Monday Update

It’s been a looonnnnggg but boring and busy few weeks, with minimal time for creating bloggy material and content happening in my life, so I figure it’s time for a quick update on what’s been keeping me occupied.

I’m…

…working on: grading research papers. I’ve got 105 five to seven page papers to work through. Even just looking at the stack is overwhelming. I have to keep reminding myself that it’s all for the greater good. And that the massive amounts of unpaid time I use notating and commenting on their writing will help them in the future because they’ll take what they learn from this experience and apply it to other classes. And that this will overall help them become better writers and better students, because they’ll take time to read through my notations and comments – they won’t just look at the grade on the back and then forget about it. Because they care about more than just the grade… right? Right.

…feeling: Christmassy, but burned out. It’s making it really difficult to focus, right at a time when it’s super important for me to focus or else I’m going to be in grading hell VERY fast. All I want to do is put up my tree, drink coffee while wrapped in a blanket on the couch, and listen to Christmas carols while I knit. But I can’t. I still have the final grading push to get through. And hell, it’s not even December yet.

It’s helped to try to take 5 minutes here and there to just breathe and recenter myself – but sometimes that 5 minute breather turns into a 15 minute break where I do things like cut paper snowflakes and make santa hats from scratch (complete with shading in red pen) for my office pope. Whoops. (#sorrynotsorry)

…listening to: Spotify radio. I’ve been a spotify subscriber for a long time, but I only recently fully discovered the radio function – and I’m in love. It’s like Pandora, only with unlimited skips. The ’00s station is totally my jam. It would be Christmas stuff, but I have a feeling my officemates and office neighbors might string me up if I did that considering Thanksgiving isn’t even over yet.

…watching: Sailor Moon Crystal – OMG guys, this is seriously amazing. I started it because reading Reenie’s Sailor Moon rewatch posts at The Fangirl’s Dilemma made me super nostalgic and I’m absolutely loving it. It’s all the nostalgia from when I was in middle school, with none of the weird awkward 90’s filler or pacing problems of the original series (at least so far anyway).

…reading: Zealot by Reza Aslan. I originally picked up this book to read to see if it would be a good gift for my dad, who is into theology as well as history, and it’s got me hooked, even though religion is not necessarily something I’m super into*. A review is forthcoming once I finish it.

What have you all been up to?

*While my office pope would seem to contradict this – I’m not even Catholic. I just like the guy. It’s a long story.