Book of D: Certifications

 

Book of D: Thistles and Dungarees

The title of today's post correlates to something that happened today. The title may sound strange, but it popped into my head while I was watching reruns of Young Sheldon and cooking dinner. I was just thinking how quirky life is. Today was somewhat of an awkward day for me at work kind of full of "aha" moments, if you will. I arrived on campus early, but I saw my friend, "A," who is a professor at the University, so I changed my course of direction. She was being chauffeured by her 17-year-old nephew, whom is a novice to the world of driving. I drove around the corner to where my friend was being dropped off instead of heading into the faculty and staff parking lot where I usually park my precious CUV, Chewy II🚗. "A" saw me drive up behind them, and she scurried over to Chewy II's passenger side and asked, "do you have time to talk?" . . . to which I answered with a resounding "YES!" She got into my CUV and off we went. I didn't have appointments scheduled in the morning, so I was down for spending time with her. We went to grab breakfast and talked and talked. Unfortunately, she was/is having marital issues that made a turn for the worse right around the time her mom died over a year ago. Losing her mom was a huge event in and of itself, but my friend and her husband had also just bought their first house together. Sadly, on the day my friend's realtor called her to announce their house bid had been accepted (my spouse and I were with her, so we yelled and went to celebrate), my friend's sister in San Antonio called her later that same evening to tell of their mom's demise. "A" never got the chance to tell her mom that she had bought her first home - nor would my dear, sweet friend have the opportunity to bring her mom for a visit to enjoy the house and the lovely garden in the backyard that helped with the decision to buy that particular house. Anyway, "A" and I went back to campus after a couple of hours; we didn't stray too far - location wise, that is. I was going to drop her off at the "Welcome Center" entrance and head over to my usual parking lot.

But, she inquired about my office situation: I told her that my new office wasn't ready yet, and that the current one was giving me the creeps (long story for another post), so she suggested I use her office, which is a mere 50 ft. from where my new office will be on the 4th floor. I accepted. "A" had meetings all day, so I would not be disturbed (she does not have office hours on Tuesdays for students). I canceled an appointment I had in Big Spring, and I just stayed in her office. I took an occasional break and looked at the many pictures, degrees, and awards she had on the walls and the other scholarly artifacts she had strewn on the credenza; it looked like she had been cleaning and had not put the items back into place. Then I saw a figurine that we had given her a few Christmases ago. It was a Willow Tree with three women (sisters) hugging. I was reminded of friends, friendship, and loyalty and how often we take all those things for granted. Sometimes, much like a thistle, we don't tend to them because we think they are strong enough to survive without much care and attention. But, thistle is delicate once you remove the spines. The spines in friendship, to me, are the walls we put up in order to mask loneliness and pain. As for the dungarees, well, I just like that word and wanted to use it. 🤭 It inspired my drawing for the day. LOL.

Book of D: The Art of War

I love this book. It is telling of many things. I wrote the following on Insta and other social media timelines:

... This copy of @theartofwar_suntzu is exceptionally beautiful. I've read "The Art of War" and reviewed it several times, but I never owned a copy - until yesterday. Honestly, I was fascinated by this particular edition because of how it was beautifully bound (scarlet canvas with black wax cording and folded pages). The "maker" in me appreciates how things are crafted; there's true art everywhere.

Moreover, learning about the art of war in Tzu's eponymous novel is just icing on the ole proverbial cake: "war should be avoided with diplomacy, but if it cannot be avoided, it should be fought strategically and psychologically to minimize damage and the wasting of resources." #TheArtOfWar #TheArtOfWarIllustrated #SunTzu #PickYourBattles

Book of D: Family History

As my spouse and I were navigating through today's "to list," we decided to stop at one of our local 'Goodwill' stores. Neither one of us had anything in particular to scour for, so we each went separate ways. I found myself in the household area; there's a poster I designed for our beloved, late cat Caty, and I decided to look for a wooden frame that would do the poster justice. That is when these coffee mugs caught my eye.

It made me sad to see them on the shelf at this second-hand store because the cups must have meant something to the person who created them for their family reunion. It reminded me of the family blog I created for my family way before Mom passed away. It's been a long time since I have updated the blog; several babies have been born into the family, but the death of my dear Mama seems to be the catalyst for my unmotivated prowess these last few years, which is why the blog has gone without much updating. The lowly mug at the moth-smelling Goodwill was yet another reminder of the day's earlier discussion with my spouse about how as we get older, we tend to get wiser, maybe even cynical, regarding things and people and how it makes us less wanton as we mature to want to be around others or to go out of our way for the benefit of others when we know nothing really benefits anyone. So, in summation, what does anything we do even matter if we're just going to be an afterthought - like the family reunion mugs at Goodwill.

Book of D: A Crisis of Faith & Octopus Aliens

The title of today's post stems from the title of season 2, episode 3 of Young Sheldon. In this episode, Sheldon's mom, Mary, is really shaken over the sudden death of her friend's 16-year-old daughter who dies in a car accident. Mary's faith is immensely rattled; after all, the abrupt demise of someone so young is cause for deep consternation to most people. As Mary starts to doubt her faith, which is extremely important to her – as we fans of the "Sheldon" series (or The Big Bang Theory) are quite aware of, she goes slightly over-the-edge and goes on a drinking binge.

Let's back-up a little to the start of the episode, which has the minister of the church the Cooper family attends spewing the daily homily. The minister is preaching about G-d and how much He loved the earth that He gave His only son . . . blah, blah, blah, blah, blah (I sound like Greta Thunberg with all those "blahs" lol). Sheldon being Sheldon starts to question the minister's sermon (semantics), i.e. earth, universe, soul-saving beliefs, faith, etcetera. I won't go into the banal details of the entire episode, the point I'm trying to make relates to how humans grossly second-guess their belief systems (way too much) without so much as just questioning the faith, religion, and religious authority that is often the root of bereft existentialism. Why aren't people more like this Sheldon character . . . asking those difficult yet important questions (rhet.). Anyway, as for the theme of the episode, it took Sheldon's love of his mom, Mary, to help Mary overcome the "funk" she was in as she questioned G-d and her faith. Although the minister provided some semblance of guidance to Mary, he merely provided Mary a way in which to overlook or ignore the issue at hand (G-d, death, and religion). It was actually Sheldon who provided Mary with existential meaning of her life by simply reminding her how lucky he was to have her as his mom. Sheldon said, "Well, there are 5 billion people on this planet and you're the perfect mom for me." And, voila . . . Sheldon restores Mary's faith in G-d. It seems simple, but you know what, maybe humans need to start being more simple instead of complicating shit so damn much. As I've alluded to before, one of my favorite mantras should be used more often: K.I.S.S. (Keep It Simple Stupid). Over and out. But first, thanks "Shelly."

Book of D: Obfuscation: To Obfuscate or Not to Obfuscate

To explain obfuscation in simple terms, it means to make something difficult to understand. For instance, programming code is often obfuscated (via encrypting) to protect intellectual property or trade secrets in attempts to prevent an attacker from reverse engineering a proprietary software program. Okay, that being said, maybe you're wondering why I am writing about obfuscation in today's post. Oh, that's simple: I have students enrolled in computer science courses who are having issues with last semester's courses and are dealing with SAP (satisfactory academic program) issues. I have been working with the students to make sure they do not fail or get dropped from this semester's courses. Other staff members are helping to create a safety net, per se, for said students. The term obfuscation came up in our weekly BIT (Behavioral Intervention Team) meeting. One of BIT members asked what obfuscation meant because one of the students brought it up, and he had to pretend he knew what it meant. 

I tried to explain it in layman's terms, sans a condescending manner, but I was rudely interrupted by another BIT member. This guy is immensely obnoxious; he self-monikered himself "infinite wisdom," after his attempt at wanting to be known as "He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named" failed - because he is no Voldemort. That dreadful guy tried to be all smart, showy, and patronizing, but his explanation quickly went downhill. I was loving his crash-course in verbal crashing. LOL. The guy completely quashed the meaning of obfuscation, which sent the meeting of obfuscation into obfuscation - which I quickly noted. LOL. I stepped in (again) and explained obfuscation as something that black hackers a.k.a. cybercriminals (sometimes even white hackers) use to conceal information to make things difficult to understand. 

After the BIT meeting ended, I went back to my (cold and lonely) office and thought about obfuscation, which led me to think about how much I love programming. It is beautiful to learn different computer languages; it's an artform. It helps society with so many different facets of life. If your electronic devices are working properly, you can thank a computer coder for creating a beautiful line of e-communication. Electronic devices like cell phones, laptops, and tablets require code to function properly, and coding allows humans to communicate with these devices. Anyway, I love teaching the younger gen to code. Well, I used to, but these days, they are learning it at school in far more advanced manners than what I know. I thought about how my now 19-year-old nephew thought I was a genius because I knew JAVA, HTML, etc.... I taught him how to code at a beginners level several years ago when he was just 13 years old. He loved it and surpassed my abilities, that is for certain. When he was mostly into coding, he could have talked coding and VR prototyping alongside the experts. I also introduced my nephew to ALICE, and he loved it. The late, great Randy Pausch would have loved talking to my nephew. This brilliant nephew of mine knows PYTHON, C#, and C++ better than me. He uses his abilities to create games in his spare time when he is not acting in one of the Shakespearean plays (of which he adores the tragedies, comedies, and histories) with his schoolmates. Yeah, he wants to be an actor, but he still codes a little, that is when he is not on Twitch or Discord with his gaming community. Although I am not a gamer, I have no qualms with those who game and those who partake in extreme gaming. I have several family members and friends who fall into the latter category. Bring on all things MMORPG, and they are totally and completely into it. I have seen the outcome of days playing World of Warcraft (all games W.O.W. related), Albion, Tower of Fantasy, DnD (online and the OG), etcetera. I don't have the patience to play RPG or MUD background games. It took time for me to learn the difference between an RPG player and a video gamer. LOL. Kidding. The types of gaming genre just didn't captivate me. I did, however, like the coding and algorithms asociated with gaming. Anything that was behind closed doors and didn't incite too much attention is what enchanted me and being able to speak the language and slang. Differentiating between RPG and MUD was kind of like knowing the difference between anime and manga. Well, maybe not exactly like that. I must admit that I did/do enjoy reading manga and watching anime. As for manga, I subscibe to how one reads from right to left, top to bottom, and back to front. I always read books in that manner - even as a child I started reading from the end of the novel. I think it somehow quelled my need to know the outcome, which would posit the book worthy of reading. I guess all this is derrived from my love of building things. I also attribute my hobbies to my need to take things apart and reassemble them in hopes of improving the way they work. Not in real-life, per se, I like taking apart websites and apps using source codes and such in order to recreate something better. I will admit that I like using other people's codes once in a while especially when the codes make things run so well and unabashed like a finely tuned instrument; it makes for such a beautiful quality that I just cannot explain. I am sure others who love coding and such understand what I mean. I am sure many can explain the love of coding better than me. It's like math for me: I adore math, and sometimes I partake in solving mathematical equations to relax and to exercise my creativity. Most often, I prefer to write or read to chill and be creative, though. I even love formulating excel spreadsheets, which is also coding. Actually, MS Excel is the world's most widely used programming language. All these things are activities I love, and I am grateful that even when I am not always able to utilize the tools for work, I can still use them during my personal time. Although I am more into white hacking, if I had to chose a type of hacking, I do understand that obfuscation has its time and place. Well, except for in a BIT meeting with that one guy who thinks he knows everything. By the way, Voldemort called, he says you're still not worthy!😁 

Book of D: Paxlovid Mouth Mimics Burnt Tortillas

According to Google, people who get what's being called “paxlovid mouth” often notice a bitter or metallic taste in their mouth shortly after taking their first set of pills. 

Well, to me, “paxlovid mouth” mimics burnt tortillas. It's okay to eat part of a burnt tortilla every now and then because it only makes you appreciate the other part of the unburnt tortilla: the tasty, soft, and pliable part that reminds you of the goodness of Mama's love and care 😀. Not that Mama ever burnt a tortilla because she did NOT. I am referencing the act of reheating a tortilla on a comal and stupidly burning it. That burnt, pungent taste is awful. Most often, if you are anything like this Hispanic gal, burning a tortilla does not elicit throwing it away but rather eating around the burnt part or the edges if it's not a lot. But, there is only so much of the burnt part you can eat before it starts getting too much of a smoky, carbony taste. To me, when I had covid and was prescribed paxlovid by my doctor, and had taken the pills after the first day (6 pills/day, 3 in the morning & 3 at night), it brought on that awful burnt tortilla taste. I had to chew gum and drink ginger ale (Schweppes brand) to respectively mask the taste and get rid of the nausea. So, yeah, even though paxlovid did have a kind of a metallic taste, to me, the burnt tortilla is a better description. The aftertaste of paxlovid is what we learned in the grad counseling program as dysgeusia (dis-GOO-zee-uh), which is a bad taste in the mouth, and it can all be called parageusia. (PAYR-uh-GOO-see-uh). Whatever it is called or however it is described, paxlovid is pungent and repulsive . . .  almost as bad as the illness it is helping you recover from or beat: Covid-19. I'll take the bad taste any ole day versus getting hospitalized - or worse. I fear that covid is just here to stay, good, bad, or ugly, it is not going away. It'll just keep mutating. I hope I'm wrong, but if I'm not, maybe the drug cartel . . . er - I meant big pharma can make paxlovid taste better than metallic, burnt tortillas. 

Book of D: The Sky Is A Neighborhood

Dave Grohl, genius front man of the Foo Fighters, once said of the eponymous song, "One night I was lying out looking up at stars just imagining all of these stars as places that have life on them as well, and I decided that the sky is a neighborhood, that we need to keep our s--t together in order to survive in this universe full of life." 

I was listening to my fav radio (shock) jock of all-time, Howard Stern, on Howard 100 - SiriusXM, during my drive to work on this gloomy, rainy morning. I rather enjoyed how Howard referenced the song and managed to incorporate it into the segment of the show - as he always does. Howie didn't allude to the aforementioned quote, that was my own discovery upon doing some research (you're welcome 😉). Stern merely said that Grohl was a "genius" and that if the only thing that Grohl had ever done with his life was to have been the drummer for Nirvana, that would have been a really huge accomplishment in and of itself, but for Grohl to add to his resume that he started the Foo Fighters and sang lead vocals while writing and producing the songs, well, that is just awesome and unheard of. In doing the research after listening to this morning's Stern show, I read that Grohl had initially formed the Foo Fighters as a one-man project. I agree with Stern regarding Grohl being a genius and wonder. 

All this reminded me of the star gazer embedded in me and how I often find myself looking up into the sky to ponder: who else is looking at this same sky at this same moment (?). Corny? Yes, this I also know. I am corny by nature. You should hear my jokes. Anyway, as an avid fan of all things Seattle and Seattle-Sound, I was fascinated enough by Stern's SiriusXM show to do some research and writing today. Like the CliftonStrength's Assessment pointed out at the departmental meeting yesterday, my "top 5 themes" (Intellection, Learner, Input, Context, and Achiever) posit that I love partaking in research, writing, and learning. Yes, those are ALL kinda my thing (😉).

Book of D: CliftonStrengths Analyzed for CSBI

Center for Student Belonging and Inclusion 

(Division of Student Affairs and the Dean of Students)

One Drive