That's My Bix!

Yesterday was a surprisingly busy day and I uncharacteristically slept late (9 am!) which of course was far too hot to bring the doggoes for their morning walkabouts. Anything over 75 degrees is really too warm for these smush faces to exercise in, even while wearing their auxiliary cooling vests under their harnesses. Which was fine, honestly, because I also had to teach my last class of the semester (and also the last of my graduate fellowship — damn) and I had some prep work to get done before the class zoom opened at 11:30 am.

Class was stellar and somewhat chaotic — I tried something new with the class which was breaking them into small groups to workshop their flash fiction stories. Because everything in my class is essentially “Do it if you feel like it” in response to the state of the world, only eight of the sixteen students submitted work. I had figured fifteen minutes of discussion for each workshop piece (augmented by the opening remarks they had already done on the discussion boards ahead of the workshop), and with eight pieces and an hour to talk about them, it worked out best to split the class in half and do four and four. In theory, that meant eight students per workshop, but in actuality, with several students just unable to attend right now for a variety of reasons, it worked out to more like six and six. I had assigned their groups based on whose work was being discussed, who typically shows up in Post Quarantine Life and who is a really robust contributor.

I had devised a way to break the class into small groups with technology — Zoom won’t let you have two meetings at once, but I set up a Google Meet and posted the link in the chat window and sent one group over there. The idea was that I would be on camera and on mute in both groups but they would lead their own workshop. Thankfully I had two students with really solid leadership skills in both groups (and every one of these authors are super interested and invested) to manage it. What I didn’t consider fully was that while I could mute myself on both calls, I couldn’t mute one call while still hearing another call, so I couldn’t pop back and forth between the windows, I could just endure two, three and sometimes four people talking at once. I kept idiotically removing one ear bud as though the sound from one group was coming from the left side and the sound from the other group was on the right side — that obviously didn’t work, and yet, I kept finding myself doing it. I don’t know, it did seem to help, the same way that it helps to turn down the car radio when you’re trying to figure out where you are.

We have one more get together next week, during our finals talk, where we will clear up some loose ends, listen to each other perform their work (and I might even read one of my pieces), and do pet show and tell.

After that, I did some work on my freelance project for Tech Giant Website. It was weird to be back in the groove, thinking about deliverables and measurable qualifiers after three years out of the game. In some ways, it was like remembering how to speak a language you haven’t heard in years. I can imagine this three years feeling like a dream if I dive wholeheartedly back into tech journalism — did it even happen, was I ever here? It’s also amazing how much bravado I have about this subject, and perhaps that speaks to the culture of tech itself — it response to confidence and bullshit. But also, I guess it comes down to the fact that I a) know I can deliver what I promise, even if I have to bleed for it and b) I actually don’t care very much about the project as a whole, so it somehow removes my own internal anxiety and fear of failure from the equation.

Imagine how much we could get done if we didn’t care if we failed? Sometimes I think that’s the secret to some of the tech bros — they’ve been praised so much for the infinitesimal successes their whole lives and have gotten so accustomed to absorbing the successes of others as their own success that it doesn’t even faze them if they fall flat on their faces.

Man, writing that out makes me realize how much a driving force in my life has been the avoidance of shame.

Once I got that Tech Giant proposal done, I researched a few agents, sent out a query, and then hopped onto a quick video kibitz with my bestie Michael. I jumped off that chat to grab dinner that Esteban had whipped up — pollock, steamed lemon asparagus and Brazilian tapioca cheese bread puffs — and then after dinner had another call with my gaggle of Las Vegas lady friends that we call The Coven. That was delightful and we made many eggplant and taco jokes, but after about 90 minutes, I felt the last of my social spoons, made my adieus, and had some quiet time reading for the rest of the evening, followed by a deep dive in YouTube looking for songs I loved in the 90s, until it was 11:30 pm and I realized that the latte I had during my 11:30 am class was biting me in the ass, so I tucked the dogs for their last potty break of the night and then went off to bed.

We did spot another house that came on the market yesterday, one we’re both quasi excited about. Unfortunately, our minions in Green Bay can’t get in to walk around it until Monday, and given the current swing of the housing market, it might be snapped up quickly, so we’ll see. It’s an imperfect house, to be honest — it lacks a lot of the things that we loved about our last house, like a wooded lot with lots of property, and a four season sun room, or even a third stall in the garage, but it is pinging pretty hard, so I’m trying to keep my emotional distance from it and recognizing how much of my excitement is probably linked to my desire to GTFO of Vegas.

Despite that desire to leave, the state of Nevada is lifting a bunch of COVID restrictions tomorrow, but your Intrepid Girl Reporter is still staying the fuck home, thank you very much. And if you can, you should too.