Let's see.
So far, so good. It took about a week but I think I understand my job in the resource room now. I think the bulk will be in working with the students working on missed math credits. My 12U Physics course is shaping up well too. They are a very attentive group but a little bit quiet still. I was impressed with their first assignments - a paragraph about the nature or role of science. They put a fair bit of thought into them.
I had good fun in the playoffs last weekend. My knee had been bothering me last week but it felt pretty good during the weekend. Now, this week it is just awful. I've worn a tensor all day for the first time in years. I think volleyball coaching has been aggravating it.
I just finished tryouts for the junior boys' volleyball team today. There are a few good athletes and a couple of players with good training. But I've never been involved in junior boys' volleyball; so, I don't know how we compare to the field. We'll find out soon. Our first game is a week from Tuesday. Yikes. I don't even know who my setters are going to be.
I just got my new laptop yesterday, almost exactly ONE MONTH after I ordered it. One snafu after another. It's sweet though. I do miss a few things about my old one, believe it or not, Mark. I liked the curve of the keyboard under the wrists. I really miss the track point. Removing your hand from home row to use a mouse/touch pad is just so primitive.
TV. Terrible that Rex stayed and Aaron went home last week on Canadian Idol. Thank goodness Melissa won. I was a little scared this week because Rex's first two performances on Tuesday were actually enjoyable. Not that he suddenly developed a good voice over the week but he had suitably easy songs and managed to hold the pitch much of the time. The single written for the Idol is actually good. A rare thing in the Idol franchise. Last year's single was awful, awful, awful.
BOOKS. I'm reading Simon Singh's Big Bang. A little less "entertaining" than Fermat's Enigma or The Code Book but I am really enjoying it.
Friday, September 16, 2005
Sunday, September 04, 2005
Geekiness
I've often describe my geekiness (and that of several of our friends) with an explanation of the the reference game. As I spent most of the day alone, I had to find a solo way of indulging my geekiness. I rediscovered The geography olympics, now at http://www.geographyzone.com/new/index.php?t=1&b=1 . Although that redirects you to the new geography challenge with a much improved interface.
It's amazing how the brain works. At first I was getting only 7 out of 10 right and after a few tries was back up to pretty consistent 10/10 with the occasional 9/10 due to the South-West Pacific. Kiribati anyone? But soon I was recalling countries that hadn't even come up yet today. Soon, I was working for good times, not just perfect scores. You get a total of 120 seconds. One by one, you are asked to click on ten countries, randomly selected from 192. If you make a mistake, the correct answer is displayed - a nice new feature. I used to play with an atlas handy. I've been playing for a little over an hour and my top times for perfect scores are
100 seconds left - once
99 seconds left - once
94 seconds left - four times
Like minesweeper, there is obviously some luck involved. Small countries are bad because it takes time to hover over them. The location of a country can be bad too. It takes time to scroll across the world map. Here's a hint. Keep your mouse hovering over the Eastern part of the Mediterranean between countries for quick map shifting to within range of a very large number of countries. Another. Don't click on a country until you KNOW its whole name - it is displayed letter by letter. I've clicked on Austr(ia) only to find out that I was to click on Austr(alia).
It's amazing how the brain works. At first I was getting only 7 out of 10 right and after a few tries was back up to pretty consistent 10/10 with the occasional 9/10 due to the South-West Pacific. Kiribati anyone? But soon I was recalling countries that hadn't even come up yet today. Soon, I was working for good times, not just perfect scores. You get a total of 120 seconds. One by one, you are asked to click on ten countries, randomly selected from 192. If you make a mistake, the correct answer is displayed - a nice new feature. I used to play with an atlas handy. I've been playing for a little over an hour and my top times for perfect scores are
100 seconds left - once
99 seconds left - once
94 seconds left - four times
Like minesweeper, there is obviously some luck involved. Small countries are bad because it takes time to hover over them. The location of a country can be bad too. It takes time to scroll across the world map. Here's a hint. Keep your mouse hovering over the Eastern part of the Mediterranean between countries for quick map shifting to within range of a very large number of countries. Another. Don't click on a country until you KNOW its whole name - it is displayed letter by letter. I've clicked on Austr(ia) only to find out that I was to click on Austr(alia).
Here we go...
School's almost here. But before we look forward let's have a look backwards, if I can remember it all.
last Friday: I spent the evening at Ann and Steve's with them, Derek, Rob, and Rebecca. Great fun AND I found Dion and me curling buddies. I'm playing with Leigh and Jenn on Mondays and with Dion, Ann, and Steve on Fridays. This is going to be a fun season.
last Saturday and Sunday: Gee, I cannot remember anything except good long phone calls to Ottawa. If you know what I did last weekend, please tell me.
Monday: I went into school caught up with Heather a little. I really enjoyed Litter's game, though I was the only one apparently. Dan and player on the other team were arguing over a foul call right off the bat and we generally got our butts kicked. Our defence was actually really good. We just could not execute on offense. The player Dan was arguing with is Dave Flynn, with whom I have played and whom I really like and respect. I definitely played better than I have most of the season. I wonder if Dave's presence did it. I was making things happen on offense with precise OIs upfield around the zone, no drops, only two or three bad throws or throwing decisions.
Tuesday: Dream in High Park after school with Ann and Rebecca, which was fun despite the rain. It was Much Ado About Nothing, which I think they did the last time I went to Dream several years ago.
Wednesday: I started the day at Grand and Toy and stocked up on binders. At school, I started filing all the handouts in my drawer into binders. It took me all afternoon and I got "kicked out" around 6 because the last of the custodial staff was leaving.
TV: I'm glad that it wasn't Melissa or Aaron who got booted off Canadian Idol, as they and Amber were the only ones in the top 10 who had good voices and pitch control. Kevin has called me the pitch-Nazi in the past. I don't really like live music because of pitch problems. So I always like the in-tune Idol performances best, with little regard to "performance" but some regard to song-selection. So You Think You Can Dance was entertaining as always. The disco was INCREDIBLE, so was Artem in the Passo Doble. The rock-and-roll was also really good. It bothers me somewhat that the hip-hop dancers will get votes no matter what. Kinda like the best "country" singer in American Idol, who will always go farther than s/he deserves.
Thursday: Dion took the day off. I went to school and continued filling binders and reorganising my filing system in my desk. Got caught up with Kaitlyn and Heather and had a lengthy discussion of teeth. Crest Whitestrips come highly recommended but I'm not sure if that's really my thing. My teeth are clean and healthy - do they need to be pearly white?
BOOKS: I finished Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Leguin. I recommend it highly. It is classified as science fiction and won both the Nebula and Hugo awards for 1969 but I think it will appeal even to people who do not like science fiction. The one and only disappointing thing was the introduction, which was written by the author. I always read the introduction last because I hate knowing anything about a novel before I read it. But I had been looking for some criticism, particularly about the politics of the countries and entities involved. Is there a relationship between the Ekumen and the UN? (not really, I think) How about the Sarf? I thought that the Sarf was much like the Stasi and, of course, Orgoyen was much like East Germany. Does that make Karhide West Germany, even though it is a monarchy? Is there a relationship between the politics and gender in these countries? Anyway, I was left cold.
Friday: I got my class lists and went over the OSRs in preparation for making a seating plan. O man. I have a bunch of my strongest personalities from last year back. This should be another fun but tiring semester. I still don't really know what I'm going to be doing in resource. We'll see. Some people tell me I'm going to love it; some tell me I'm going to hate it. But the people who tell me I'm going to hate it hate everything.
I went out to dinner with Mike, Rob, and Rebecca. Good fun. We ate at Fresh, near Bathurst and Bloor. I had the special, guacamole veggie burger, with soup, Dahl. The burger was okay to good, the soup was amazing. I decided to walk home and was pleasantly surprised to find out that Indigo is open till 11pm on Fridays, especially since I got there just after 10pm. I ended up with "just" four books.
Saturday: spent forever making scalloped potatoes for the week and for the barbeque uptown. "Uptown" is my usual short hand for Dion's parents' house. The potatoes did not turn out will at all. The potatoes were undercooked, bland, and cold. But the name game was great.
last Friday: I spent the evening at Ann and Steve's with them, Derek, Rob, and Rebecca. Great fun AND I found Dion and me curling buddies. I'm playing with Leigh and Jenn on Mondays and with Dion, Ann, and Steve on Fridays. This is going to be a fun season.
last Saturday and Sunday: Gee, I cannot remember anything except good long phone calls to Ottawa. If you know what I did last weekend, please tell me.
Monday: I went into school caught up with Heather a little. I really enjoyed Litter's game, though I was the only one apparently. Dan and player on the other team were arguing over a foul call right off the bat and we generally got our butts kicked. Our defence was actually really good. We just could not execute on offense. The player Dan was arguing with is Dave Flynn, with whom I have played and whom I really like and respect. I definitely played better than I have most of the season. I wonder if Dave's presence did it. I was making things happen on offense with precise OIs upfield around the zone, no drops, only two or three bad throws or throwing decisions.
Tuesday: Dream in High Park after school with Ann and Rebecca, which was fun despite the rain. It was Much Ado About Nothing, which I think they did the last time I went to Dream several years ago.
Wednesday: I started the day at Grand and Toy and stocked up on binders. At school, I started filing all the handouts in my drawer into binders. It took me all afternoon and I got "kicked out" around 6 because the last of the custodial staff was leaving.
TV: I'm glad that it wasn't Melissa or Aaron who got booted off Canadian Idol, as they and Amber were the only ones in the top 10 who had good voices and pitch control. Kevin has called me the pitch-Nazi in the past. I don't really like live music because of pitch problems. So I always like the in-tune Idol performances best, with little regard to "performance" but some regard to song-selection. So You Think You Can Dance was entertaining as always. The disco was INCREDIBLE, so was Artem in the Passo Doble. The rock-and-roll was also really good. It bothers me somewhat that the hip-hop dancers will get votes no matter what. Kinda like the best "country" singer in American Idol, who will always go farther than s/he deserves.
Thursday: Dion took the day off. I went to school and continued filling binders and reorganising my filing system in my desk. Got caught up with Kaitlyn and Heather and had a lengthy discussion of teeth. Crest Whitestrips come highly recommended but I'm not sure if that's really my thing. My teeth are clean and healthy - do they need to be pearly white?
BOOKS: I finished Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Leguin. I recommend it highly. It is classified as science fiction and won both the Nebula and Hugo awards for 1969 but I think it will appeal even to people who do not like science fiction. The one and only disappointing thing was the introduction, which was written by the author. I always read the introduction last because I hate knowing anything about a novel before I read it. But I had been looking for some criticism, particularly about the politics of the countries and entities involved. Is there a relationship between the Ekumen and the UN? (not really, I think) How about the Sarf? I thought that the Sarf was much like the Stasi and, of course, Orgoyen was much like East Germany. Does that make Karhide West Germany, even though it is a monarchy? Is there a relationship between the politics and gender in these countries? Anyway, I was left cold.
Friday: I got my class lists and went over the OSRs in preparation for making a seating plan. O man. I have a bunch of my strongest personalities from last year back. This should be another fun but tiring semester. I still don't really know what I'm going to be doing in resource. We'll see. Some people tell me I'm going to love it; some tell me I'm going to hate it. But the people who tell me I'm going to hate it hate everything.
I went out to dinner with Mike, Rob, and Rebecca. Good fun. We ate at Fresh, near Bathurst and Bloor. I had the special, guacamole veggie burger, with soup, Dahl. The burger was okay to good, the soup was amazing. I decided to walk home and was pleasantly surprised to find out that Indigo is open till 11pm on Fridays, especially since I got there just after 10pm. I ended up with "just" four books.
Saturday: spent forever making scalloped potatoes for the week and for the barbeque uptown. "Uptown" is my usual short hand for Dion's parents' house. The potatoes did not turn out will at all. The potatoes were undercooked, bland, and cold. But the name game was great.
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