taking advantage of this moment…….

…to make a rare and elusive entry. My reading and noting has also been rare and elusive, so many apologies for that. I’m hoping things are finally starting to quiet down around here. And by "around here", I mean at work. It’s been pretty quiet at home, which is fine with me. Although when I’m at home I am too wiped out from work to do things like catch up with all my OD buddies. 

It’s Clearing the Seniors for Graduation Time again. Yippie. I just emailed the shortage letters today, which, as usual, has resulted in much whining and weeping and "but nobody tooooooooold me!!!!"-ing. As well as one quite unsettling phone call in which I was sworn at and then hung up on before I could tell him to call back when he could keep a civil tongue in his head, and then hang up on him first. Even better, he came in the office while I was at lunch and was rude and angry to Miss Artsy, although without the swearing part. He’s missing three courses which are on his checksheet, were listed on his audit which he reviewed and signed, and are required of everyone in the program. But dammit, that is a bunch of shit and he’s not putting up with this shit and he can’t stay here another damned semester for shit like that!!!! Yeah, he could take some lessons in either common courtesy or more innovative swearing. We have alerted the Ass’t Dean and stuck a warning note on his folder. It does make me a little nervous when students act like that, since we live in Gunslinger World where any nutcase can get an automatic weapon and haul it to campus and shoot us all down. 

That is pretty extreme, at least. The rest has been mostly just whining. With a surprising amount of non-freaking-out and calm explanations of why they are missing what they are missing, and polite requests for guidance on how they can fix the issues. SO I really should appreciate that. And I do, I do!! It’s just the Freak-Out Kids who make the big impressions. 

I’ve still got a ton of work to do — we have twelve late applicants to clear and send letters to- but I have worked non-fucking-stop for weeks and I really really need a break. I really really need a few days off, but that isn’t likely to happen anytime soon, so I’ll do this as a consolation. And at least it’s just work being a bitch. My dad is doing great, my MIL is doing pretty darned well considering what she’s been through (housebound and using a walker and cane, but out of the nursing home rehab and able to take care of herself.) The weather has been gorgeous – it has been in the 70s all week– but the temperatures are due to plummet over the weekend. Which should not be a horrible surprise, since it is nearly November. This weather has been quite unusual. 

OOOOOHHHHH, but it was TERRIBLE two weekends ago, and… we didn’t go to Oz. WAAAHHHH!!!! Very disappointing – we didn’t go last year either due to horrible weather. We’ve never ever missed two years. I think last year was the first one we’d missed since we started going some fifteen years ago. The big problem is that you have to buy tickets in advance and they are for very specific two-hour slots. And you don’t know what the weather is going to be like (and it can swing to ridiculous extremes – I’ll never forget the year we went on Saturday and it was nearly 80, then went back on Sunday and it was snowing). I think next year we may just go up there and try to get tickets at the gate. You pay $5 more (they are $20 in advance and if you wait till the gate they may be sold out) but this is the second year we’ve spent $40 and then didn’t go. They are not refundable, as the website stresses a gazillion times. At least the money goes towards upkeep of the park. But I think we’d be better off spending ten more dollars – and chancing that we will have to wait till later to get in – than buying these extremely restrictive tickets in advance. We’d intended to go Saturday – and the weather was not bad that day- but the early tickets sold out, and Baker B wanted to go early. 

So. That was very disappointing. And I have no Oz photos. Again.

I suppose I better get back to work. On a folder for a student whose middle name is….. Fury. Seriously. Who names their kid Fury??? Apparently someone whose parents were hoping for a pony.