Just in Case I'm Not Already Bored

           

The online courses offer a new feature to the mix.  We now have the option of listening to instruction, discussion, assignment or what have you. 

 

As each sentence is read, it lights up in green.

  The word being red is highlighted in blue.

 The player says 'Speech-enabled by ReadSpeaker".  Machines can't feel.  There is no voice to indicate emotion.  ReadSpeaker makes sounds.  It is monotone.  It makes whatever I have to read even more boring than it already is.  I asked for excitement not a challenge to see if it could be made even more boring.  Even a class that I love would sound dull with this devise. 

            Ironically how my last post was about poor sleeping habits.  Apparently my prayers were answered.  All I have to do is turn on this "speaking" invention, plant myself in the recliner and baby, I am gone. 

  

Who knew?

Sweet to Sleep

             I have never had the best of sleeping habits.  Ever.  According to mom, I believed I had had my fill of sleep by the time I was one.  I got to relive that with Jenna!  After turning one,  she has ALWAYS been a horrible nap taker.  I guess she gets that from me.  Patrick, on the other hand, put in enough hours of sleep for all of us.  He was great at taking naps and sleeping during the night.  My mom was neurotic.  As I had always been awake, she was not used to a baby who was gifted about sleeping.  She would often check him just to make certain he was still breathing.  Total opposites.

 

            There are times I crash out of sheer exhaustion.  I wish it was more frequent - or rather I wish I could sleep like I'm exhausted but not feel exhausted ever - just always feel well rested.

            Sometimes I fall asleep in the front room when the TV has been on.  Often Roland has left me there because he knows I prefer the airflow in more open space - although there is more airflow in the bedroom that is part of our current house.  It is the biggest bedroom I have ever had.  Plus (as I mentioned earlier) our broken couch is as comfortable as a jagged rock.

            Sometimes I wake up during the night either in our room or the front room and will think I'm in the other.  That is how I want to sleep.  Deep and unaware.  I want to wake up refreshed - not dry from the electric heat or too hot or too cold (the cold thing rarely ever happens except for my ears and toes.  They are often cold when I am awake.  I often wear a hat and slipper socks  while I read or exercise or do puzzles. 

            I know that good sleeping habits will help my emotional development.  I'm all for that.

https://www.memecenter.com/fun/6469/catch-some-zzzs

A Dictionary on the Table

            Mom and I had played "Scrabble" on occasion, but I preferred playing "Upwords". 

We used to play several times a week. We had a dictionary on our kitchen table at all times - or that is how it felt anyway.

            Our dictionary eventually got torn up a bit, but it was nothing compared to the tiles of disappearing letters.

  

            They would scratch off and we attempted to go over each with a marker until finally we just broke down and purchased a brand new game

 

            Eventually those tiles wore out as well.  After I married mom purchased another upward game with a more spacious board and smaller tiles.  After she had gone into assisted living, I took the game to live in my household.  It was this version that made it to Oregon with us.

            It is a game Jenna doesn't enjoy playing, but recently Roland has made the sacrifice of leaving the TV in order to play "Upwords" with me.  We don't yet have the sparing relationship that mom and I had together - often playing two or three games in a row.  Roland's maximum (so far) has been one.  It hasn't come close to the competition which mom and I had experienced, but it seems to be getting there.  I am grateful for Roland's willingness to work his way into becoming an "Upwords" rival.

When it Rains, it Pours

            It’s been just over three and a half years since we had made the purchase of our reclining couch and chair – something that had invited comfort in the showroom.  We didn’t realize the furniture had been created over extremely heavy frame that would misshape each time it was moved.  Thus, coming out to Oregon really took a toll on our misshapen couch each time it was moved.  It’s sad that it’s value had depreciated so quickly.  We feel so gipped.  But what can we do? 

We have looked to replace our pathetic couch, but it’s not a priority.  There are two other issues at hand.

            First there is the matter of the car that my mom had purchased brand new, however Roland and I put more miles on the car than she ever did.  We had borrowed it to go on long trips thus it had quite a bit of mileage on it before we had purchased it.  We have worn the poor baby going up and down hill;

I don’t think our car was designed for climbing. 

            Saturn checked the car each year as part of their service.  I don’t think it got as much attention after Saturn went out of business.  It currently needs a transmission.  A car seems more necessary than a couch.  Also, more expensive.  A second car would be imperative.  Of course, it costs much more than a couch.

            And now we have an additional problem.  One of our toilets leaks. 

We don’t from where exactly.  Our carpet was wet and we dried it out, but we noticed the carpet managed to get drenched again after another flush.  So, for now, all of us must use the master bath.  What moron decided carpet in the bathroom was a good fit anyway?  We’ll be contacting the insurance company on Monday to see if we are covered.  We’ll have to cut the carpet out (which had actually been our plan since before we moved in, but still don’t have the finances for) and redo the floor (in addition to plumbing expense) 
           Then there is the matter of medical bills - not even sickness but check-up routines. 

I can't imagine how outrageous it would be if any of us were actually sick or hospitalized!  What a nightmare!

            Oh, the joys!

I Need to Take a Breather

            I had quite a full agenda yesterday.  After the sun rose, I drove to Riddle as Jenna had a dentist appointment.  On our return, I stopped at Dollar General for just a few items to add to her lunch and then I took her to school.

            I meant to turn in my assignment before my assessment, but I somehow had allowed myself to become frazzled and instead of submitting the assignment I clicked my assessment and started the quiz. 

            Once the quiz starts, there is no turning back, there are no retakes.  Most tests are timed. I had less than two hours.  And though it is open book, the e-book appears on just one third of the screen and I have to control plus each page I am on in order to view something bigger.  As I had explained in my last post, it is very time consuming.  And while I thought I knew the answers to some of the questions, there were a few that had stumped me. 

            It took all of two hours and I started marking answers just to have them answered but still hadn't checked on whether they were correct.  Time ran out before I was able to find them all - plus I knew I had a luncheon to attend.  I should have waited until this morning to take the assessment!  I doubt I would have gotten a much different score however - but perhaps I would have had a few more right.  I don't guess I'll ever know for certain.

            I had misunderstood the meeting time, for I thought I was assisting with cleaning the church before going out to eat. I have not assisted with cleaning a church building since I lived in Utah.  It is quite different here as it is a smaller building and only one ward meets there.  In Utah the cleaning was always done on Saturday - sometimes by different families, sometimes by organization.  The ward I had attended in Kearns split the work in half with one family cleaning  the chapel and the other the rest of the building.  In West Valley the chapel made about a third of the work (bigger building and three wards)

            This ward is cleaned on Thursdays.  A couple alternates weeks with two sisters - or at least that is how it has been.  But health issues have complicated matters and so there have been requests made for others to volunteer their time.  Aurelia had started at 10:00.  On the average, I am not even available on Thursdays until noon - so I was not there when the workload started.

            Aurelia had invited me to lunch because she wanted me to meet with one of the sisters that she visits teach.  We met at the restaurant that serves Mexican food before returning to the church.  They had the majority of it cleaned already.  I was asked to dust and wipe down the kitchen and doorknobs. 

            The "dusting" reminded me of dusting in the temple.  One has to have a recommend to clean in the temple.  I haven't done it often.  Maybe three times in West Jordan.  It seems like it was a very long time ago.  A white cloth will remain white by the end of the night.  I used a blue micro cloth at the church yesterday.  I did finally manage to find some dust on the piano used in the Relief Society room.  All the dust I had gathered yesterday amounted to less than the size of a fingerprint. 

            One tiny piece of glitter sparkled over the piano keys.  I was excited that there was only one.  I saw glitter ALL of the time when I was cleaning in West Valley. I don't think there was any week I cleaned that I didn't see glitter.  So finding only one glitter speck was really quite refreshing.  I think if they assign workers - even more so specific jobs (that's what they had done in my mom's ward;  my nephew and niece had been assigned to clean the blackboards; someone else was assigned vacuuming and so forth) also I think they might get a better turn out on a Saturday than a Thursday.  Cleaning on a weekday just seems weird to me. 

            Then again, my mom's ward had several hindered people who were/are active.  Those that attend this ward may already have multiple callings.  I do.

            I did not return to the house until just before 4:00.  Today I've been managing online billing, account balances and other information required for credit.  Jenna will be home in one hour and though I have accomplished a lot, I still need my breather.   Tomorrow we'll be going shopping for a car.  Dang! I feel so overwhelmed with missing hours.   

I Need More Analogies and Less Pauses

   In this post I made a comment about how a survey is sent out during the final week of an online class and that we are expected to fill out said survey before we can continue with program.  I have now taken 4 or 5 classes in which I either haven't had a pop-up or else it popped up later than usual.  I don't know if I'm through with the surveys as I am halfway through my program, if it's a fluke, or if there have been bugs in the system when the school changed its format.  I'm guessing the latter.

          Currently I'm taking the first of six intermediate accounting classes.  I signed on to the live lecture and was asked how I felt about last week's assignment.  O.K. I guess.  In the chat box I wrote, "I didn't hate it but I didn't love it either."  The instructor laughed as she read my comment.  She seemed to agree because of the subject matter.

          Seriously?  If you actually agree with me, why not liven up your lectures?  Why present something boring in an even more boring manner?  Why does accounting have to be so boring?  At least try to fake some enthusiasm.  What are you doing teaching a course where there is no passion?  Are all accountants boring?  When I type accountants in Google imaging, for the most part they don't look boring.  They're smiling. 

https://summers-mcnea.com/

They're laughing.

http://www.insightsfinancialreview.com/skills-every-accountant-should-have/

 Maybe at an inside joke that has nothing to do with accounting? 
These silhouettes make accountants look like super heroes.  Hey, there's an idea: make the boring profession appeal to children.

https://www.ckca.co.uk/

So here are my ratings for my current class.

Overall, I am satisfied with this course.

 I think not; It's accounting. 

The work required for the course is reasonable.

 So far.  It seems relative.  Finding the correct page number on the ebook has been a major pain!  I think it's consumed more of my time than just doing the dumb problems!

The instructor is organized and prepared. 

No, Not really.  I would think there would be less pauses and shorter ones.  I don't know that she has ever taught online before.  I sense that she is not experienced with this.

The instructor is knowledgeable about the course subject.

Honestly, her voice indicates that she is more bored with the subject than I am . . . if that is even possible.

Instructor teaches concepts in a way that is easy to understand. 

Okay, I'll give her that one. She did make more sense of the chapter at one point.

instructor holds my interest 

Not hardly.  Again, it may just be the subject.  I find CrashCourse videos easy to understand;  however they don't seem to deal with accounting.  SwotSmart does put out a more entertaining video than do most accountant videos I have seen.

I  hope I may view the next two weeks with more gusto as I haven't found it thus far.  Why was it I chose to major in accounting?

Heavy Bars for Tonight's Cook-Off

                I think the young men and young women have a combined activity each month.  Once a year (I guess in January) they have a cook off.  Jenna had wanted to make the "cupcakes" that we had at her last birthday party - sure she is combining three ingredients to make something else, but I don't really think it should count if Reese's, Pillsbury and Duncan Heinz are really doing most of the work.  The rules are that it needs to be a recipe and not from boxes.  We didn't happen to have brownie mix, cookie dough and peanut butter cups hanging around anyway and so Roland had talked her into making an apple pie.

            Pie for an armature cook-off?  Really?  I could sense that Jenna was not that thrilled with the idea of making any kind of pie. Nor did she wish to start it last night but rather after she returns from school today.  However, Roland was able to assist last night and will be working when she returns from school.   I don't want to make pie!  I looked for a recipe that would work with ingredients that we already have.

            From years' past, I can remember when Peggy Bird was in her domestic mother earth stage.  The woman was always baking.  I loved going across the street because her kitchen was always filled with pleasant smells of baking.  Molasses cookies seemed to be the number one staple.  But I do remember my first encounter with Peanut butter squares (or peanut butter fingers as the boys called them) coming from her house and had searched for that recipe so that Jenna could make them.

            She found all the ingredients and placed them on the table and then measured each one out and really did do most of the stirring and combining and baking herself.  We didn't have the right size pan and so our bars came out thicker - and heavier.  I don't recall ever having such heavy bars before.  We could have made the frosting, but chose to sprinkle on chocolate chips as soon as the pan was removed from oven.

            I turned the oven off and returned the pan to the warm oven to allow chips to melt as the oven cooled down.  After a few minutes we spread them over the bars. I cut them into rectangles this morning, but thought better of it and cut each rectangle in half - not only because it would give Jenna more bars to take, but because they are heavy and a long bar might be too much sugar shock for some.  

            So here is the final product minus what we sampled and the oversized edge that she ended up taking to school.

            The recipe we used is found here, though there are others.  I might have used a different recipe the last time I had made them (recently as October) or had used two different pans as mine were not as heavy.  I think these ones that Jenna made are definitely the most heavy I have ever eaten.  I am assuming there will be leftovers.