Sweet November/Long December Suite

My crappy October stretched well into November this year leaving me a little mystified that we are in December already. As if waking, disoriented, from an unintended nap I blink my bleary eyes and try to regain my bearings. Where did the time go? Or perhaps more to the point, where the hell have I been?

The Atlantic hurricane season officially ended yesterday. It was a little milder than predicted projected forecast and yet we had one “severe weather day” cancellation of school that we made up last Wednesday. Hurricanes, of course, know nothing of calendars. Another storm this year is pretty unlikely but what the liars with maps weatherfolk call hurricane season is nothing more than a period of higher probability. I’ll be content never to suffer through another year as freakishly destructive as the one we had two years ago.

I had unexpected compliments from two administrators this week. [Hmm, compliments from administrators are always unexpected now that I think about it.] But one of them was a request to serve on a committee which in my experience is not always a great compliment. Still, it’s a chance to get on the good side of my new boss and I agreed to do it even though it means I had to reschedule a dental appointment and alter my lesson plans for Monday so I could be off-campus half the day. Grrr. I just hope it doesn’t turn out to be a waste of time. [I waste more of my own time than I should, but I try never to waste other people's time and I get really irritated when other people waste mine.]

I start listening to holiday music on Thanksgiving every year and I usually buy a few Christmas CDs each year too. I plan to write a post about some of my favorites, but in case I don’t let me tell you that I’ve been playing One More Drifter in the Snow Get the CD by Aimee Mann almost constantly this last week. (She’s probably best known as the voice singing Voices Carry when she was in ‘Til Tuesday in the mid 80s, but she’s done some great solo work since then.) Its ten songs are a bittersweet blend of traditional and original tunes. I especially like “Whatever Happened to Christmas” — I find it hauntingly beautiful — and “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch — gleefully sinister. Through the whole thing I imagine being curled up by a fire with some delicious hot drink — mocha, I think. That’s no mean feat in the 80 degree heat of a Florida winter. Perhaps there’s a reason to believe….

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