Ring picture

I really should be doing something like grading or getting ready for class this week, but I'm pooped and need a break. Plus, I just don't feel like doing any of that right now. So I'm going to try to post a picture of my ring. I've been trying to get a picture posted for a while not, but every time I take a picture, it seems blurry. Finally, I had Ken try to take one farther away and then I zoomed in on it. It might actually look ok now. My ring is white gold, with three stones in the middle and four smaller ones along the side. When we have my wedding band made, it will be all small stones in white gold so that it lines up with the stones on the engagement band.

So there it is!

Thank goodness for 4-day weekends at the beginning of the semester

Week 1 is done. It was certainly quite the busy week. It's going to take some time for me to adjust to 4 classes at Hawkeye and 2 at UNI. It's very interesting seeing just how different the two populations really are. Case in point: I have 2 students at HCC who told me the first day that they are pregnant and several more who already have children (they are younger than I am). At UNI, non of my students have referenced having children or families other than their siblings and parents.

I teach at Hawkeye on MWF and UNI on TR, so at least I am not running all over the place. That will make it nice, I think, when I can go sit up at UNI on TR and grade during the morning for those classes or even work on HCC stuff for class as well. I got all my preps done for 3 of my HCC classes this week as well as my UNI one. I still need to get ready for Wednesday's HCC other class. That's on my agenda for tomorrow.

The good thing is that all of the people I work with at HCC are really nice. I was kind of worried that they might not accept me or would be snooty or resentful toward me for taking the job, but so far, so good. Of course, I haven't really interacted much yet with the adjuncts or RPT writing teachers since we have very different teaching schedules. Soon our meetings together will begin though I think. Starting the week after this one, I'll also be taking a new faculty course called Linking Teaching and er...something or other. We're required to take it as new faculty and we get "graduate credit for it"...ohh...just what I want. At least the tuition is reimburseable through the college. It's weird to think they require us to take these courses and give us credit for it. I hadn't exactly been planning on taking more classes right away, but at least they're teaching courses, so hopefully they'll be interesting.

We had a nice Labor Day weekend! We had our last garage sale of the season on Saturday. Sister Maria came and helped out all day, and thank goodness she did because we we're busier than I ever imagined we'd be on a holiday weekend. We made over $200 on a 1-day sale, which will be divided between Maria, Lisa, and Ken and me, based on what items we each sold. Ken and I plan to use garage sale money for house-related items. Right now we're thinking about either putting the money toward a nice clock for the living room or a rug for the living room floor. We haven't decided yet. The best part is that our garage is just about cleaned out again. We'll be able to put one of the cars in come winter!

Well, the night is drawing to a close and I want to get some sleep for the week. More later!

Developmental Writing Instructor, am I (alt. title: Kiss of JD!)

I did it! I got a different job! And not a moment too soon, I might add. I was going crazy in my other job (and I secretly think Ken was too just having to deal with me). I just couldn't handle any more nights of coming home from work, feeling said, hurt, frustrated, and then falling into fits of crying. You see, they hired me to be a Communication Specialist, but they gave me so little to do. Most of my day consisted of trying to look busy. One of my "projects" was in fact reading the local paper for articles written about the company. How's that for a Ph.D. coming in handy?

Of course, I would get the occasional article to write for the newsletter or to proofread, but seriously, those things just don't take very long. I don't know whether they thought writing a 1-page article on some dude's visit to the tractor plant should take 2-3 weeks to write or whether I was just writing fast, crappy articles. It also hurt a lot that the student worker (who is completing her BA in PR at UNI) got to take on cooler projects than me. Case in point, while I'm reading the newspaper, she's designing cool posters for the 90th anniversary celebration. While I'm responding to emails from people asking to have their name added/removed from a listserv, she's designing handouts for the managers' meeting. Add to that the many times she bossed me around by saying, "If you're bored, you can run these AA batteries down to recycling" or "If you're bored, you can organize the paper drawers next to the copying machine." Pu-leeze. WHo did that girl think she is?! Then, of course was the general feeling of being the uninvited guest to two BFFs' sleepover. Aforementioned student worker and our supervisor were obviously BFFs from the time before I arrived, so I clearly was a most unwelcome addition. They would sit behind my cubicle chatting all day long while ignoring the fact that I was even in the same dept (there were only 3 of us in the dept). My personal favorite was the day the 3 of us were sitting at lunch when student worker asked boss if she wanted to split an ice cream cookie ignoring the fact that I too am at the table with them. Then she proceeded to bring it back to the table, make a big deal about cutting it in half for the TWO of them, and then stared me right in the eye while she ate it, of course making a big deal about how good it was.

And so, in the midst of dealing with this hellacious work environment, I applied for a different job, and my prayers were answered when I got the call Friday night at 6 pm that Hawkeye CC wanted me! Yes, it's a little late in the season considering classes start in only a few days, but I'll take it, and take it I did! Gave JD notice on Monday at 8 am and promptly left for new faculty orientation at 9 a.m.! I had to go back half a day yesterday to work at JD and then all day today since I wasn't giving them a full 2 weeks notice, but like it even mattered. Seriously. They were all fake nice to me as I left, and I'm sure they'll be snarky now that I'm not around. But who cares, I'm outta there! They can have their little chit chats and their ice cream all by themselves now. Plus little student worker can run her own freaking batteries down to the recycling.

So, that said, I have a ton of work to do and need to get busy on some syllabi! I have a faculty in-service tomorrow. Oh, wow, this will be a busy weekend! Oh, and did I mention that I'll get paid more at Hawkeye and will actually have the college pay for my benefits! Woo Hoo! It's about bloody time this degree paid off. Yay!

Playing Hooky

I'm home from work today because I hurt my back on Sunday. I wish I had a better story for how I hurt it, but unfortunately it was just "one of those things." I had come home from church and a quick trip to the grocery store with mom and was just about to sit in the living room and have a little lunch. I bent over to get a pillow off the couch and oops, something hurt. I guess I've pulled a muscle or something, but the amount of pain that comes with such an event is enough to make me think I broke a vertebre or something. I was flat on my back for the rest of Sunday afternoon and evening, and when I awoke, I knew there was no way I was going to make it into work today. As the day's gone on, the pain has lessened somewhat, but it is still there. The worst times are after I've been lying down and want to get up or when I'm upright and want to sit/lie down. That doesn't give me much choice. Either get down and stay down or get up and stay up.

I've managed to walk around the house a bit more this afternoon and have found that sitting in the computer chair is actually more comfortable than the bed or couch because it sits up higher and takes less effort to get up or down. Great -- now if I could just sleep in this chair and wheel myself to work tomorrow. I want to be able to go to work tomorrow at least for part of the day. I guess we'll see come morning.

Mom brought me a veritable medicine cabinet of creams and lotions that are supposed to ease muscle pain. Thankfully most of them don't make me smell old. I just can't really tell if they work or not. Ibuprofin doesn't seem to do a darn thing, let me tell you. But I am now a firm believer that all households must have at least one heating pad!!! Thank goodness, due to a Christmas miscommunication, we own two. I had Ken position one on the couch before he left for work this morning and I had one in bed with me. The thought of having to bend down to plug one in was more than I could stand this morning.

I think I'm now going to try to work on my syllabus/assignments for the comp classes I'm teaching in 2 weeks. That was supposed to be on my calendar for yesterday, but as you can imagine, that didn't happen. I have to take breaks when sitting here as my back gets more achy the longer I sit. Here's hoping this goes away by tomorrow!

If anyone has any good/interesting bachache remedies, please pass them along. I'll try anything at this point.

July Updates, House Pictures & A Special Event

It's hard to believe that July is almost over, but it's been a pretty good month overall. Ken and I took a trip last weekend to Minneapolis to see the Twins/Rangers game. It was good game and the Twins won. It's always nice to be at a game when the home team is winning, especially when you really don't care which team actually wins. After the game and a late-night trip to bail my nephew's car out of the impound lot in downtown Minneapolis (the short story is that he and his buddy parked in a bad spot and got towed for a grand fine of $280), we spent some more time in and around the city.

We also hit the Mall of America on Saturday followed by a trip to the Como Zoo (which of course included animals, cotton candy and more fabulous summer mini-donuts). Then off to a lovely Italian dinner in a small town outside of the big city. On Sunday, we went to Niagra Cave (picture is of me in the cave though it's hard to actually tell that I'm in a cave. The bad hair is blamed on the 90% humidity and the water dripping from the cave ceiling.) and then made our way back home by way of Burr Oak, IA where we decided to check out the Laura Ingalls Wilder museum (not very impressive I must say). We were going to hit the Beanpod Candle outlet store in New Hampton, IA, but made it there 30 minutes too late and they were closed. We'll have to save that for another time.

Oh, and I finally had a chance to get some pictures taken of our place. Here is the front and side.

We have a 1-stall garage and a driveway that conveniently allows us to park side-by-side. In the other picture, you'll see our garage (note all flowers were planted by a former renter not us). At the very back of the yard, it slopes downward toward a little creek. We even have ducks!

The other pictures are of the inside of the place. As you can see, the living room opens up into the kitchen and is divided by a bookcase/bar. We had wanted to get some bar stools to sit there, but we just haven't done it yet. We really like how open the whole main part of the house is. It's so much easier to see and talk to each other, not to mention it makes the whole place feel bigger. Ken was busy relaxing on the couch.

In other news, this weekend, Ken and I had some guests from Illinois. My friend (and former boss) Lisa from the Heartland TTC and her husband came through with some donations for the Kleins in CR. They brought several boxes of kids' things that I'm sure will be very useful. After a quick lunch at Peppers in Cedar Falls, they were off to head back to IL and enjoy some of the scenery by way of HWY 20 and Galena.

Friday night was a rather special night as well. Ken and I went to dinner at a Japanese Steakhouse up the street from us called Tokyo. This was a major event considering that Ken doesn't eat Chinese food or Japanese food, but he was a trooper and really enjoyed the rice, steak and chicken. He even ate some of the miso soup. I was very proud of him!

Afterwards, Ken really wanted to go mini-golfing, so I said ok and off we went to Airline Highway's mini golf center in Waterloo. There, on the 4th hole, I received my engagement ring, a beautiful 3-stone ring in white gold. For those of you thinking the location was an odd choice, you should know this was the site of our first date (oh so many) years ago in May of 2001. As is our fashion these hot summer days in Iowa, we grabbed ice cream on the way home and had a lovely evening overall!

Work, weeds, and a clogged sink

This will be just a quick update as it's been a long week already and I'm pooped. Things here are fine. The new furnature arrived and is loved by all. We kept it covered for a bit during the days when we weren't home until we could figure out how the cats would react to it, but all is well there. I'll get some pictures up this weekend I hope.

Ken and I are headed to a Minnesota Twins v. Rangers game on Friday night. Our friends Kelly and Jeff gave us 4 free tickets and supposedly they're pretty good seats--about 20 rows up behind home plate...at least that's what the internet tells us where they are. We're going to stay the night at a military base for a whopping $33/night! Wowsa! We gave the other two tickets to my nephew Josh who's bring his buddy up for the game. I think Ken and I will go to the Mall of America on Saturday for a while then home again to complete more house projects. We're planning a little housewarming at the beginning of August and there's still a lot I want to get done around the place. I've been putting landscaping bricks that we got from sister Kathy's place in Parkersburg (the house that fell apart in the tornado), so that looks nice. I can't get any flowers to plant though because, unbeknownst to me, there are only certain times of the year where you can get the cheapo gardening flowers. Oh well. We'll make do. The landscaping still looks nice though with the bricks.

In other news, we bought a lawnmower with our garage sale earnings, which I tried out last Sunday. Works great! We also just finished dealing with a little plumbing issue - the kitchn sink majorly clogged and even after a bottle of draino and me tearing the pipes apart underneath, we couldn't fix it. So we had to call Philly McGilly, the landlady (no that's not her real name - we just liked the sound of it) to get a plumber in here. Surprisingly, one came out today and all is restored. Of course, this would have to happen the week we have a houseguest staying with us! My friend Tina whom I knew from UNI is in town for a youth theatre thing in CF, so she's crashing here in the evenings. That's what spare bedrooms are for, after all!

Work is, well, work. I can't say much right now about my job that I love. So far, I don't have enough to do and am bored much of the day. When I'm writing, I'm good. But I find that I have to find ways to get busy or at least look busy. People keep telling me that it's the "slow season" and that it'll pick up. It's just not very intellectually stimulating at the moment, and I feel sort of out of place right now. It's hard to get to know these people, and it's so different from teaching/academia. I feel a bit like a square peg right now. It's also hard being in a small department -- there are only 3 of us, which if I do my math right, makes me the third wheel. I'm still looking for other jobs (this is a contract position) and have applied for a full-time teaching job at the local community college....fingers majorly crossed. I keep trying not to get my hopes up, but I think it's too late for that. They're up and I'm hoping. I submitted my materials last week and the deadline isn't until this Friday. It'll be ok if I don't get it, but I know I'll be disappointed.

I do plan to adjunct at UNI this fall though in addition to the regular job. They've asked me to teach 2 composition classes, which I'm actually kind of excited about. First, more money, and second, a chance to get back in the classroom after a year off. It will be interesting to teach and not be a student at the same time.

OK - better run. I want to pull some more weeds before the sun goes down.

Sturgis Falls and other things

Llamas for Obama! That says it all, doesn't it? For me, this was the best part of the Sturgis Falls celebration parade that Ken and I went to last weekend. For those of you who don't know what Sturgis Falls is, it's basically the summer town celebration put on my the town of Cedar Falls. It's their way of paying tribute to William Sturgis, the man who founded the town and for whom the town was originally named (hence Sturgis Falls).

We went to the parade in the morning with Ken's sister Linda and family, Lisa and Matt, and his sister Maria and her family. We're definitely back in the swing of being around lots of family now, let me tell you! After the parade, we went down to the bandshell part for some food (MINI DONUTS!!!) and music. Because of all the flooding, the Sturgis Falls activities were greatly slimmed down this year. Normally, we'd have been running all over parts of the town to hear different bands and dine on such select items as the Turkey Leg, a Matt favorite, and grilled sweet corn. Given that there's no corn yet (thank you very much flood of 2008), we settled for, did I mention, mini donuts, tenderloins, strawberry smoothies, and kettle corn. All still very enjoyable. So, back to mini donuts, apparently Illinois does not believe in them. I haven't had mini donuts since I left Iowa in 2003. Man, did they taste good this year!

You may notice from this parade picture that Matt and Lisa are wearing matching NY Giants T-shirts. That's because they were fresh off their most recent trip to NYC. I believe this year they went to a baseball game of sorts at a famous ballpark, but ever the Giants fans, they show their support for this team before any other.

Here's a non-Sturgis Falls picture. A couple of weekends ago, my side of the family all got together at the Farm -- the commonly accepted term for my Grandma and Grandpa's farm out near Dunkerton, where Aunt Sheila and Uncle Roger have lived and farmed for as long as I can remember. In our family, it's just affectionately known as "the Farm." This is a picture of Audra near some flowers. She and I took a little walk around the grounds to look at trees and flowers while the grown ups talked.

To the right is a one of my favorite pictures. This is what we think is the oldest tree on the farm. I don't even know what kind of tree it is, but the cool thing about it is the one branch extending to the left. It's grown so low that it grew into the ground and then came up again. There is actually grass growing over it . Here's a shot of Audra hamming it up near this spot.

So, we're getting in some good family time since we moved back home. This 4th of July finds us enjoying some much needed time at our own place doing some house projects. We'll be meeting friend Jeff and Kelly in Dysart tomorrow morning for a parade and then a grill-out. Tonight we have fireworks in Cedar Falls and then fireworks in downtown Waterloo on Saturday night.

Back to house projects...this morning, I hacked away at a horribly overgrown and deadly rose bush in our front yard. I call it "devil bush" and Ken calls it "vile weed." No kidding on this one folks, I have scars on my hands, arms and legs from the thorns on this thing from trying to mow around it. It was so big that it was hanging over our driveway and Ken had to tie ip up with rope and a stake so that it wouldn't fall sideways. I was done with it, so I chopped it up and we hauled it away. I did leave some new growth though so that maybe we'll get roses in the future. Hopefully the landlady won't be mad. Pictures to come soon.

While I was busy with this, Ken was behind our garage desperately trying to use a pitchfork to load old dead lawn clippings into Mom's truck. Apparently the people who lived here before us liked to just dump their lawn clippings behind the garage. Here they've steadily festered into a pile of stinking grossness. Finally sick of it, I put Ken on the task of using a pitchfork to get rid of it. All had been going fine until he discovered a huge bees nest buried within it. Then, of course, he had to stop until we could purchase a can of RAID to kill them. I've never seen anyone go through an entire can of RAID in less than 5 minutes. Needless to say, the boy doesn't like bees.

In the end, the space behind the garage looks (and smells) much better and the vile weed will taunt us no more. My final words as I hacked the last bit of into smitherines...."I win devil bush." My next house project is to remove the old ugly bricks around the back flower bed and replace them with the lovely ones I got from Kathy's house post-tornado. Should be fun. Will include house pictures soon. Promise. Good news...new furnature's coming next week!!!!