Update Link: You’re Not Sorry – Part 58

Happy Sunday! Going into the last afternoon of the break before three full straight weeks of classes. We’re in school until December 23, but that last day is a half day when the majority of the day is the teachers vs. students in our annual volleyball tournament, so it’s not even that bad. I’m looking forward to this December — I managed to finagle the content schedules so that French II & IIII are watching media from December 5-December 19 — and only French I is still finishing up a unit that second week. It’s going to be a much more laid back month than normal.

The Praxis went okay yesterday — I feel better about the writing than I did the last time, and slightly better about the speaking. These are my weakest areas because I still rely on doing a lot of preparation and the spontaneous creation of the language is more challenging when you can use notes or resources. I scored like 4/18 on both those sections last time, but this time I made the word count on the writing without issues, and while I don’t know if the writing was as complex as they wanted, I was able to get my point across a lot more confidently. The speaking section, I also got 4/18 last time and I *think* I did better on the first two tasks than last time.

That being said, I’m still expecting to miss the 162 score by a few points. You only get 20 seconds to read the questions on the listening section, and I missed answering 2-3 questions because I was rereading the choices and lost track of the timer which I don’t remember doing the last time. Still — progress. And I can get away with failing it again because the state just needs to see that I’m trying to finish the certification because French teachers are like unicorns. We don’t really exist, lol.

ANYWAY.

December starts tomorrow, and it’s going to be great to be able to come home and not feel like I have to do a ton of work at night! I have so many plans for this month, writing wise. Let’s hope I can make it work. So far, I’ve nailed every day of Flash, even when I was tired. I’m trying to rebuild my writing stamina so I can write 1-2 hours every day 🙂

See you tomorrow! It’s a grocery run day, so I’ll be updating closer to 6 or 7.

Update Link: You’re Not Sorry – Part 57

I can’t believe I had to pay almost $180 for the privilege of taking an annoying three hour French test. Leaving in a few hours for the torture, and hoping that I pass this time so I can move on to the LAST step I need for my certification — the OPI interview which is going to be the worst experience ever. I love teaching French, but the certification process is a nightmare.

ANYWAY.

I can’t believe we’re at Part 57 — that’s insane, lol.

I did finally get a really good idea for the next flash fiction series — it’s related to another story I’ve been developing for a long time, but I couldn’t quite work this idea in without making the story three times as long (lol, shocking right?) so I decided to spin it off and make it its own thing. I want to sit with it a little while before I’m completely sold on it or share some info with you.

See you guys tomorrow! I’ll probably be posting around 2!

Update Link: You’re Not Sorry – Part 55

Every time I make the smallest attempt to stay up a bit late and then sleep past 8, Lizzie the Terror reminds me that I have mouths to feed no later than 8 AM. Literally slaps at my face with her paws until I give up and feed her. I respect the commitment, honestly.

Tomorrow’s update will definitely be early! I have to take my French Praxis again at 2PM, so I’ll be leaving my house around 1. I’m not looking forward to it, though I honestly might accidentally pass it since it’s been about two years since I took it last and I’ve been doing a lot more advanced French prep since I’m teaching higher levels. Man I wish I’d just taken it back when I graduated. I was so much more fluent in the advanced stuff back then, but oh well 😛 I was 12 points short of passing last time, so you never know. But it’s a 3 hour test, so I won’t be home until almost 6 and I will likely just stare at the wall afterwards. It’s excruciating and I hate it so much.

Update Link: You’re Not Sorry – Part 55

Hope everyone had a great holiday! I devoured Stranger Things last night — it was sooo good! And it was really great to just shut down social media, put away the phone, turn off the lights, grab some wine, and just enjoy one of my all-time favorite TV shows.

I should be updating mid-day tomorrow, but we’ll see.

 

ETA: Happy Thanksgiving!!! I’m moving today’s update to later this afternoon. I’ll probably write at 7 or 8 and post at 8 or 9. I stayed up to watch Stranger Things, and listen LISTEN I was too pumped to go to sleep until like almost 2, and then overslept. 

See you tonight 🙂

Update Link: You’re Not Sorry – Part 54

Early update because I AM FREEEEEE (until monday). Admin let us out at noon today because again, I work for one of the districts in the area. Came right home and decide to get the update out of the way so I can prep for Stranger Things. I can’t believe it’s on tonight, we’ve waited so long!

I’ll be posting early tomorrow, probably at 11 or noon because I’ll head to my sister’s early.

Hope you guys are enjoying our binge-a-thon!

Update Link: You’re Not Sorry – Part 53

Almost Thanksgiving break! And the worst part of my week is over! Tomorrow is a half day, I’m just tossing on Nailed It France! and letting the kids run wild while I catch up on some grading. And then wheeee four days off!

I’ll start tomorrow’s update between 1:30 and 2 — depending on what time I get out. We’re scheduled to be done at 12:25 but pep rally days tend to finish a bit early and my principal is literally a king among men — we got out at 12:05 last year for winter break.

I’ll update and then I’m heading downstairs to finish watching Season 4 of Stranger Things before Season 5 premieres at 8. If they kill Steve or Dustin in the first four episodes, don’t expect to hear from me for at least six months, I’ll be too devastated.

See you tomorrow!

OH and the style issues were fixed so that chapters look pretty again, whee!

Update: You’re Not Sorry – Part 52

I stepped out of my classroom to do afternoon hall duty and immediately stepped in gum. Welcome to Mondays.

Tomorrow should be much earlier — I got caught in Thanksgiving grocery madness and didn’t get home until almost 4:30. Glad you guys are enjoying the marathon 🙂

I did a little investigating on the style issue, and it looks more irritating to fix than I was hoping, so I’ll tackle it tomorrow.

Update Link: You’re Not Sorry – Part 51

It feels very weird for it to be 12:30 and everything is already done for the upcoming work week (not my laundry, shhhhh).

I’m aware that there are weird style issues on the individual updates that look like this:

I think the plugin I use to make my chapters link into series changed the name of that element in the style sheet, so I have to play with it a little later. It’s on my list to investigate.

I’m doing a grocery store run tomorrow after work, so I should start writing around 5 and post at 6, or at 5:30, posting at 6:30. It just depends on how long it takes. See you then!

Update Link: You’re Not Sorry – Part 50

Let’s kick this marathon off 🙂

I really think we’ll finish this story by the end of the marathon, but I also thought this story would only be 50 parts at most, so what do I know?

I’m spending this weekend planning the rest of the marking period and even working on unit plans for the rest of the year. It feels so good to be looking at the big picture stuff again and not stressing over the nitty gritty details of what am I going to teach tomorrow? This is the first year when I’ve given myself permission to actually let the majority of December-January be media/book content and not try to teach new material. I already feel like how that change is going to be really helpful next year in making the schedule. Every year I teach, I learn new ways to make life easier, and after next year, I won’t have to add new courses (which also means I lose that extra money writing curriculum but that’s stress for later) so we are in the home stretch.

A note on times —

Saturdays, I think writing at 1, posting at 2 will generally be the sweet spot. Sundays, should be similar but might move earlier. Monday – Friday, when I’m working, I’m hoping to write at 4 or 5 PM depending on the schedule, and days off (like Thanksgiving and next Friday) will depend on energy.

Next Saturday, I have my Praxis exam (will stress explain this later) so I’ll be updating earlier that day.

See you tomorrow 🙂

Hello 🙂 So good news and bad news.

Bad news — I’m gonna miss tonight’s Flash Fiction.

Good news — tomorrow, we start a holiday marathon! I’m committing to updating Flash Fiction every day between now and January 4!

I had a great week at work! I’m almost completely prepped for NEXT week already! I’ve got about an hour or two of work tonight (maybe three). I only have a limited amount to prep for December since I do less content, and that’ll be done by the end of Thanksgiving break — which gives me an entire month to start prepping January and the rest of the year. The last three months have been awful slog of too much work, too little downtime at work with chaos in renovations, burns, and illnesses, blegh. But I’m feeling really great about the rest of the year (and even getting a headstart on NEXT YEAR, crazy!)

I have lots of plans to make up for the last three months starting in December — but we’re starting small with Flash Fiction updates daily for 44 days — which should let me either finish the current story or get REALLLY close to it.

I really appreciate all the patience over the last few months,  especially with the constant skipped updates. I don’t take it for granted those of you who return update after update or support me at Patreon. Thank you so much, and I can’t await to get this marathon kicking!

I’ll be writing around 1PM and posting at 2PM tomorrow!