Tuesday Talk

After running my 1/2 Marathon (13.1 miles, ~21km) yesterday, I felt a little bit sore this morning, so I ended up staying in bed a bit later and did not get onto the trail for my run this morning until 7:45am.  It was also a very cold and blustery morning (32 degrees Fahrenheit (0 Celsius) with 20mph winds (32 kph) ).  But, I did get the run finished for today.  I ran 6.6 miles (10.2km). 

Today's agenda is to try to write another chapter of lecture notes for students in one class, and to record three audio lectures to accompany the chapters of lecture notes I wrote for my other three classes yesterday.  If I stay focused, I should be able to manage all four tasks relatively well.  I also need to try to finalize and double check a few electronic exams I wrote last Friday to make sure I did not make any mistakes before launching them so the students may take these exams later this week. 

The format we have to give electronic exams is unfortunately very "clunky" and does not lend itself to easy development of an exam.  The simplest method unfortunately is to write out the exam in the word processor of your choice, and then to cut and paste each question individually and then to cut and paste each potential foil (potential answer to choose from) individually.  So, basically, after writing out the question, I typically have to then cut-and-paste six times the individual lines of text from that single question into the electronic exam format.  It is doable.... but it does lead to a lot of cramping of my mouse hand. 

I have over the last few days, decided to take a particular pipe of mine each day while I am working and to place it in a holder in front of my monitor so that I can glance more at its beauty while I work.  Today's pipe happens to by a Dr. Grabow freehand that is quite nearly identical to the image I found above.  It is a somewhat larger bowled pipe and it fits very comfortably in the palm of my hand when I hold it.   I also have a pouch of vanilla tinctured burley-virginia mixture that is open so I can have a pleasant room aroma as I work.  Would I like to actually smoke a bowl or two or five today while I work... well, yes... of course I would.  But, at least I get to admire the pipes beauty and smell some beautiful smells while I work.  I think I will also put some early Miles Davis on in the background. 

PipeTobacco