Voodoo Child v. 16: it doesn't have to be eternal to be immortal.

I got an email a few days ago from Slipper and she said that we all had to go to a meeting. The Merit Awards, actually. I thought we were getting some team award. Pretty fresh. I put it on my calendar. The day comes (yesterday), and I get down to the meeting a little late. True to form, I spend a few minutes wrapping up stuff and then heading to the gathering.

Sitting there by myself (see what happens when I come in late), the ceremony goes as planned. I feel wierd sitting there by myself, but that's life. They announce service awards. I wonder why we were all asked to come. We normally go anyways, right? I wait for the Team Award. We don't get it. Hrm. Service Award. Don't get that either. I wonder where my group was. And then they start talking about the Technology Award, and mentioning that the winner used it in tutoring.

In my infinite wisdom, I'm thinking, "Who else does tutoring on campus?" Wait...I'm the only one on campus that really does that. Then they keep talking about the person. My ears start to get red. Hot red. Oh shit. That's me.

There are over 200 people sitting there, a lot of people far more talented than I, and of course, natch, a lot of people who I'm far more foxier than. I joke. Not really.

They call my name and I go up to get the award. I feel strange. I should have dressed up, I told myself. I should have fixed my mop head. Oh well. I get a plaque. And surprise, a check. W00t.

Pretty cool for just doing my job.

So here we are at 23 weeks. Intriguing. Moving and stuff. I debated about telling people only because I thought it was going to be a  neat little secret to keep to myself, but nah, it's all over the place. My appointment went well yesterday, and the doc said, "Halfway there!" Yikes. She's right.

Can I introduce you to my best friend? Here she is. The pillow, not the lady, you dork. Anyways, see how happy the lady is? That's how happy I am when I get to sleep with El Snoogle! Even Husbandido loves the Snoogle. Did I get paid to do this commercial? Of course not, but if LeachCo wants to kick down some endorsement funds, I'd be happy to accept them. If you have a gnarly acting pregnant lady around you get her this pillow. Seriously.

I'm looking forward to summer coming down the pipeline. It's been nice to enjoy such good weather these last few days, but it's going to be even mo betta when it's quiet, I can get work done, and I can have my ass  handed to me by Buff Bagwell, my brother, in Scrabulous. Jerk.

Anyways, back to work. Where's that student who went to get lunch? She's taking forever. Better bring me a snack.

Voodoo 

Posted by Voodoo Child at 12:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

It's nearly the end of the semester, a few short days, as a matter of fact, and it'l be here before we know it. And before you know THAT, it'll be August and the kids will be back (and I'll have another one to add to that batch o' kids!).

As of late, life has slowed down, thankfully, and I can focus on what I need to do with life at work. I hate taking work home, and I've been doing a lot of that lately, but not lately. Often, I'll bring it home, and never take it out of my bag. Oh well.

Weekends have been taken away from me too...and it seems like if it's not one thing, it's another. I've been doing evenings too, and that's not always as fun. I have to admit, I'm a complainer. You haven't already figured this out? I am. But you have to remember this: I'll bitch, and then get over it once the event starts and then it's all good in the hood. Tonight is Filipino graduation. Two nights ago, it was African American Recognition (I so love the Black National Anthem). Next week Latino Grad, and then....the big Graduuations. Six ceremonies, and you got it, I'm at each one of them.

Here's another complaint: I have a cold. Nothing major, just a cough. Boogers. But not as bad as Patient Zero, Husbandido. He has full on Man Flu. You know, the kind where it's ALL so bad. Poor thing. Then I get sick too? Geez.

Bambina's Room? No movement on it. Sheesh. We should have at least cleaned it out by now! But that's life. We have no real plan, I suppose that's the problem. Maybe I should have a sit down with Husbandido, the engineer. I think that means we'll have to go out to dinner and discuss our plans.

I got my first Mother's Day Card yesterday! So schweet. Thanks Tiyan and Dizzles.

Okidokes, I'm going to check some email and wait for Yuck Mouth to pick me up. Darlington Meeting coming up soon!

Voodoo

PS: Next book: Julie and Julia. 

Posted by Voodoo Child at 09:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I started teaching 9/27, and for the most part that's been consuming my life these last few weeks. Part of it is because, well, you haven't lived until you have taught a college course. Yes, little kids are cute, they are manageable for the most part, but my students are WOO like R. Kelly says.

Let's get things straight. I like teaching. It's fun. My class is fun (at least I think so), and we do meaningful stuff. Okay fine, it's an orientation to college class, success strategies, to be exact, but it's full of first years, second years, and wow, seniors. Now, you're probably asking, so what are seniors doing in a class that's meant for first years and transitional students? They need units. I can't hate on them. My university doesn't have fun classes like PE 44 that I took at Moo U. That was the best 2 units EVAR.

But what's been rough is that my class is 3:30-5. Wow. You know how you feel at that time? Well, that's how they look. And it's how I feel! Imagine trying to charm the pants off your class (not literally, you freak) and helping them to get their learn on, and they're looking at you like you're crazy. CRAY CRAY. My main means of presenting in class is to use powerpoint. Every single lecture is already powerpointed and ready to go. I use these sweet tools called clickers. I have discussion board responses, and super personalized projects for folks to do. It's fun. But it's rough when the room is warm, and they're falling off the chairs.

I have colleagues who tell students to not use laptops in class. I allow it. Honestly, it's how people take notes these days. But I also am not lame enough to recognize when someone receives an IM. I called someone out when their AIM started up. Comedy. It's just tough when my students are in the back obviously not paying attention to what they're doing in class, but they're on facebook.

I started my class with one premise: you're grown. You make your own decisions on how you want to be in this class. It could be sheer hell or it could be amusing if you let it. So I don't trip if they don't come to class, or if they're all about facebook. Do you really want to get a C in a class that's about how to be successful in college? It's telling. Students who fail out of my class (yes, there are those), pretty much can count on doing the same in the rest of their college experience.

I want to care. No wait, I care a lot about my students. All 25 of them. I'm just struggling because I have two co-teachers who I am trying to train the hell out of so they can teach their own class at some point. It's fun to do the class, really.

I keep telling myself that. I just spent about two hours reading journal entries online that they wrote, and I love how willing students are to spill their guts and be honest about their challenges in the academic environment. The class gets more interesting for me, and even though it's been hard at some points, it's reaffirmed my love for being in the classroom.

Honestly this is the reason why I haven't blogged much. I've been sitting and thinking about teaching lately. I've also been watching Husbandido play Halo 3.

So I'll be back next month. This month, btw, is Manifesto Month! I'm open to discussions on what I should write about. If anything, hurry your thangs up because I only have a few more days!

Voodoo

Posted by Voodoo Child at 10:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

The first day of school has come and gone. It's only nine more months until we move onto Summer Break. I'm just kidding. It's nice to see the childrens again, be able to catch up, chat and make some new friends. I wish I could go into detail about how wonderful some of my kids are, and I'd love to go into even more detail about how much drama some of my day can be. But I'll tell you some stuff that's relatively innocuous.

I have an intern.

I did my time as an intern. Two years to be exact. I was very fortunate to have good mentors in my life, ones that I'm very close to til this day. I'm always thrilled to be able learn from someone who's more established in the field. I'm also very fortunate to be able to have these situations on a regular basis. I think one of the things I've learned in life is that if you have the opportunity to learn, you should run to it with wide fucking arms open, your mouth big and wide ready to drink in the knowledge. Was I always like this? Hell no. But now I am where I am, if I'm not learning something, I'm ready to get sent to pasture like a sorry cow.

But so here I am, ten years since my master's degree and ten years since I've been an intern, and now I have the fortune to pass down the knowledge, yo. I look at it as a responsibility, seriously. I have the opportunity to train a young mind, and I'm going to make sure I pass down what I can to her. Everything. It's not like I'm a god or anything, but I know I'm good at what I do, and goddammit, if you don't believe me, come and watch. I want to be able to make sure the field is FULL of people who know what the hell they are doing, not full of people who are in it just to get rich. I lie. You're not going to get rich doing what I do. Hold on whlie I laugh a bit.

At any rate, I'm taking her through campus, bringing her to my meetings, making sure she can get a sense of the vastness of my job on campus. It's not vast, I just do a LOT of shit. Anyways, she turns to me and says, "Do you know EVERYONE?" People stop me and say hi, others give me the Waddup Nod. Others pull me to them and ask me when they can set up a meeting with me. Another student, observing this says, "Can I touch the hem of your garment?" She laughs. I laugh. I buy her lunch.

I want to be able to pass down to the childrens a good experience, to know that advising doesn't have to be crappy. That it is possible to learn in a fun environment, and that with hard work, you can become a G at what you do. There's a difference between being comfortable and wanting to be bigger, better, and wiser. You have to expose yourself to situations where you'll learn and expand that comfort zone. Even if it means learning the things about you that SUCK. And I know there are things that I'm not happy with.

So I work on it every damn day. When I'm not challenged, it doesn't do it for me, so taking on an intern is like being back in the classroom myself. I ask her all the time, what do you think worked that I did. And more importantly, WHAT DO YOU THINK I DID THAT WAS OFF? I have no ego in this matter. I don't care how great I am (but I am great), I care about how crap I was that day. So I can make myself better.

I read somewhere that God doesn't look at your badges or your awards. S/He looks at your scars.

And I gots plenty.

Voodoo 

Posted by Voodoo Child at 08:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

This last week, the kids were gone. ALL gone. Amazingly, some came back on Monday for god knows what reason, but it was really kind of quiet. Too quiet to be honest. I wish there was a little noise. Alas, there was none. And to top it off, it's mad raining. Oh and every sound I did hear, I swear I was going to freak out.

I packed up my stuff on Monday and moved to another office, where there were at least two people there at all times. Nice, huh?

So in that office I go, and to my sweet surprise, some of my colleagues, like myself, were bored and wound up congregating in my "office" with me. That office wound up being my colleague's conference room, so now instead of three bored people, there were now five. Today there were six. Ha. The fun never ends.

I don't know what it is, but people like to drop in my office and shoot the shit. It's fun. Nine times out of ten, we're having work-related discussions, so it's not all bad, but there are those, so, what are you crocheting today conversations that are humorous. I want to tell you, despite having shacked up in new digs and hanging out with the homies, I was very productive. Seriously.

You see, I love work, I really do, it's self-defining, gratifying you name it. It's also nice to see things you want to work on get DONE. You know what I mean, right? So I had a few major projects to do: letters of recommendation, drafting a new faculty brochure, redoing the entire website, etc. That's a lot. Stuff I can't even fathom getting done if the kids are around. I wanted to knock stuff out of the way because like most people, I like to have fun. I have time to accommodate my colleagues' drop-in consultations (sometimes I think people take me to lunch because I'm the Oracle or something but yes pass the ketchup) that way. When idle, make the best of the time that you do have so that you can be absolutely productive.

I'd hate a job where I sat on my ass. life is too short to have a big ass anyway. I like to hammer out projects, think outside the goddamn box, and have a fresh perspective on life. It's an absolute necessity for me to be on top of my game. I can't rest. It's a must do in a can do world. God i sound like a management book, but I hope you understand.

Yes there are days when all I want to do is chat with my friends. But I feel much better at it when I don't have to worry about that project that is staring me in the face, you know? But in the next week I'm taking some personal time. I'm going to try and get some of my quality time in with friends, esp. those I never see. So G, I'm coming out to see you! No, jk, i'll wait until it's warmer ;-)

Onto other things...all the Christmas cards went out. I'm chewing my nails because I feel like I've left some people out. That's bound to happen, isn't it? Crap. I always forget people at the last minute so I feel like  putz because I forgot. Damn on me. I also got most of the presents that I think I need to get. I need to get one more for pops and I'm all good. God, what to get the guy who literally has everything. LITERALLY. it's mind-boggling.

Tomorrow, now that I think of it, starts the holiday party rounds we have to do. four in four days. it's amazing, isn't it? But good to spend time with family, and it's wonderful to be able to connect with people I haven't seen. I'll be giving you all more quality time in the next few days, I hope. Take care and if I don't see ya, Happy Holidays.

Voodoo 

Posted by Voodoo Child at 11:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Found this...thought I'd share. Enjoy!

vdc

Posted by Voodoo Child at 08:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I was in class today, administering the final exam for my class. I feel kind of bad about it now that I think of it...perhaps I was being rough. The hint was that it was a 68 question final exam, to be completed in 90 minutes. Also, maybe it was hardcore when someone turned it in and said, "are you trying to kill us?"

I half-smirked. No. But yes.

The other day I was doing a lecture on diversity and relationships, and it was really hard for them to comprehend how to use I statements. In other words, instead of saying "you're a dick" you would say, "I don't agree with you." Someone wanted to argue with me and say, it's still offensive. I said, no, it's not offensive. It's about YOU and not about them. This went on for a few minutes. Back and forth. Fine, it'll be on the final exam.

Don't piss of your teacher.

I made it open book too, just to be fair for giving them so much stuff to work on. Surprisingly enough, if you get a special helpy helperson for your test, guess what, it's harder. Truth be told, it's an open book test, so you should technically have the answers at your fingertips.

Oh yah, it's worth half your grade.

Rough. Don't take my class.

But I will tell you this:  more often than not, 4 years after I've taught the class, when my kids are graduating and I'm helping them go up to receive their diploma, they have all come up to me and said thank you. Thanks for kicking my butt, for helping me out, and for giving me some insane ass final exam.

Like all things in education,  the process is one that doesn't pay off right away. It'll come to you when it's ready. Or if you let it.

Now off to correct those fuckers. Did I tell you they were 17 pages each?

Voodoo 

Posted by Voodoo Child at 09:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)