Tuesday, 11 March 2014

My Desk is a Mess (but my rowing has improved)!

My desk is indeed a mess, as you shall see. But let's start off with some pics from an evening walk to the pet supply store ...

Fuzzy


Eerie


Swingin'


Moon Over 4th


Not a Café (one block from chez nous)


And now ... the DESK


Empty test strip containers that need to go in the recycling / Professional Development forms for work / Steinbeck novel to discuss with Dug / The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time (to teach this summer) / Groovy leather pencil case (Xmas gift from Secret Santa) in which I keep insulin pens / Income tax receipt from Access Copyright (which pays a small annual amount to compensate for any photocopying of my novel Adam's Peak) / Highlighter pen for marking up novels (yep, I do that) / New bicycle lights, handlebar grips, axle thingie (to replace items stolen a while ago) / Income tax receipt from the Public Lending Right (which pays a small annual amount to compensate for library use of Adam's Peak) / Pre-approval letter for a Visa airmiles card, waiting to go in the recycling / Framed painting of Sri Pada (Adam's Peak) in Sri Lanka, done by Leah's hubby's grandmother and generously bequeathed to me (to be hung very soon) / iCal pages stapled together and marked up with insulin doses and blood sugar levels / A pension statement from UBC, where I taught Writing Centre courses for a couple of semesters in 2005-6 / Dog training handouts waiting to go in the Freddie binder / Numerous books for learning Spanish, which I've been working on haphazardly for several years now / A few books for the study of French, which I speak somewhat more fluently than Stephen Harper, but not as well as Justin Trudeau / A Bible (not the canonical King James version), which I refer to for literary purposes / A wastepaper basket that used to reside on the floor but had to be moved up when its contents proved too tempting for a certain canine family member!

Finally, to wrap up, here is another visual from the Stealth-Phone of Coach Annette. It's only three strokes and a few seconds long, but I'm proud of those three strokes. They're a noticeable improvement over the lopsided, hunchbacked rowing I tend to slip into when tired, lazy, distracted, insufficiently warmed up, hypo-/hyperglycemic, etc., etc., etc. ... :)


Yay, team!

2 comments:

  1. My desks, nook table have you beat! LOL! But I know the feeling.
    I cannot believe you would teach "The Dog..."! I began to like the book, praying it wouldn't become cloyingly cliche, and then it did. I was not a happy camper when I finished it...it felt "safe" and "treadworn".
    Anyhow, Love the photos! Love the rowing, as well! That's something I haven't attempted since my college days at UW! My hat's off to you!

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    Replies
    1. Yay ... finally some friendly disagreement in the blog! ;-)

      I liked The Curious Incident and thought it did something interesting (though certainly not radical) with the conventional happy-ending structure. I also think it expresses some quite important and complex themes. The main reasons I'm teaching it, however, have to do with the suitability of its language/structure/content for the particular course, which is a college prep course for non-native English speakers. In a certain sense, the main character of the novel is a foreigner and a non-native speaker in his world. I'll see how it goes over with the students!

      Yeah, my desk isn't terrible. :) I actually took that shot just to check if my camera lens was scratched then decided to use it in the post.

      When you rowed, was it sweeping or sculling? I dig sweeping but never have much occasion to do it these days.

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