on Saturday). So that helps. This is not a side job. It’s another job. Two jobs y’all. Plus the copyediting…that’s a side job.

Saturday, we went for a hike at 6 PM. It was too hot before that. 6 was just about right.

My parents’ dog Katie is not used to 3 miles, but she did it. She’s getting older, but she was a trooper. Except when she kept trying to turn around. She gets a walk every day with my parents, but I can’t do that when I don’t get home until dinnertime.

Anyway. She slept well Saturday night.

We noticed these new anthills. There’s always been these spread-out hills, but I haven’t seen these tower things before.

And deer tracks.

Or big hare? Possibly. We know there are deer out there, even if we don’t see them. I really am trying to get that hike in every week. Heat and time don’t help.

The cat condo is currently in the bedroom to give the cats some space from Katie…although to tell the truth, I think they’re fine.

I’ve watched both cats walk right past her to get to the food and then back out into the living room. She just stares at them. She used to chase them. No longer.

Yeah. Well. Sometimes. Feel free to explain electrical hookups to me. Or space. But not the English language. Some issues. Some issues from 8th-grade boys! Oh fun.

OK. Energy preview today. Staff meeting. Hopefully efficient use of prep time and meeting time. Grade some stuff (I didn’t get through all the school stuff in the end). Survive the heat. Go to Lowes and return the stuff they said I had to have to install the dryer (even though I already had those things) plus get a refund for the thing they said I had to have and they didn’t bring. Pick up the parental mail, because the store was closed all weekend. I was supposed to go Friday but didn’t leave school until after they were closed. READ MY BOOK. Seriously. Fuck the world if I can’t do that every day for at least a little while. Then iron some justice robes tonight. In here. Where it will probably still be 90 degrees. Woo hoo!

See the Chaos…

Oh my. First full week of school. Started losing my voice yesterday (again)…but I made it one more day this week! Yesterday I talked all day. Nonstop. Ugh. Lecture/notes stuff. It had to happen. Today? Today they make slides. By themselves. The second most common question from a middle-school kid (after “how old are you?”) is “Can we work with partners?”. Not today. All next week? Yes. Not today. I have this one kid who might be on the spectrum and he’s kinda driving me nuts. He is constantly raising his hand, which shouldn’t be annoying, because at least he doesn’t just yell things out, but when his hand is in the air, he’s not listening, so I’ll get the same answer I just got from another kid. He always raises his hand. For everything. I’m working on getting the rest of the class to answer right now. Might have to resort to popsicle sticks for answering questions. It wouldn’t be the first time.

There are some parts of school that are easier this year, but I’m at 7 hours of afterschool meetings after the one this afternoon. In one week. Too many. In September, there’s one week that might kill me. It’s a lot. I’m really looking forward to this weekend, except there’s no dinner plan for tonight and that is always a mistake. And I have to start grading, which kind of sucks. Because once I start, I have to keep going until June. Seriously. No breaks.

So I’m struggling to get ironing done around all this. Wednesday night, I got home after 6, after 2 hours of a sex-ed curriculum meeting. The pro is that the state has our backs. They wrote something (California Healthy Youth Act) that is on our sides, not the kneejerk parents’ side. I just need them to opt out, but one actually said, “I thought this was a meeting to decide what our children were going to learn.” Sigh. And if you think that, please go get your teaching degree and credential and join us. Or homeschool them. Because I’m tired of people negating my 21 years in the classroom and educational/professional experience. You know better? Then you fucking do it. I need to teach ALL the kids, the kids with two moms, the kids going by names that you don’t think match their gender, the kids who are attracted to the same or both genders. I teach ALL of them. I respect and honor ALL of them. Not just your kid. And I don’t hold your idiocy against your kid. I hope they do better.

So I ironed after that, after dinner, after IDK what else.

So this is what it really looks like while I’m ironing. Piles of fabric that I pull out, I go get more from my drawers, I pile those up, there’s piles and piles. And then I put them all in the bins to make it neat each night for the photo. This thing has a lot of fabrics in it and I’m not even halfway.

I ironed a lot of body parts.

Little ones. There are a lot of people in this quilt. Twenty-six? If you count the Swamp Thing (I didn’t), it’s 27. And they each need different shades of fabric. Last night, I did their clothes.

I didn’t quite finish. I have one more to go. Then IDK what.

Usually I would crop photos like this so you only saw the fabrics, but then I was like, no, let them see the chaos. Iron on the edge because all the boxes of the rest of the pieces are taking up so much room, teacup full of tea, unfinished stuff everywhere, fan on because it’s still warm in here at the end of the day. It’s supposed to be 102 degrees next week. Not a fan (ha ha I’ll need a fan though). So this was clean up. Put all the piles in the bins so I can see them. The bin on the top left is all flesh tones, and I’ll need to go darker still for some of the justices. Probably pinker too. Lots of pink. Too much pink. Next up? The umbrella and then, FINALLY, the goddess legs. That will go quickly. Dirt and roots.

I’m about 20 pieces away from 700. That said, I’ve already ironed some of the numbers higher than that. So let’s say 700. Only 1350 to go! Woo! JAYSUS. In the last 7 days, I’ve managed 7 hours of ironing. The previous week? 9. Before school fucking started? 14…well, that was the week I went back for 3 days. The week before? 19 hours. Sigh. Fucking sigh. Last night, we had to deal with the dryer, after a 2-hour sex-ed meeting, after my stitching Zoom (which I appreciated, don’t get me wrong, even though I didn’t do much). So I didn’t start ironing until 9:50 pm. May tonight be better. Please.

Well, on top of all that, Nova has a bladder infection that might be part of a genetic issue, so she’s on meds. Kitten’s gastro stuff got significantly worse, so the Man picked up 5 meds for her last night because I couldn’t get to the vet in time. She doesn’t feel well; she actually hissed at me this morning. That said, she took all her meds and is back to sleeping in the blue fabric drawer of fabrics I will have to wash to get clean at this point.

And Katie is here.

Katie is absolutely chill, but the cats remember times when she wasn’t, and they are freaked out. They walk right past her though, in the dark, so IDK what the issue is. Everyone is adjusting.

SO! Don’t talk at school today if I don’t have to. Get the energy labs set up. Finish cutting out all the energy cards. Roll around and talk to all the kids today (I roll around on a chair…it’s fun) (wait, I said don’t talk…don’t talk LOUDLY). Survive the meeting after school…I didn’t even tell you how someone came in my classroom and stole the bag all my literacy books are in, but I have to take them to multiple meetings and now I don’t have a bag for all that shit. So frustrating. It’s fine. It’s almost done. The week is almost done. Write warmups for next week. Let all the stuff I had to do last year to survive planning 8th grade go and start planning with the new teacher, who may or may not be willing to adjust/adapt. She needs to be. I don’t know how to flat out tell her that, but I suspect I will need to at some point. I need so many things right now. It’s fine. Really. I got this. More tea though.