Kenny Smith | A remarkable thing happens …

Libraries and books and classes and things

So let us reset the scene. We have moved through Christmas. Everyone has returned home. No one knows what day it is. My grading is done. Final grades have been submitted. I have turned my mind fully to spring classes.

Fully is probably overstating it. But I’m working on stuff. One class is all but done. Twenty percent of the new class is done. Soon enough that one will become a sole focus.

Also, I want to go to the local small town library. I’d like to explain the library situation to you. We live in an unincorporated community. The small town next to us has a library that you might categorize as, “cute.” It’s staffed entirely by volunteers. It is open 26 hours a week — 20 in the summer.

In the county seat, over in the other direction, there’s a “Free Library.” That’s in the name. And it’s free if you live in the city. If you live in the county, as I do, that costs $15 a year. The free library is slightly better appointed than the cute library.

In the next county, where campus is, there is of course the campus library — currently under renovation. And there’s a library system, six branches of varying size, I’m sure. If I want to join that library, because I don’t live in the county, I could pay $100 a year for a membership.

But!

That larger library system is a member of consortium of 22 libraries and systems. If you’re a member of one of those, you have privileges at the larger system.

My cute library is not a part of that consortium.

You know, being out in the country has it’s benefits and its drawbacks. As I have documented, for the first year we were here we didn’t have garbage pickup. We don’t have road clearing. Somehow, the library thing is the one that annoys me.

None of this makes any sense, none of it matters, because there’s always the ILL, the Interlibrary Loan system.

Interlibrary Loan is a miraculous system. You simply find a title somewhere that you want, that’s not in your home library. You tell your library. They fetch the book for you, and then you get what you requested. The only thing is that ILL operates a little differently everywhere you are. Local rules and resources and all of that. My last campus library, for example, you had to go over to the library to pick it up. The place before that, they brought it to you. It was awesome.

Whatever it is, I have this feeling that the process here will be the weirdest one yet. I’ll find out in the next few days, maybe next week.

The bike riding continues. Last week I wrote of the speculation of trying to hit randomly collected goals that were just a little out of the realm of comfortable possibility, but definitely possible because I could see it, right there, on a spreadsheet. A document that serves only to taunt me.

Well, I decided to reach for all of those goals, most miles in a December, a round number, the circumference of the the planet (at this latitude). They were close to one another, but far away from me. And so I set out for it. After 40 miles on Christmas night, a bit more after that, 110-ish miles this weekend, there was a bad ride this afternoon, and then another one tonight.

The problem is that the ride earlier today was bad because I’m tired. Legs are almost dead. I am probably under-fueled. And the basement is a bit demoralizing at the moment.

Also, I have another long ride tomorrow.

Those big goals might have been a little ambitious. But you can’t get close and just stop, even on your arbitrary goals that mean, in the end, nothing at all. That’d just be rude.

And a bad way to end a year.

Stupid spreadsheet.

family / Friday / photo — Comments Off
27
Dec 24

The godfamily Christmas

We had parents with my godparents-in-law today. (Just go with it.) My godsisters-in-law (just go with it) were there, and so were their husbands. And all of the god-nieces-in-law and god-nephews-in-law. (Again, just go with it.) These are long, long, deep family ties.

My godparents-in-law met at my in-laws wedding. The godfather has been my father-in-law’s best friend for seven decades. The godmother went to nursing school with my mother-in-law. So each is the godparents of the other’s children. And my wife and the two god sisters basically grew up alongside one another.

When I first started coming to this Christmas party there were just 10 people. Now, it’s 15 people, including the children aged 4-to-16.

The kids are great. The next to youngest was sent to school one day with Christmas money and a shopping list, because this is how we’re teaching commercialism these days, I guess. We were on his list, for some reason. Only, he didn’t come home with any presents, or any money. He bought our gifts, and then gave them away to his friends, and the money, too. He wanted them to be happy.

That was the best present of the year, honestly.

So this sweet-hearted boy got sent back to the school store again, new list, more money, and instructions to bring the presents home. And don’t you know what I found in the bottom of my little gift bag were the best presents of the year. Two years in a row he’s bought me something. It was a little toy last year. He saw this thing and thought of me for some reason and he was so excited and proud. This year, the present was from him and his little sister. I looked down and could see it was a drink, so I pulled out this bottle, made a big show of reading the tea label and was very excited.

This, he said, was more from him, and not his little sister.

I reached back in the back and pulled out this bag of pretzels. Again, I made the big evaluation, and deployed the charmed reaction. How did you know? These are going to be so good!

This, he said, was actually more from him, and not so much his little sister.

He’s six.

Meanwhile, his sister is opening presents and holding them all up like she’s auditioning for The Lion King, or just won the greatest history of sport. Every gift a triumph.

We’re trying to talk this particular Christmas party down to just getting gifts for the kids, because the rest of us are impossible, but the 6-year-old is shopping for the olds.

In a few days, I’ll send his mother a picture of me eating these pretzels and drinking this tea — because, somehow, he knows I like tea — and brag on him some more.

I made the mistake of asking one of the kids how many Christmas parties they had been a part of this year. This one, today, was party number five. There were two more to go.

Nobody else was getting pretzels and tea, though. Just me.

family / photo / Thursday — Comments Off
26
Dec 24

Christmas cats

We had a lovely Christmas, and hope you did too. It was low key, my lovely bride, her parents, just a few small presents, and the traditional prime rib dinner.

The cats, I think, got more presents than the rest of us. And they’re now zonked.

I got a nice stocking and a few fun things to read. We got a grease pig, which is a device you use to clean the chain of your bike. My mother-in-law went to a bike shop and said, “I don’t know what I need. What do I need?” And they said, “We all use this.” And wouldn’t you know it, we don’t have this tool.

I used it this evening, without taking any photo or video evidence, and it made a huge difference. It’s a good gift.

I also received a new light and radar for my bike. This is the same one that I got my lovely bride for her birthday, and it is an impressive feat of lightweight design and engineering. So now, when we get back on the open road, we’ll both be a bit safer. (I’ve pedaled 82 miles these last three days, but the trainer doesn’t require a radar.)

I got her front row seats to a show. There’s also another concert that same weekend. She’s also running a half-marathon that weekend. For Christmas, I got The Yankee a long, exhausting weekend next spring.

We are planning a trip with the in-laws for next summer. Just don’t tell the kitties.

It was a lovely Christmas day. And there’s one more party tomorrow.

photo / Wednesday — Comments Off
25
Dec 24

Merry Christmas

photo / Tuesday / video — Comments Off
24
Dec 24

Christmas Eve

We had a white Christmas Eve! Almost. It was the kind of snow that stuck to stone, but couldn’t manage to hang on anywhere that wasn’t pre-chilled. And there wasn’t much to it. Even still, it looked pretty for a few moments.

And at 11:59 p.m. last night my last two classes of the semester ended. When they asked me if I would like to teach 8-week classes it didn’t occur to me to look at the end date of the term. Lesson learned.

So I spent a bit of the early a.m. hours grading some quizzes and discussions. I still have to evaluate the final assignments, and then tally the scores. But that’s what Thursday will be for, I’m sure.

When I was outside looking at the snow on the pavers, I heard the honking, and looked up, just in time for this happy little composition.

About an hour later, we were sitting inside chatting about this and that and I heard the honking again. Look how the sky had changed

The geese had big holiday travel plans.

And now I’m going to go to the grocery store, and maybe the drug store, just to get out of the house. I have been so focused on trying to wrap up my grading I don’t think I’ve left in several days.