Standing at the Trailhead of Winter

I couldn't believe how nervous I was as I poured the developer into the canister. My hands were literally shaking. You'd think I was performing some important surgery. No. I was developing my first black and white film in many years. Many, many years. I've been working towards this moment for the last three years. Every time I took a step forward, I ended up taking two backwards. I was so afraid I was going to royally mess up the process and not have any frames worth printing (or in today's world, scanning to the computer). My mindset was I'd rather not try if it meant failing. How dumb is that? Thankfully Lovely Beautiful Daughter told me to just stop. It wouldn't matter if I did fail. It's just film and chemicals. Both can be bought and the process can be tried again. And again until I get it right. I used to develop film all the time. The muscle memory would kick in sooner or later. The fails would be less and less.  I'm so glad I listened to her. Whi...

The grading is done. At least for the students who have been paying attention, which is the majority. Those who have not been paying attention will find out sooner or later, most likely after grades are submitted and they see they failed the class. They still have four days to get late assignments in. But experience tells me they won't take advantage of the grace period. They'll have to repeat the course. During these last few days of grading and seeing some students shoot themselves in the foot, I've been muttering about these students and their bad behavior. Angel Baby will hear me and say, "Mom, let them fail." I know he's right. Still, I have a tough time watching this happen. I've already heard from one student who is upset over my not accepting his final papers sent to me via email rather than submitted into the LMS. He stopped attending class quite a while back, five or six weeks ago. Because he wasn't in class, he didn't get the informa...

Had a dinner fail last evening. The cornbread. Took my first bite and immediately the baking soda overpowered the rest of the flavors. Almost as soon as the concept "baking soda" registered in my mind, I realized my mistake. The baking soda should have been baking powder. Which explains why the cornbread turned out nearly flat, more like a corn tortilla. As I was preparing the cornbread, I was also trying to listen to Hubby tell me something (which, my bad, I can't even remember what it was he was saying to me). I know I read the recipe, but I wasn't truly paying attention to what I was doing. At least it was only the cornbread. The chili was yummy and perfect for the cold day, and since it was some that we'd made a couple of weeks ago then froze for a night like last night, it gave us day 6 of eating in. This morning, I was determined to make up for last night's fail. For some time now, like several years, I've been trying to find the best buttermilk pa...

Day 3 into a 30 day healthy eating challenge with a friend turned into an epic failure for me. I did really well right up until dinner. I stood up to join the family in the kitchen, and I made it as far as the table then had to hold onto one of the chairs while I waited for the grip of dizziness to pass. That bout of dizziness was the second time today that I about went down. The first time happened when I stood from sitting at my desk in the office. Thankfully Funny Delightful Son was standing next to the desk and wanted to give me a hug right then. I put my arms around him and used our hug to keep myself steady. After the second round of seeing major black spots and feeling that telltale weakness wash through my muscles, I succumbed to eating not just one grilled cheese sandwich but two. And some Greek yogurt. After watching an episode of our current Netflix choice, I stood and waited. Nothing. Thankfully. Going cold turkey on giving up sugar and processed carbs is tough. I know I...