Aasimar

Scintillae's page

RPG Superstar 6 Season Marathon Voter, 7 Season Marathon Voter, 8 Season Marathon Voter. 5,858 posts (6,546 including aliases). No reviews. 1 list. 3 wishlists. 46 aliases.


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I'm in hell.

A lot of the coaches at smaller schools tend to send their tournament invites statewide so that other small schools, even if it's a drive, can get involved. Normally, this is fine. I tell the kids about the close ones and ignore the rest.

Today, however, has been a going on 3-hour back-and-forth argument in reply-all about a joke one of the coaches made. It's like watching a couple confront each other about the dating app still on one of their phones, but they've locked all the doors so you can't escape.

I'm not even going to the tournament. I don't need to know. Aaaaaaaaaaah


8 people marked this as a favorite.

Here's a new one.

What the student meant: Justine sacrificed herself to gain forgiveness.
What the student said: Justine scarfaced herself to gain forgiveness.

Very, very different take on Frankenstein.


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What the student meant: Frankenstein is a novel of the Romantic movement.

What the student said: Frankenstein shows romantic tension.

I think we're improving on the Creature/Helen Keller buddy cop movie.


4 people marked this as a favorite.
captain yesterday wrote:

Masks are more placebo than an actual deterrent. Go nuts if you want to wear one but they won't keep you from getting sick.

Just saying.

Counterpoint.

I haven't gotten sick enough to call out since I started wearing a mask around my classes.

Before I started regularly masking, I'd have to use nearly all of my sub days because public schools are petri dishes.

They might not block COVID, but they've blocked the usual flu/respiratory ick like a charm. So they can prevent you from getting sick in addition to being just plain considerate of others.


4 people marked this as a favorite.

Forensics Coach from Other School: Here are League tournament invites! Also if anyone has any extra prompts for Extemporaneous or Impromptu, I would really appreciate it!

Pulls up lyrics to "We Didn't Start the Fire;" compiles list and shares

I wonder how long til she notices.


3 people marked this as a favorite.

"All right, we're going to do some vocab review."
"On Quizlet?"
"No, OnlyFans."
class proceeds to do a collective mental record scratch
"...Yes, Quizlet."


2 people marked this as a favorite.
Freehold DM wrote:

I'm all for duolingo.

That owl means business.

I have a Duolingo owl I made and hung up in my room for a "Have you done your homework?" banner.

Always scares at least one kid who's up on the memes.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Limeylongears wrote:
Scintillae wrote:
Drejk wrote:
Monterey Jack incident?

Last year, I started the tradition of giving the kids proofreading passages - just articles I found and inserted errors into for them to catch. One was from a recipe blog.

A group of girls came near to blows over whether or not Monterey Jack should be capitalized. A table was nearly flipped. I had to intervene by googling it, which started more arguing about cheddar.

Cheddar should absolutely be capitalised. It's a place, in Somerset, SW England.

That's what I thought, but when I looked into it to verify, several sites did not capitalize it. Hence the argument.


2 people marked this as a favorite.
Drejk wrote:
Monterey Jack incident?

Last year, I started the tradition of giving the kids proofreading passages - just articles I found and inserted errors into for them to catch. One was from a recipe blog.

A group of girls came near to blows over whether or not Monterey Jack should be capitalized. A table was nearly flipped. I had to intervene by googling it, which started more arguing about cheddar.


"Here, have an ACT practice passage."
...
"It's No Change."
"It's not No Change."
"I will die on this hill. NO CHANGE."
"There's an apostrophe!"
"So?"
"It's supposed to be plural!"
"I'M SAYING NO CHANGE."

So that's how I watched a friendship deteriorate over an apostrophe. This is almost as bad as the Monterey Jack incident.


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"Why is there a picture of Barbie on the bulletin board?"
"Shakespeare."


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Syrus Terrigan wrote:
Freehold DM wrote:
Syrus Terrigan wrote:
NobodysHome wrote:
. . . stable of writers were uniformly awful, all coming from the, "Hey, this fad is popular right now! We need to put it into the show!" school of thought that was so execrably predominant . . . because originality was dead. . . . .
there are libraries' worth of truth in that statement.

I wish I could make everyone who swears by this sit down and watch a few days worth of truly original stinkers. Fads are annoying, but rarely appear with no reason whatsoever- although they certainly may lack appeal to all but a niche audience. Not all that's original or novel is good solely due to being original or novel.

I dunno, maybe I've been watching too many failed shows of the xx's/starting lineup of fall XXXX retrospectives.

** spoiler omitted **...

Firefly v. Outlaw Star

......simply, Firefly wins because it doesn't have Aisha Clan-Clan in it. It's like they tried to give a migraine a personality.


3 people marked this as a favorite.
Limeylongears wrote:
Heating's been bust for a couple of days at work. When we suggested getting some space heaters in, the big boss was resistant at first, saying that our unwillingness to work in the cold reflected poorly on our combat readiness in case of war with Russia. I assume he was joking, but can't be 100% sure.

Are there windows in your place of work that your boss is careful to avoid?


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"....so, as we see, the Creature has learned that his appearance is terrifying to those around him, and the more he hears from the cottagers about humanity, the more he realizes that he is truly alone. No friends, no family."
"He can go to an orphanage."
"I don't think they'd let him-"
"A blind orphanage."


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NobodysHome wrote:

I love pets and their uncertain object permanence, or their faith in your ability to change things they don't like.

We've got a nice juicy storm hitting California this week, so of course the Cranky Calico is nonplussed. She makes me go into the kitchen with her, I open the back door, she hears and smells the rain, bats her tail angrily a few times, and wanders back inside...
...and 15 minutes later she's asking me to do it again. You can hear the rain on the roof, kitteh!

I've also seen it in wonderful videos of dogs who go to a door, see the bad weather outside, and immediately go to a different door hoping for better weather through that one.

Recognizing that the weather sucks seems like one of those simple evolutionary things you'd expect all animals to do, but pets seem to feel that since you can make light, heat, and food whenever you want, why can't you adjust the weather as well? Makes no sense!

I've heard that pets see turning on and off the shower as controlling the rain.


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What Was I Doing Again?
sits down to grade writing prompts on Classroom
sees reading worksheets sitting beside computer needing entered, does those
moves daily agenda slideshow, realizes afternoon class does not have a slide, stops to adjust
looks up vocab list to add terms for bellwork today
realizes I never made the quizlet for this quarter's vocab terms, open quizlet
realize it's been a month and we should probably do a vocab quiz, begin writing vocab quiz
"Ms. Scint, did you grade my writing prompt yet?"
glances back at the completely untouched writing prompts I sat down to do two hours ago

It's probably a good thing I've been talking to my therapist about ADHD...


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NobodysHome wrote:

So, I don't like posting about internal company politics because it can make the company easily-identifiable, then you get the whole, "You posted on social media disparaging the company," excuse for firing.

But at this point, GothBard doesn't particularly care.

The owner of her company is an incompetent Elon Musktard with all the stupidity that entails.

The latest mandate? Their project switched to a new game engine two weeks ago. This morning the owner mandated that no one on the project is allowed to work with anyone else for the next two months so that he can personally review each individual's work in the new engine and fire anyone who doesn't meet his expectations.

Insane Counterproductive Micro-management by an owner: Check!
Billionaire owner assumes he's an expert in all fields?: Check!
Threats to fire anyone who doesn't toe the line?: Check!

Yep. We are SOOOOO happy that GothBard has a solid chance of getting out of there before these idiotic meetings. But it's obvious no progress will be made on the game for the next two months because how many games do you know of that have been developed by multiple people who weren't actually allowed to work together or communicate?

EDIT: And for those who feel I'm casting aspersions, the owner out-and-out says that he admires Elon Musk and his management style and is attempting to emulate it, so it's not just, "Oh, this looks like how NobodysHome thinks Elon Musk manages," it's literally the owner saying to his employees, "I'm trying to copy how I think Elon Musk manages."

Cause nothing says "good at business" like idolizing the guy who singlehandedly tanked the value of his company. Stockholders would like a word. setting aside my thoughts on running a company based on stockholder appeasement...


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I have peaked as a teacher.

I made a simple infographic featuring a cartoon parrot beneath a speech bubble containing a woman smiling at a keyboard while standing beside a strategy board game.

This is incredibly stupid.:
Iago claims that Desdemona prefers Cassio to Othello.


4 people marked this as a favorite.

Life with High Schoolers

"WAIT! This is an odd question! flips to the back of the book Ok. I got that one right. Now I have to show how I did it."
"Draw a stick figure looking in the back of the book."


2 people marked this as a favorite.
quibblemuch wrote:
Vanykrye wrote:
Is it bad that I kinda want Frankenstein to be real?
It’s worse that I’d assume he ends up looking and sounding like Elon Musk. Sigh… dystopian futures seemed so much more fun when I was a kid…

The irony is that Frankenstein would have caused less damage if he acted like Musk.

Frankenstein's biggest problem is that no one knew about his creature until he started murdering people. He didn't tell anyone at his school that he was robbing graves, torturing animals, etc., so no one could believe that such a creature existed.

Musk? The failson would livetweet the entire process.


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Things my kids say:

"Wait, Helen Keller is real?!"
"...yes."
"Is Frankenstein real, too?"


1 person marked this as a favorite.

"Ms. Scint, how do I cite a quote for a Shakespeare play?"
"Ok, since the lines are always consistent when page numbers aren't, you put act, scene, lines." writes two examples on the board, just random numbers

....apparently one of the random quotes I picked was right from the climax. Whoops.


5 people marked this as a favorite.

Overthinking 101 with the Kiddos

Me: [Kiddo], have you turned in your project yet?
Kiddo: No, but it's almost-
Me: Okay. This is the one you showed me this morning. Did you answer the question?
Kiddo: ...yes.
Me: Did you explain how things have changed about that topic since Shakespeare's day?
Kiddo: ...mostly?
Me: Did you make a prediction about how your topic will be relevant to Othello?
Kiddo: Yes.
Me: Works cited?
Kiddo: Yes.
Me: Did you avoid making your slides look like vomit?
Kiddo: insulted YES.
Me: ...then you're done! Just turn it in and breathe!


watches kids goofing around in the hallway after school

Me: ...you're weird.
Kid: You're weird!
Me: ....yeah. How have you not noticed this?
Kid: ...I dunno.


5 people marked this as a favorite.

Another Edition of "Teachers Have to Say the Weirdest Things"

"Tell me what makes your story Gothic or Romantic."
"He tries to kill himself!"
"I'm fairly certain that happens in more genres than those two. I'm gonna need you to put your eyeballs on the notes and absorb the words into your brainmeats."

"Of course it's Romantic - he's got a wife and child!"
"Preeeeetty sure people have families in other genres."

"Yes, Poe and Byron were both trainwrecks, but they're different flavors of trainwreck."

on deciding parts for a forensics duet wherein one character dies
"Welcome back! Figure out which of you wants to live."


Awesome, thanks!


We've already had three snow days. But we're finally able to get started on our novel studies. 'tis Othello and Frankenstein time.


3 people marked this as a favorite.
NobodysHome wrote:
So I have no idea whether this constitutes "politics", but John Oliver did a fantastic hit piece on Homeowner's Associations, and that plus CY's complaints leads me to wonder: Is there anyone who's ever had a positive experience with a homeowner's association? Ever?

Yeah, the people who get themselves appointed to the position because it's the only form of authority, control, and personal fulfillment they'll ever have in their sad, empty little lives.


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And wrestling meet cancelled.


3 people marked this as a favorite.

The district has decided not to cancel the wrestling meet tomorrow, which means I've gotta work concessions. But we're going to sell pancakes and hot cocoa/coffee, so we should make a killing.

And maybe, just maybe, this means I don't have to do this much fundraising for the speech kids next year.


It's been a hot minute since I've been able to turn my mind toward GMing anything, and I've finally gotten a new group together. They'd like to learn to play in 5e, but I really wanted to run through Iron Gods.

Has anyone made an attempt toward converting the AP to 5e rules? Any advice?


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quibblemuch wrote:
DungeonmasterCal wrote:
quibblemuch wrote:
It's less the cold and more the darkness.
I have been diagnosed with "reverse seasonal affective disorder", something less than 10% of all seasonal depressive disorders. I don't like bright sunlight, I can't stand the longer days, and I'm actually much, much sadder when the rain or snowfall stops than I am when it's happening. If I were rich and could spread my money around like gravy on a biscuit, I'd travel from pole to pole to maximize the amount of night time I get, except I don't know anyone in those areas. Oh, wait. I do know a guy in Alaska, who describes himself as "the only gay, Communist, pacifistic anarchist in this hemisphere", which suggests he has an evil counterpart in the southern hemisphere, I guess.
That reminds me of this rest stop I saw in Texas that boasts "The Largest Cross In the Western Hemisphere" which immediately made me picture a Texan standing somewhere in China under a REALLY big cross, throwing his cowboy hat to the ground, stomping it, and shouting "We're gonna hafta change the goldurned sign from 'In the World'!"

Well, the biggest cross is the one you invent to carry yourself.


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I finally remembered my password!


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NobodysHome wrote:

Speaking of the "Reply All" apocalypse:

A PM received the All Hands invitation and did a Reply All, "I'm getting blood work today. Can we reschedule this?"

So,
(1) She got the day of the meeting wrong.
(2) She Replied All.
(3) She asked her SVP to reschedule his All Hands for her convenience.

Oops.

Is her name Karen?


This may be a longshot.

I recently remembered a short story wherein William Shakespeare somehow ends up watching a performance of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. I cannot remember the author or anything else about it, and googling this keeps trapping me in a cycle of reviews and summaries for the play.

Anyone have any idea what I'm thinking of?


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NobodysHome wrote:

That's pretty funny -- Scint started an AI discussion yesterday afternoon, and this morning I got a global email from Global Megacorporation that we are NOT allowed to use ChatGPT in any of our work.

Is Scint secretly one of my executives?

Hmm...

I wish I got paid that much.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
NobodysHome wrote:
Scintillae wrote:
Spare me. Some of the Usual Suspects have discovered ChatGPT for essays.

I'm interested -- how hard is it to spot them?

Because in spite of everyone believing that ChatGPT is the next miracle solution to everything, its technical writing, er, leaves much to be desired.

It absolutely loves to state utter nonsense as absolute fact when you get into engineering.

I blame sci-fi.

One of our district admins sent us a link to a site that's designed to detect AI-generated writing, so pretty easy. Just the hassle of pasting the text into it first.

And I looked at the other kids' as a baseline - the two I wrote up? 80+% AI-generated. The highest anyone else hit was 20%, and this was from a kid with a solid writing style that I could see the bot cribbing from, plus I watched them actually use classtime to work on the paper.

And yeah, the AI-papers were...not good.


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Spare me. Some of the Usual Suspects have discovered ChatGPT for essays.


I'll admit that my interest in it is solely due to looking at "this day in history" and realizing it wasn't just the same day but the exact year.


6 people marked this as a favorite.

Kiddo: It's your birthday, Ms. Scint?! How old are you?
Me: Look up the Exxon-Valdez spill.
Kiddo: Wow! There's no WAY you're that old!
Thousand-yard stare


6 people marked this as a favorite.

In other news, the main reason I've been around less is because I've been working on getting my speech certification. I've just had that approved, which means I am fully cleared to be our new debate/forensics coach and teach those classes next year.


7 people marked this as a favorite.

Children are bickering about Chik-Fil-A vs. Raising Cane's

Me: I'm hearing a lot of fowl language from that corner of the room.
Kid 1: ...what? We didn't
Me: Because you're talking about chicken.
collective silence, groans

They're gonna find my body in a locker someday.


6 people marked this as a favorite.

helping herd the junior high kids for group photos

Photographer: [kid 1], smile!
Kid 1: No.
Me: [kid 1,] dead puppies.
instant laughter from the group

So the youngins think I'm a psycho.


3 people marked this as a favorite.

writes a reading comp worksheet about a Batman article to give the kids something fun to practice with

class immediately breaks down into arguing over Batman adaptations


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"Ms. Scint?"
"Yeah?"
"So...Banquo's children will be kings. But Malcolm's now king."
"Yes."
"Did Duncan's wife have an affair?"
".......it could also mean that one of Banquo's descendants will marry one of Malcolm's descendants."
"....that makes more sense, but I like mine better."


2 people marked this as a favorite.
Vanykrye wrote:
lisamarlene wrote:
NobodysHome wrote:
David M Mallon wrote:

Also, while in NM, I added another entry to my ever-growing list of forum people I've hung out with in real life:

** spoiler omitted **

Ooh! Ooh! Here's my complete list! ** spoiler omitted **

And Vany keeps threatening to visit if he ever follows through on his Big Western Road Trip.

I really want to, but the timing keeps getting hosed for me to take that kind of time off work. The best opportunity I had was in April-May 2021, and it went sideways due to the timing of job hunts and such.

Now...it turns out that there may be an opportunity in May 2023...weirdly.

My brother-in-law is supposed to get married sometime that month (my father-in-law is the one that informed us, and he forgot the actual date). We were also told that they had to get hard numbers now due to the size of the bride's family versus the venue capacity, and we had to get in contact with The Adult Kid to find out if she wanted to go. I assumed she wouldn't, but surprisingly she's committing to going. Slight catch. She can't fly, doesn't have a car or license. Aiymi also won't fly. Amtrak just from our place to The Adult Kid's is 28 hours one way.

So I have been asked if I could drive us to Florida by way of Colorado, and then back to Illinois from Florida also through Colorado. One of those legs *could* go through Texas.

And through Kansas. shifty eyes


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Oh, Macbeth.

"Wait, this answer can't be right."
"Which?"
"It says that one of the signs that something is wrong is that Duncan's horses ate each other."
"And?"
"Horses don't do that!"
reads the relevant passage aloud
"But that's not physically possible."
"You do recall that this fictional play also has witches and prophecies?"


6 people marked this as a favorite.

So, I've been writing trivia questions on the board each week as a contest for my classes. I wrote this one's on Friday, went home, had a hectic weekend, and completely forgot about it.

I stepped out of the room a bit before class and came back in as the kids were sitting down. One kid points directly at me and yells, "Vampire!"

I take a stunned moment to wonder what to say to this, then I look at the board: "During their contest, Mary Shelley created Frankenstein and his monster. What creature did John Polidori write about?"

My secret remains safe another day...


7 people marked this as a favorite.

"Okay, now that you have this background on the play, write a short paragraph predicting which element will have the most interesting effect on the plot!"

"...I thought it was interesting that the king's family was divided between Catholics and prostitutes."

this is going to be a long year


9 people marked this as a favorite.

"Make sure you check out a copy of Macbeth before you leave today! I don't want anyone getting out of here Scot-free!"
groans

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