082318 avid is three things 1. compendium 2. what i want it to be 3. what you want it to be designed (find quote from someone including the phrase “didn’t like school” unless that’s totally just somehting i dreamed up, which it probably is) not around the usual expectations that you just know what to do and you’d better perform because school’s a competition and your future depends on winning; but rather around the idea that you can learn how to learn, that we can help each other through this, and actually get something useful and encouraging and inspiring from it; that it shouldn’t be about knowing the answers but knowing how to come up with good questions; the compendium may need a little adjustment here and there; it’s solid stuff but we’re not bound by it it’s not a competition of who who can be the most authoritative expert; i’m not the wizrd of oz behind the curtain trying to make sure you don’t see that i’m just some guy, you know? i know a lot about some things, and not as much about other things. you know a lot about some things and not as much about other things. AVID is kind of a class about everything; it stands to reason that there are going to parts of this we have to learn about together. AVID is also *not* three things: 1. it’s not something you can just passively receive information from 2. it’s not something you can fail, as long as you show up and play along 3. ---- ok we’ll come back to that later and flesh it out, but that’s the basis of the Week 1 video for AVID, the one that we’re required to have, that the “practice” quiz is based on. Cool. I like it. I think it’ll work well. I can refer back to my “start here first” or whatever, and see what other specific essentials i might want to add; some of those as i recall could make good “quiz” questions. well, ok, i’m just going to look right now, as long as i’m in that frame of mind. ---- ok we’ll finish that later. after taking Megan to the dental clinic for her impressions (no, she’s not going to DO impressions, she’s going to HAVE impressions TAKEN (from where? from her mouth. is she going to miss them? will they give them back? oh shut up)) so that the parsimonious greedy stingy cheap miserly penny-pinching *niggardly* bastards that are in charge of health insurance can decide if she deserves to get braces paid for or not. And if the answer is no, and if I really do get full time, then I really have to consider whether i want to switch them over to my insurance. But even that insurance, though it probably has a few more choices and may (or may not; who the fuck knows) be more frugivorous in a major medical situation, will only pay what seems like it’s going to be way less than half of orthodontia, so basically they got you screwed either way. Whatever. One thing at a time. I’m breaking all the rules this morning. I started out with a thing about work (but it was really light-bulbing up my waking brain with the same fluid ferocity as a story, so I don’t actually consider that an infraction). I paused and got up and did a couple things, like opening the blinds, straightening out a couch-back blanket, picking up some popcorn crumbs, yelling at the cat because she was lolling around by the window making little bitchy meowhining noises. I started and stopped again to call the dental clinic back because of their stupid “confirmation or else cancellation and if cancellation then you’re fucking kicked out, peasant!” Then I started and stopped again to make some coffee. Then I started and stopped again because talking about the dental insurance thing reminded me there was one more chance to make changes to our plans through SDW and I went to check and see when that was and it turns out tomorrow’s the last day, so I downloaded the info pdf and made a reminder on my calendar about that. So I’m really doing this “wrong” this morning, but that’s OK. At least I’m still doing it, bottom line, and some days you just have to be a little flexible. MIND YOU, THAT’S NOT THE SAME AS THE “SOME DAYS YOU HAVE TO BE A LITTLE FLEXIBLE” that is a mind-self-fuck, the kind that inevitably leads you out of your practice zone and back to just being an idle dreamer. I am—trust me, I am VERY familiar with THAT kind of “you have to be flexible.” I have seen that one’s teeth and the inside of its mouth plenty of times, thank you very much, I have smelled its sour chianti breath, I have tasted its burning guts and I have been its pile of shit with bones sticking out. I have lived on the dank floor of its abandoned cave, oxidizing slowly into white remains. I have been pecked at by half-interested birds, and accidentally deposited miles away where, by the glory of whatever the code word “god” really means, I have been given another chance. And another. And another. And another. So yes, I do know that difference. And the kind of “you have to be flexible” I was talking about this morning is not that kind. It’s the kind where I really am having fun being good at my job, without falling into the trap of thinking that it’s only one job—or two. I have at least three. Always. I do know the difference, and I do appreciate that you really do never know when you’re finally not going to get that last ’nother chance. Not entirely one hundred per cent sure, but I’m pretty sure—you don’t know until it’s too late. I’m actually pretty happy at the moment, happy to be a gently aging peasant with at least three jobs, at least one of which at any given time actually feels something a little bit, in some domains, seen from certain angles if the sun’s just right and you squint your eyes up just the right amount, like “important.”