Hi there pubski and friends I had a ticket to fly to Vancouver this morning, but forfeited it (note to self: get a refundable ticket next time). I came down with conjunctivitis, aka pink eye, and that seemed to lead to other itis's. It is not recommended to fly with a severe head cold, stuffy ears, and infecting all the other passengers, so here I sit, visiting my beloved hubski. I still have a return ticket for next week . . . so I'm hoping to get better soon and pick up a cheap flight (the one that charges $90 for a carry-on).
I don’t believe in “work-life balance.” I don’t think our experience of living is binary. Life is life and can include work, nature, climbing, biking, picking up aluminum, parent care, child care, studying, and so on. If we need, say, music in our lives and don’t have it, be attuned to the hunger. If you don’t feed yourself what you need (rest, contact with others, touch, hockey, whatever) you might become passive-aggressive, aggressive, or even develop panic attacks.
What a great picture at the top of this post. I am thrilled for the shout-out and wouldn't have seen this so soon if not for thenewgreen making a FB post. I don't seem to get shoutouts anymore, unless thenewgreen plays hockey. OK, hubski, let's barrel on into the next decade with grace and hope in these dark times.
Hubski Zoom Had a great chat with _refugee_, elizabeth, and c_hawkthorne last week. Topics included when is gossip gossip and when is it information sharing. Conclusion: Gossip might negatively change the attitude of the listener towards the person under discussion. Information sharing might possibly help the speaker change or understand their own attitude towards the person under discussion. More Hubski Zoom I look forward to more Hubski Zoom. Jitsi, actually. Many of you are probably sitting at your computers work-zooming, or school-zooming, or family-zooming. I barely turn on my computer, so it can be amusing. Winter, snow, cold and warm soup . . .
Hello Hubski/Pubski I'm adding some 3 subheadings here. Those of you checking in, try these subheadings. I'd love to hear how you're doing. 1. RIGHT HERE, RIGHT NOW The universe has been telling me to get my ass down here, I mean my fingers and keyboard. There was some discussion last night on the chat (_refugee_, ButterflyEffect, am_Unition, elizabeth about hubski's tenth hubskiversary of existence coming up on December 5, 2020. Even if the borders are open (Canada/USA), I'm not sure anyone will want to travel. (I originally invited all Michigan (or anyone who wants to travel) hubskiers to my house in Canada.) -- but perhaps we should wait a year. Besides, there's something palindromic about 11. 2. TONIGHT Tonight I'm giving my first online lecture to Startup School. The class is called "How Not to Kill Your Co-Founder" (Subtitle: Strategies for Successful Teamwork). This is normally a totally interactive participatory session. People show up with their team members and do activities like create reliability agreements and norms for conflict. They leave feeling closer and more trusting of team members. But tonight, the organizers are not using any interactive technology - I show my slides and talk into the void. (My slides fill the screen) so I can't see if anyone is there, if they are awake, anything. 3. GOING FORWARD Meanwhile, the university is talking about doing 90% of the classes on line and I'm FINALLY thinking VERY SERIOUSLY about retiring. It seems like a good time because I'm not super enthusiastic about teaching on line, even if it is on Zoom and can be reasonably interactive. I can think about retiring because I'm older than you, probably a lot older than you, and because I have other things to do, and also it's been a good run BUT MOSTLY because my program has expanded and my course as I've been teaching it -- intensely and intimately -- is going to be modularized, they say because the way it is is not scalable. And I'm not scalable -- in fact, I'm shrinking. But after tonight, I will take a deep breath and move on into the summer of Covid. and I'll try to CONTRIBUTE more as I move into a new phase. as for thenewgreen Higgs-Boson Forever!!
Of course the pub is open only for take out/delivery. I understand the pubskikeeper has some powerful brew (plague of locusts) (see Exodus 10:1-20). Socially isolated except for the other two people in my household - a Turkish post doc researcher specializing in water justice and a retired rabbi specializing in social and political activism (but frequently discouraged). I also have regular visitors to my side yard: mostly possums, skunks, and racoons at night. We work late by a large window. The motion lights go on and we close the indoor lights and see who's visiting. They tend to come one at a time, clearly also socially isolating. I am in an urban area but there are expansive forests not too far away and wetlands not too far away. If we were a little closer to the escarpment, we'd probably also have coyotes and deer. I wait for spring. The temperatures for the next week are predicted to be in the double digits (C) or 50s (F). Oh spring, hurry. We need you.
Preoccupations Another 10 or so hubskiers showed up on the check-in since the original count. That was fun. By the time mk gets the Stripe payments platform fixed, steve and I will be able to donate about $200 to hubski. Edit Knowing who's out there makes me want to show up more. Poetry A friend of mine was diagnosed with esophagal cancer. She was working on a poetry book for a publisher - but it can take two years to go to press, so we're going to privately publish 100 copies and, I hope, have a small launch for her now rather than posthumously. We once had a small publishing company called "Pinking Shears Publications." We created it to publish anthologies for literary festivals that we ran together. The Pinking Shears account had $1000 in it, so we can use that money. I've been doing a close line edit and many of the poems are very powerful -- about the experience of getting this diagnosis. For example, sitting in a medical waiting room with a goldfish tank, she describes the orange fish, and then surrounding the tank. Purples, blues, greens, wine-dark red, khaki and black – but no orange. Their faces – our faces – blank as fish quiet as fish with occasional ripples of information, consternation, consolation, a glimpse, here and there, of despair, fear, or patience. A smile toward a fellow-traveller floating through this sea of possibility. I'm kind of preoccupied with that. I should be able to take it to a local publisher next week. Sigh. The quote I've been using at the bottom of my email is this: Speak now, kiss now Before the river freezes altogether (from "Spring Forward, Fall Back" by Troy Jollimore) Meanwhile, outside today it is -10 degrees C (or 14 degrees F for some of you). Speak now, kiss now, before the river freezes altogether! Patients dressed in all colours sit in chairs,
TIME Wow the pub opened nine hours ago. Then I remembered that the rest of the world wakes up three hours earlier than the Pacific coast. Speaking of time my birthday is coming up soon and I actually DID write a one-woman show for my birthday AND gave a preview of it this just past Monday in Vancouver. and people were omg, lil, you have to take this on the road, to the Fringe, to the . . . and I'm, like, no. I'm committed to doing it in my backyard, at my birthday party in Ontario on August 19 (real birthday August 16), and that's it. It's pretty raw: domestic violence, recovery and redemption, crazy husband shit, nightmares of dating, and more redemption. It's hard enough to live it, but to relive it (on stage) and make it funny [note laughter in picture] is exhausting. But yay!! it's done. The title of the piece is Every Marriage Is a Good Marriage: Even the Bad Ones.
I just read the article and obit, and then read again the story about your Opa and the eulogy that you posted in June 2018. Now 8 months later, Oma has joined Opa in the Great Oneness that is the invisible web of connections and spirit that we all are part of. You are so blessed and lucky to have grown up with such inspiring people. I am sad for your grief and pain of loss, such loss. My biggest fear about creating loving connections is that they will end. I have to keep telling myself that we never really get over anything, but we do learn to carry it more gently -- and be grateful, while we are enjoying our loving connections, and later, grateful that we were capable of this great love we had. xxxooolil
I am just about finished writing my one-woman show to perform at my upcoming big birthday. I really have to give credit to hubski because much of it was originally written for hubski (various state of the lil reports). The name of the show is "Every Marriage is a Good Marriage (even the bad ones)." It starts like this: I never intended to get married ever. I was interested in partnering and cohabiting, but not too interested in marriage. Marriage seemed somehow authoritarian and restrictive. My most serious partners over my first 20 years of partnering, also seemed authoritarian and restricting, as well as jealous and controlling. I didn’t trust marriage. I’d had proposals. One went like this: Offstage voice: I want to marry you. Not now, but maybe sometime in the future when you like me better.” My first husband said, Offstage Voice: Either marry me or move out." Everyone hates moving. One man also said to me, Offstage voice: I have to see you, even if it has to be through bullet-proof glass.” That wasn’t a proposal, but I liked his impulse towards self-protection. ------------------ I will be arguing that every marriage is a good marriage: even the bad ones, but until very recently, my experience with romantic partners and husbands has been less than stellar. Each of my early relationships was worse than the preceding one, with my first marriage ultimately being the most dangerous. Who knew that a Jewish marriage not only begins with glass breaking, but also ends with glass breaking? Clearly my choices were based more on convenience than compatibility. Maybe I mistook intensity for intimacy. Maybe I just had no skill in living wisely in the world. Every marriage is a good marriage even the bad ones because they teach you to live in the world. I went to a school of education in 1974 and graduated with a teaching certificate. I wasn’t long in my first job before I realized that teacher’s college mostly just exposes you to classrooms and children. If you don’t run away screaming, they give you a teaching certificate. Nothing I learned in teacher’s college was relevant in my first classroom. I could say the same thing about life and relationships.
Background On July 5, 2015, my partner of 22 years, husband for 18, told me suddenly and without warning that he "needed space." He had "met someone." He seemed to think that he had to be single in order for her to take him seriously. She didn't take him seriously, but we were done. Then, he fell into a slough of despond and is still doing very badly. Nonetheless, we were already in the middle of legally separating and continued in that direction. The Separation Agreement Yesterday: signed, sealed, singed, spit on, done. What I Learned The Separation Agreement is filed nowhere except with us and our lawyers. It is only filed with a court if one of us needs to have a court order to deliver on whatever was promised. That's apparently how it works in Ontario. I needed this document though to use in various ways 1) get the pension services to split off 20% and redirect it to me 2) show my evidence of income so that the bank is more willing to remortgage 3) evidence of income so I can get him removed as guarantor of my mortgage (one of the agreements) 4) particularly, though, it allowed us to find out what is required by law and to protect each of us (mostly me) in a formal agreement 5) if either of us wants a formal divorce at some point, all the real work is done. Divorce requires some paperwork and filing charges of $447 (2016) total. What He Learned I asked "What can be learned?" of course. After a pause, he said, "I should have appreciated what I had." no shit Sherlock What Else I Learned Anything can happen to anyone anytime. We know little and control even less. You don't have to go down with every ship. Stay fabulous. If the universe can create someone like you, the universe has already created someone for you. Sometimes, with a little psychic paging, magic, faith, luck, skill, and awesomeness, the two of you might just meet. mivasairski
keifermiller suggested something about inane office politics. I suspect that there is something that you don't know. That something might have nothing to do with you. Probably some parent phoned the principal complaining about something. Did the principal attend any of the classes ever? It sounds like your past physics teacher attended one of your classes and thought you did good. He sounds like not the warmest guy - but I'd strongly consider asking him. There are various ways to approach him, including saying that you very much enjoyed giving the short lessons and would like some mentoring on how to do it better. Share the good feedback from the students, but say you wish you knew why you were asked not to come back. Also, who is the teacher in charge of the Math and Physics Club. Who did you work with scheduling your short lessons - the principal or someone else? In conclusion: there is something you don't know. You may never know it -- but I hope you continue your enthusiasm for teaching. It might be a calling. Don't let the bastards grind you down.this situation bummed me out
yes, understandable. It's mystifying to be "fired" from something and not know why. This happened to a friend of mine recently. One week he is getting commended for being the best in the department, the next week he's being told he's "not a good fit" and turfed.Suffice to say that I got my past physics teacher to utter the highest compliment I've ever heard from him ("You did a good job", the guy is almost impossible to impress and it showed on our grades.
Last week I bought green onions to cut up for a salad, soup, omelet. I cut the tops off (just the whites, no green) and put them in a glass of water. This is what happened. Now I have a sustainable source of green onions. Try it. Thanks byonic for telling me how to post pictures on hubski and thanks to mivasairski for onion lessons.
22:32 < lilski> I said earlier that I teach computer science students - but I basically teach them how to be human beings First of all, what does it mean to be a human being, let alone teach someone to be one? I will make more of an effort to describe what I do because my flippant shorthand sounds stupid and arrogant. When the usual response from people is a sad nod, and "Good idea," I am only reinforcing negative stereotypes -- and like all stereotypes, they can potentially lead to prejudice. I have a feeling that this is going to be one of those posts of mine that will ruffle some feathers.
Not at all. Thank you for writing. In fact, your letter made me immediately realize how I appear to some people.He came into the program as a multi-dimensional, highly skilled and multi-talented human being. I can't take any credit. and this thing from IRC on the 20th November 2016:
Sorry for being peevish about it, but as someone who is focused on hard sciences and getting patronising treatment from most humanities-oriented people around me ever since I can remember, I can't help but resent some of this attitude (don't blame me, blame multiple people who told me verbatim that I must lack a soul to not appreciate some poem or picture :/).
and not appreciating some arty thing doesn't make you any less human.but I'm at loss about what you actually do in class.
I focus on interpersonal communication skills, particularly listening to others; listening to what they say and don't say; examining our own reactions to stress, conflict, and confusion; understanding that what we see and perceive and interpret might be different from others who are with us; examining how, like it or not, our emotions are the engines of our lives and often objectivity is subjective. In addition, public speaking classes are all about connecting with others not talking at them.What is the thing that your students lack
My current students don't particularly lack anything more than any other group. We all struggle with communication and connection.and how does acquiring it make them into 'human beings'?
I regret ever using that phrase, but I will say this: the students often tell me that the class asked them to engage in new thoughtful self-reflection, that they have changed the way they relate to others, and that they feel more in control of their lives. That's not being a human being, but it's something.What's about your students that your aim is to make them into those 'multidimensional human beings'?
I want them to be happier and more effective. I want their teamwork to be more successful. I want them to understand their unintended contribution to their own problems. I'm grateful to have a chance to work in an area that seems meaningful to me and seems helpful. I hate coming across as arrogant. I imagine I will share this thread with my students. That will be an interesting conversation. Sorry, but I simply loathe when in my own life the, supposedly, attuned to humanity people just throw me into some easy 'cog-head' category and go forth with their pre-existing assumption.
Have you challenged their preconceived notions? What did they say? What evidence did they have?I'm not angry or resentful specifically toward you, lil, but I'm asking because so far you have proven that you will not just dismiss my questions outright with something along the lines of "you will not understand, untermensh".
I hope I have responded non-dismissively.
I just want to add that, historically, this thread was looking for quotations from something you had been reading recently. It's not "favourite quotes" but more an introduction to your current and immediate inner life via your reading. I just looked back at the #quotesporn tag and it is notable in its spontaneously arising volunteer moderators.
Good morning pubski. It's Yom Kippur in the Jewish calendar and those inclined towards hunger, self-reflection, and repentance have until sundown. Religious observances offer the possibility of transcendence, community, and connection to the Great Oneness to whom prayerful people pray. mivasairski says that humans have real indescribable experiences of transporting awe; religions and rituals were created to help people understand and replicate those experiences. However, he says, if you learn to feel awe, wonder, gratefulness and oneness with all of creation, you no longer need the weight of religion. I do like rituals. There might be fasting.
coffee, bartender, just coffee Work Students are reading my Write Better Dammit blog. Will it help? The whole thing needs to be rewritten better, dammit, The last one is called What Is a Sentence, Dammit?. The entire blog was, of course, inspired by the hubski tag #writebetterdammit. Rosh Hashanah I now have 16 people (??!!) coming to my erev-erev Rosh Hashanah dinner, including my almost-90-year-old mother, 4 cousins + spouse, 5 siblings, or step-siblings, and their partners, one nephew, one daughter, one friend, and mivasairskiThis is insane, but true. I will write them today and ask them to bring a short statement: This year I am passionate about ... and One thing I would like to do this year is ... There will be much singing. --- So much more, but I have to move onward into the day. Have a great day, pubski. Edit Another two people asked if they could be invited. I was going to say "no," but mivasairski said, "If there's room in your heart, there's room at the table." What could I say? 18 people. Edit 2 The extra two bailed out. Back to 16. :-)
SUBHEADINGS steve steve is so busy loving everyone in the pub this morning that he should be a subheading. IRMA still no feet on the ground, but one of the compound owners is waiting in Tampa all stocked up with a generator and water to get the go-ahead to return to the island along with other evacuees. He's a pharmacist at the plaza, so they might give him an earlier go-ahead. Remote sensing, googly earth type technology took a close look at Key West on the 11th. Zoom in. We could see the roof of our house. It still had a roof!! So if the hurricane shutters held out and flooding was only 2-6 feet, we are okay and can still have our BIG HUBSKI Key West MEETUP, dates t.b.a. OK HAVE TO RUN NOW as the Rocky theme plays in the background, I have to get off this laptop and off to meet my first of three classes - brilliant CS grad students, Will I be able to convince them that a course in public speaking and interpersonal communication is a fun happy place of warmth, acceptance, and bonding? (Much like hubski.) Who knows. Off to work anyway.
My mother's 90th birthday is tomorrow, January 1. I'm having 50 or more people here 4:30-7:30 (senior-friendly hours). My mother said that all she wanted for her birthday was a kleyzmer band. I booked the band about 18 months ago. I'm okay, maybe even happy, with the distribution of labour among the siblings. My younger brother said he'd order the catering. My older brother said he'd pay for it. My younger brother and his wife said they'd look after flowers. They ordered 91 white long-stem roses! omg. My older brother said he'd bring six bottles of champagne, but at the last minute changed it to wine. His daughter is bringing 50 plastic champagne flutes. I made the invitation with the help of mivasairski, but my older sister handled all the RSVPs, and got herself here from Nelson, BC, in the Kootneys. My daughter got the Prime Minister, our MP, and the Governor General of Canada to send letters of congratulations. The Queen only sends a letter when you turn 100. (Both the Queen and my mother are turning 100 in ten years. Will the Queen send herself a letter?) My daughter got all the letters framed and will read them aloud. She will also read greetings sent by remote cousins and others. I'm paying for the band and providing the venue which is my house. flagamuffin has stayed here. My mother will pay for the wait staff to do the cleaning. My step-sister will make a giant cake. It's a great joy for me to have a relationship with my mom who has known me my entire life and actually made me. My mom has been supportive, loving, and consistent. She has buried two husbands: each one amazing, interesting, kind, and together with my mom, engaged in creating more goodness in the world. So that will be my New Year's Day.
My point is this: You don't "make" anyone feel left out if you somehow leave them out of a group cyber-huggy shout-out. If they want to feel hurt and left out, they can ask themselves, hubski-style, what can be learned from their feelings of hurt.I'm afraid of doing any shoutouts for fear of forgetting people and making anyone feel left out.
Just stop that right now. Most of us have never met any of us. We have this strange existence in other people's imagination which is both flattering and frightening. -- I mean WHO on hubski imagined our Russian buddy ThatFanficGuy having a giant moustache?
Hi Hubski My tribe usually goes for Chinese food on Christmas or Christmas Eve. Here was my fortune cookie: Unusually philosophical for a fortune: If you want to win anything - a race, your self, your life - you have to go a little berserk.
That's a fine bit of writing kb!! I think artsies should be blasted with science through and through. The thing in itself, the earth, the cosmos are all mind-numbingly beautiful and poetic. And language, what a beautiful scientific invention that is. The separation of art and science is a FALSE DUALISM. And as we've discussed here before OftenBen Reject the binary, all dualisms are delusional.
The author of the Medium post above had some serious questions for me as well. He cared enough about his education to take the time to write me a long email full of challenges. He said he had done that for his teachers in the past and never got a satisfactory response. Like yours, his challenges were thoughtful. For example, he thought the material in my course book were opinions because, while I have a bibliography in the back, I don't provide detailed evidence of the research and sources. I want to focus on activities in the class. I rewrite my course every year and will definitely put in sources throughout the book. Great idea. I long for students who care enough to challenge me and it takes confidence, courage, and commitment to do that.Either way, I'm sorry about this whole exchange.
Don't be. I appreciate the exchange and very glad you brought up the points you did. If my unnecessary thoughtless generalizations cause harm, they must be questioned.
I've been broken. I've been healed by the transformative power of love, the possibility of hope even in a dark time. Another thing that strikes me about your story is the sudden transition from darkness to possibility. That's how it happens. One minute you're on a bridge: the next you're finding a sense of Oneness with another sentient being. Finally all through your journey, the highs and the lows, you've understood this: Stories happen to those who can tell them. I always felt that even during your saddest times, you had a sense of the narrative possibilities, so you crafted a story out of the darkness and shared it with us out here in the Hubskiverse. Sharing it helps you carry it a little more lightly.
Thanks for the tag and the beautiful story. What jumps out for me is your line about "holding her making her feel loved." You did a beautiful generous thing for her. Maybe that's part of how we recover from our own brokenness. We do this for each other. Misty-eyed in Miami airport.
We pinched each other a few times to make sure we were real. After several ouches, the meeting convened. In consideration of the upcoming US election, we had our own secret Hubski ballot. 1. Who is over the top? 2. Who is under the top but on their way over? 3. Who is most likely to self-immolate? 4. Who is most likely to succeed, but doesn't know it? 5. Who would you donate your stem cells to in a life or death situation? Edit There were two more q's on our ballot: 6. Who in hubski is most likely to colonize Mars? 7. Who is most likely to take over the world?
Wow, the pub is empty. I don't even see a bartender. I'll wander behind the bar and see if there's any coffee. Mmmm coffee. Now, I'll settle down in a booth near the door and write in my journal - try to get the day organized.
What does USA, China, North Korea, Iran, and Saudia Arabia have in common?It confers right on victim, to justice
It depends on what you mean by justice.It acts as deterrence to some extent
I haven't seen any evidence of this. Have you? Does state-sanctioned murder teach people not to murder?About 140 countries have abolished it, mainly in Europe.
Mainly in the world. In North America 2/3 countries have abolished it.
When did I become Miss Grundy?I overuse commas and lil is probably throwing a fit over that.
Really bfx? After all we've almost been through together, you think I'd throw a fit over commas?
On Not Taking One's Self Too Seriously I occasionally pick up old journals for perspective. In one of my journals from 1990 I meet a guy who says, You're a candle in the sewer of life. I've been called other things: You're a lifeguard on the ocean of thought. You're tumbleweed blowing through a dream. and of course, to keep things in perspective my ex-husband said: Fuck you. You're an evil person. You ruined my life. Of course later he took it back, regretted everything, and said he had been "bewitched" - but not by me. eeep, got to run pubski. Leaving my beer half-drunk (rather than myself).