My neighborhood's like a small town.

Not only does the one hardware store that I go to sometimes close up early, but the other day when I popped in to get some weatherstripping right as the owner and his wife were closing up early, I was short ten dollars, and they said to just stop by later and give it to them.

Class dynamics at school.

I do office hours by appointment, and one freshman writing student had swim practice and was hoping to meet during the day rather than early evening, so I set up a lunch meeting with him during my break from my 9-5 shift at the library, but he got confused on location, and so I left when he wasn't there and rescheduled for two days later same time after a very professional, apologetic email from him.

At that second meeting, though, I was tired from working my near minimum wage job a lot that week and having my lunch taken up with the meeting, and all of a sudden I just "clicked in" to the situation, and realized that I was taking on too much between my two jobs, to let him get away with not having to miss what is essentially a daily leisured hobby.

That made me super disgusted when I thought of it that way, that I'm this highly trained professional who has to work 2 jobs and even then can't achieve a modest or predictable income, and I'm rearranging my life for the hobby of a 19 year old.

It's not his fault, but eff that, what nonsense...

It's surprising how easily I slid into it, though, because I always try to "fit one more thing in" and arrange writing workshop meetings to take into account students' extracurriculars if I can, and I did the same in this situation, without stopping to think about what was really going on.

What nonsense.

I'm so glad I decided to get the f*ck out of higher ed, and I only hope it's soon, that I can disconnect.

Potentially awkward encounter with a student.

The other week I was at school downloading all these pdfs from the major journal of sexology, since in a few weeks I'll be having coffee with a grad student who's been part of the major research on "So what the f*ck's up with tr*nny-chasers?" (the subject of the articles are phrased a bit more academic than that, admittedly, but that's honestly what the research amounts to).

Anyhow, I was checking the pdfs to make sure they downloaded properly, and I had one up on the screen with a title of something like, "Sexual Arousal Patterns in Crossdressers," when all of a sudden I heard a cheery and pleasant "Hi, [My first name]!" from behind me, and walking past me right then is one of my current (white) (male) freshman writing students, in a moose antler hat since even though he seems kind of sweet and dopey, he's probably pledging some fraternity.

I said hi back, but I was cringing inside.

I don't think he saw the screen, but what would he think was going on if he did?

It was like 8pm at night, and it was obvious I had had a long day and was still in the school library, and I was sitting there, reading that?

It would have come off as mega-weird, if he had noticed.

Library antics:

The other week I had shifted books to the point where I could reach across the aisle and pull a book, and then shelve it right in front of me.

The next time I worked, I shifted all day, and got to the point where I was at the end of a row, and for a bit I could reach through the shelf, grab books from the other side, and flip them around and shelve them right in front of me.

Dollar store clerk's Thanksgiving.

The other week I was in the dollar store and ran into that one (young) (hispanic) clerk whose girlfriend's (evangelical) parents made him change his dyed hair if he wanted to keep seeing her.

I asked him how his Thanksgiving was, and he said he had spent it with them, and it was kind of nice.

"Why?", I was like. "I thought they were giving you shit about your hair?".

"Yeah," he was like, "But that's all gone now, I just got it cut, and the last of the dye is gone."

He then said that he appreciated their Thanksgiving, because his family's is a drunkfest, but with theirs, everyone paused and said what they were thankful for, and then later everyone had a little something to drink with dinner.

"Yeah, drinking can be too much sometimes with family dinners like that," I was like.

"Yeah," he was like, "I wanted to skip because my ex was there, but then I'm glad I missed because my mom was so drunk, I was getting texts all night."

He then said this his (Mexican) family plays that lotteria game, and they had shots on some squares, and his mom got so drunk that she broke 2 of his aunt's shotglasses, and they were from her special collection from different places she's been in the U.S., and she was pissed.

. . .

I could see that kid as a convert to evangelicalism...  Very passive, kind of likes some things about the culture, would probably take the rest of it with a grain of salt.

Very disturbing.

Bar convo (2 of 2): 80-some year old man story.

That same night at the bar, this guy was saying he took his 80-some year old grandfather to the doctor, and that he had last been to the doctor in 1969.

They checked him out, and everything was fine.

"You want a flu shot?", they asked him.

"You haven't put anything into me for years," he was like, "And you're not going to start now!".

Bar convo (1 of 2): Thanksgiving Santa.

The other Friday night I was at the one (too brightly lit) neighborhood bar near my apartment, and this (younger middle-aged) (white) woman a few stools down was talking a bit too loudly to her friend and the one bartender who was working.

She used to be the 2nd lead bartender at a major chain restaurant that was a sponsor of the city's Thanksgiving parade, and she said the place was always slammed afterwards from the advertising, and because a Santa who was on the float was there after the parade, too, for the kids.

She said he was nice, and would hang out after his Santa-ing and drink Jack Daniels.

Every once in a while, too, he'd pop in during the summer, and he would always leave whoever was working a nice tip.