Focus

 

Ava has been involved with Tae Kwon Do for the past six months or so. Even when interrupted by a four month shutdown she still participated via Zoom. She recently received her yellow belt. She really has taken to it although she sometimes doesn't enjoy it. It's hard work but it has given her a lot of confidence. It has been great for her physical fitness. The move to yellow belt really accelerated her level of confidence.

The Weirdness

 

 

Been too long. I guess I kinda got unmotivated to blog. Lots been going on. Back to school. My kids are starting the year at home learning virtually. It's a surreal scene at the high school. Everyone in masks. Teachers forced to periodically relocate out of their rooms for "deep cleaning."  I had to relocate my last two periods to the school auditorium on the first day of school due to a kid being sent home with a fever. Turns out it wasn't Covid...but they ain't taking chances.

So now we have finished week two. The outbreaks usually begin in earnest after two weeks. So next week could be interesting.

Complicity

A confession and a personal mini-manifesto...

Silence is complicity.

Racism is a cancer. Acknowledging the systemic racism in our society is not enough. I must also confront those racist thoughts that poison my individual soul. Every day I must acknowledge the prejudices that seep or even sometimes flood my consciousness. I cannot pretend it doesn't exist. I must confront it head on, figure out how it got in there in the first place, then excise it brutally from my mind, my heart and my soul.

Denying its existence in my soul simply allows the cancer to spread. I must beg forgiveness and ask my friends who are not of my ethnicity how I can do better. I must listen, acknowledge, and act. I must not worry about offending those who will be angry when I point out that white protestors armed with assault rifles can storm a statehouse while African-Americans are shot while jogging, murdered by policemen with a knee on their neck, and threatened with police violence for asking a white woman to follow Central Park rules. And that's just the past few days!

This is not a partisan issue, this is a human issue.

Just a few more things...

Wear a mask!

Vaccines work.

And there's nothing wrong with mail-in voting.

Put on your mask!

I made a weezer mask. =w=

I just don't understand this opposition to wearing masks during this time of pandemic.

Just put on the mask! Stop being a toddler! No one is sending you to a concentration camp! You are not being oppressed! You're going to walmart for twinkies and diet coke!

No one is asking you to storm the beaches of Normandy! No one is asking you to ration your food!

Put the mask on!

Be kind to others.

Listen to the doctors and scientists...not the politicians. This is not political!

Wear your mask!

You might save a life and maybe even yours.

This country is turning into a bunch of babies!

Ulysses Done

It took 391 days. Eight more days than I predicted on April 10, 2019. It was on April 10th that I started reading Ulysses by James Joyce. I originally predicted I be finished on April 28th, 2020. I actually finished on May 6, 2020. Not too far off! Fell off a bit in the middle somewhere but The Quarantine allowed me to catch back up. I'm just proud I actually completed this goal!

The secret was reading two pages a day. This took the pressure off. I could read other books at the same time. I didn't have to worry about the obscure language. I just read two pages a day and kept going. Another key was utilizing the online resources that helped explain the content. It was a difficult read and I needed the help.

But the challenge was worth it all. Completing a goal over a long period of time is immensely satisfying. I had been attempting to tackle this book for twenty years and it feels so good to have gone and done it. I guarantee I'll be celebrating Bloomsday on June 16th this year!

So I've kinda begun a routine of reading one challenging book over a long period time while reading one or two other more accessible works at the same time. I've now challenged myself to tackle Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon. 776 pages. It's not the length, its the depth of the content that can be challenging. So this will be my long read for the next while. I started today, May 7th, 2020.

There seems to be page breaks about every eight pages or so...a lot more than the two pages a day pace I used for Ulysses. But I'm going to give that a shot. Some page breaks are a little shorter and some a little longer. I haven't looked through the whole book so I could be in for some surprises. But I think I'll try to keep it at eight pages max.

At 776 pages that would mean I would be done in 97 days. I'm going to give my self a little longer simply because I'm not sure I can do eight pages a day every day while reading two other books concurrently. So I'm going to give my self 155 days (average of 5 pages a day).

So that means I should be done with Gravity's Rainbow by October 8, 2020. 155 days from now.

Let's do it.

When No One Shows...

Me, all by myself, when none of my students show up to their scheduled Zoom Meeting.

We're now in the middle of our 7th week of Remote Learning during The Quarantine. At first attendance to my meetings was robust and energetic. Zoom was new and interesting. But soon students began muting their cameras so all you could see were static avatars. A few weeks went by and more and more students stopped showing up. The novelty faded fast. And maybe the content of my Zoom Meetings did not hold interest for them. Plus, 9:30 am is pretty early for some of my students these days. I don't take it personally. But it can sometime get lonely out there...

Little things...

My daughter has made face masks for her stuffed animals and dolls.

I've heard that the wearing of face masks has become a political issue.

Anyone who refuses to wear a mask in public during this pandemic is a selfish idiot.

I always tell my students "if you can't do the little things then you can't be trusted with the big things."

Wearing masks and staying home are little things. Our nation can't seem to handle that. 

May the Fourth

May the Fourth be with you, Rebel scum!

Readings for the End of the World

So I tagged Gary Shteyngart, one of my favorite authors, a tweet yesterday. And he responded!

Plywood Tennis

Again, we are always trying to find new ways to entertain our kids once they complete their daily remote school work. Here's a ping pong table we made of a cheap piece of plywood and a cheap portable table tennis net. Cheap, but provides hours of fun!

Tree Swing

We are doing everything we can to keep variety in the lives of our kids during The Quarantine. At least we can go outside in our current Quarantine situation. I know many are trapped in their apartments. My daughter was begging for a swing to hang up in the tree in our front yard. This was an easy project that has provided her hours of entertainment over the past week. It took me longer to wait in line at Lowe's to buy the wood and rope than it did to saw the wood, drill the holes and hang the swing up.

Intense

Put up the tent in the backyard. Kids needed a new scene. I like how it adds square footage to our modestly sized house. I'll have to move it around every few days so it doesn't kill the grass. But it's nice to have another space to escape to, even if it's temporary.

More Background

How boring are blog posts about Zoom backgrounds? The Quarantine has changed my views on things that in the past I would have found boring. Here are some of the virtual backgrounds that I have been using for my Zoom Meetings...

My favorite bookstore (although I've only been there once)...Shakespeare and Company in Paris. 

The Royal Tennis Court near the Palace of Versailles where the French Revolution started. 

The cockpit of the Millenium Falcon

The Hall of Mirrors in the Palace of Versailles

Some Background

I've been conducting a lot of Zoom Meetings during The Quarantine as I teach my high school classes remotely. I've started using virtual background to change things up as we are now in our fourth week of online classes. StarWars.com made available some hi-res backgrounds of iconic Star Wars imagery for this purpose. I've also used some of my favorite landscape photos in my phone as backgrounds. I'll post some of those later.

Recently I began using a short one minute video loop as my background. I created this loop from the classic 1902 silent film, Le Voyage dans la Lune (A Trip to the Moon). This film is often credited as being the first science fiction movie. Directed by Georges Melies it was a major blockbuster in it's day. The film is about twelve minutes long and it's available on YouTube to stream. I captured a minute of the footage and created a loop to use on my zoom meetings.

Quarantine Reading Material

 Inspired by an old friend who asked the following question...

“I'd love to learn more about what you're reading during quarantine and why?”

I’ve been reading two pages a day (all I can handle in a single sitting of this book) of Ulysses by James Joyce for several months now. I’m on the 19th and final episode. Should be done by the end of May. I still don’t understand much of what I read of it. Have to use online resources to make head or tails of it. But I will be very happy to finally conquer this literary white whale! I will consider it a literary equivalent of making the pilgrimage to Jerusalem or Mecca! 

Re-reading The Plague by Albert Camus. Always a good read. I have been amazed at the parallels to today’s crisis. On Part Four now. Society’s denials of the reality of their plague rings frighteningly close to our denialists today. Quiet heroism of individuals doing their jobs in difficult situations reminds me of our health care workers, grocery store clerks, first responders, etc today.

On the Kindle, I’m reading Left Bank: Art, Passion, and the Rebirth of Paris, 1940-1950 by Agnes Poirier. A great history of the lives of artists, philosophers, writers and other creatives during the dark days of the Nazi occupation of France. How they managed to keep culture alive in the underground is fascinating. I’m only on Chapter Three but fully engrossed! I applaud and encourage those amateur and professional artists sharing their creative endeavors online during this quarantine. Staying creative helps maintain our sanity.

Cushing

I never knew how important Cushing, Oklahoma was to the global economy. I'm not sure if I've ever been there. I've seen it on highway signs and heard of it but don't think I've ever passed through. It's a little out of the way from the Will Rogers Turnpike.

According to Business Insider: "World oil prices are controlled by the amount of crude oil stored at Cushing, Oklahoma. That’s because Cushing is the pricing point for WTI (West Texas Intermediate) oil prices, the most-traded oil futures contract in the world."

Decades ago they used to call Tulsa the "Oil Capital of the World." I guess it's actually Cushing now. Storage capacity in Cushing is apparently at max meaning energy companies now have to pay to store it somewhere else. This has led to oil being worth negative dollars on the world market. Never thought I'd see that happen. Cushing, wow.

More Live Quarantine Concerts

Another one of my favorite performers, Colin Meloy, frontman for The Decemberists, is also conducting live weekly quarantine concerts. I find these live concerts very comforting.

Lola and the Quarantine

If I recline for just a second, Lola has me trapped. Makes it hard to get back up again and get to work.

Masks

Mowing during a high pollen day sometimes requires extraordinary measures of protection.

Bob the Duck is Back

Last week Bob made his first appearance of the season in our yard. He lives year round at the little farm across the way. But during the spring and summer he comes to our yard at least once a day for some fresh bird seed. His partner Joyce has not shown up as of yet and we have not seen her at the farm. Joyce may no longer be with us or maybe she's just not into leaving the barn these days. Good to see Bob during these days of pandemic. Bob does not understand social distancing.