Like other and more organized bloggers, I occasionally want a rag bag of a post. This one will be quite raggish indeed.
First, an update on my medical fun and games. I have been measured in practically every way known to medical science and am now waiting for the verdict as to whether I can have minimally invasive surgery. This verdict will be delivered next Wednesday via a Zoom meeting with my doctor. Thankfully, some things can be done this way and the hospital people are very accommodating about it. Unfortunately, some things cannot and require me to abstain from coffee, chocolate and all other things caffeine for up to two days before trekking into the city hospital. My suffering cannot be adequately described.
Second, the mess on the desk. Still there. Between the medical stuff and the secretary for our local hall stuff, I am not in paperless mode. I actually dug out a bunch of outdated types of paper for the Annual General Meeting handouts and colour-coded them. Not that most people noticed, alas. I now have to get an updated minute book to a wonderful person who is going to back me up as secretary while I get on with the medical stuff. And I am willing to bet I can do that without printing another copy of anything, provided I can sort the piles I have. Yeah. And, as I rolled merrily along, I formatted the ad for our next event the wrong size. A plaintive email from the local paper alerted me to this. Talk about typing errors.
More Organized Blogger just put up a post about typing errors and got a lot of comments to agree that it is a very easy thing to do. I hang on to what is described as a ‘gaming’ keyboard because it has raised pads and is the same large format as the standard machine on which I learned. It also clicks and I love that. If I try to type on a small, smooth keyboard, I make a huge number of errors. I use, as I have described in other posts, a correction app called ‘Grammarly’ to find the errors. So far, all the underlining in this post is highlighting usage. Well, except that they want me to hyphenate “colour coded”. And so I just did.
Earlier this morning I read a lovely and lovingly written post by a former teacher about a student of hers who went in very wrong directions and has died very young. It made me think of some of my former students, long ago and fairly recently taught, who struggled. And whom I am very much afraid I could not help enough. I ended up wondering why it is the failures I remember vividly, rather than the things that worked, the successes. One does not lie awake at 3:00 am brooding about a girl who went on to a Master’s degree in your subject, for instance. Or I don’t. What keeps you awake in the small hours? Other than the aches and pains of old age, that is.
Okay. Time to quit this and hit ‘print’. Note single quote mark. Easier than using the shift key to get the proper one. Not lying awake about that.
I hope all turns out well for you this coming week! Thinking about you!
ReplyDeletewell, I met all their benchmarks. We will see.
DeleteI light up when you post, but I am sorry about your health issue(s). As you know, I have some problems with my keyboard, but I never have too much to undo because I am the keyboarding tortoise. I do send you all sorts of best wishes for your impeding surgery. At least it 'sounds' like it is coming up soon.
ReplyDeleteI will know this week and report. I fought my highschool scheduling mess and got a typing class where I learned the qwerty keyboard pretty well and got about 50 wpm. But the small keyboards on my phone and iPad defeat me, because I can't use the proper fingers. JG got me a keyboard to use with the iPad, but even it is too small. So, yeah, I am trundling along with you and the hare is far, far ahead. However, I do very much enjoy the delete button. No more whiteout. Lovely.
DeleteNo chocolate! No caffeine! Your immense suffering is duly noted. I shall call you Ste. Mary from here on out. (Adding the 'e' just to be Pretentiously French For No Reason.)
ReplyDeleteA clickety-clackety keyboard would drive me bonkers. My laptop keys make a soft thud, which I just now noticed (thank you very much!) and that's even a bit much.
I know your surgery will be just fine, and that you will come through it like a champion. Keep us posted. And point taken about not dwelling on our losses as educators. I shall try.XO
I learned on a noisy keyboard and if I do not hear a sound when I hit a key, I do not know if I have actually hit it hard enough. So, clickety clack. I notice that JG tends to disappear when I am typing something. Hmm.
DeleteI will post as I go, and with any luck it will be as regular as I usually report. (Stop laughing!!! I do try.)
Yes, a rag bag post is definitely a good thing and this term was a new one for me, so thanks, Mary. Adding my good wishes to those of fellow bloggers and hope that all goes well for you for the minimally invasive type of surgery. Interesting to read the method that determination will be delivered, via a video call. But, then face-to-face contact is changing and not for the better is what I am thinking. Like yourself, I am guilty of maintaining paper as well as electronic copies of some documents.
ReplyDeleteThe hospital is being helpful as we live an hour and more away from it. So if they do not need my body, video works. I agree that face to face is changing. I much prefer it, especially to 'phone' conferences where I cannot see faces. Bea, I have to mark up the paper; putting margin notes on an electronic document is just Not The Same.
DeleteI'm so sorry for all you're going through medically. Sigh... these things are happening as we get older.
ReplyDeleteYes, I do think about some of my 1st grade students. I have one that wrote a book and sent me a copy. But I have another student who was held back and put in my class. He did better, but when I looked up his name, I found he'd been arrested for smuggling drugs by the FBI. Sigh...