TLQ: The Movie (2023 session 3) Week 12, The Storm

I hope you're all enjoying your little treats, because this is a good news/bad news week, or a Fortunately/Unfortunately story. Hang on . . . 

Fortunately, the higher-ups approved all our extra expenses.

Unfortunately, we can't use our credit card because the island has been hit by a massive storm and all communications are down.

Fortunately, we had just received a shipment of supplies, including several kg of baking potatoes, lots of yarn, chocolate, our Secret Gift items, and, oh, I'm not sure, the interns are still unpacking.

Unfortunately, a stowaway kitten tangled all the yarn.

Fortunately, it's ridiculously cute, and young enough that our on-set cats are adopting it as a mascot rather than getting territorial.

Unfortunately, we don't have enough fuel to run generators for all the cabins, yurts, etc.

Fortunately, we do have fuel enough for the generator at the main lodge, so there are cooking facilities, lights, hot showers, and laundry facilities there.

Unfortunately, it's raining buckets so you are pretty much guaranteed to get soaked on your way here.

Fortunately, we also have a large stash of firewood and there's a huge fire going, so pack your things into plastic bags and come on down to bake potatoes and make s'mores. Bring any stashes of food you have in your cabin/tent/yurt and we can make Stone Soup; bring your art supplies and we can either add to the Secret Gifts or wrap them beautifully. (But beware of kitten! Anyone who finds untangling yarn relaxing is going to have a lovely time . . . )

What items or skills can you contribute? What are you hoping the interns will find in our last shipment from the mainland? Faced with a storm, are you more likely to hunker down in your cabin and sleep through it under your down comforter, or come down to the lodge and make the best of things in the group?

We hope you'll check in and let us know how things are going!

Contingent Cassandra (held over)

Professional:

--Finish grading the lit midterms

--Finish grading the comp proposals 

--Keep up with writing/posting post-conference summaries (including preliminary grades for truly complete drafts; not sure how many of those I'll see)

--Grade at least 2 sets of lit process work

Household--

--It would be nice if I got the books boxed, dining table cleared, and the fall/Thanksgiving tablecloth put on.

Personal:

--Make progress on one church project that is now time-sensitive: write preliminary publicity copy; correspond with potential speakers

--Try for even a modest amount of movement each day: a short walk, some stretching, and/or some weight-lifting.

Daisy

ONE PAPER!!! DO IT!!!!

Data section for other paper

Budget for big association

Lab stuff, get samples in oven

Dame Eleanor Hull

- swim and cardio once each (gym closed most of this week), weights twice, yoga 5-6 times.

- grade a set of papers, plus a couple from mini-class

- research 1 hour x 5, mainly Latin, conference paper project; ten minutes a day on KW chapter

- research possible Latin texts for spring reading group

- look at some MS images (being consultant to another scholar)

- take Sir John to a medical appointment

- have relaxing holiday week (my original plan was to get a lot of work done while I didn't have any meetings, but at this point . . .)

heu mihi

1. Get some exercise. My knee hurts because I attempted a wall squat yesterday, so I think that stretching and yoga should be a priority.

2. Work on my book x 5 (can be just reading a little bit!)

3. Enjoy Thanksgiving with my family! Take some time off!

4. Read and prep for Monday's class; read ahead because this novel is long and dense and I also need to recall where I need to issue content warnings

JaneB

(In recovery mode)

Julie

1. Report on PhD thesis and viva on Wednesday

2. Workshop on grants (also Wednesday)

3. Student meetings

4. Finish article revisions

5. Conversation about research assistant.

6. Exercise

7. At least one house job.

8 Start Christmas prep.

9. Read book for book club meeting Friday.

Susan (held over)

1. Finish at least three more papers from Big Collaboration and send them back. If I'm doing really well, I'll do more, but not going to pressure myself.

2. Get the next week of LMS stuff posted before I go.

3. Prepare for conference

4. Have fun at conference

5. Try not to worry too much about what's happening at home.

 

TLQ: The Movie! (Session 3 2023) Week 11: Small things

 TO-DO LIST 11/19

get phone number for local wildlife expert for re humane raccoon relocation

take journalist to lunch, in exchange for silence re raccoon infestation

call Mum

make more coffee

deliver snacks to yurts, bring extra chocolate for ones with help-over goals

explain to props master again why he cannot have live fireworks for shots inside castle

call insurance guy re fire damage to draperies in grand hall, take pictures for file

hide the new case of wine for emergency deployment

deploy emergency stash of yarn and colouring books

arrange payment plan for astronomical bill from massage therapist, also book ahead for the next month

borrow moving van to take empties to recycling depot

more coffee

schedule fittings for upcoming scenes

schedule interviews for the week

get back to elementary school about set visit, schedule for December

return load of overdue library books, van again?

wording for email to our cast

Good morning stars! We’re not doing interviews this week, there are so many things going on that it feels like one more scheduled things might be the straw and the camel kind of thing… In the spirit of preparing for the season of twinkly lights and fancy food coming up we’re doing a secret gift exchange… Put your submissions on post-it notes and put them in the two cookie jars at reception so we can collect them all next week. Goals and lists are welcome in there too…

For Jar 1: list five things that you would love to get in a secret gift exchange – usual rules apply, we’re going for inexpensive but cheerful things that you happy!

For Jar 2: a list of five small wins from the last couple of week – anything that you are proud of doing or made you happy!

Julie

1. Teaching prep
2. Progress review for PhD student
3. Organise workshop on applying for grants
4. Finish reading thesis.
5. Conversation about work for research assistant
6. Chase house jobs.
7. Maybe plant bulbs next weekend.

Contingent Cassandra

Professional:
--Finish grading the lit midterms
--Finish grading the comp proposals (yes, for the projects they're currently drafting; in my defense, quite a few came in late, and a few haven't yet come in at all, but the students are resistant to the idea of giving up and concentrating on their other courses; it's too late to officially drop)
--Keep up with writing/posting post-conference summaries (including preliminary grades for truly complete drafts; not sure how many of those I'll see)
--Grade at least 2 sets of lit process work
Household--
--It would be nice if I got the books boxed, dining table cleared, and the fall/Thanksgiving tablecloth put on, but we'll see. Household stuff other than the very basics of meal prep and cleanup isn't really a priority this week.
Personal:
--Make progress on one church project that is now time-sensitive: write preliminary publicity copy; correspond with potential speakers
--Try for even a modest amount of movement each day: a short walk, some stretching, and/or some weight-lifting.Dame Eleanor Hull

- swim twice, cross-trainer twice, weights twice, walk at least once, yoga more or less daily
- write another assignment for mini-class
- grade a set of papers
- research 1 hour x 5, mainly Latin, conference paper project; ten minutes a day on KW chapter
- look at some MS images (being consultant to another scholar)
- assorted meetings and admin work I don't want to do
- set up and use calendar pages in Moleskine
- work with my husband on winter trip plans
- dig up compost-heap potatoes

heu mihi

1. Work on ch. 6 x 6; aim for some more focused work/at least two longer stretches of writing and/or research
2. Run x 3
3. Grade batch of papers
4. Reformat citations for paper due at end of month; submit paper
5. Make progress on departmental equity review

JaneB (held over)

a) pace myself, allow time and space for counselling/GP stuff and reacting to counselling, morning pages
b) reinstate some key habits - move intentionally for at least 10 minutes a day, 5 fruit & veg., picking up spaces that get messy, filling in my daily log, taking vitamins. (keeping the last two because it's nice to have some easy wins!)
c) basic environment stuff - catch up with bin emptying, dish washing, filing financial papers. keep up with laundry!
d) do at least one thing from the non-basic environmental stuff list (little jobs)
Work stuff, not divided into three categories for now:
e) do email triage on no more than two week days for no more than 2 hours total
f) write some coherent points for the Individual Risk Assessment/Reasonable Adjustments requests I'll need to discuss on return to work
Fun: (I consider this medicinal in the current circumstances)
g) at least a couple of blocks of time reading, crochet, and playing or preparing D&D. Do the next seven Inktober sketches, never mind which day.
h) make cards, wrap & send two packages - a birthday present for my Aunt and a Hallowe'en care package for my nibling

Susan (held over)

1. Finish at least three more papers from Big Collaboration and send them back. If I'm doing really well, I'll do more, but not going to pressure myself.
2. Get the next week of LMS stuff posted before I go.
3. Prepare for conference
4. Have fun at conference
5. Try not to worry too much about what's happening at home.

Daisy

Paper meeting and revised draft
Finish introductions for both new papers
Finish data section for one paper
Fun with kid

TLQ: the movie! (2023 Session 3) Week 10: in which we're all harried

Where’s my production assistant? There you are! We need to—oh wait, let me grab this intern. You, take this angora yarn and polished oak crochet hook up to JaneB’s yurt, and try to talk to her about the shopping list—

Hello? Oh, no, this is a great time, I’ve been wanting—

Have you ever known a movie that wasn’t over budget? We need to—

Stick the hook into the angora and slide them both—

No, I was talking to the intern! About Padraic—

While you’re up in that direction, stop at Cassandra’s cabin and ask if she wants nuts—

No, no, you’re not nuts at all, I understand your concerns! But we’re out here in the middle of nowhere and we can’t replace Padraic now. We need—

Well, if we’d started with the cheap whisky, it wouldn’t be a problem, but he and the raccoons got used to the good stuff and now— The unicorn? Listen, that was a bargain, especially compared to renting the castles, which was such a great idea you had, by the way, and you should see the footage we got with the unicorn last week! I’ll get the production assistant to send over a few minutes of video and you can—

Grab the intern before they leave and have them check with Susan about both the shopping list and cleaning; how often does she want the sheets changed?

I was saying we’ll change the schedule if you insist, but really at this point the cheapest thing is likely to be just to barrel on through, getting all the footage we can while we’re here on the island and Padraic is actually on site (there’s nowhere he can go, right, and eventually he’ll get bored with the raccoons), and then I’ll handle the editing when we’re back—

Hey, you can pre-edit some of the footage for me, right? Put it on your fancy laptop and send a few minutes to the home studio fossils—

Bosses! I said bosses! We really appreciate your belief in this project! One of the talent is knitting you a sweater—

Yes, of course it’s hypoallergenic. HYPOALLERGENIC. I didn’t say a word about hypodermics! Whisky and red wine are the most—okay, I understand, talk to you—

Is the intern out of sight? Yes, make mine a double. And for Cat’s sake, order more before the home office cancels our credit cards. I’m sure it’s an empty threat, but just in case. The home office always gets fussy at about this point in filming, but they booked us in here through the middle of December, they know where we are and what our situation is, it’s not like we’re filming in the studio. Once the Christmas movies start to come out, they’ll leave us alone again. We just don’t want JB to come out himself to check on things.

Check with the cast about what would help the most to get them through the next few weeks. Linen sheets, more cats on site, merino blankets, ice skates, ice machine, snow machine, I don’t care, just keep them happy. Interviews? I guess we could ask them to talk about a rough time in their careers and how they got through it, but be gentle, I think some of them are having a rough time right now. If they’d rather talk about their favorite games or make a plan for something else they’d like to do on the island, that’s fine.

Contingent Cassandra (held over)

Professional:

--Grade as many as possible of the composition proposals
--Make some progress on grading lit process work

Household:

--Finish fall sowing in garden
--Measure and mark new location for compost pile and begin turning/moving
--Do at least one thing that gets something out of or better organized/containerized in the apartment

Personal:

--2x some kind of movement: stretching, weight-lifting, long or short walk
--Initiate 2 key email exchanges for church committee work
--Get in touch with at least one young-adult niebling

Daisy

Mark midterms
Mark reports and grad papers
Accounting for community organization
Thesis defense (as external reader)
Paper meeting and revised draft
Introductions for both new papers

Dame Eleanor Hull

- take care of new car problem (already done, actually)
- swim at least once, cross-trainer twice, weights twice, walk at least once, yoga more or less daily
- write another assignment for mini-class
- grade a set of papers
- research 1 hour x 5, mainly Latin, conference paper project; ten minutes a day on KW chapter
- look at some MS images (being consultant to another scholar)
- do some mending
- set up and use calendar pages in Moleskine
- work with my husband on winter trip plans

Heu mihi

1. Many many meetings, comprehensive exam session, coffee hour for program, more meetings, BLAH BLAH BLAH
2. Read 25 pp. of advisee's dissertation
3. Work on ch. 6 x 6
4. Ch. 2--more loose ends
5. Accompany kiddo on church youth retreat (I'm hoping that I'll get some work done??)
6. Now that it's lighter in the mornings, run at least a few times!

JaneB (held over)

a) pace myself, allow time and space for counselling/GP stuff and reacting to counselling, morning pages
b) reinstate some key habits - move intentionally for at least 10 minutes a day, 5 fruit & veg., picking up spaces that get messy, filling in my daily log, taking vitamins. (keeping the last two because it's nice to have some easy wins!)
c) basic environment stuff - catch up with bin emptying, dish washing, filing financial papers. keep up with laundry!
d) do at least one thing from the non-basic environmental stuff list (little jobs)

Work stuff, not divided into three categories for now:

e) do email triage on no more than two week days for no more than 2 hours total
f) write some coherent points for the Individual Risk Assessment/Reasonable Adjustments requests I'll need to discuss on return to work

Fun: (I consider this medicinal in the current circumstances)

g) at least a couple of blocks of time reading, crochet, and playing or preparing D&D. Do the next seven Inktober sketches, never mind which day.
h) make cards, wrap & send two packages - a birthday present for my Aunt and a Hallowe'en care package for my nibling

Julie

1. Teaching prep (one lecture)
2. 3 x meetings (1 difficult, 1 useful, 1 blah)
3. Article revisions
4. Conversation about work for research assistant.
5. Read PhD thesis for viva in 2 weeks time.
6. Find people to fix two house problems
7. Go to farm shop to stock up.
8. Take some stuff to charity
9. Exercise
10. Make soup, try some new recipes.

Susan (held over)

1. Finish at least three more papers from Big Collaboration and send them back. If I'm doing really well, I'll do more, but not going to pressure myself.
2. Get the next week of LMS stuff posted before I go.
3. Prepare for conference
4. Have fun at conference
5. Try not to worry too much about what's happening at home.

This might be ours...

 16 feet tall and seats 6...

TLQ: The Movie! (Session 3 2023) Week 9: Character Development

Hello to all our stars!

Your mid-movie check-ins were all excellent, and it was great to see all the progress, it will be amazing footage. Even better, great to see the willingness to adjust expectations and goals to reflect circumstances, we all know that is necessary but sometimes it is hard to do.

Logistics for the week… After the extremely enthusiastic response to our massage therapist we’ve talked to finance and hired her company to be a permanent presence on set. The sign-up sheet will be on the information bulletin board, go wild!

The entire stock of red wine is finished, we do have another shipment coming so your patience is appreciated. While we are waiting we have a great shipment from the local cidery to try, there is a variety of alcohol-free ones too, the elderberry one is particularly good. We also found a few cases of whiskey in the gaffer’s trailer when we had to remove the raccoons, he’s sending a couple of those over to the big room with the fireplace in the central lodge, help yourself. Due to the enthusiastic response to the local red wine several artisanal cheese-makers have also sent over samples, and we even have a box from the local chocolatier. Please try all of them, we love supporting local businesses and have paid for all the merchandise already so enjoy!

Just a safety note, while it is getting colder there is definitely not enough ice on the lake for skating, ice-fishing, unicorn races, or sledding. The inflatable unicorn has been relocated to the indoor pool. We also bought a set of mini inflatable unicorns that can be used in the hot tub without losing their glitter. We’re holding a raffle contest to name them, put your suggestions in the jar at reception.

For this week we are talking character development. The director has asked me to collect some thoughts from everyone on how they would like see their character grow professionally over the course of our story. Everything changes, so do we, and we have a chance to reflect on how to direct those changes. This can be longer than one movie of course, don’t feel limited by the length of our time together. So for this week let us know in the comments if you feel like it… What is something that you would like to see change in your professional self? Is it something about how you work, how you write, how you do your research? And for a bonus… Is there any part of that change that you could incorporate into the second half of this session?

Goals from last week below, have a wonderful week everyone!

Dame Eleanor Hull
- take care of car problem
- swim once, cross-trainer twice, weights at least once, walk at least once, yoga more or less daily
- revise assignments for mini-class
- research 1 hour x 5, mainly Latin, conference paper project
- do some mending
- work with my husband on winter trip plans

Julie

1. Teaching prep.
2. Review for PhD student
3. Prepare for visiting speaker URGENT
4. Meet with dissertation students.
5. Write for two hours (article revisions) - colleague is organising a writing retreat, so will try to keep that slot free.
6. If kitchen finished, arrange cupboards etc.

JaneB (held over)

a) pace myself, allow time and space for counselling/GP stuff and reacting to counselling, morning pages
b) reinstate some key habits - move intentionally for at least 10 minutes a day, 5 fruit & veg., picking up spaces that get messy, filling in my daily log, taking vitamins. (keeping the last two because it's nice to have some easy wins!)
c) basic environment stuff - catch up with bin emptying, dish washing, filing financial papers. keep up with laundry!
d) do at least one thing from the non-basic environmental stuff list (little jobs)
Work stuff, not divided into three categories for now:
e) do email triage on no more than two week days for no more than 2 hours total
f) write some coherent points for the Individual Risk Assessment/Reasonable Adjustments requests I'll need to discuss on return to work
Fun: (I consider this medicinal in the current circumstances)
g) at least a couple of blocks of time reading, crochet, and playing or preparing D&D. Do the next seven Inktober sketches, never mind which day.
h) make cards, wrap & send two packages - a birthday present for my Aunt and a Hallowe'en care package for my nibling

heu mihi

1. Work on ch. 2 loose ends
2. Reread, polish, submit Freiburg paper
3. Finish and submit teaching award nominations and hiring requests
4. Start planning ch. 6
5. Grad students: Read other student's exam essays; read 25 pp. of different student's dissertation
6. Look over article for secondary journal

Susan (held over)

1. Finish at least three more papers from Big Collaboration and send them back. If I'm doing really well, I'll do more, but not going to pressure myself.
2. Get the next week of LMS stuff posted before I go.
3. Prepare for conference
4. Have fun at conference
5. Try not to worry too much about what's happening at home.

Contingent Cassandra

Professional:
--Grade as many as possible of the composition proposals
--Make some progress on grading lit process work
Household:
--Finish fall sowing in garden
--Measure and mark new location for compost pile and begin turning/moving
--Do at least one thing that gets something out of or better organized/containerized in the apartment
Personal:
--2x some kind of movement: stretching, weight-lifting, long or short walk
--Initiate 2 key email exchanges for church committee work
--Get in touch with at least one young-adult niebling

Daisy

Another trip, lab fun, for 4 days
Meet with coauthors and edit paper draft from post-doc
Do introductions for two papers
Do one figure for each paper