Digital Invective

The echocardiogram revealed that Scooter's heart has a small bit of seepage among the chambers, but apparently that is true for most people. Her doctor's nurse indicated that her heart is fine. Apparently she is prone to fainting spells (if prone means once every three years or so) . I very much appreciate all of those who prayed for her well-being. It is a blessing to hear from brothers in Christ you never knew you had.

Pardon the following extended rant. I don't rant well. Go read Spleen or Screeds for some real quality rage. I’m hoping that the transformation of my rage to pixels will allow it to mellow and depart. (Actually, as I type this now a day later, I'm doing fine). Be aware that there is nothing in what follows that will be either redemptive or edifying.

Caveat lector.

Yesterday began with a severe lack of sleep from the night before. My bride is working evenings right now and our quality time for a “daily dialogue” is between the hours of 11 pm and 12 am.

When I arrived at work Monday morning I discovered that my 5 day old computer hard drive had crashed. Frustration mounted as I realized that I was going to have to reconstruct some documents for a 9:00 meeting. I did complete some of the work, but at the cost of my sanity.

In the meeting we discussed how we would apportion a 5% raise that is the first raise our state legislature has passed in six years. As a colleague of mine said after the meeting, “I feel like we’re a bunch of skinny rats fighting over a crust of bread.”

Following the rat meeting, I found out that an insurance company had not received my medical records from my doctor’s office despite the fact that they have faxed them repeatedly. I went by the doctor’s office and said to the secretary “I need some help dealing with an idiot insurance company.” She replied “Most of them are” and graciously rendered assistance. Then I reminded myself not to use the word idiot.

When I returned to my office, I had a hostile student waiting to talk with me about one of his classes. For a department chair, this is not unusual. Probably four or five times a semester I’ll have a student come by to register a complaint or just vent about their classes. But our conversation revealed that his was a class he took TWO years ago. He had one of my colleagues for the class and wanted to protest his “F”. After an extended conversation revealed that he had not even spoken with his professor first, I encouraged him to do so.

Ironically, while Dave was spending some time with Psalm 78, I was turning to Psalm 30, a beautiful thanksgiving psalm which helped a lot. I then decided to start on my sermon for Sunday (our pastor is attending a conference next weekend, in that state, and he foolishly asked me to preach in his stead). I’ve never written a sermon when I was mad before, and I look forward to seeing how it turns out.

When I arrived at home I noted Shrimpy’s passing. I was unsure if s/he was sleeping or dead, but when I put him/her in the water, s/he floated upside down. Scooter is at pre-teen camp through Friday, so I have until then to figure out how to break the news to her. The time honored sit-com solution (going out and buying a new tadpole) is not an option because Skeeter saw the corpse. Maybe Shrimpy could “get better” all of the sudden…hmm.

Then after dinner I hustled Squealer off to bed and got ready to end my day. I vegged with my new issue of Christianity Today and my old issue of Sports Illustrated from last week.

Then, around 9:45, as I began to drift off to sleep the phone rang. It was the student. The student from earlier. The one asking about his grade. The one who had waited for two years, but couldn’t wait until 8:00 the next morning when I’d be back in the office. We conversed. I encouraged him to come by the office Tuesday morning. He did.

I’ll tell you about my meeting with him tomorrow.