RBOC: Halloween 2017 Edition

• I just sent an email to the chair of a university-wide committee saying I wasn't feeling well and won't make it to the meeting today.  This is true (I have a headache, which probably has to do with the onset of my period [for the first time since, I don't remember, maybe early August?]) but there are other reasons, including I'm over-committed for the next two weeks, and it's Halloween, and the last meeting I attended was a colossal waste of my time and the agenda for this one looks to be similar, which SUCKS because I really did want to be on this committee.
• Instead of attending said meeting, I will comment on my backlog of student writing and take care of some phone calls on my long list of annoying calls to make and/or do some online shopping because my kids are lacking winter coats that fit ( LG has gained about 25 lbs in the past year [hello puberty!] while Tiny Boy is too small to fit into the coat in our hand-me-down stash and slightly too big for his last year's coat) and/or make some soup.  Because snowing.
• You'll notice however that I am writing THIS.
• My new TV watching habit involves The West Wing, which I somehow managed not to watch back in the day (that was the era of Gilmore Girls, I suppose?)  I am not entirely sure that I like it (a bit too patriarchal for me, honestly) but there's something about watching a PRESIDENT be presidential that makes me feel somewhat better about the state of the universe, even if it's TV rather than real life.  Should I keep going?
• I decided the other day to mix apple cider and red wine, which came out like some kind of sangria.  I need to try it again, and play with the ratios, and put it in a thermos tonight for when I take Tiny Boy out in the SNOW to trick or treat.
• He is going as Cat Boy, which is some blue superhero cat from a TV show he has never actually seen, while LG is one of the Heathers from the musical Heathers (not the 1990s movie with Winona Ryder, whom she only knows from Stranger Things) which involved procuring a blond wig and a trip to the thrift store for clothes I would have worn circa 1989.
• LG did not carve a pumpkin but created a Trumpkin out of sharpie.  If I'd had my way, it would have had a very large scary open mouth.
• I'm not sure what's up with the random CAPS.  I'm feeling feisty.
• I finally realized I was not going to work on a book project this semester and just suck it up and prioritize getting smaller things (essays mostly) off my hard drive and out in the world.  And then interestingly two book series CFPs have come across my desk that fit books I have in the works.  I'll take that as a sign.
• I'm really hating teaching this semester.  It's barely past midterm and I'm looking forward to my next semester's classes, even though I will have literally twice the number of students.
• Okay, now I really need to get to the grading...  Happy Halloween, everyone!