Back to school

Yes, the kids went back to school this week, so here we go with their last semester in public school. They had final exams on Tuesday and Wednesday, left over from December, and then their new classes started on Thursday. They both had their math finals on Tuesday and both did terribly. Teen B got a D and Teen A got... a G? He said to me, "I thought I did better than that." So we contacted his counselor and he's going to try to get himself a peer tutor for this semester. Should have done it last term. I don't know why I keep thinking we have all the time in the world.

Final grades are (mostly) posted and Teen B did OK: two A's and three B's. Teen A's grades were more exciting: two A's, one B, and two D's. That's a 2.6 average, so he's still good to get into Metro (which requires at least a 2.0 average) and, most importantly, it means he gets credit for those classes, so he can still graduate from high school. Whew. Yes, a D is a passing grade. OMG. Rocket Boy and I have a little trouble coping with our children's grades, both of us having been extremely good students in our day. Me: National Merit Scholar finalist; RB: graduated a year early. Oh well. Look where it got us. 

We got a little snow on Thursday, just an inch or two, very pleasant. Then, Thursday night, it just dumped, totally unpredicted. We woke up on Friday to an extra 6 inches or so and it was still coming down. Teen A went out to his car and came right back: "Where's a scraper?" That tells you how little snow we've had so far this year. I went out and scraped off my car and Rocket Boy's, then did the west driveway down to the sidewalk. The plumber (our neighbor) did all the sidewalks with his snowblower, such a nice guy. 

Then Teen B and I drove off to school, but a large portion of Broadway was closed due to buses running off the icy road. I have never seen that before. We detoured over to 16th Street and rejoined Broadway there, but there were still three more buses ahead of us that had gone off the road. Very impressive. But my new tires had no trouble at all. I love my new tires.

This coming week it's going to warm up again and be completely dry. And on we go with this "winter" as they call it.

So, first week back at school. I did pretty well with my resolutions, my somewhat new schedule. Giving myself a couple of hours in the morning to read and write went pretty well. I think my after-lunch schedules are too packed, though. Each day I have two cleaning tasks and two non-cleaning tasks. 

• Monday my cleaning tasks are to take out the trash, compost, and recycling and clean the kitchen, while my non-cleaning tasks are to plan the week's meals and shop for them. That worked out fine. 
• Tuesday my cleaning tasks are to change the cat water and clean the bathroom, while the non-cleaning tasks are to lift weights and spend half an hour or more on the files. I got through all of that, but it was challenging. I was tired.
• Wednesday (late start day) the cleaning tasks are to sweep all the floors and clean the bedrooms, while the non-cleaning tasks are to make phone calls and plan things (like vacations). I managed to sweep the floors and I called to make a vet appointment for Baby Kitty, but that was all. The bedrooms were ignored, and I did no planning.
• Thursday the cleaning tasks are to vacuum the rugs and clean the living & dining rooms, while the non-cleaning tasks are to lift weights and spend an hour on genealogy. Well, let's see. Baby Kitty's vet appointment was at 10 am, which meant I didn't get my reading/writing time. And then I needed to go to Sprouts to buy fish for dinner, and Teen A wanted various things from King Soopers, so I went to both stores, and that used up the rest of the afternoon. No weight lifting, no genealogy, no vacuuming, no cleaning of rooms. Then when I got to the high school to pick up Teen B, I saw a text from him: "Pick me up in about 90 minutes." It was 4 pm. What was I supposed to do, go home again and wait until 5:15? I decided to just sit in the car. I talked to our insurance agent, sent some emails, got caught up with Reddit and such. It was fine. But tasks didn't get done.
• Friday, of course, we had that snow. My official cleaning tasks were putting out the trash and either compost or recycling, plus mopping the kitchen & bathroom floors, and my non-cleaning tasks were to pay bills and work on the files some more. Well, because of the snow I had to spend time shoveling and de-icing just to be able to put the trash and compost out, and after that I was tired. I did mop the kitchen floor -- by hand, with a sponge, to get the really sticky stuff off -- and then I was even more tired. So the bills got put off until that evening, and no files were worked on.

The week was complicated by something ridiculous: on Sunday night, when I went to take my shot, I forgot to take the cap off the pen. I pushed the button, but nothing happened. Something felt wrong. There was no brief pain. I studied the pen. Aha! the cap! I took the cap off, and $40 of medicine (my co-pay) squirted harmlessly into the air.

I couldn't move on to the next pen, because that was the last pen in the box, and they won't give me the next box early. So as the week went on, I got hungrier and hungrier. And not hungry for regular food, either. I wanted junk food! I wanted candy, chocolate, and salty snacks! It was awful. Also, I wasn't satisfied by just a taste. I wasn't satisfied by any amount of food. I really couldn't believe how quickly the effects of the drug vanished, replaced by total insanity.

I told myself: this is going to be a weight-gaining week, don't worry about it. And oh, it was! Six pounds in one week! So ridiculous. Even though I was always hungry, I really didn't eat enough to gain six pounds. But six pounds I gained. It didn't help that the weather made it hard to exercise. I did get in three walks, plus snow shoveling, and one weight-lifting session, but it didn't help.

Anyway, it was a week. Next week will be different (maybe better, maybe worse, but different).

Yesterday, Saturday, Rocket Boy and I went to a protest (ICE Out for Good) downtown (the picture shows us reflected in the window of a passing bus). It was our first time attending a protest in downtown Boulder. I was really tired (I'm still not recovered from the dumb flu), but I dragged myself out there. We parked at Boulder High, rather than taking the bus, and that was a good plan. Then we just walked the block and a half to the bandshell where people were meeting. I read somewhere there were 1500-1600 people there. It didn't look like that many to me, but definitely a few hundred.

If I'd been more energetic, we would have walked around, seen more of the crowd, but I felt better just standing in one place. Some of our friends who were walking around did find us. We stayed from about 12:15 until about 1:45 and then went to the car repair place to pick up Rocket Boy's car, which was having an oil change.

Today, at my request, we went to the Denver art museum to see the Camille Pissarro exhibit, "The Honest Eye." It's been there for a few months, so I didn't think we'd have any trouble getting in, getting tickets, and we didn't, but there were actually a lot of people there. If we'd come earlier (we got there a little before 3 pm), we might have had to wait to see the exhibit. That surprised me. I mean, who cares about Camille Pissarro? Apparently lots of people in Denver. And I was captivated by his paintings, so I guess I can understand.

When I was a little girl I had a reproduction on my wall of an Impressionist painting that we've always assumed was a Monet. Something happened to the picture, and I've never been able to find it again. It's probably "Girl Playing with a Hoop in the Garden," or whatever the title is, by Monet, but that's never seemed exactly right. Probably just my memory playing tricks. But anyway, when I saw some of the previews of the Pissarro exhibit, I thought, maybe my picture was actually by Pissarro!

Spoiler: it wasn't. There was only one picture in the show that reminded me of my picture, and then only slightly. 

But I still really enjoyed the show. My favorite picture was this one, titled "The House in the Woods," although when I tried to find it online it seems to be titled "The House in the Forest." Same difference. Apparently it's not a famous picture, because I couldn't find anything written about it, and there weren't any reproductions of it in the museum shop. But I really liked it. I went through the whole exhibit and then went back and found this one again and took a picture of it.

So, the week ended up pretty well. And if we can just get through this coming week we'll be halfway through January.