Day 19 - LA County Dept. of Public Health mandates indoor masking and OUTDOOR masking at large events

More online teaching today…

9/3/21. Friday

7:00 – 7:30 - My alarm goes off, but I lie in bed until 7:30 for transition time.

7:30-11:00 – It’s the second day of class for my highschoolers and they still don’t have access to Canvas so I prepare today’s prompt and send an email blast to the students at 8:00. It’s the same as Wednesday – the students respond to the prompt and I respond to the students individually because this high school has requested a Synchronous class and I know Mrs. B. is probably still circulating in the classroom.

Once the students are finished with the emailed version of the Discussion Board, I send them AUDIO Lecture – Chapter 2 – Part I and the link to the Google slides.  A couple of students email that they can’t access the AUDIO lecture, so I respond that they can listen to the AUDIO lecture for homework once they have access to Canvas, which will probably happen tomorrow.

As the students are listening to lecture, I take Attendance, then send chastising emails to those students who didn’t respond to the prompt, informing them that they will be marked absent.

11:00-12:00 - I check email at College No. 1 and it is today that I discover I. am. being. evaluated. this semester. Adjunct evaluations typically take at least 10 weeks, with some sort of task scheduled for completion every other week – it’s incredibly time consuming. Ironically, Adjunct are evaluated every 2 years while tenured professors are almost never evaluated. I was just evaluated at College No. 2 last semester and that process was a pain in the ass and involved even more work than usual because not only do you have to demonstrate you can effectively teach face-to-face in a classroom, you also have to show your ONLINE chops via your Canvas shell design. Now, as a result of Covid-19, it is impossible to deliver a college class without having a mastery of Canvas. I print out the timeline for my evaluation and set aside.

The paperwork involved in being an adjunct instructor is astronomical. The due date for submitting my Continuing Education contract at College No. 1 is in five days so I review the CE classes that I can attend, via Zoom, for the month of September.  It takes some time to coordinate the CE classes with my schedule, but I eventually settle on two and submit my contract for approval. Spoiler Alert: the presenter cancels one of the classes without notice, three hours before it is scheduled to run, which means I will have to repeat the above process all over again. What a waste.

12:00-12:30 – Quick shower. Lotion. Covid-19 uniform. I listen to The Daily.

12:30 – 1:00 - I drive to my therapy session and eat a Lara Bar along the way. I’m early so I put my make-up on in the car.

1:00-1:30 – Therapy session.

1:30-2:30 – I drive to Woodranch Restaurant and order take-out from the parking lot. After 15 minutes, I step inside, pick up my food, and drive home.

2:30-4:00 – I have barbecue chicken; corn-on-the cob; and cheesy mashed potatoes for lunch and read Work Won’t Love You Back.

4:00-4:30 – I call Home Depot and ask to be transferred to the “Doors” section. Shockingly, a female answers the phone and I explain that I’m ready to purchase the doors for my garage.  “Bobbie” says she’ll be there until 9:00 p.m., so I make an appointment for 7:00 p.m.

5:30-6:30 – I take a  nap; then

6:45-7:00 – drive to Home Depot.

7:00-8:00 – I report to the “Doors” section and Bobbie is not there so I have to ask an employee to page her. Bobbie is a 60-something woman who used to work in the “Doors” section. I show her the door I want to purchase and she informs me that the door leading from the garage to the kitchen MUST be a “Fire rated” door and the door I’ve selected is NOT. Of course, nobody mentioned any of this before. Although the vendor who took the door measurements said the door from the garage to the outside must also be Fire rated, Bobbie says it’s not mandatory for this particular door. 

Bobbie questions the measurements provided by the vendor – she thinks the measurements are off and says she’ll call the vendor to verify, which I doubt she’ll do.

I mention that I also need a screen door and she shows me a product called MeshTec that I really like, although it’s expensive.

I ask Bobbie if the vendor will still hang the doors that I selected.  She said no, because the doors I’ve selected are not up to code. I think I better find someone else to hang the doors…that way, I can order the doors that I’ve already selected.

I thank Bobbie and leave. I learned a lot about doors today.

8:00 –8:45 - Home and L. is also home so I talk her into taking the dog for a walk with me.

8:45-10:30 – I sweep the patio and clean the red-rock bed, then trim the dead leaves from all of my plants. When I’m finished, I water everything. I listen to Labyrinth.

10:30-1:00 – I put on a professional blouse, spackle on the make-up, and record a 3-minute introductory video for the Canvas shell for my high school class. L. airdrops the recording into the Canvas shell and I spend the rest of the evening updating the first few weeks of assignments and the corresponding due dates.

I transcribe the 3-minute video, per ADA guidelines for the deaf, and post next to the video.

1:00-2:00 – Kitchen duty. I ready my beach bag and lunch bag for tomorrow. I listen to more Labyrinth.

2:00-3:00 – Nighttime routine. I work on a blog post and start a load of laundry. Bed.