Month: June 2024

The makings of a great teacher

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What makes a teacher great?

Teaching is one of those things for which not everyone has the gift. It’s also not limited to the classroom.

Teaching can take place anytime and anywhere that someone is learning from another source, be that an actual person or just life in general.

Now, another thing to be clear on for how I’m answering this prompt. Being a GREAT teacher is not always the same as a SUCCESSFUL teacher. Success in teaching means that a lesson was adequately grasped by the learner, and you don’t have to be a great teacher for that to happen. Some students are just very quick on the uptake, which can compensate for a teacher’s lack of skills, while some students struggle no matter how skillful a teacher is or what they do to help them along.

To be a great teacher (in human terms) requires more. Patience. Compassion. Empathy. An eye for seeing through the fog of uncertainty in a students mind and being able to provide a spark of encouragement. To nurture that spark and keep it alive. Teachers inspire us to learn and be creative. They provide a piece of the foundation for future generations to grow and thrive, and without them we would be lost. No progress would be made and we would still be banging rocks and sticks together.

Teachers are undervalued in today’s society. They are so much more than just glorified babysitters for working parents. Remember that, and try to show some compassion towards them for the hard work they do.

A real pain in the side

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Have you ever had surgery? What for?

This story takes place in April of 2014. At the time, under the Obama administration, they had established rules for healthcare that students could still be covered under their parents health insurance plans up to 25 years old. (I’m sure there was another stipulation but it escapes me right now.)

Unfortunately for me, I had just turned 26 a couple weeks prior.

It was a Friday evening and I noticed a pain in my right side. I thought it was just gas or something and I was just going to try and sleep through it. No matter how I lay in bed I couldn’t get comfortable enough to fall asleep. The pain got so bad that I decided to go to the Emergency Room.

It was late in the evening when they admitted me and I hadn’t messaged my family yet because I was waiting for lab results and scans. Eventually the doctor on duty came in and explained what the scans showed and why it took so long. It turned out that my appendix was in an unusual position. Normally, the human appendix hangs down, but mine was sort of tucked upwards behind the intestines, but once they found it they were able to diagnose that I had a case of appendicitis!

So, they booked me for surgery the following morning and the rest is basically history. Was in and out real quick, my parents came up that morning to help me pick up prescriptions and get home, and then I was recovering at home.

Simple daily habits of 2024

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What are your daily habits?

For the time being, as I’m working on consistency in various areas, my daily habits are fairly simple.

I take meds in the morning and evening. The morning meds I take when I get up for work (during the week) or I make sure I wake up to take them before going back to sleep on the weekends (I like to sleep in unless I have something important going on.)

I try to answer the daily writing prompt every single day, but some days I skip it and just post something relevant to what I had going on that day. Today should mark 257 days in a row of writing a post for my blog.

I’ve also been working on learning French through Duolingo, and with using the streak freezes (I’m not perfect and have missed plenty of days) I’m well over 400 days of doing that.

The last thing I’ll mention that is a daily habit of mine is some of the New York Times games. I almost always play Wordle and Connections, but occasionally the daily mini crossword as well.

That’s it for my consistent daily habits right now, but I have other things I need to work on that should be daily as well.

Living sustainably

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Are there things you try to practice daily to live a more sustainable lifestyle?

Personally, I don’t put in a lot of conscious effort into “sustainable living”, and maybe I could do more, but there are a few things I do habitually that likely fit the bill.

I’ve had the same metal water bottle for almost five years now and it goes with me everywhere. I use it everyday so that I don’t have to use too many cups or other drinking containers, at least when it comes to plain water.

I do try to be a little more aware of what I’m recycling, like making sure I’m not putting greasy cardboard in the bins.

I’ve also been trying to minimize my driving, but that’s moreso because of time consumption and not environmental resources/pollution. My car gets great gas mileage, so in the event I do have to travel a lot (like my recent trip back to Colorado, I hit an average between 40 and 50 miles per gallon) I can fill up less and therefore sort of pollute less.

Outside of those things, I can’t think of anything else off the top of my head that qualifies, but I know I could do more.

Something memorably delicious

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What’s the most delicious thing you’ve ever eaten?

As much as I like food, I can’t say I recall specific memories of eating something that was (in the moment) the most delicious thing I’ve ever eaten.

I’m a notorious sweet tooth, or at least I used to be, but I also love savory and herbaceous things. It’s hard to decide which direction to go because both sides offer different experiences, and even within those two flavor profiles you can have dramatically different styles. I’ve had some amazing stuffing/dressing on Thanksgiving. I’ve also had some amazing Tiramisu.

If I had to pick something, it would be something more nostalgic than anything. In that case, I would land on the breakfast burrito I loved growing up in Colorado. I recently went back and was able to have one for the first time in YEARS and it was just as good as I remembered it being even though they recently went through a change in ownership.

I wish I knew the secret recipe to those burritos. I might just have to go visit again and see if I can try to figure out the flavors and ingredients. Good thing I’m going back in the near future!

Wearing the same thing forever

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Daily writing prompt
If you were forced to wear one outfit over and over again, what would it be?
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If I really had no choice but to wear one outfit over and over again (except that I seem to be allowed to choose what the outfit is) then it would be fairly simple. Jeans and a t-shirt.

I don’t need anything fancy, and the prompt doesn’t say that I’m not allowed to wash the outfit in the event that it needs washing, so I’m not going to come up with some elaborate getup to be forced into forever.

Jeans are comfortable enough, socially acceptable, and fairly durable. A t-shirt is a fairly standard piece of clothing that can be worn anywhere (even a boardroom, as long as you’re the owner/president/CEO of the company) and the only thing I would actually be concerned with is what may or may not be on it for a design.

Maybe I’m approaching this prompt to simply, but that’s the way I’m going to run with it because I don’t see a need to make things unnecessarily complicated.

The importance of spirituality

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How important is spirituality in your life?

I have constant mixed feelings when it comes to spirituality, primarily because of how strongly it is tied to organized religions in today’s world.

There is nothing wrong with spirituality, let me make that point as clear as possible right now. Even as fairly UNreligious as I am, I do sense (from time to time) that there is SOMETHING out there. We just don’t have anything that can accurately measure or detect whatever it may be. (Looking at you Ghost Hunters…) The human body and mind is probably the most complicated and sophisticated “measuring device” we have in that regard, and even THAT doesn’t do anything for us because people can’t agree on anything nor can everyone do these things equally (if at all) which creates such inconsistent results.

Anyways, tangent is done, and all that being said, it’s not important to me on any fundamental level of how I live my life. The world keeps spinning, we all keep living our lives and doing things in the ways that we believe are best. That’s all we can do.

That’s my stance.

How I practice self-care

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How do you practice self-care?

Sometimes, I just go do my own thing. Reading a book, playing a single-player game without chatting to friends. Just disconnecting to get some quiet time, basically.

Like the last few days! I was maintaining my usual daily activities (Duolingo, daily writing prompt, some daily NYT games like Wordle) but otherwise didn’t answer messages most of the time. It helped that I traveled out of state to visit friends, which I did so by driving for roughly 10 hours one way while listening to video essays and educational materials related to science fiction and fantasy writing. Was in my own little world and not worrying about anyone else (except other drivers, obviously.)

Hope everyone had a great weekend!

Time wasting

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How do you waste the most time every day?

The older I get, the more I recognize that I’ve wasted time on so many things, and I can’t get it back.

That being said, sometimes you just can’t avoid it so you might as well embrace whatever it is you’re wasting time on. Like time spent in bed or the bathroom.

I love sleeping in, so much so that there are days I’ll sleep until noon or later. Although, I probably stayed up late the night before.

Time wasted in the bathroom is usually because I’m on my phone, but in those cases it’s possible I’m doing something productive as well. Any other time spent in the bathroom is fairly short, like showering. (I have what I believe to be a solid shower routine and can be done in less than ten minutes.)

Those are the most common things I do that are time spent in a way that is wasteful, but I’m sure there are other things I’m just not thinking about.

Childhood Nostalgia: Food Edition

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Daily writing prompt
Which food, when you eat it, instantly transports you to childhood?
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Growing up, my family was fortunate enough to have Schwan’s in the area. If you don’t know what that is, it’s a frozen food delivery service. They drive around in these utility type trucks decked out with coolers/freezers and emblazoned with company logos and art. You could either call them up and place an order or schedule a monthly or weekly stop where they come to your home, hand you a magazine of products for you to select from, and then give you whatever you want so long as it was on the truck. (It wasn’t cheap, mind you, but not exorbitantly expensive like today’s food delivery services that took over the gig work industry during and after the pandemic.) We didn’t order/buy from them very frequently because of the cost, but there were a select few items that we would get once or twice a year (I did say not very frequently) and those were a kind of highlight to my childhood, at least when it came to food.

The one item that would top the list of foods that transport me to my childhood, the thing I enjoyed most often from those Schwan’s trucks, was those little single-serve vanilla ice cream cups that had a swirl of strawberry. Those cups that come with the little wood spoon. I still see them around today, and have even had little flashbacks just from LOOKING at them.

It’s not like they were a staple food/dessert/treat of my childhood, but my family loved those little cups of frozen joy.