Requiscat in Pace

My good friend P died the other day. She was up in years but you'd never know; she was a tiny bundle of energy. I hadn't seen her in months, as she had a stroke while visiting her daughter in the South last May, and never got well enough for her husband to bring her back home. I was hoping that, with the move back to HomeCity, I'd get to see her, even in a nursing home--but that was not to be.

She was my first mentor, incredibly supportive and encouraging. She came to my PhD graduation and I think she was just as bust-your-buttons proud as my parents were. She loved it when we visited her, and got a huge kick out of my kids.

I will miss her.

Isabelle's Daughter

One of my many hobbies is genealogy. I've gotten quite far in my dad's lines, going back to the 1600's and sometimes beyond that.

My mother, though, is a different matter. She was adopted as an infant, and we knew only a few facts about her birth and her biological family. I've searched before for her father and mother, with no results.

Until Saturday night.

On a whim, while simultaneously watching my hockey team play and noodling around on Ancestry.com, I idly typed in my grandmother's name and pressed "Search all records."

Up popped the 1930 census, and there she was--with her father and mother and younger brother. I knew it was her, because her mother's name was the same as my mom's birth name. I was floored. After all this time, after all those searches, I had found her.

But of course, I couldn't just call my mom and tell her this news on the phone. I had to WAIT until I saw her in person. FOUR AGONIZING DAYS. But during that time, I found out lots of other things, including the amazing fact that her maternal grandfather worked for a time on a farm. That farm belonged to my dad's sister-in-law's family. As my friend Robert would say, worlds within worlds.

So on Tuesday I sent my mom an e-mail and told her to stay up until I got back from class, that I had something important to show her. When I got to my parents' house, I made her sit down and then I simply said, "I have found your parents."

She cried.

Student funny

In one of my classes, I have students design an experiment to optimize the range of a model trebuchet. Usually I have them try for the longest distance, but this year they got to besiege a castle.

When Youngest Daughter went to England last summer, she bought me a cardboard castle that is sturdy enough to withstand the barrage of projectiles from a tabletop siege engine. I took it to class and the students had so much fun that they didn't want to go home.

So, when the experiment was over, they had to analyze the data and write up their results in a report. Team Two's lab report had an opening paragraph so delightful I had to share:

"The tiny invisible residents of the little white castle have been irritating the professor of the Design of Experiments class. The members of this team have come to the good professor's aid by laying siege to the castle...the objective is to drop two or more missiles into the courtyard of the castle to show the residents what to expect if they fail to 'toe the line'...

Godspeed, Best Friend

My best friend is heading to Iraq tomorrow night for a year's stint, helping the Iraqi courts and working on their elections.

My initial reaction was cautiously jealous; after all, who wants to send their best friend to a war zone? But on the other hand, what an opportunity--and for those of us unfit for the military but who love our country (no "global citizens" here, we are proudly and firstly Americans), what a chance to serve her.

We went down to see BF last month to spend some time, and more importantly, to anoint her and pray specifically for this mission. As devout Christians, we believe beyond the shadow of a doubt that God is in this assignment, and that He has a purpose for BF in Iraq and those of us at home.

So, while I will miss BF tremendously, I am also tremendously proud of her for taking on this challenge and trusting God's direction. We are hoping that my yearly teaching stint in Kosova will coincide with her every-three-month furloughs. That's in God's hands as well.

Travel safe, BF. We are praying daily for you and for your work. I am looking forward to having lots of tea and gingersnaps together when you get home.

I make grown boys cry, Part Deux

So the Vomiter is still sick apparently. No news on Fever Dude.

I got this response from a friend to my post:

---

I think it is time for you to contact the CDC and alert them to your test schedule. Clearly there is a public health risk from such illness-inducing examinations that produce high fevers and vomiting, and immediate recovery the next day. No wonder people weep to be in that environment. I believe the virus that causes this illness is called the H9N10-- the Holy crap! I have No chance of passing virus.

I laughed so hard I thought I'd cry.

I make grown boys cry, and other tales of woe

So. It's Week Five, and that means midterms.

I teach this fun little two-credit course that has 20 students in it from mostly non-engineering majors (which was a surprise to me, I figured I'd have all engineering nerds in it). Tonight was the open-notes midterm. One student, who missed the first two weeks of class to go to football camp (our school has no football team, go figure) and thoughtfully let me know AFTER he'd missed class, supplying me with his cell phone number so I could call him up and fill him in on all the fun stuff we'd done--well, he took sick a couple hours before the exam and sent me a message. He said he'd been vomiting all day but he thinks he'll be well enough to take the test tomorrow.

Another slacker dude who still owes me the project proposal that was due last week caught a fever an hour before class. He thinks his 100 degree fever will be all better by noon tomorrow.

The third little snowflake was out getting a new Mohawk haircut and skateboarding with friends at a soon-to-be-demolished apartment complex on campus. He didn't remember there was an exam until half an hour after class had started. He also didn't remember that it was open notes.

He cried through the first ten questions, looking at me pitifully as he wept, hoping in vain that his noisy gulps of sorrow would move me to have compassion on his snowflakitude. That Mohawk sure makes him LOOK like a mean dude, but hey. Give him a couple questions about gastraphetes and man, he'll dissolve into a puddle of tears faster than you can say "half-pipe".

Actually, he's a nice kid and he hung around after everyone else had gone so I could assure him that no, the midterm was not worth 40% of his grade and he'd survive this fiasco.

Where have I been?

Goodness! Such a long time between posts.

Well. I've been busy. Driving back and forth to HomeCity and UniTown, packing up and cleaning the condo, cleaning up the HomeCity house, working--it's been a tough September.

I turned in the condo keys yesterday. Fingers crossed on getting the security deposit back! With Eldest Daughter still out of work, I need the money. Most everything is moved back to HomeCity, except for some leftovers sitting in the parental units' garage.

Tomorrow Mom and I head to the City Too Very Far Away to spend the weekend with ED making apple butter. Should be lots of fun! We have apples and jars and books for ED to sell on Amazon, and the inevitable computer packed with work to do over the weekend. Ugh. I wanted to get on the road by 9 a.m., but couldn't get out of a noon meeting so we won't start until about 1 p.m. Pewp.

As part of the cleanup going on in the HomeCity house, I've been pulling out all the kids' stuffed animals and taking photos of them. Then I send the photos to all three so they can decide which animals stay and which go. Sometimes there's a surprise addition to the picture...

The general consensus was that the cat on the left could stay, all the rest had to go.