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Happy Limeyday!
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With a complementary striptease!
I might be a bit sweaty, though, because today the temperature skyrocketed to riddiculous 30 degree C... (a little over 85 of those weird farhenheit degrees for you 'Muricans). And I went for a long* walk.
*well, at least comparing to my lack of mobility in the last year and a bit.
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Howdy, John!
Is everything secure?
|
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With a complementary striptease!
I might be a bit sweaty, though, because today the temperature skyrocketed to riddiculous 30 degree C... (a little over 85 of those weird farhenheit degrees for you 'Muricans). And I went for a long* walk.
*well, at least comparing to my lack of mobility in the last year and a bit.
Yeah, the weather has been all over the place.
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I'm hungry.
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I'm hungry.
Don't look at me; I'm having a cooking fail evening.
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I'm hungry.Don't look at me; I'm having a cooking fail evening.
EDIT: Not nearly the failure I originally thought. I'd planned on crispy tofu with stirfry broccoli and snow peas, but I only had 2T soy sauce left in the bottle, and was totally out of cornstarch, sesame oil, and xiaoxing rice wine (Which, btw, makes *the best* stroganoff).
As it happens, If you coat the pieces with tapioca starch instead of cornstarch, they actually end up lighter and crispier, and the very dry sherry left over in the drinks cabinet from my experiments with Marlborough Pie this winter made the sauce a bit sweeter than with xiaoxing, but not too sweet (I cut the brown sugar by half).
EDIT: Don't look at me weird about the tofu thing. I don't like it, but Dr. Whingey Darling and the kids do.
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I'm hungry.
I have spare jolloff (and pies), should you want it.
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Happy Limey Day!
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I'm hungry.I have spare jolloff (and pies), should you want it.
I had to google it.
That looks good!| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Yasmin Williams - harp guitar.
This is it.
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I'm watching chopped and I want to take on my cooking rivals. Celestial Healer is powerful, but my breakfasts are unbeatable.
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Pass, unless I can be the judge.
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And today, I am 42, or, more likely, six seven-year-olds in an extremely voluminous trench coat. To celebrate, I am going on a jolly to the earthly paradise that is Huddersfield.
Happy Birthday (yesterday), Limey!
You've become the answer to life, the universe, and everything for 365.2etc days! Enjoy it!
I'm pretty frustrated with people in my life right now.
Also I now have burns on my left arm I get to deal with.
But no one has asked if I'm okay, or said they were sorry for dropping whatever it was from above the stove into the hot oil I was cooking with that splashed all over my arm.
For the record I'm fine, but pretty cross, and doubtful to get a good night's sleep.
Oh, no! That's bad! I'm so sorry! Hope that heals quick - I remember my only actual oil burn was very painful for some time.
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*SIGH*.
Between sessions of the homebrew game I took every player aside and advised, "Your current plan of digging a bunch of trenches and locking yourself in a building isn't going to work. This is a CR+6 encounter. You need to come up with a way to break it down."
Last night? "We'll dig a bunch of trenches and lock ourselves in the building."
I tried. We'll see how they do with such a passive plan.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Is the building made of wood and have a thatched roof? If so, a couple of torches could throw a wrench in their "plan".*SIGH*.
Between sessions of the homebrew game I took every player aside and advised, "Your current plan of digging a bunch of trenches and locking yourself in a building isn't going to work. This is a CR+6 encounter. You need to come up with a way to break it down."
Last night? "We'll dig a bunch of trenches and lock ourselves in the building."
I tried. We'll see how they do with such a passive plan.
Yep. Wooden building. Open fields. Forward scouts with the attacking army who will see all the entrenchments and have the army ready for them.
Y'know, well-prepared bad guys vs. PCs who are just winging it.
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I received my first rumor as to the choir director's departure, and it rings true as well as demonstrating to non-teachers what it's like to try to do your best for students.
(1) It was completely optional; in EVERY communication she made it clear that students did not HAVE to come. In spite of this, I know that many parents complained about the event, because she confided to the chaperones how frustrating it was to have a non-mandatory event and have a bunch of parents complain that they weren't going to put their children at risk by sending them.
(2) She was exceedingly careful to follow all CDC guidelines at the time: The event was outdoors in an open field, everyone was required to wear a mask, and everyone was required to be at least 6' apart at all times.
In spite of this, it was apparently in violation of the contract the teachers' union had agreed to with the district.
Here is where my suppositions begin: From what the adult students says she said, not only did many parents complain, but several teachers complained as well, forcing the district to act. Considering it was COVID-related, it makes sense that she'd be put on administrative leave to avoid further endangering the kids. It doesn't gel with the students' statement of, "We don't want her to come back until she's ready," but I know her well: She'd've felt utterly betrayed that her fellow teachers had turned her in and started a formal disciplinary review of her behavior, and could've easily said something along the lines of, "Well, I don't see why I should come back."
Similarly, she has little tolerance for administrative bureaucracy. If she thought it was good for the kids or it needed to happen, she made it happen and then worked out the administrative details later.
But the whole thing pieces together too perfectly for it to not have some grain of truth: People were up in arms about the gathering. It surprises me because I considered myself "excessively COVID paranoid" and yet I saw nothing wrong with the event: As mentioned, it was optional, open-air, and following all CDC guidelines. Impus Minor chose not to go, and there were no repercussions for him.
But teachers turning on each other and turning each other in for violations is all too common, especially when the teacher in question is excessively popular with students (yes, teachers have cliques just as much as students do, and popular teachers are frequently hated by their peers).
Knowing the choir director, she dug in and refused to admit wrongdoing: How had the event endangered anyone? And it was probably the final straw in a LONG litany of battles with the administration that finally saw her leave.
It's sad. It's the end of an era at the school. And yet again, it's because of an overbearing administration that cares more about the letter of the law than what's best for its students.
If she'd insisted on in-class meetings in violation of the agreement, I'd be on board with the discipline. But a Saturday social gathering in a park? Not so much.
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Speaking of COVID, the two week wait is over and GothBard and I are finally officially fully vaccinated!
Woo hoo!
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Disney World trip is begun!
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Is the building made of wood and have a thatched roof? If so, a couple of torches could throw a wrench in their "plan".*SIGH*.
Between sessions of the homebrew game I took every player aside and advised, "Your current plan of digging a bunch of trenches and locking yourself in a building isn't going to work. This is a CR+6 encounter. You need to come up with a way to break it down."
Last night? "We'll dig a bunch of trenches and lock ourselves in the building."
I tried. We'll see how they do with such a passive plan.
Yep. Wooden building. Open fields. Forward scouts with the attacking army who will see all the entrenchments and have the army ready for them.
Y'know, well-prepared bad guys vs. PCs who are just winging it.
I remember in a game that my character critically failed a Perception check, and the GM showed me a specific way to beat the enemy.
Because the character was paranoid as heck with no one else as perceptive as he was, he didn't trust the info. At the end of the session, the GM asked why I didn't take the suggested route...
He hadn't realized how badly I had bombed the roll...
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
I received my first rumor as to the choir director's departure, and it rings true as well as demonstrating to non-teachers what it's like to try to do your best for students.
** spoiler omitted **...
Max props to that teacher!! And I'll double-down on it for her mic-drop exit!!
I hate that the kids lose out because of this nonsense. The arts are suffering, not because of a lack of relevance, but because of a lack of regard within the halls of education. And that is shameful.
But good for her for flipping those pretentious nitwits the bird and getting out. She did a good thing, and they hated her for it. That's just low.
----------
This resonates with me in a special way because my mother retired from teaching high school English for very similar reasons: the administration knew she cared for the kids more than she cared about standardized testing performance, and the children loved her for it. And she was no pushover educator, mind you -- her students showed true progress, each and every year. But the powers-that-were at that school neglected her and tried to force still more drudgery upon her one time too many -- she retired by sending a screenshot of a handwritten note (on college ruled paper) to the school principal after about an hour and a half of deliberation after she received confirmation of her assigned classes for the next fall semester.
And she's never regretted that decision.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
This resonates with me in a special way because my mother retired from teaching high school English for very similar reasons: the administration knew she cared for the kids more than she cared about standardized testing performance, and the children loved her for it. And she was no pushover educator, mind you -- her students showed true progress, each and every year. But the powers-that-were at that school neglected her and tried to force still more drudgery upon her one time too many -- she retired by sending a screenshot of a handwritten note (on college ruled paper) to the school principal after about an hour and a half of deliberation after she received confirmation of her assigned classes for the next fall semester.
And she's never regretted that decision.
I walked out on teaching when I encountered an administration that:
(1) Ordered me to pass at least 2/3 of my students in every class, no matter how well or poorly they performed, and(2) in front of my best class, told me that all of my students were too stupid to do the work I was asking of them, and I was an arrogant <expletive> for expecting it of them.
I've always wanted to go back, but the pay is less than half of what I make in tech, so I can't particularly afford it. Nor does GothBard miss how stressed it always made me dealing with the administration.
In my particular class, I would hand out a sample exam with full solutions the week before the test. The sample exam would have a question such as, "Find the integral of e^3x". I'd work out the whole solution, both in class and in the handouts. The real exam would have, "Find the integral of e^4x." About 35 of my 44 students would leave the problem blank.
The final straw was the third midterm: The sample exam WAS the real exam. I didn't even try to change the numbers. And the average was 28%. The students simply weren't paying any attention at all. It was the worst class I've ever had, so half of them were failing, they filed a formal complaint, and the dean upheld their complaint without asking for a shred of evidence from me.
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GothBard's frustrated with my complaining about the kids' tactics, because she's in that game as well, but she at least gave me an "out": The kids will learn that the army is following absolutely standard protocol for the last few millennia: When encountering entrenched resistance in a wooden building, light the building on fire and shoot anyone who comes out.
I think once they realize the army has no intention of even approaching the building, much less entering it, their whole plan of "lure the entire army inside and trap them there" will be exposed for the fiasco it is.
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Math should be about numbers, as soon as you start introducing letters into the mix I'm lost.
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Disney World trip is begun!
okay. Best of luck to you. Please enjoy.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
This resonates with me in a special way because my mother retired from teaching high school English for very similar reasons: the administration knew she cared for the kids more than she cared about standardized testing performance, and the children loved her for it. And she was no pushover educator, mind you -- her students showed true progress, each and every year. But the powers-that-were at that school neglected her and tried to force still more drudgery upon her one time too many -- she retired by sending a screenshot of a handwritten note (on college ruled paper) to the school principal after about an hour and a half of deliberation after she received confirmation of her assigned classes for the next fall semester.
And she's never regretted that decision.
I walked out on teaching when I encountered an administration that:
(1) Ordered me to pass at least 2/3 of my students in every class, no matter how well or poorly they performed, and
(2) in front of my best class, told me that all of my students were too stupid to do the work I was asking of them, and I was an arrogant <expletive> for expecting it of them.I've always wanted to go back, but the pay is less than half of what I make in tech, so I can't particularly afford it. Nor does GothBard miss how stressed it always made me dealing with the administration.
** spoiler omitted **...
This sounds fundamentally unfair.
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Math should be about numbers, as soon as you start introducing letters into the mix I'm lost.
Even then its all lies. 1+1=3 for unusually large applications of 1.
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Most students
ab = b^2 (Multiply both sides by b)
ab - a^2 = b^2 - a^2 (subtract a^2 from both sides)
a(b-a) = (b+a)(b-a) (factor)
a(b-a) = (a+a)(b-a) (substitute a for b, since they're equal)
a(b-a) = 2a(b-a) (simplify)
1 = 2 (Divide by a(b-a))
Amusingly, trying to write out the proof it looks like a much better proof that all numbers are equal to 0. At the a(b-a) = (b+a)(b-a), divide by b-a there and you get a = b+a, or 0=b. So a=0 as well. So any two arbitrarily-chosen numbers that are equal must both be 0. I like that conclusion even better!
i = i
sqrt(-1) = sqrt(-1) (definition of i)
sqrt(-1/1) = sqrt (1/-1) (simple math. Both -1/1 and 1/-1 are equal to -1)
sqrt(-1)/sqrt(1) = sqrt(1)/sqrt(-1) (break up the square roots)
-1 = 1 (cross multiply)
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Got my first jab today. Feel a bit tired and out of sorts, but not too bad.
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Got first dose of vaccine two days ago. Felt tired AF the first day and slept 3 hours when I got home, then couldn't do much all day. Yesterday I felt like my arm was slowly being ripped off by ten kindergartners. Today I feel fine.
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Oh my s$#&, captain, I hope you're okay!
Sorry about the delay. So much going on I rarely can catch up on all of fawtl, but I feel terrible missing that!
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Elaborating a bit on the kids' game, I feel like I'm hitting my head against a brick wall. The general dynamic is:
(1) "Can we buy an item that will resolve our issue?"
(2) "Can we recruit NPCs that will help?"
(3) "Since (1) and (2) failed, it must be a fight we can win. Attack it head on!"
I told them that they needed to learn to use tactics, planning, patience, and thought, and I was going to give them an encounter they couldn't win without planning. I told them it would be CR+6 and unwinnable without good tactics.
Step 1: Impus Major asked whether the local town (population 83) had multiple scrolls of Cloudkill lying around.
Step 2: The group has been scouring the countryside trying to get any yokel who can hold a pitchfork to help fight. The sheer carnage of a bunch of ill-equipped Commoner-1s against an organized well-equipped army of Warrior-3s is terrifying.
Step 3: Even after I explicitly told them that building trenches and holing up in the building would get them all killed since they have all of three effective archers among the lot of them, they built trenches and are planning on holing up in the building and then trying to take on the entire army en masse in a final, bloody, climactic battle scene.
What frustrates me the most is that last night one of the kids even said, "We have horses and they don't. Why don't we just do a kiting retreat and kill them before they even get to us?"
And he got shot down with, "They'll shoot the horses and then we'll have to fight them in the open with no building to protect us."
Er... when that building is going to be burning down around your ears before a single bad guy enters it, I think that's still a better choice...
EDIT: I'm not looking for brilliance here, just ideas like:
- Nighttime raids on the bad guys because the entire party has low-light vision or dark vision and none of the bandits do
- A kiting retreat was a great idea. They have bows with better range and casters who can put up tactical Wind Walls to minimize enemy bow fire. "I shoot, then ride behind the Wind Wall" at least protects your horse every other round. Sure, the other round would be, "I ride out from behind the Wind Wall then shoot," but it would be better than nothing
- Setting up a hidden encampment far behind where the bad guys are likely to surround the building. "Oh, lookee! Only 1/4 of you are on this side of the building and the other 3/4 are hundreds and hundreds of feet away. 8 on 10 with caster support seems like we can do it in 3-4 rounds before the others get here. And then, oh, we ride away."
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Got first dose of vaccine two days ago. Felt tired AF the first day and slept 3 hours when I got home, then couldn't do much all day. Yesterday I felt like my arm was slowly being ripped off by ten kindergartners. Today I feel fine.
Ouch! Hope the second one goes better!
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
This resonates with me in a special way because my mother retired from teaching high school English for very similar reasons: the administration knew she cared for the kids more than she cared about standardized testing performance, and the children loved her for it. And she was no pushover educator, mind you -- her students showed true progress, each and every year. But the powers-that-were at that school neglected her and tried to force still more drudgery upon her one time too many -- she retired by sending a screenshot of a handwritten note (on college ruled paper) to the school principal after about an hour and a half of deliberation after she received confirmation of her assigned classes for the next fall semester.
And she's never regretted that decision.
I walked out on teaching when I encountered an administration that:
(1) Ordered me to pass at least 2/3 of my students in every class, no matter how well or poorly they performed, and
(2) in front of my best class, told me that all of my students were too stupid to do the work I was asking of them, and I was an arrogant <expletive> for expecting it of them.I've always wanted to go back, but the pay is less than half of what I make in tech, so I can't particularly afford it. Nor does GothBard miss how stressed it always made me dealing with the administration.
** spoiler omitted **...
I walked out on teaching when an administrator walked by the classroom and said "hey, wait a minute, you don't work here!".
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
Elaborating a bit on the kids' game, I feel like I'm hitting my head against a brick wall. The general dynamic is:
(1) "Can we buy an item that will resolve our issue?"
(2) "Can we recruit NPCs that will help?"
(3) "Since (1) and (2) failed, it must be a fight we can win. Attack it head on!"I told them that they needed to learn to use tactics, planning, patience, and thought, and I was going to give them an encounter they couldn't win without planning. I told them it would be CR+6 and unwinnable without good tactics.
Step 1: Impus Major asked whether the local town (population 83) had multiple scrolls of Cloudkill lying around.
Step 2: The group has been scouring the countryside trying to get any yokel who can hold a pitchfork to help fight. The sheer carnage of a bunch of ill-equipped Commoner-1s against an organized well-equipped army of Warrior-3s is terrifying.
Step 3: Even after I explicitly told them that building trenches and holing up in the building would get them all killed since they have all of three effective archers among the lot of them, they built trenches and are planning on holing up in the building and then trying to take on the entire army en masse in a final, bloody, climactic battle scene.
What frustrates me the most is that last night one of the kids even said, "We have horses and they don't. Why don't we just do a kiting retreat and kill them before they even get to us?"
And he got shot down with, "They'll shoot the horses and then we'll have to fight them in the open with no building to protect us."Er... when that building is going to be burning down around your ears before a single bad guy enters it, I think that's still a better choice...
EDIT: I'm not looking for brilliance here, just ideas like:
- Nighttime raids on the bad guys because the entire party has low-light vision or dark vision and none of the bandits do
- A kiting retreat was a great idea. They have bows with better range and casters who can put up...
As someone who regularly GMed for kids before the pandemic I'd like to point out your problem is you expected them to come up with a plan in the first place.
| 7 people marked this as a favorite. |
Credit Crookshanks for telling me straight up "You can either lead us by the nose or watch us die, over and over again".
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Oh my s#%+, captain, I hope you're okay!
Sorry about the delay. So much going on I rarely can catch up on all of fawtl, but I feel terrible missing that!
Thank you!
And thanks for all the well wishes, it's not terribly bad, nothing blistering, just really red in a cool splash pattern on my lower arm (mostly on my wrist, but some did get further up my arm).
Mostly what hurt was the complete lack of compassion from everyone in the house. I understand I'm pretty hardcore when it comes to pain, but some sort of "I'm sorry" or "are you sure you're okay?" A couple of minutes later goes a long way.
It's all good.
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As someone who regularly GMed for kids before the pandemic I'd like to point out your problem is you expected them to come up with a plan in the first place.
My kids are older, and the collapse of my Serpent's Skull campaign was really stereotypical: There was one kid who came up with all these amazingly-stupid ideas early on in the campaign. He was new to gaming, and he didn't know what he was doing, so his plans failed spectacularly.
He learned. He became fricking brilliant. Every time he came up with a plan I thought, "Wow! I hope the kids do that!"
And because of his previous issues, the other players would shoot him down.
And I'm seeing the exact same player shooting down all the good ideas at this game. I think I'll call him out on it. Because pooh-poohing all the new ideas and sticking with the idea your GM has explicitly told you NOT to do is pretty bad.
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I split another hammer at work today, so that's still pretty fresh.
I made sure to tag it for the mechanic, it says "Needs tape".
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
As someone who regularly GMed for kids before the pandemic I'd like to point out your problem is you expected them to come up with a plan in the first place.My kids are older, and the collapse of my Serpent's Skull campaign was really stereotypical: There was one kid who came up with all these amazingly-stupid ideas early on in the campaign. He was new to gaming, and he didn't know what he was doing, so his plans failed spectacularly.
He learned. He became fricking brilliant. Every time he came up with a plan I thought, "Wow! I hope the kids do that!"
And because of his previous issues, the other players would shoot him down.
And I'm seeing the exact same player shooting down all the good ideas at this game. I think I'll call him out on it. Because pooh-poohing all the new ideas and sticking with the idea your GM has explicitly told you NOT to do is pretty bad.
I have a brother that does that. Still. After thirty years.
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I have music stuck in my head now.