unraveling around the edges

By the end of this week, I could feel myself coming apart.  My two classes after lunch are always more boisterous than the morning classes. but this week, they just seemed crazy, and I had to really struggle with myself to take the effort to bring them under control.

My biggest issue is one class where I have two very disruptive students, who insist on doing nothing, or bothering other students, or often, both.  I'm still looking for a sweet spot, the perfect technique of redirecting them that actually gets them back on task without the entire class screeching to halt while I do it. My redirects fall on death ears, anyway.  Very frustruating.

I started this post some time last weekend, but it still more or less applies.  I'm heading into my last week of LID, and physically I just feel off.  I've been staying up late so I can stay more or less caught up with grading and grad school homework, so I'm constantly exhausted.

I have two more days of school before fall break, but I won't actually be around for a good part of it, because I have to leave early on Monday and Tuesday to go up to Phoenix for my Thyrogen shots.  Tuesday morning I'll be in a meeting to plan this year's science fair, which is of course the topic I've been more or less obsessed with, since I'm doing my non-thesis project on implementing it as a portfolio.  (It's going OK for most students, but I'm still not reaching everyone.)

Mom's decline continues.  She rarely speaks in sentences anymore, and her mobility is severely limited.  She can't hold a cup anymore, or feed herself.  Writing this out I can feel a weight on my heart.  She is suffering, and I pray for peace for her, and for all of us. The time is getting shorter, now.

I ping-pong between thinking of Mom and my own health issues.   I would love my scan to be clean but I'll be shocked if it is, since the pain in my collar bone is nearly constant, and I have a new hard node just under my jawbone that's causing that new odd pain.  Pain is an unreliable indicator, but it is a worry.

At least I'm eating well.  Since I have to eat what I cook, I'm cooking a lot. I do consider making guacamole to be cooking, especially as I've modified the Chipotle recipe and I'm practically living off it.

I-have-all-this-stuff-in-the-house Guacamole
(Chipotle's recipe with substitutions for the onion, jalepeno, and cilantro)
2 ripe avocados
1/4 tsp + kosher salt
juice of 1 lime
1 shallot, diced fine
cayenne pepper to taste
~1 tablespoon parsley (rehydrated dried)

It's the lime, I think, that makes it so divine.

(But I've also made carnitas, and roasted onions, and a beautiful chicken cacciatore, and chili, and awesome chicken breasts with lemon, garlic, and rosemary, and ratatouille.  We seem to be eating a lot of chicken, but no one's complaining.  I even managed to make quite excellent gravy twice, once for chicken, and once for turkey -- roasting over aromatics makes all the difference.)