Friday, November 29, 2024
Today was my friend Carol’s birthday. I spoke to her a week ago. We usually don’t talk that frequently, but today was special. I said, “Are you ready?” She paused a minute, confused, and then laughed. Was she prepared for my Happy Birthday song?
Mike couldn’t sing to save his life. We created a happy birthday song that accommodated his limitations. It’s different each time we sing it. Some beg me not to sing it to them; some call me for the pleasure of hearing whatever rendition I create for them should I forget to call them. When Mike was alive, he did his version, and I did mine- simultaneously. It’s just me alone now, but I want to maintain the tradition. I also love doing it.
Carol and I chatted for a while. She and her husband, John, were going out for dinner to a new restaurant recommended by a friend. The following night, they were going to a potluck dinner with friends Carol made through an exercise class, which developed into a hiking group, which evolved into a friendship group, including activities like dinners with husbands and attending entertainment events like plays and concerts. It sounds great.
I contacted Eli, a gardener, to tell him Margo delivered the forty-two plants. When could he come to plant them? He said Friday. When he didn’t show, I asked for another date. Saturday. In anticipation of his coming, I needed to unwind the drip hose. I asked Yvette for help. We unspooled something like 300 feet of hose. When Yvette and I finished the hose task, I went back to trimming the plumbago from my neighbor’s fence, creating a path to get in there easily in the future. I did most of the work by hand. The branches were too thick for the hedge trimmer.
Trimming the hedge was time-consuming but not dangerous, except for one incident. I stepped on a short branch that went right through the sole of my Oofos. At first, I thought it went into my foot. Would I need a tetanus shot? When I checked it, I found no broken skin. I put on Makes No Claims (Intrasound gel) on it. I didn’t even have a bruise.
I worked with the twins. Twin A is mentally lazy. For that matter, many of the students I work with are. If the answer doesn’t come to mind automatically, their response is, “ I don’t know.” They make no effort to figure it out. Today, I forced her to figure out what the last sound in Africa was, the schwa. I told her the session would end when she gave me the sound. She figured it out.
I worked on phonemic analysis with Twin A, but I haven’t been doing that with Twin E. She’s working on a third-grade level, while Twin A is working on a fifth-grade level with a lot of support. I chose the more advanced level for her because her automatic recall of one—and two-syllable words is pretty good. She reads those with fluency.
I developed the phonemic awareness approach to teach phonics, but even I will resort to traditional approaches to teaching reading. I recently increased my use of my method. I found it surprisingly effective. Students improve rapidly, even the slowest students. Duh!
A few weeks ago, I organized my updates by the year. I created Blog Book 2019 and 2020. I was inspired to do so because of what happened to one of my blog sites. Somehow, I wound up with two. One is called “Mike’s Death; Betty’s Life,” and the other, “With Mike; Without Mike.” The latter was the one I maintained. I didn’t even know about the other’s existence until I came upon it by accident. I usually accessed the blog site through Chrome. One day, I accessed it through Safari. What do you know! They were two different blog sites.
The one through Safari had all the early entries starting in January 2019, when Mike collapsed and was flown to Oahu to spend the next five weeks in and out of the ICU until he died. The one I had been maintaining was Chrome. It had 104, 640 hits. It would get 100 hits a day. I think English language teachers discovered it and assigned it to their students. Then, one day, everyone disappeared, and it had zero hits, day after day. I have no idea what happened. I assume it was a technical glitch.
Meanwhile, the blog site on Safari that I hadn’t maintained kept getting hits. It had over 60,000 without any new input from me. I started adding to that site. Since the last entry was in 2020, I had a lot of catching up to do.
Judy recommended that I publish the journal entries on Amazon, a book for each year. With that thought in mind, I organized the entries by the year, saved them, and did nothing for a while. Then, when I went to look for them on the computer, entering Blog Book 2019 in the search bar and got nothing. That was alarming. The other day, I entered 2019. Bingo! Up it came. Phew! On the other hand, I can’t imagine that I will go so far as to publish the journal entries through Amazon., but I abandoned the Chrome site and started updating the one on Safari.
Darby walked with Elsa and me tonight as she does many nights. We marveled at the beauty of the night sky. We often feel awe living here. The views of the ocean and the mountain against the sky are ever-changing. Mike and I would sometimes applaud the view of the setting sun over the ocean. The cloud formations and the sunlight make the difference between one night, one minute, and the next.
I recall a Princeton professor saying how his wife wanted to buy a house on the lake. He objected, arguing it wouldn’t be worth the money. She had her way. He changed his mind, saying the view was different every day. Nature is truly a marvel.
Friday, November 29, 2024
Today was my friend Carol’s birthday. I spoke to her a week ago. We usually don’t talk that frequently, but today was special. I said, “Are you ready?” She paused a minute, confused, and then laughed. Was she prepared for my Happy Birthday song?
Mike couldn’t sing to save his life. We created a happy birthday song that accommodated his limitations. It’s different each time we sing it. Some beg me not to sing it to them; some call me for the pleasure of hearing whatever rendition I create for them should I forget to call them. When Mike was alive, he did his version, and I did mine- simultaneously. It’s just me alone now, but I want to maintain the tradition. I also love doing it.
Carol and I chatted for a while. She and her husband, John, were going out for dinner to a new restaurant recommended by a friend. The following night, they were going to a potluck dinner with friends Carol made through an exercise class, which developed into a hiking group, which evolved into a friendship group, including activities like dinners with husbands and attending entertainment events like plays and concerts. It sounds great.
I contacted Eli, a gardener, to tell him Margo delivered the forty-two plants. When could he come to plant them? He said Friday. When he didn’t show, I asked for another date. Saturday. In anticipation of his coming, I needed to unwind the drip hose. I asked Yvette for help. We unspooled something like 300 feet of hose. When Yvette and I finished the hose task, I went back to trimming the plumbago from my neighbor’s fence, creating a path to get in there easily in the future. I did most of the work by hand. The branches were too thick for the hedge trimmer.
Trimming the hedge was time-consuming but not dangerous, except for one incident. I stepped on a short branch that went right through the sole of my Oofos. At first, I thought it went into my foot. Would I need a tetanus shot? When I checked it, I found no broken skin. I put on Makes No Claims (Intrasound gel) on it. I didn’t even have a bruise.
I worked with the twins. Twin A is mentally lazy. For that matter, many of the students I work with are. If the answer doesn’t come to mind automatically, their response is, “ I don’t know.” They make no effort to figure it out. Today, I forced her to figure out what the last sound in Africa was, the schwa. I told her the session would end when she gave me the sound. She figured it out.
I worked on phonemic analysis with Twin A, but I haven’t been doing that with Twin E. She’s working on a third-grade level, while Twin A is working on a fifth-grade level with a lot of support. I chose the more advanced level for her because her automatic recall of one—and two-syllable words is pretty good. She reads those with fluency.
I developed the phonemic awareness approach to teach phonics, but even I will resort to traditional approaches to teaching reading. I recently increased my use of my method. I found it surprisingly effective. Students improve rapidly, even the slowest students. Duh!
A few weeks ago, I organized my updates by the year. I created Blog Book 2019 and 2020. I was inspired to do so because of what happened to one of my blog sites. Somehow, I wound up with two. One is called “Mike’s Death; Betty’s Life,” and the other, “With Mike; Without Mike.” The latter was the one I maintained. I didn’t even know about the other’s existence until I came upon it by accident. I usually accessed the blog site through Chrome. One day, I accessed it through SaJfari. What do you know! They were two different blog sites.
The one through Safari had all the early entries starting in January 2019, when Mike collapsed and was flown to Oahu to spend the next five weeks in and out of the ICU until he died. The one I had been maintaining was Chrome. It had 104, 640 hits. It would get 100 hits a day. I think English language teachers discovered it and assigned it to their students. Then, one day, everyone disappeared, and it had zero hits, day after day. I have no idea what happened. I assume it was a technical glitch.
Meanwhile, the blog site on Safari that I hadn’t maintained kept getting hits. It had over 60,000 without any new input from me. I started adding to that site. Since the last entry was in 2020, I had a lot of catching up to do.
Judy recommended that I publish the journal entries on Amazon, a book for each year. With that thought in mind, I organized the entries by the year, saved them, and did nothing for a while. Then, when I went to look for them on the computer, entering Blog Book 2019 in the search bar and got nothing. That was alarming. The other day, I entered 2019. Bingo! Up it came. Phew! On the other hand, I can’t imagine that I will go so far as to publish the journal entries through Amazon., but I abandoned the Chrome site and started updating the one on Safari.
Darby walked with Elsa and me tonight as she does many nights. We marveled at the beauty of the night sky. We often feel awe living here. The views of the ocean and the mountain against the sky are ever-changing. Mike and I would sometimes applaud the view of the setting sun over the ocean. The cloud formations and the sunlight make the difference between one night, one minute, and the next.
I recall a Princeton professor saying how his wife wanted to buy a house on the lake. He objected, arguing it wouldn’t be worth the money. She had her way. He changed his mind, saying the view was different every day. Nature is truly a marvel.
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