Ravings of a Textual Deviant

This week’s class was probably the best one I’ve taught so far. I had fairly good participation, not a lot of complaining, almost no disruption at all, and even saw some people smiling during class. Unlike last week, everyone was quite keen on final relaxatio, too.  I remembered to keep them moving, and have found as many alternate options as I can for people who pariticpate seated in chairs.  I’ve even got a couple things I’m going to steal from one of my teachers for the next class.

So, on the way to do the Christmas thing with his family, Ed and I stopped off to get a present for his brother and sister-in-law—a nice bottle of wine.  We got back to the car, whereupon I handed the gift bag and bottle to Ed and said “You know what to do.”

He replied, “Drink the wine, grouse for half an hour, pass out, and pee myself?”

My brother has been taking trapeze lessons at least as long as he’s lived in Portland. When he was an undergrad, he put a lot of his spare time into learning things like tightrope walking and juggling. So I wasn’t at all surprised that he told me that his boss get worried when he says he’s going to run away and join the circus.

“You’ve been saying that since you were in college,” I reminded him.

“Yeah,” he said, “but now I’ve actually got the skills.”

One of my friends who doesn’t like brussels sprouts told me this story today…

Only a few people at a family gathering liked brussels sprouts (none of whom were children), and the host had overbought. As reheated brussels sprouts are not an improvement on the original, the host disposed of them in the usual manner, which was to put them in a dog dish and leave them out for the critters who lived in the enormous tree in the backyard. The leftovers were duly put out, and the kids settled down to watch the squirrels, birds, and ‘possums. Imagine their delight as they saw the ‘possums batting the brussels sprouts out of the dish and leaving in a huff.

If I ever have my own yoga studio, I’m going to have to get a set of these:

This week was much better than last, although there was still less participation than in some of the earlier classes. There was a lower level of disruption, although it was still somewhat distracting for me as a teacher. Fortunately, I stumbled onto the trick to keeping the students interested and involved. They really seem to like repetition and movement, which I discovered when we did a kripalu-type move that I don’t even have a name for. Essentially, it’s a standing, side-to-side moving twist at the waist, letting the arms swing freely. My first yoga teacher, Sondra, taught it, and so does one of the teachers at my gym. My students absolutely loved it, and we spent about five minutes of the hour-long class just on that move.

I also taught them alternate-nostril breathing, which I personally find very helpful for sinus and headache pain. It’s said to be helpful for calming oneself, too, and I’ve talked a couple of people through it during emotional upsets. One of them told me that one of the things that helps is the need to concentrate on what you’re doing, and that gets you a bit of emotional distance.

Nobody was in the mood for final relaxation, which I thought was a bit odd—most students, even kids, love the final relaxation. But as soon as I figured out it wasn’t going to happen, I shrugged, moved into some neck and shoulder stretches, and ended the class. Still, they all seemed to feel good after it was done, and they even had a Christmas card for me.

Quotes from work during Dead Week.

“This place is like an Agatha Christie novel—fewer people show up each day.”

“I may be a minister, but I’m an evil bastard.”

“Would a suction cup stick to a skinned cat?”

One of the teams in the next building over has a small plush moose that’s been their mascot for a couple of years. Usually, it’s prominently displayed on top of a filing cabinet. Occasionally, someone moves Moose into a different position and adds scenery or props. A few days ago, I walked past Moose, and noticed that someone had scattered a couple of brown M & Ms under his hindquarters. The next day, a smattering of chocolate-covered raisins had been added to the display. After that, it was an extra-large Tootsie Roll that had been…sculpted. Today, a sizeable chunk of melted chocolate had joined the scene.

I hope there aren’t any chocolate meringues to be found.

L: The guardians of animal nomenclature had mixed feelings over a proposal to name three newly-discovered species of slime-mould beetle after US President George W. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. A pair of insect experts reserved the names Agathidium bushi, Agathidium cheneyi and Agathidium rumsfeldi for their latest creepy-crawlies.
Me: Slime-mould beetles, eh? I think I’m OK with that.
L: Me too!
Me: I’m not experiencing any mixed feelings, other than a very mild disappointment that it was not an actual slime mold.
L: Wonder what color slime mold the beetles like?
Me: Red. Red states…blood…power ties…

I didn’t write this one, but I couldn’t resist it. Dedicated to my hard-working, hard-drinking, hard-joking coworkers…

If a packet hits a pocket on a socket on a port,
And the bus is interrupted as a very last resort,
And the address of the memory makes your floppy disk abort,
Then the socket packet pocket has an error to report!

If your cursor finds a menu item followed by a dash,
And the double-clicking icon puts your window in the trash,
And your data is corrupted ’cause the index doesn’t hash,
Then your situation’s hopeless, and your system’s gonna crash!

If the above doesn’t help with your computer troubles, perhaps this will.

If the label on the cable on the table at your house,
Says the network is connected to the button on your mouse,
But your packets want to tunnel on another protocol,
That’s repeatedly rejected by the printer down the hall.

And your screen is all distorted by the side effects of gauss
So your icons in the window are as wavy as a souse,
Then you may as well reboot and go out with a bang,
‘Cause as sure as I’m a poet, the sucker’s gonna hang!

When the copy of your floppy’s getting sloppy on the disk,
And the microcode instructions cause unnecessary risk,
Then you have to flash your memory and you’ll want to RAM your ROM.
Quickly turn off the computer and be sure to tell your mom!