Category: Daily updates

Generally musings of the day, usually accompanied by a photograph

Into December

The grading saga continues, with tomorrow as the slightly-stretched deadline. It’s going to be a long 24 hours, followed by dealing with plagiarism cases and calculating participation grades.

Over the weekend, I did photograph this year’s Massey Christmas Gaudy. Some preliminary, minimally-edited photos are already up.

Tomorrow we are being graded in our Judo class, for possible advancement to yellow belt. They actually taught us more than the assigned syllabus includes. My technique certainly isn’t great (especially for escaping hold downs and smoothly transitioning between them), and I will need to do a bit of vocabulary cramming tomorrow.

Once I am done with this term’s TA duties, I need to turn back to my PhD work. I will be working as a research assistant, but need to decide if I should also try to get some (considerably better paying) TA hours next term. Next year my departmental funding gets cut by half, and then it goes away altogether the year after.

P.S. It was good to see the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers reject the easement requested for the Dakota Access Pipeline, pending an environmental assessment. There are no permanent victories in the fight against fossil fuel infrastructure, but anything that delays project and increases risks for investors hold out hope for helping us avoid the worst consequences of climate change.

Now 100001

As a coincidental birthday gift, I finally received my September, October, and November pay today. The first order of business: pay off my frightening credit card balance.

I won’t be able to spare much time for celebrating today, as I am still embroiled in my second big wave of grading for the term. Once this finally wraps up, I will be able to focus on my neglected PhD work.

Friendships and Judo aside, a miserable time

My second (worse) wave of grading for this term has begun: first year essays which we are vexatiously required to grade exclusively online.

At the same time, my PhD proposal continues to drift into strenge new realms of lateness; opening my email inbox produces blasts of panic; and it’s hard not to obsess over the insanity south of the border, even if that obsessing serves no productive purpose. The Trump victory also raises questions for my PhD project, with my supervisor making the dispiriting suggestion that it may be wise to drop Keystone XL from the analysis, and possibly refocus the whole project on opposition to natural resource projects in Western Canada, including fracking. This is about the last thing I want when I desperately need to get a proposal submitted and approved, and then get ethical approval granted.

On another note, the Lionel Massey Foundation (Massey’s student council) has acclaimed a “new College photographer” whose one set so far, from the Halloween dance, strikes me as rather amateur in quality.

To add to it all, I have not been paid for my teaching work since April 28th and have been living by drawing down the PhD account I established while still working and spending every cent I have ever earned from photography (no gear replacement or repair for the foreseeable future).

Another difficult rent day

I finally learned the reason why I haven’t been paid since my previous teaching assistant job ended in the spring. In an email from July where the body text said nothing about action on my part, one of the attachments contained instructions that have to be followed to get me into the UTM pay system. Submitting it means I will get paid for September through November at the end of this month.

During times like this, I find that I have to establish a gating mechanism for stress because I can’t hit all my deadlines if I am worrying about everything at once. That means I often need to freeze and exclude particularly stressful aspects of life until I have enough breathing room to engage with them without knocking everything else out of smooth operation.

Vortices

Grading and other obligations have amassed into a vortex which will keep me stationary and spinning this week. Today I basically need to wrap up my midterm grading. Tuesday I need to find an alternative way to pay my rent and internet bill because I haven’t been paid for my UTM TA work, meet with Dr. Neville about my proposal, prepare my tutorials for the week, and go to Judo. Wednesday I am out in Mississauga to teach back-to-back-to-back tutorials, followed by double office hours to help people with their forthcoming essays (the basis for my second, worse round of grading this term). Thursday a trip to the dentist will punctuate the completion of my application to the next Canadian Political Science Association conference. Friday I am back at UTM all day for a notes-and-photography assignment. Saturday, we have a double Judo class in the company of the intermediate and advanced classes.

Judo as a partnered undertaking

One way in which Judo is remarkable and surprising is how it is profoundly collaborative and cooperative.

Many warm-up exercises and all grappling and groundwork rely on close trained cooperation between two people.

Much of beginner Judo consists of learning how to fall without injury, and how to help a partner who is developing a technique gain ability.

It’s worth noting that since starting in September, we haven’t tried any free grappling in a standing position. The closest we get is free attempts to throw and hold down an opponent when you both start on your knees or sitting back to back, and we have been encouraged to tap out and end the round when we are convinced we cannot escape the hold down.

We are learning so many different techniques and working with partners of so many body types that we often need to seek guidance from the instructors and advanced students about how to perform techniques properly. For me, the hardest thing is doing a whole set of difficult tasks simultaneously: whether it’s practicing a forward rolling breakfall with initial foot and shoulder and arm positioning and then complex movement and then more precise foot and arm positioning, working on throws that require coordinated and complex foot and upper body movements, or trying to maintain or break hold downs using a combination of taught technique and the improvisation of enthusiasm.

A worrisome number of people think the Queen picks the Prime Minister, and that every Canadian law had to be approved by the British parliament before 1982

I am nearly 50% of the way through this term’s first big batch of grading, with the rest to be done by Tuesday. My lower right ribs have also nearly healed, and today’s Judo class went very well.

I may be able to spare the time to take some photos at tonight’s Halloween dance at Massey, which is unfortunately at the same time as the Clay & Paper Theatre Company’s annual Night of Dread.