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Chicken Monday: 6/29/09

School is kicking my butt this semester, and as such I have nothing truly new for today's Chicken Monday. However, I've got something funny: the video I took while Pixie was here in June. Enjoy!

Again, from my front porch

Look what's on my porch THIS morning! He's three months old or thereabouts; came running from down and across the street when I called the outdoor cats to breakfast. Very big purr, this one, and super-friendly.

And yes, he's from a different litter than the kittehs who showed up Friday—this guy's half again their size, knows how to purr, and is very people-oriented. He's also eaten up with fleas and ear mites. I dusted him with diatomaceous earth, and enjoyed watching the fleas die as their exoskeletons were shredded to bits. Heh-heh.

From Chuck E. Cheese's

Mom's thrilled to be at Chuck E. Cheese's for my stepbrother's little girl's 4th birthday party. Really. She's beside herself with joy.

I met Mom and Steve at Chuck E. Cheese after spending most of the day at D2U, working on the podcast-based lecture for my online country music class. Most of the evening was spent in hilarious conversation with them and with my stepbrother and stepsister-in-law.

ME: My God, this place is awful.
MOM: Yeah, it is.
ME: It's great if you're a little kid, but—I mean, my brain's about to run out my ear.

After a while, though, I adjusted to the corny animatronics and overwhelming din of shrieking children and video games, and started looking for ways to liven things up for the grown-ups. Well, for Mom, El Seebeno, and myself, anyway.

ME: Okay, so—so Chuck E.'s a mouse...
MOM: Right.
ME: And this duck-thing, I guess that's the token girl in the Make-Believe Band...
MOM: Right.
ME: And—wait. There's a one-eyed, one-horned flying purple people eater on keyboards, a Grandpa Jones-looking hound dog on guitar, and a pizzeria owner on drums.
MOM: And a talking TV camera. And a talking moon made out of Sculpey.
ME: God help us.
MOM: I think that duck-girl-thing dyes her hair.
ME: Mom. Ducks don't have hair.
MOM: Look at her up there, and then on the video screen. It's white with black ends here, but bright yellow in the video.
ME: It's a feather boa, Mom. Ten bucks at Michaels.
MOM: Wonder if the carpet matches the drapes?

*****

ME: That's it.
MOM: What?
ME: I'm having my birthday party here.
MOM: [gives me a look like the one above]
ME: C'mon, it'd be fun!
MOM: Jesus.
ME: For real, Mom! It's been done before.
MOM: [sarcastically] Who would you invite to your Chuck E. Cheese Grown-Up Birthday Party?
ME: Umm...well, Clint and Carol, umm...Linda-Lou and her husband...and Lois and Roger...
MOM: And the Colonel?
ME: Well, yeah.
MOM: Seeben, do they sell beer here?
STEVE: Umm, they used to.
MOM: [to me] If they don't serve beer, the Colonel ain't comin'.

*****

ME: Okay, so...we'll get a bunch of grown-ups to come to my Chuck E. Cheese party, but they'll leave the kids at home—
MOM: You really think people's kids are going to let them go to Chuck E. Cheese's while they stay at Grandma's. HAAAA!

*****

MOM: Do you honest-to-God want your birthday party here?
ME: Well, it'd be out of the ordinary.
MOM: That's for damn sure.
ME: Okay, tell ya what. We'll all come to Chuck E. Cheese's for my birthday party, and have pizza and cupcakes, and we'll sneak in some Jack Daniel's in flasks—
MOM: [again giving me The Look]
ME: —and then once I'm good and liquored up, I'll hop up on one of these tables and start stripping, liven this place up a little—
MOM: [same Look]
ME: And then— [grabbing a strip of El Seebeno's Skee Ball prize tickets; running them back and forth between my legs]
MOM: Were they out of TP in the bathroom?
ME: No, that's the stripper-taking-off-her-thong-all-sexy thing.
MOM: Whatever suits ya.
ME: And then we'll get thrown out and won't have to pay for my birthday party!
MOM: [gesturing to middle of room at support post] And look, there's your stripper pole right there.

From my front porch

Well, well! Look what was on my front porch at 6:45am, with four siblings nearby, and Mama watching from the driveway!

Student Essay Insanity #60!

It's been a long time since the last Student Essay Insanity, mostly because I've not been teaching. Sorry, folks. But now that we're at the end of the second week of Summer Term, I have a few gems to share. Of course, these are real bloopers, from real college students, and they're real(ly) bad. I shit you not.

From my Georgia Regents' Exam writing class:

Propose a model sex education program.
In today's world many Americans are having sex, whether it be at an early age, before marriage, or just as a job.

How does your public image differ from your private self? Explain.
On outside I am a phosphorus outgoing guy.

From Division II University's Freshman Writing Improvement Project:

--The thought of natural resources being null and void is terrifying to me.

--We live in a society that is disposable.

--I also had to search hard to find Israel on the map even though it is a highly spoken of place.

Mah kittehs need a wheel, too.

Maybe the Colonel can have one fabricated for me?

Okay, fine. I have now seen it all.

What do students need to know about country music?

This summer finds me teaching my country music course online at Division II University. While I've taught English online before—and believe me, that's something I'll probably never do again—this is the first online class where I've looked forward to putting together lectures and podcasts.

But this summer's group is different from the awesomely crazy students of the very first class. Many of these folks don't know much about country music, but had thought that my class sounded like an interesting way to earn three hours' worth of elective credits. The current students have been great so far, and have let me know which materials work well and which don't. They've also had a lot of questions about content. I'm sharing my iTunes playlist with my students; I have about 150 songs in the course playlist, as of this writing. We have an online chat/lecture twice a week; I also post at least one 30-minute lecture about the week's readings. The lecture notes are posted as well, with some active links so students can see for themselves the performers I'm discussing. There's a weekly test over the readings, and later in the term we'll get to some research projects.

If you were taking a "Survey of Country Music" college course, what kinds of things would you want to know? Or if you were teaching it, what do you think would be most important for the class to know?

Chicken Monday: 6/22/09

From the back porch

Here's a brief Pupdate. Is this the same pitiful puppeh the Colonel rescued a month ago?!?

HAPPY FATHERS' DAY 2009!!!

Photo from I Can Has Cheezburger?

In the words of El Seebeno, HAPPY FUCKIN' FATHERS' DAY to all you dads out there! I hope you have the best goddamn Fathers' Day in the whole universe! I'm extremely happy and fortunate to have Steve as my stepdad...and to have had Newton B. Goode III as my dad.

It's a very low-key Fathers' Day Weekend here at the Happy Kitten Cottage. Last night, I joined Mom and Steve for steaks on the grill; they'd spent most of the day building a chicken pen in my backyard (lots of great pictures to post). They'll be stopping by here on their way to visit my stepbrother, Clint, who has recently been declared cancer-free after a very scary bout with testicular cancer. Clint is dad to an adorable four-year-old girl, so this is a joyous Fathers' Day for us all.

The Best Goddamn Dress in the Whole Universe

In this post, I explained how an oft-used family phrase got its start. You may want to go back and review before reading on.

Mom's sewing skills are beyond awesome. Pixie and I are very fortunate to have a Mom who sews; we have the. coolest. clothes. and get many, many compliments on them. But there's one dress that has topped them all.

The fabric below, called Loteria and produced by Alexander Henry, was on eQuilter last year. And it gave me fits.


So I bought almost six yards of it. Not that I knew what the hell to do with it, but I got the fabric while I still could—it was selling out fast.

Then I remembered I'd seen this reprint of a 1952 Butterick classic, and bought it. I asked Mom whether she thought she could make this dress with the Loteria fabric.

I know you're having some serious Pattern WANT, so here's the link. A testament to how awesome this dress is: the pattern's still in print 55 years later.

"I dunno," Mom sighed. "That fabric's gonna be a bitch to match."

And then she got to work.

A couple weeks later, she arrived at my house unexpectedly one afternoon. "Got your Mexican tarot dress almost ready. You need to try it on and be sure the hem's right." So I tried it on...


Front view, skirt hanging as it should
(Yes, I PhotoShopped green bell peppers over my face.)


Front view with skirt spread out


Back view with skirt spread out

"Mom," I said when I regained my composure, "this is the best goddamn dress in the whole universe."

Since then, Pixie and I have had Mom make the dress in four or five other colorways, and every time the result is absolutely stunning. It's easy to put on—just slip your head through the neck, one button in back, and three up front in the overskirt, and you're done. Once Mom got the hang of the pattern, she could finish one in a couple days. It camouflages bulgy waists and large hips, and comes in sizes up to 24.

And yes, Mom would certainly make one for you.

Another kitteo from Joy

I feel like a phony posting videos instead of real blog content, but they're all I've got right now. Well, and y'all tend to like them, too.

Joy, however, is another story.

Chicken Monday: 6/15/09

Today is the start of Summer Term classes, which of course finds me running around like a headless...well, you know.

Here's chikin video taken while my sister was in town a couple weeks ago.

Pupdate: Video from the road

I took this video during my and Lucky's trip to Nashville; we stopped a couple hours north of Birmingham so both of us could pee and stretch our legs. He's a great little traveling companion. Remember that this video was taken before the vet discovered he had a huge abscess in his abdomen, and before his second round of ivermectin injections (for scabies, aka "the mange"). You'll see how much better the little fella looks when I post new pix and video.

Pupdate: Bath time

Here's a video I took while my sister was in town a couple weeks ago. I'm filming, and she's bathing this angelic little dog.

Home safely, kthx.

I arrived at the Happy Kitten Cottage at 9:35pm, and the kittehs were acting as if they'd just been rescued from Andersonville—oh, the horror. Lucky was at Mom's house (she picked him up from the vet this afternoon), and he was overjoyed to see Mama, as this Mama was her doggie.

More trip details tomorrow. I'm beyond tired.

From southern Indiana

Greetings from French Lick, Indiana, hometown of basketball great Larry Bird. I might've had a Bird sighting on the outskirts of town, but can't be 100% sure.

From a Nashville parking lot

On a bumper in Nashville, TN. This is the heart of why I do what I do, even if the "kids" I teach are technically adults. AP Rocks! Comp I & II Rock!

Maybe it's not a train!

Hopefully, the AP English Lit exam will be finished on time—as of yesterday afternoon, we were actually running out of essays to grade, and the officials calculated that we were approximately 75% of the way to being completely done with 346,000-plus essays. You read that correctly: 346,000-plus. Three hundred and forty-six thousand essays.

This group of 1,100 high school and college English teachers? We're earning our paychecks, by God.

Better than it used to be

I've been here in Louisville at AP grading for six-and-a-half days now, and I've begun to miss my critters. And I mean seriously miss my critters. Then again, it could be the very strong Irish-Kentucky Coffee talking. I dunno.

When the Colonel lived in Nashville, I'd go visit him once a month or so, maybe arriving on a Thursday after, and would leave Sunday afternoon/early evening. By Saturday night, the Kitteh WANT would begin creeping in. Everywhere we'd go, I could find something having to do with cats. The Parthenon, Tootsie's Orchid Lounge, Titans Stadium, Harpeth River State Park, wherever. If a poor hapless stray kitteh happened across my path, it would get loved on. Or I would attempt to smother it in my inordinate love for beings with four legs and triangle-shaped ears who happen to say meow. "Oh, God. A kitteh," the Colonel would sigh, and I'd be off across the parking lot.

But this time, I've done a little better. Lucky's being cared for by Dr. Sam* and staff—when I called yesterday, they said he was bright-eyed, playful, and eating well. Mom called to say both my indoor and outdoor kittehs are doing well, as are the chickens. So I feel good knowing they're in good hands with Mom and Lois looking after them every day.

Maybe I can hold out until I get home Friday evening. Then again, maybe I need another drink.

From another AP Lunch

This AP Lunch brownie was filled with chocolate chunks. I took one tiny bite, then could bear no more. Because brownies should either be plain, or have nuts in them. The chocolate belongs in the cakey part—NOT as big, obnoxious chunks interfering with the lovely texture of the brownie, as my sister and some other crazy people seem to think.

Chicken Monday: 6/8/09

I can't seem to get videos to upload to YouTube from the English Department's slow laptop, so I give you a chikin video repeat. Fresh videos to come for next week's Chicken Monday, though.

Still grading.

Today at AP grading, I completed around 150 essays, which is pretty fast for me. While I do a lot of rating standardized essay exams, this one is the most high-stakes exam, and I want to be sure I'm fair to each student.

I wish I had more to post, like the awesome pictures of Louisville that I've taken, but this slow computer makes it awfully difficult to put together interesting stuff. The connection speed (not completely the laptop's fault) makes it impossible to post any new videos to YouTube, and the tiny flat keyboard and touch-pad excuse for a mouse make typing and highlighting really difficult to do with any accuracy or speed. I hope to transfer a few files to my USB drive in the morning and perhaps use the AP computer room to upload a video or two.

You are awesome readers. Thanks for checking E&P—more exciting stuff will be up as soon as I can manage it.

Pupdate

Many of you have been asking for an update on Lucky, and I'm very glad to tell you that he's doing much, much better since the Colonel first picked him up out of the middle of the road. His scabies (also known as "the mange") is 85% cleared up; he got his second shot of ivermectin on Tuesday. The swelling in his abdomen was partly due to my overfeeding him (yeah, I know, imagine that), and partly due to some large abscesses. Dr. Sam* put Lucky on a twice-a-day regimen of strong antibiotics—thankfully, he's pretty easy to medicate.

The first week or ten days found Lucky sad in both appearance and demeanor. You remember the pictures—he was in awful shape and probably didn't have much longer to live when the Colonel happened upon him. But now that the meds are in his system and he's feeling better, he's turning into a real puppy: sniffing at whatever crosses his path (including kittehs, and I hope to get a couple puppeh-kitteh showdowns on video), leaping and bounding after me when he goes outside to pee, whining when I disappear from his sight, and looking clear-eyed and happy when we spend time together. I never thought I'd enjoy a dog's company, but here I am, looking forward to going home at the end of next week and seeing him again. (Don't tell the kittehs about any of this.)

Lucky is spending the week at Dr. Sam's* boarding facility; the Colonel still can't foster the little fellow, and he needs someone to give him serious meds twice a day. I told the vet techs to be sure to pet him good, because I didn't want him thinking he'd been thrown out once more. Maybe he'll remember m e and be glad to see me.

Off to bed. This AP grading thing is kicking my ass. More news tomorrow, and maybe some pictures.

From a dismal AP meal

My sister thinks brownies, like these from AP Lunch, should contain chocolate chunks. My sister would be wrong.

From the Kentucky International Convention Center

The AP Breakfast: It ain't Mom's home cooking, but it's pretty good.

Many things to tell you

Okay, I'm finally back in semi-blogging mode and can slow down long enough to post again and tell you all about the wonderful adventures I've been having lately. Lucky, Pixie, and the AP English Lit Exam are awesome.

Pixie and I had a fantastic time, and I was sorry to see her go. Lucky seemed to enjoy getting to know his new aunt; he had already bonded with his foster mama and grandmommy. He's doing much, much better now that he's had his second scabies (mange) shot and is nearing the end of his first round of anti-abscess medicine. He's turning into a real dog now, complete with barking, growling, scampering, and being silly.

I arrived in Louisville, Kentucky, late last night to begin a week-long working vacation as an AP English Lit Exam reader. Today's grading went really well, and I'll have much to explain about it in the coming days.

I don't know exactly when new posts will be up, but I can guarantee at least a little something Saturday evening and Sunday evening at the latest.

Sorry for the lack of posts

Folks, I'm exhausted and getting ready to leave for Louisville, Kentucky, this afternoon—I apologize for how little I've posted. Everything's okay, though, and I have a lot to tell you. I'm taking a laptop with me on the trip, so I should have some new material up in a day or two.