Weekend Plans Post: School Daze
So school has been gearing back up here in town. Kids coming in from out of state, everybody is gearing up for whatever’s going to happen, and hoping for the best. Meet new people, make new friends, have new experiences.
And “Back To School” means that schedules around the house are changing again. Maribou goes from working more or less the same shift that I do to working her afternoon/evening shift so she can help provide better coverage at the library to better support the students.
Now, of course, since we’re still in a place where the majority of support we give our various jobs is done online so this changes very little logistically for us. I have to be quieter in the morning when I wake up, I guess, and I need to QUIETLY fumble about to start the day instead of feeling like it’s okay to yell “oof” when I kick something. But, on the days I don’t have to go in, the fumbling about is limited. (And on the days I do have to go in, I just pull the clothes from the dryer in the basement from when they finished when I washed them immediately after getting home the last time I went to work.)
And so this weekend will be spent doing the various chores around the house to get ready for the prep week to come. Change out the cat boxes, empty the various trashes and recycling containers, do the laundry. A big week is ahead of us and then, the week after that (I think) is the first week of school proper.
Keep your fingers crossed.
In lighter news, I finally broke “an hour” with my latest 5K. It was by a mere 40 seconds, but that’s the big barrier that I had in front of me. So now I get to google “what’s a good time for a 5K?”
That can’t be right. So maybe I’ll try again and break an hour by two minutes or so.
So… what’s on your docket?
(Featured image is Shoulder Cat Listening To The Window, Resting Head On Staff’s Hand. Taken by Maribou.)
I survived my first week of Corona-time classes. I have one student quarantining after she traveled back from Australia (she got tested earlier this week but is also being cautious) and one student quarantining because he had a contact who tested positive. (I think i will be OK; I am masked up -as are all the students – and I am 6′ away from everyone).
It’s kind of exhausting though, and teaching my big intro class via Zoom only sucks bigly.
Weekend plans are minimal – rest up, I have another “virtual Knit Club” meeting, and I have a virtual meeting of the campus Wesley Center Board on Sunday. I need to do a little prep for next week but I can do that at home and I am looking forward now to two days at home where I don’t have to wear a mask at all.Report
So your students, to the best of your knowledge, are taking this stuff seriously?Report
they seem to be. That doesn’t mean the younger ones will and I realized last night as much as I hate teaching the intro class all online, that’s the one with the people most likely to do foolish things.
that doesn’t mean one of our non-trads won’t get exposed at their workplace or their kid bring it home from school, and I expect to see cases spike in the next few weeks. I’m hoping our distancing will mean *I* don’t get quarantined, because teaching from home for two weeks while also praying I don’t get sick would be really unpleasant.
So far, though, fingers crossed for people continuing to take distancing seriouslyReport
I know that every year (maybe every other), I hear stories about how Mono is running around campus.
“Don’t share glasses of water! Don’t share pop!” is what I always say but people just roll their eyes…Report
New Milestone: 2 5ks in a week.
I am told it will soon be 3 5ks a week.Report
Started getting ready for a short visit to some fam. Clean the car, wash the car, etc. It’ll be nice to get away from doing nothing but working all day to doing nothing at all.Report
Middle son is off to his tiny (tiny) Great Books / Liberal Arts / Catholic college in the NE… they have a pretty rigorous protocol set-up and given the size and nature of the school (plus lack of exciting places to go/do in the area), I’m somewhat optimistic they’ll make it to Thanksgiving. They’ve altered the schedule so that everyone goes home and doesn’t return after Turkey day… they are planning to ride out the ‘regular’ flu season with everyone at home and are contemplating a very delayed start (Feb/Mar) for semester 2.
Personally, I’m anticipating a ‘second wave’ or more accurately a fully disseminated flu season that could be really bad; on the other hand… if we bump along like we’ve been doing so far? Gonna have to re-evaluate some of those assumptions about T-cells and much lower herd immunity rates. Not gonna lie… depending on the outcome of the election, I’m expecting narratives to shift or not regardless the data. But we won’t know what all that looks like until Feb/Mar.Report
We’re also “hoping for Thanksgiving” (and I very much am, given how I have gone from screaming into the abyss all summer to “about 80% normal” just because I could teach some classes in person (even IF with everyone masked and me broadcasting on Zoom for people with medically fragile family members).
They’re doing some testing (the invasive swab kind) and are doing pretty good contact tracing (one of my students is now quarantining because of a contact with someone who tested positive) and I’m hoping that this won’t be a clusterfish but will be “less than ideal but not terrible”
I’m also holding out hope some of the new rapid tests I’m hearing about are as good as claimed, and that they can actually AFFORD them for us. I’d rather a robust testing program this year than pay raises for the next five….
I am bracing for spring semester to have to be all online, I bet we’re gonna see a wicked winter peak, whether it’s a second peak or just the first that never ended.Report