Update for the Masses

So, it has come to my attention that I have not been updating this little blog of mine with enough frequency. Well, maybe, life has been a bit too busy for me, or maybe I just like getting emails from people that I don't hear from all that often.

Here is the scoop... I was all set up to be a teacher for the coming school year. A little district just south of where I live had a position open for a Setting III EBD teacher. They hired me the same day that I interviewed for the job. I was pretty excited to be a full time teacher again with my own room and all that nice stuff.

I spent first half of the summer finishing up the paper for the Readings class that I never finished in Nebraska. It was a lot writing the Master's paper again, except I knew better this time. I was very conscience of how I had done things and how to document what the outcomes were. I made a database and reports and cited a lot of other people for the knowledge that I read. I had two people proof read what I ended up submitting to my former advisor. It was such a relief to have that done and out of the way. I had plans for the rest of the summer to learn bit more about webpage stuff and database management. I was excited to get some of my curriculum on-line like some of the survey things that I have kids do on paper. It was slow going and I actually came up with a sketch of a web site that might actually do some good for teachers.

All of that was ground to a halt... Kim decided that we needed a dog. Not just any kind of dog, but a frickin' Puggle. A hybrid mix between a beagle and a pug that is against the laws of nature. This is the kind of designer dog that people breed to make money based on a fad and also gets a segment on "The Best Week Ever"( I saw it once on Youtube, but I could not find it). So, this dog entered our (my) life and has been an ever involved process of cleaning up poop and going for walks. This meant that I was now a dog trainer rather than a coding master with databases and web pages all hooked up together. Sit - followed by a treat and a rub - Off - followed by ignoring - Sit - followed by a treat and rub... and on and on it goes.

While all of that dog stuff was happening, I started my training for the new school that I would working at. Things started out with an OK training on the Individual Education Plan management system. It wasn't the same as EasyIEP that they used in the first school district, but it was close enough. There was a review of how to write goals and objectives. I got to meet some of the other new teachers for the district as well. Then came the train for the language arts curriculum. The district (special education department) paid for us and paid us to be sent to this training for Language! , a total package that hits literacy, sound symbol relationships, writing, composing, the whole picture for under achieving students. I had looked at this package while in Nebraska and I knew quite a bit about the research that went into it. The training was not so great, but the package was fine. The way it was all laid out really made it easy for a teacher to pick up and use. I guess the previous edition was very user-friendly. So, for an edition change to happen meant the research had been done and results were found to be good. At the end of the training, we were told that we would be using the previous edition. I about fell out of my chair. This was shortly followed by there will be no more curriculum purchased this year.

I didn't understand. Why were we sent to and paid for being a training for which we could not even use the material? This especially didn't make sense in a district that claimed they didn't have much in terms of resources. However, what really didn't sit well with me was the fact that we were trained to use one set of protocols and then told to use another while provided the same stated results. The researcher in me did like that at all. This was basically dismissing the research that had been done on the program. Basically, I figured out that I wanted to still be in school and not in the classroom for the sake of the benefits.

So, I resigned from the classroom teacher position and here I am substitute teaching again for now in my first district that I worked for while taking classes at the University of Minnesota - Twin Cities. I just talked to the person who will possibly be my adviser and things look good. Kim is finishing up her job and starting a new one shortly.

I am MrPeabody and I am finally getting back on track after a year.

But I want a movie and I want it now....

So last night, the wife and I were a little out of luck. The Netflix movies that we had to return were still in the place that we had set them to remember to mail them out. We don't really have a monstrous movie collection and we have seen most of the movies about a gazillion times and no less.

Fortunately, I had been lurking on Digg the previous night, which is what I usually do when I can't sleep, and found a link that told how to turn on the "Watch it Now" feature within Netflix. I was quite happy to see it and to try it out. The main draw back for me was in order for the feature to work, only Internet Explorer would work with it. I don't have WINE (the windows environment simulator) working because I use VMWare for the total emulation. So, I fired up VMWare with Windows XP. followed the simple steps and it worked. Within the VM environment it was fine for me to watch, but not so much for the two of us.

I shut my laptop and ran the VGA cable to my older DLP TV and there you have it. I did have to boot into my Windows side of the computer as I don't have a huge amount of space for the VMWindows. We ended up watching two movies that night, "Hell House" and "Clue." Both were fine in terms of quality. It did remind me of watching a friends copy that they had taped off cable from their top loading VCR. I just wish that their was a bigger selection of movies to work with, but I understand I did jump into the "Watch it Now" options before I was told officially that it was ready.

I am Mr. Peabody and I am trying to get the most out of what I already have.

Time + Opportunity = Change

Since the last posting, I have had a complete change of scene. My wife was unable to find any kind of work while in Nebraska. I was nearing the end of the summer term and we had to make a choice about moving. Living apart again wasn't really an option, but it was talked about. She did look at jobs close to where we were, but still nothing. It all came down to moving back to Minneapolis. She received some job offers up there and wasn't sure about it. We also found out that if one leaves a grant-funded position in the middle of the semester, that student (me) would have to pay the grant back.

So here we are back in Minneapolis. I have been keeping busy with substitute teaching and working on a paper that was due last summer. Kim now has a full-time job.

The transition back to teaching and working with jr. high and high school was not as hard as I thought it might be. I found that my background with emotional behavioral disorders and classroom management really helped out. Much like my transition from Windows to Linux, which has also happened over the course of these months. I have set-up a home server, so now Kim and I have automated back-ups running. I am not completely running solely on Linux, there are still a few things I need Windows for. All in all it has been good.

I am Mr. Peabody and I am embracing my inner tech-geek.

Time flies

So, it has been one academic year through this Doc program. One of the four of the orginal cohort has dropped out. I don't see that happening to the rest of us. The one that did drop out had been tagged as such since the beginning. The summer sessions start in a matter of hours. I have to take one computer class ( cruch all the numbers from the various databases that I created), one on-line special education law class, a readings class, and one of my cohorters and I are teaching a class this summer. It looks to be pretty busy.

My wife still is unable to find a job. That is a whole bunch of stress on us. It has been almost a year since she finished. I really don't know what to make of that. Is it her or is it just Nebraska or is it both? When this comes up as a point of discussion, the tension rises in the house and I end up sleeping on the couch.

My coffee roasting has come to a halt. I haven't really done much of it since classes started. It takes too long. I enjoy thing about doing it, but that doesn't get the caffiene boast that I need in the morning. I have also found that when I do use the popcorn popper to roast, I end up with flat tasting coffee. So, I buy coffee from the mill when I can and when we can afford it. Well, I need to get dressed for class.

I am Mr. Peabody and I headed off to become an SPSS master (the numbers will now bow down to me).

Working and Working some more

So, here I am. Sitting in a coffee shop yet again. This is pretty much all I do. I get up, eat, make coffee, and work. I have figureed out so much stuff since the last entry that I made back in Oct. I have started to actually make head way in to what it means to be a doctoral student. I am a little more confident in my answers than I was last semester. The out look right at the moment is good. I have a lot of work to do, but in a way it all comes together. Not like last semester all. I am so glad that is over. Well, back to reviewing articles.

I am MrPeabody and I just work and work and drink some coffee.

This life is very academic

So, it has been a while since I wrote anything down here. Well, that's what happens when your life suddenly turns into one of academic thinking and working. My pee-on status has been upped a little bit at school. Rather than only being one who is told what to do and maybe how and where to find what it is that one is supposed to do, I have now become the"go-to" pee-on. Now, I haven't officially been given the title or the plaque for my barren office, but I get asked all kinds of questions by my co-horters and sometimes even the professors. Apparently, what comes out of my mouth is something that makes sense to them or it is the answer that they want to hear. What I have determined is that since I keep regular office hours in my white-walled basement bat-cave, I am very easily found by anyone who wishes to access the information that can fall out of my mouth. The others tend to work elsewhere, either on campus or at home. Not that I have a problem with that, sometimes it would be nice to talk face to face with someone rather than through email.

I have taken on the task of understanding and creating databases. I had some experience with that last year when my dad and I (mostly my dad) worked on a gradebook program. Now I have two databases up and running for various information that I need to keep take of and make little reports for. This took so much time for me last week. I also felt like the biggest geek. I did take this geek percentage rating quiz like two weeks ago. I was 27.9% geek. For those that know me, it really should not be that surprising. So, given my new understood level of geekness, I was able to figure out and get the databases to what I wanted. Drawing from ones inner geek, can help out in a pinch. Kim took the geek test. She was called a poser and they didn't score her. She says she was being honest. I think she has a little bit more geek in her than she is willing to admit. Given that, she married a quarter geek. If we have any kids they will be at least 1/8th geek.

Well, today is Saturday and home game for the Cornhuskers. That means that after kickoff at 2:45, it is a perfect time to go grocery shopping.

I am Mr. Peabody and I am doing a great job of procrastinating.

Feeling kneedeep, but I should be over my head

Things are very much falling into the patterns of just bearly getting things done in time. I don't even feel like I hav etime to be doing this, but I would rather be writing this than revising a stupid paper for a stupid class. I have a really really pointless class called Science Writing. It is a complete waste of my time and engery and unfortunately it is a big part of time in classes. The premiss of the class was to help become a better writer through looking at the process of writing with a scientific basis. That sounds fine, but really the professor is focused on writing for the general public using a newspaper style of reporting. This very much plays down what I need in terms of writing for a educational research. It is very frustrating. This class will take up nothing but time and that is in very short supply at the moment. Aside from that class things are going very well.

I really like working on the research pieces that are being persued. This whole Wraparound Fidelity is very interesting to me. Taking a look at making sure what is said to be going on is actually going on. Holding people accountable for their actions is what it comes down to.

I also am now married. This is turning out to be a very good thing. Kim and I have had a few conversations about what are the differences and, really, are not too much. We had merged accounts and insurence companies prior. We just need to what on saying what we mean in ways that the other can really understand it, but I think that will always be the case. Communication is a piece that is always a "something we are working on." At least we are on the same page about working on it, so that we don't butt heads too often :). We do tend to find the humor in a lot of our miscommuncations, though. We did go to Target yesterday and to Peir 1. With all the gift cards and what not, we spent about $800, but ended up only paying $10 out of pockets. So, we have a new kitchen table and chairs, along with a wicker truck and assorted other pieces of decor. That was so much fun for me.

I am Mr. Peabody and I have a fudge bar colored TV room.