ekaterinn

Ello all; still not ded; have a meme (thanks to the lovely kat_lair):

Rules: List ten books that have stayed with you in some way. Don’t take but a few minutes, and don’t think too hard – they don’t have to be “right” or “great” works, just the ones that have touched you. Tag ten friends.

1. Among Others by Jo Walton. Utterly fantastic. Anyone who's ever loved sf/f or even just books in general should read this.

2. Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie. A book about a ship who's no longer a ship. It swept all the major sf awards in 2014, and deservedly so.

3. The Likeness, by Tana French. French uses beautiful prose to write mysteries with compelling characters - this book is about a favourite character, going undercover in unusual situation.

4. Brown Girl in the Ring, by Nalo Hopkinson. Magic, Toronto, and a wonderful narrator - what's not to love?

5. With Child, by Laurie R. King. One of her Kate Martinelli mysteries, less well-known than her Mary Russell novels - in this the lesbian detective takes on a missing child case. Kate is a joy and a cynical delight, always.

6. Good Omens, by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman. Angels, demons, witches, and an Anti-Christ who's not quite right, oh my!

7. Faking It, by Jennifer Crusie. Ultimate comfort read and funny as hell; would rec this to anybody looking for a fun book, whether or not they usually read romance.

8. Other People's Children, by Lisa Delpit. Central to any understanding I have about teaching students from different cultural backgrounds than my own.

9. Komarr, by Lois McMaster Bujold. Ekaterin and Miles, a mystery, past hurts, and future hopes.

10. Alanna: The Lioness Quartet, by Tamora Pierce. Gender play in fiction! Going undercover as a boy to become a knight! Alanna was, remains, and will ever be badass and fantastic.

Things I noticed: mostly fiction (and sf/f at that), mostly women (yay!), and mostly white (could be a lot more diverse). If you feel up to it, I'll love to see the list of anyone on my flist/dwcircle!

A list of happy things:

My mum and my sister visiting
My students, who are creative and loving and adorable
4.0 GPA
The book Pete the Cat Saves Christmas
Being totally done with my M.Ed.
Latest episodes of Welcome to Night Vale
Being almost done with the grant
Seeding the bookclub suggestion list with queer sci-fi books
The therapists and aides who work with my students - they're all amazing
Writing fic again (and writing fic with my best friend)
Lovely comments from people on LJ/DW
Only 4 more days left of school!

What's something happy in your life now?

is this thing on? *taps mic* Hey, I ain't ded! Also, I got a letter from my adviser that read in part:

"I am happy to inform you that you have passed the comprehensive examination required for the master's degree in special education."

I PASSED COMPS! I will soon be a MASTER of SPECIAL EDUCATION! *cackles evilly* *writes IEPs*

...shit, this means I need to start applying for PhD programs, right?

Happy Turkey Day to all Stateside on my flist! This has been a rather a tumultuous fall for me, and I have not been keeping up with either DW or LJ very well. In the last few months, I have: had a very rough start to the year, behavior and evaluation wise, broken up with my girlfriend of two years (a mutual decision, but still sad), been very sick with the Bavarian Death Flu, embarked on something new and exciting, but still a bit scary, with an old friend, submitted my first grant (a whole half-hour before the deadline!), taught (and wrote a curriculum for) RE, been taking two grad classes while working full time, and been missing my sister living with me.

Things have settled down some now, but I am gearing up for my winter holidays unit (Christmas, Hanukkah, and Kwanzaa), preparing for my second observation, hopefully buying presents and sending out cards, and, oh yeah, writing another grant, a final, and two IEPs.

I am very grateful to all of my friends, both online and off, this year!

One week into a new school year, and I'm already sick! This has to be some kind of fucking record. Luckily, when I went to the clinic this afternoon, they gave me a steroid shot and antibiotics, so I'm already feeling better. Which is a good thing, because two of my three grad classes start tomorrow, and I'm doing Extended Day for at least two afternoons this week. I can't afford to be sick!

New group of kids is interesting. I have more special ed kids this year, so the class as a whole is lower on average than last year. But I think they'll shake out to a good group, eventually. Quote of the week: One of the kids, on her return by the kindergarten teacher from sneaking off to the big kids' playground: "I want to go to the PARK!" *g*

I am going to try to post every week this fall; we'll see how it goes! For now, an old meme: Ask me a question, any question, and I'll answer it. ^_^

Happy Easter to those celebrate it and Happy Spring to all! I'm at my girlfriend's house in Maryland, having just seen her play handbells in the Easter service at her church. ^_^ I'm glad to be on spring break and hoping to get some writing done this week while marathoner452 is at work (besides the grant that's due May 2nd, grr).

I'm also happy because I got my hair cut shorter than usual last week by my hairdresser, who is an older Southern lady who took my coming out to her with nary a blink. It's a bit of a dyke haircut and I am very pleased:

( My new haircut! )

That was a bumper sticker I saw on a car in my church one day. It was the first thing I thought of when I saw this strip from xkcd:



I'm not searching out any news about the oil spill, because I'll just worry endlessly about something I can't do much about, though I do plan to see if I can volunteer with clean-up this summer. But I can't help reading the headlines of the newspapers I pass by, and I just know whenever BP says anything, they're lying out their ass. My mom used to describe Louisiana as more Caribbean then U.S. and I think she's right, both in the cultural sense and in how we're treated by the media and the government in the rest of U.S.

Still, I'll pay good money (to the Dems, natch) to watch James Carville ride an alligator. *g*

So for my birthday, one of the kindergarteners gave me a cold. AWESOME. I left work after ELA and slept for 7 hours. I think I'm going to eat ice cream and watch Bones. Year 28, you'll better be fucking amazing to make up for this, that's all I'm saying.

It's like somebody flipped a switch in the sky, and it's now seriously SPRING. It's warm out, and I'm wearing sandals and shorter skirts and no leggings! I'm seeing my students without coats for the first time in MONTHS. It feels hopeful, as if we might survive this long, hectic year.

I went to a crawfish boil today, a sure sign of spring in Louisiana. Good food, good people. I'm also looking forward to spending spring break with marathoner452 in Maryland in a couple of weeks. I'm planning on walking more, and eating more salads with spring greens.

I'll be also interested in hearing what everybody's favourite things about spring are, if y'all want to share!

I had a really good birthday today! I went with a whole bunch of my 2nd grade students on a field trip to the swamp. They loved it and they were awesome - well-behaved, willing to touch the snakes and explore during the animal presentation. Also, a lot of them sang me "Happy Birthday", and I got a few cards, presents, and even a balloon from a parent.

After school, I got strawberry CAKE at Girls' Night. Lots of birthday wishes from lots of people, a lovely message from my sister (yes, do call back tomorrow!), and a funny card from my mom.

I'm exhausted, but full of YAY.