February 6, 2015

 I set my alarm this morning, just for the satisfaction of turning it off and going back to sleep. Sadly, I fell back to sleep much too quickly so I didn't really get to enjoy the realization that I was rudely awakened but able to ignore it and go back to bed. Oh well.

Today was a very lazy day. I responded to a discussion post, so I'm done with that for the week but I might still respond to another post, just to be safe. I also need to read the textbook chapters for the other class, which I plan on doing tomorrow.

I finally set up my desktop today, mostly out of curiosity in the Battlefield: Hardline beta. I was still annoyed by how it performed the other day on my laptop. It didn't take too long to set up my computer but it took much longer to download the game. During that time I ate lunch, watched some of Die Hard with A Vengeance, and probably did something else, too.

And then I played the game. The beta has two maps and three gamemodes. I tried Conquest and Heist but it turns out I still suck at Battlefield. I spent the whole time looking for people, finding people, and then getting killed. Couldn't win a gunfight to save my life, literally. Then I tried Hotwire, which is the gamemode I tried the other day on my laptop and had a horrible experience because of the lag. I also could drive in third-person because the camera freaked out and I had no idea what I was supposed to be doing. Well, today the game ran fine and I knew that I was supposed to get in one of the marked cars and try to drive it as long as possible. Previously I thought only one team captured cars and the other team had to stop them, which sounded kind of sucky for the team not capturing cars. It is way more fun knowing that anyone can get a car. And, I'm actually pretty good at driving. I love driving games and the fact that people are trying to shoot you and blow you up takes it to a whole new level. It doesn't really say much because everyone is technically a noob, but I did manage to get the top spot and the MVP medal three or four times. There was one match where I was on such a roll that I drove the slow-ass tanker truck around the map for over half the match and racked up a huge score.

I also took the opportunity to fly a helicopter. At one point back in Battlefield 3 on Xbox I could kind of hold my own in a helicopter, at least to get from point 'A' to point 'B'. I tried flying a couple times in Battlefield 4 but couldn't get the hang of the mouse and keyboard. Also, every time I got in a helicopter to try and work it out, other people would spawn in the helicopter and then I was that asshole that didn't know what he was doing and crashed right after takeoff. In the beta there are only transport helicopters and a lot of the time in Hotwire they aren't used because it is kind of boring. People want to drive cars, not ride around in a helicopter. Unless the pilot is good, in which case you can follow cars around and blow them up with the giant machine guns. Anyway, in the more open map I started dabbling with the helicopter, figuring out the basic controls and just getting a feel for the thing. I got to the point where I was able to do laps around the map and kind of track cars so my gunners could shoot at them. The other map required flying between buildings, which I did manage, even saving myself several times from near disaster. But I'm still not good and there is probably no way I'd survive in an attack helicopter. I think for those you need to fly in first person so you can line up the guns, which sounds terrifying.

It is now once again very late and I am ready for bed. My brother invited me out for lunch again tomorrow and I'm looking forward to trying a new restaurant. It'll be hard to beat the veggie sandwich I had last weekend but we'll see what happens.

February 5, 2015

 I feel like I am becoming the boy who cried sore throat but once again my throat feels like something is about to happen. Eventually I'm going to be right.

Today I decided not to take my textbooks to work and I think that broke the internet. I bought some ebooks last night and I was going to look at them in my downtime today so I decided not to bring my textbooks with me.

When I got to work I finished putting my shortcuts on all the computers and then I went down and helped with kindergarten literacy centers. That was a pretty good time. The kids were supposed to draw their favorite toy and one girl said she was going to draw the queen. I found out after she drew her picture that the queen was actually her mother. So I started suggesting actual toys in order to find something she could draw. She ended up going with Barbie dolls but still continued to draw people instead of the dolls. I eventually got her to draw one of the boy dolls and she started telling me a story about him. He was really strong and could throw rocks but if they hit a window the window wouldn't break, but he could knock the school down with his rocks. He also flirts with her sister because her sister kissed him. And he's Spider-Man. It was a pretty interesting tale.

We made it halfway through the first graders' lab time when the internet died. And it stayed down for the rest of the day. Classes primarily come to the lab to get on Compass Learning or Type To Learn, both of which are internet things that don't work without an internet connection. There aren't even any games on the computer because kids go to websites for that now.

This afternoon both kindergarten classes were scheduled to come to the lab. The first class opted not to come but the teacher ended up composing an email to me with his class (because email within the district still worked) and I wrote back. He later told me that the kids really liked working on the email and then my response. For the next kindergarten class I set up Paint and let the kids draw. I gave several of them instruction on how to get started and then I just had to stand back because kids are pretty quick learners and they were eager to help their neighbors figure things out.

At the very end of the day the former resource teacher who now does stuff for Boys & Girls club came down to the lab because she had to upload a physical form to a website, which she couldn't do because the internet was down. My first thought was to get it on her phone so she could upload it from there but that wasn't going to happen because I didn't have a cord to connect her phone to a computer and I couldn't send an email from my computer to her phone without the internet. I ended up scanning it and emailing it to myself from the copier (which is a thing I had never tried because but it actually works pretty well). I was able to email it to my work account because that was still working. I then put it on a thumb drive for her so she could put it on her computer and upload it when she got home and actually had access to the internet.

With all of that going on I kind of forget today was the last day of the week and didn't shutdown my computer or put out the sheets that cover the computers over the weekend. Whoops.

After work I went to the old house and loaded up my car with a bunch of stuff. So much stuff. I wanted to work on answering discussion post questions for class tonight so I am saving the unloading of my car for tomorrow. I'm already not looking forward to that. Not only because of all the back and forth trips, but also because all that stuff has to go somewhere. I liked when there wasn't so much clutter in the new house.

Tonight I unsurprisingly got distracted by internet things and DVRed shows but I did eventually respond to two discussion posts. I want to respond to at least one or two more tomorrow or Saturday just to make sure I appear sufficiently active in the discussion. I earned all twelve points on the last one and I'd like to do the same this time because all together that is one point shy of a quarter of our grade for the class. That is significant.

It is late so I'm going to go to bed now. I think I'm going to set my alarm as if I had to work in the morning just so I can turn it off and go back to sleep. I run the risk of that becoming a habit, which would be bad for when I actually need to wake up early. It could also backfire and I may be wide awake when the alarm goes off and unable to fall back to sleep. I think I'll risk it.

February 4, 2015

 It is nearly midnight so hopefully I can make this a short entry.

This morning I was helping a second grader with a Reading Counts test because he isn't the best reader and was having trouble just reading the questions and answers. I was helping him sound things out and at one point he misread something. I can't remember if he confused whatever it was with trains or coal but seemingly out of nowhere he told me you have to stay away from trains because when you run out of coal you get punched in the face. I had no response, mainly because I was trying incredibly hard not to fall on the floor in a fit of laughter. He was completely serious about what he was saying and I want nothing more than to follow his train of thought back to the station and figure out what he was talking about.

I spent most of my day working on the desktop shortcut situation. Successfully, I might add. I made a batch file that would open up a program, making one for each of the Office programs I wanted shortcuts for. I still couldn't get it to work in Chrome or Firefox because whenever I clicked on the link it would just open a page showing the code of the batch file. Then I stumbled across some random forum, and a random comment on that forum, and learned that Internet Explorer could run batch files. I'm not a fan of IE but it got the job done so I was happy. I tested it out on the back row of computers in the lab and everything worked great.

Over lunch I decided to make the Office page look a little better, which was a good idea, but it ended up setting me back because it took me forever to switch it out on the computers I had already installed it on. But I eventually got there. Once I had my system of installing it down, I was able to update a computer in about five minutes, which is a little over two hours, but actually much more than that if you count how long it took me to figure everything out.

Here is the process I have to go through for each computer. I navigate to the Control Panel and make hidden folders visible. I delete the old Shortcuts link and associated folders off the desktop. I navigate to my new Shortcuts file and Office file on my drive and drag them to the desktop. Then I copy the font I used for the Office page, navigate to the Fonts folder, and paste the font in. Next, I go to the Public Desktop folder and drag over all of my files from the desktop. I then make a copy of IE and move it to the Public Desktop folder. I change the icon for IE to an Office one so it looks like an Office thing, not just an internet shortcut. Then I go into the Start Menu and the Accessories folder to find Run so I can open up the gpedit.msc and navigate through several folders to get to the Group Policy for changing the IE homepage to the link of my Office shortcut on the Public Desktop. I have to do it this way, instead of doing it from inside IE, because it needs to be for all users on the computer, not just me. Then I make a shortcut of my Shortcuts file (because you can't change the icon of a website you make in Word but you can change the icon of a shortcut) and change the icon to the star that I used for my old Shortcuts file. I select all the folders and files on the desktop that I put on the desktop that I don't want seen (because the Shortcuts file and the Office file each come with a folder attached containing pictures and other stuff) and I make them hidden. Finally, I hide hidden objects once again so all that stuff disappears, and then I close out of all the folders I have open. It is an incredibly tedious process. Thankfully I only have twelve computers left.

After work I went to Chipotle. While I was there, I got a text from my mom asking if I had left work already. When I got back in my car I said “Yes” and a short time later she asked if I could grab my sister's bowl out of one of the teacher's rooms. My theory was that she asked one question but was thinking she asked another, so she wasn't really ignoring my response. She later confirmed that she was thinking she had asked if I was still at work, which would have made her subsequent request more reasonable. Either way, I was still relatively close so I went back and got the bowl. Then I went and mailed a bill and bought a Powerball ticket before heading home.

My burrito was pretty good tonight despite the lady being really bad at judging how much stuff to put on the burrito. She started by giving me half a spoonful of rice even though the thing was overflowing with rice, so I had to ask for more. She was also stingy with the beans and sofritas but I didn't want to continue asking her to do a better job at her job.

I showed several videos after dinner, and not just because I was avoiding writing my discussion post for this week. But I was definitely doing that. Even after I came down to my room. I never turned on my TV but I did get sidetracked several times on the internet while trying to think very hard about what to write about. I want to say it was worth all the “wasted” time because I ended up coming up with ideas that hadn't occurred to me before but were way better than my initial ideas. I kept with dishes and utensils for “library-like” organization and came up with my old shelf of memories (random items with memories attached) and my picture folders on my computer (compared to my music folders). I'm pretty happy with it. Tomorrow I'll start reading other people's posts and write some responses.

But now I'm going to bed. Once again I wanted a short entry and did the opposite. It is now half past midnight and I can definitely feel it. Luckily we don't have school on Friday so I won't feel bad about taking a nap after school tomorrow and messing up my sleep schedule.

February 3, 2015

 I completely ran out of things to do today at work.

This morning I went down and helped out with literacy centers in kindergarten. I usually do the listening group but we were a person short today so I got that group started and then went over to whatever center the parent usually helps at. I think it might be word work but I could be completely wrong. Anyway, there was a basket of plastic hearts (because it's February) and inside the hearts were letter magnets that spelled out words. The kids took turns picking a heart and then trying to unscramble the words. One of the words was “this” and it turns out, those are also the letters that spell “shit”. The latter was the first word the girl spelled and she looked at me with a very mischievous gleam in her eyes and I shook my head so she started rearranging them. Luckily none of the other kids saw, especially the kid next to her because he kept saying all the words the other kids got out loud and in a fairly loud voice. I wouldn't want to be the adult responsible for the group where the kid shouted “Shit!” for the whole classroom to hear.

After that class I went across the hall to see if they would need me over there. There was the student intern along with a para and a parent so it didn't seem like they needed me but I wanted to make sure. The para was pushing the tables apart and he looked up and whispered “We don't need you, or want you... I'm sorry, that's something I want to say to my father.” It was hilarious.

Another funny thing was said while the sixth graders were in the lab this morning. I was standing in the back with the teacher and he asked me if I could tell who's birthday it was based on the clue that in their family you were allowed to wear leather, or faux leather, on your birthday. And then we both looked at the girl wearing the leather pants. I had noticed it earlier because leather pants seem a little ridiculous, even for sixth graders who are just starting to try and figure out their style. The birthday thing was an interesting explanation. I can see maybe being allowed to wear makeup on your birthday but leather clothing, of all things.

Throughout the rest of the day I had classes in the lab but when there weren't classes I was at a bit of a loss because MAP is done and I hadn't asked around for any busy work. Eventually I decided to update the Shortcuts website I made. I wanted to add in links for Khan Academy and Free Rice, which I did, even though it was kind of a pain and I ended up having to remake the entire website. I'm doing it in Word, which should be easier than writing out all the HTML, but I kind of don't think it is, and HTML would be more fun. And time consuming, which is good when you're trying to consume time. It was a bit of a bitch trying to get everything centered and spaced correctly on the page. It looked fine in the Word document but then it would be all over the place on the webpage. I ended up having to go back and forth, making incremental changes in the document and checking the webpage to see where things were at. They now look super wonky in the document but just fine on the webpage. I don't get it but it works.

When I finished that up I had the idea to make a webpage, like the Shortcuts page, with just Microsoft Office programs on it, so the kids could open that up from the desktop and then pick the program they wanted instead of going through the Start Menu. I also thought that would be simpler than cluttering up the desktop with shortcuts for each program. It appears to be a bit of an issue, however, trying to get a webpage to open a program, because in web browsers, executables are generally seen as a bad thing. I tried using a hyperlink with the address for the program and that didn't work. Now I'm thinking about making a batch file that will open the program and linking to the batch file in the webpage. I'm going to look more into that tomorrow. Really, I would like to just pin the programs to the taskbar, but I couldn't figure out a way to do that for all users on a computer. If all else fails I'll just put the individual shortcuts on the desktop, but I'm not ready to admit defeat yet.

After work I tried out the Battlefield: Hardline beta. I downloaded it on my laptop and I don't know if it was my computer or the beta but it was pretty laggy. Maybe I need to update a driver or something. I feel like I also had lag issues with the BF4 beta but I could be misremembering that. Either way, I ran around, and drove around for one match, and got a few kill assists but never managed to get a kill. There were several instances where I should have gotten a kill but the lag ended up getting me killed. If I really wanted to see if it was computer related I could set up my desktop and try it on there but that seems like a lot of effort for a game I'm not that interested in. It's basically a slightly sped up version of BF4, and BF4 is still a good game. Even if I haven't played it in forever because I've been distracted by other things. Either way, I don't foresee myself buying the game.

I was going to write my discussion post tonight but I kind of feel a bit out of it, my head has been feeling on the verge of dizzy all day, and the topic for this week is still a bit murky. I have to write about things in my personal organizing that are library-like and things that are museum-like. I can't quite wrap my head around that yet. And based on the few posts that have been made so far, I'm not alone, because they also seemed to be grasping at straws a little bit. At the moment I have that feeling like I have accidentally walked into the wrong class and I don't want to admit my mistake so I sit there acting like I know what's going on but really it is all flying over my head. It just feels like we have been dropped into the deep end without much of an introduction. I mostly blame that on the textbook because it really seems like its main purpose is to show how educated and smart the author is rather than actually trying to teach the reader new things. It kind of reminds me of the comment one of my professors made last semester about how often times people working on their PhD find it hard dumbing down what they're saying to the general public. They are so engrossed in their little specialty that they forget that everyone else isn't completely versed in that specialty. It really doesn't matter how smart you are if you can't convey that knowledge to others.

February 2, 2015

I am officially done with MAP stuff until the next round starts in April. Today I downloaded and printed off the last of the reports, updated all of my spreadsheets, and finished all of my pie charts, including a set for the principal that showed a comparison of the entire school from the Fall to Winter and a comparison for each grade level. It feels good to be done.

During second grade reading groups with morning I got coughed on numerous times so I will probably be sick in the near future. It makes no sense why I haven't been sick yet this year.

And that was pretty much my day at work. Not very exciting. I need to find something to do tomorrow because I think I'm all out of busy work.

Tonight I did the assigned reading in one of my textbooks. It is the organizational book and I frequently find myself reading something and then saying (usually out loud) “what the fuck did I just read?”, and there are more than a few instances where it still doesn't make any sense after going over it a few times. Some people just shouldn't write textbooks.

After eating that delicious sandwich yesterday I am on a bit of a food kick. Those kicks never really go anywhere because I quickly realize I'm lazy and have no real motivation to actually cook. But I like to entertain the thought. Currently I'm watching Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives, which always makes me want to start eating meat again, and all the foods that will lead to a heart attack.

And maybe tonight I'll dream of delicious food. That would be pretty great. I'm going to go see what happens.

February 1, 2015

 How is it already February? This year has started out at quite the pace.

I woke up this morning and did things but right now I can't recall what. I'm sure they were exceedingly important things. This afternoon I had lunch with my brother and sister. It was snowing today but thankfully I had no issues getting to the restaurant. I got a veggie sandwich with lettuce, guacamole, roasted red peppers, cucumbers, cheese, and a ranch sauce on toasted wheat bread. It was really good. I need to start making sandwiches. Spice up my own lunches a bit. Peanut butter does get a little boring and my kidneys don't like the oxalate. As for the rest of lunch, it was also good. I like hanging out with my brother and sister. I was able to give my brother the books I got him for his brother, which he liked, and I also played the birthday song for him before emailing it to him, which I think he liked more than the books. At least I hope he did.

When I got home from lunch I read a textbook chapter and then did other things. I tried watching Grown Ups 2 but the recording cut out at what I am assuming was a vital moment in the movie, a confrontation between the frat guys and the adults at the backyard 80s party. It was available On-Demand but it wouldn't let me fast forward because it had to download and it isn't the kind of movie I wanted to sit through again.

Tonight I watched two episodes of Shakespeare Uncovered and Maverick, while playing some more Tera. I would like to continue playing it but I imagine once the semester really starts to pick up and assignments start coming I'll be devoting most of my time to school work. Can't wait for that.

Yesterday I think I stretched out weird on my bed when I was playing Tera and managed to pull something in my leg. Or I did it while exercising this morning, which is probably the more likely answer. Either way, by this afternoon I really started feeling it and now it is really uncomfortable to walk. I kind of have to throw my right leg out in front of me because if I try to lift it like I normally do when walking it hurts. I'm hoping I will wake up in the morning feeling completely fine. That would be ideal.

Tomorrow all the MAP stuff should be updated so I can print off the last of the reports and get those to the teachers. I can also finalize my spreadsheets and pie charts. And then I'll have to come up with something else to fill my time because we've got a month before State Assessments start.

And now it is late so I'm going to go to bed.

January 31, 2015

Today was a pretty lazy day but I maanged to be somewhat productive. It took me awhile but I eventually got around to making a few discussion posts for class. That leaves me with just one more chapter to read for this week.

I got on a forum and had a discussion with a couple different people to figure out the pre-wired internet situation of the new house. Turns out, it is pre-wired for telephones, not the internet. That doesn't really make any sense to me because it was sold as being for the internet. I learned on the forum that we need a different block thing. The one now has all the ethernet cables connected but that is the only option with the block. The one we need has ethernet jacks next to the cables. That makes a lot of sense but I don't get why the builder didn't have that put in instead of the phone one. As long as all the wiring in the rooms was done correctly, it shouldn't be too hard to rewire a new block. That might be a weekend project sometime in the near future.

Speaking of the internet, I connected our Dish to the wireless network. Now we will be able to watch shows On-Demand. At the moment I am struggling to keep up with the stuff I DVR, so I have no real interest in On-Demand at the moment but I'm sure at some point it will be nice to have.

Tonight I played Tera for the first time in awhile and it was a lot of fun. A lot of running/riding around and killing things. At one point I accidentally ended up kind of out of the map. I started going up a hill, just to see how far it would let me go, and I managed to make it quite a long way, almost to the top of the highest mountain. I was tempted to keep going down the other side but my quest objective was back where I came from so I turned around. On my way back down I found a message board that was put there just for people who managed to climb all the way up there. It allowed me 20 characters to write a message for whoever comes after me. That was pretty cool.

Tomorrow I'm going to have lunch with my brother and sister. My brother wanted to do it today but I heard about it from my sister ten minutes before his lunch break and there was no way I would have been able to get ready and across town in time. Also, much like last time, I had just finished eating lunch. So, tomorrow I will be ready to go and I won't have eaten. A nice change.