Monday, July 18, 2022

 Monday, July 18, 2022

 

  My leg did well whenever I got up during the night to pee, but it was a bit of a struggle walking Elsa in the morning. While my healing progressed faster than the last time I overdid it, it was not 100% yet. I just walked the dog far enough to do her business.

  I brought up the files I would need for my 9:30 appointment with the M & W sisters and sat down to meditate for an hour on the irritation I felt around others. I read that we all become more intolerant with reduced exposure to others. I saw good results after meditating. I responded much better in my tutoring session with the girls.  

     Going-into-second-grade M chose to work with the question exercise. As we worked, problems were exposed. She still had difficulty using the exact words in the sentence to answer questions in the In The Book section. We worked on decoding multisyllabic words today. It was a word she had heard and could use. Following the decoding rules produced a pronunciation slightly different from how the word is usually said. This is a problem for all English speakers when reading. We must use the context to figure out what the word is. M could not do this yet. I didn’t think she considered the need for it. 

  After the tutoring session, I had half an hour before my Reading & Writing Office hours. I completed the daily Wordle puzzle. I got ock all in green from my trial words in the last three slots, but I had seven choices for the first two letters. I did eenie-meanie-miny-moe and made a choice. While my choice wasn’t correct, it eliminated half of the remaining ones. I was lucky and hit it right for my next choice. 

  I called John, Jean’s, my Hanai sister’s husband, to wish him Happy Birthday. He was eighty-six today. An unfamiliar voice answered the phone. At first, I considered it might be Jean with a cold, but the rhythm of the voice was all wrong. Lisa laughed, sensing my confusion. She was visiting from Richmond to celebrate her dad’s birthday. Jean came on the phone to say they were sitting down for dinner. I told her I just wanted to sing Happy Birthday to John. She handed him the phone. I did the “Ross” version. John giggled.

   I did the NY Times Daily puzzle because I completed all the archived Mini puzzles for July back to 2014. I always hated doing crossword puzzles. When I saw Mike do one on his tablet and get immediate feedback if his letter choice was right or wrong, I thought, “Maybe, I can do this.” I do like it. I also could cheat in comforting ways. When I didn’t have a clue about a word, I tried all six vowel letters in every spot. That gave me information without my having to do it through Reveal. It was only me; I was cheating. No big deal. I did it as little as possible. I also didn’t force myself to deal with endless frustration. I was doing it for my amusement. It wasn’t an integrity issue. 

  I did BrainHQ, brain strengthening exercises, and Lingopie, a language learning program. The program teaches languages through exposure to TV series in the language. I was working on German, my ‘first’ language. I put first in quotes because I never learned to speak it well. Like most heritage speakers, I answered in English while I understood everything my parents said in German. Also, my parents didn’t use German to express complex thoughts, just those basic parental directions. The program does more than play videos. It provides subtitles in the learner’s native language and target language, the option of clicking on any word to get the definition or pronunciation, and pop quizzes.