A Nemesis Sun

At the heart of much speculative fiction (and fiction in general) is a question. What if? On Tuesdays I like to throw one out there and see what you make of it. Do with it as you please. If a for-instance is not specified, feel free to interpret that instance as you wish. And if you find this becomes a novel-length answer, I'd appreciate a thank you in the acknowledgements. 😉

From this episode of NASA's Unexplained Files (it's the segment that begins at about minute 11 and is about 7 minutes long)...

What if we had a second sun that we couldn't see?

(How can't we see it? If it were an infrared star, one that emits energy that's beyond the visible light spectrum, our eyes wouldn't be able to perceive it.)

Simple Knit Hats

I've been doing some Christmas knitting. Nope, I'm not getting ahead. Oh no. This is knitting for last Christmas.

Better late than never, right?

Hat 1:

The lighting on this is horrible, so here's a better shot I took outside...

And hat 2:

I made it a little longer as the recipient likes to roll up the edge...

I'll get better pictures later. Taking pictures outside was out of the question today (too windy), and I didn't have the stamina to play with getting better lighting inside. Another time...

And on that note, I may be a bit behind on my blog visiting this week. Not to worry, just a minor cold, but I'm going to be taking it easy so I can get over this as quickly as possible.

A Yellow

Boy 1: "Why does your shirt say 'pink' when it's gray?"

Boy 2: "I see those shirts all the time, and they're never pink."

The girl, not sure what the big deal was, gave some sort of explanation. I figured I needed to jump in.

Me: "'Pink' is the brand name."

Boy 1: "Well, that's a stupid brand name." He flailed about, trying to come up with a good analogy. "It's like your name being..." He failed to come up with anything that made sense.

Me: "Brand names are brand names. A color is a perfectly valid name for something."

Boy 1: "No. It's like her name being... It's like this," and he indicated his orange, "was called 'a yellow'."

I pointed out that was a terrible analogy as the color was named after the fruit.

Boy 1: "Well, it's still stupid."

I don't disagree. (I have a bad habit of taking the opposite view when someone starts saying something that is not necessarily wrong is wrong. Even when I agree.) For a long time I couldn't figure out the "Pink" shirts. But as the shirts are innocuous, I stopped dedicating much thought to them.

I shrugged and walked away. Later, the boy called me over.

"Can I eat my yellow?" He indicated his orange.

Since eating in class is discouraged, I said no.

The boy continued to refer to his orange as his "yellow". Even the next day.

If that's the hill he wants to die on...

How Not to Wear a Ribbon

I saw the small bag with the ribbons in them when I arrived in class. The Post-It said I was to pass them out to first period and why. But, being a middle school class, I figured passing the ribbons out at the end of the period would be for the best, so I set it aside.

But then, midway through the period, one of the assistant principals came over the PA to say something about the ribbons. Now the kiddos were clued in to their existence, so against my better judgment, I passed the ribbons out.

These were the standard small lapel pin ribbons that celebrities wear on the red carpet. These ribbons were orange, and they had provided a small pin to attach them to clothing. (Alas, not a safety pin...)

If you know middle schoolers, you know what came next.

They couldn't figure out how to attach the ribbons. I tried to demonstrate, but they were mostly not listening. One girl just had me attach the thing to her shirt.

The boy next to her, however, decided to pin the pin through his finger.

The girl was grossed out. She asked him to take the thing off his finger. Knowing it was bothering her, the boy, of course, now made a bigger deal out of the pin sticking in his finger than he had before.

I'm squeamish. I objected to this display as well. When the boy wouldn't relent, I informed the boy he had now lost the ribbon. He handed it over with minimum fuss.

The rest of the class managed to attach the ribbons to their clothing. One boy put it on his pants. Another put it on his backpack. The other boy who attached it to his finger put the ribbon on something else.

At the end of the period, the boy wanted the ribbon back. They were having an assembly that day, and all the students were encouraged to have them on. I explained that if he attached it again to his flesh, he would lose it completely.

He attached it to the hood of his sweatshirt. Well, I said it had to be on his clothing. So, good enough. He argued that attaching it to his hair would work as well, but I vetoed that idea. And then they left.

Why were ribbons being distributed to the students? They were in honor of the student who passed away over winter break. Cancer. They were honoring her with a moment of silence at the assembly.

Voices Carry

Math support. It's an extra math class for students who need extra help in math. Because they need extra help in math, these classes tend to be filled with students who hate math. And act out. And are freshmen...

Yeah, it was a bad, bad period.

I emailed the teacher and his co-teacher that evening...

(The teacher has a co-teacher for all but this period. But these students are also in with the co-teacher in another period, so she knows them. I figured she wanted feedback, too, so I included her in the email.)

It was a two-day assignment.

The worst offenders were Lawrence and Jose.

I ran into the co-teacher the next day. She informed me that she had made her displeasure known (she had "ripped them a new one"), and three students, including Larry and Jose, were going to spend the period with her (in the learning center).

Fine by me.

When they arrived to class, I wondered. The co-teacher called me to tell me to send the miscreants to her. So, I told them they had to go. They put up a protest, for a moment. Then they happily agreed.

I walked away, but I heard Jose say to Larry, "We'll take our time getting over there. We'll get there with two minutes left in the period..."

A moment later they were gone.

The room was loud, but I still easily heard Jose. And now I knew what my next step needed to be. I called the co-teacher and told her (1) the students had just left class, and (2) what Jose had said.

"Well, then, I should come out to meet them," the co-teacher said.

Surprisingly, the class settled after that. They still weren't on task, but they weren't nearly as crazy as they had been the day prior. Which just goes to show how getting rid of a couple bad players helps control a classroom.

But then, suddenly the students in class were at the door, opening it, looking out...

I got over there and told the students to sit down. I poked my head out to see what the commotion was about. Two security personnel (with their golf carts) and the co-teacher were having a discussion with the kiddos who should have already been at the other room.

It looked to me like the kiddos left the room and were planning on hanging out around the "porch" of the classroom. Because they were seated on the ledge. And I got a definite "hanging out" vibe.

I closed the door and turned back to the kiddos in the room. They had work to do.

No one ventured near the door again. One of the security guys came in and wandered the classroom. (The co-teacher had told me earlier that she had asked them to check on us during class time due to the craziness of the prior day.) He left. And things went back to the mild chaos that I expected of them.

I have no idea what happened to Larry and Jose. I'm sure it was a reasonable consequence for their actions.

I swear, teenagers don't get that their voices carry. They talk amongst themselves as if the adults can't hear them. Silly boys.

Annoyed, Part 2

At the heart of much speculative fiction (and fiction in general) is a question. What if? On Tuesdays I like to throw one out there and see what you make of it. Do with it as you please. If a for-instance is not specified, feel free to interpret that instance as you wish. And if you find this becomes a novel-length answer, I'd appreciate a thank you in the acknowledgements. 😉

Last week's question actually generated this week's question. As I was waiting yet again for another comment to post, I had a more nefarious idea why everything's been so slow...

What if computer glitches/slow downs are happening because we're being spied on? As we all know, our data is being mined by various entities. So, what if they're doing it very badly, and our slow internet is because of how they're gathering our information? 

Okay, so maybe I'm being a little paranoid. But just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get me. 😉

Dayflower Water Bottle Cover

I knit a new lacy cover for my water bottle.

At the moment, I'm sort of between projects. I mean, I know what I'm working on next. I have the yarn. I just haven't started the new stuff yet. So, no decent pictures.

But I have this pretty that I completed New Year's Day.

I'll probably make the pattern available at some point. Is anyone interested in making their own?

Also, I'll sell these to anyone who wants their own but isn't a knitter. Just let me know.

This is my third water bottle cover project. Here are the previous two...

As I only have two water bottles, the black one has now gone to a new home.

Hopefully I'll have pictures of new stuff next week.