I love fall.
I don't love raking leaves - but I love it when they are done. Actually, it's a pretty mindless task and if I had more time on my hands, I think I could even love doing leaves. I love the colors of fall, the weather changing, the end of daylight savings time, Thanksgiving food, and the promise of Christmas right around the corner. I especially love the vacation days, family time, and snow. I love it once my house is decorated for the change of seasons (which generally doesn't happen as soon as I would like), and the smells of the holidays. Pumpkin and cinnamon, for example, are especially nice smells together.
Indian summer in the fall is good, too. Surprise days of 70-80 degrees make me want to go outside because I can (that sounds like a Bill Clinton thing to say, but it's true).
I realize in the fall that I have some beautiful sweaters, and I have missed them during the spring and summer months. But to be honest, I hate shoes. That's probably the worst part of fall and winter - having to wear shoes instead of sandals. Makes my feet hurt just to think about it. And I'm not crazy about heavy coats either. Lucky I have a garage that I can just hop in my car, drive to work, hop out, and it's a quick stint into the building - so generally, no heavy coat needed on a daily basis.
I wish I liked football, but I don't. Almost everybody I know loves football season for one reason or another, but I just never understood why grown men would want to run up and down a field, bang into each other over a silly ball. I feel the same way about golf. Tennis makes sense to me; even soccer - both of those sports require personal control skills with an opponent - and the object of the game is not to hurt somebody - as in the case of football; or to spend hours hitting a tiny little ball all the way over there and get it to fall in that little hole that you can't even see from where you are standing - which is why they have to put a flag on a stick to show you where you are shooting for. Dumb.
But I do love the sound of my dad, brother and my nephews watching football while I am usually in the kitchen (used to be with my mom) making some yummy snacks and hors d'oeuvres for the guys - and planning dinner or the next family gathering, discussing what we're going to do for Christmas. That is my recollection of football enjoyment, and I do miss it. Go to a game? Not if I don't have to.
This year, fall is different than it has been in the past. Maybe it will be the same, but certainty no longer exists in my family's world. Freddy and Nancy have been hosting Thanksgiving the last several years - we've gotten into a really good groove going to their house for the day with Tres, Tim, Anne and the kids, but this year - the plan is in place but Freddy's situation has been a huge obstacle this year and ... who knows what will happen. Same thing for Christmas.
One thing is for sure: Change is what fall brings. The change of seasons, colors, family comings and goings - which all seems to have more meaning this year than in year's past. As much as I like change, I like familiarity better.
Sunday, October 31, 2010
Thursday, October 28, 2010
A good eye for design
... is it an acquired skill or is it inherent?
I've always had the good fortune of having editors who could easily tell the difference between a good design and a crappy one. Newspaper and Yearbook have two distinctly different design needs - fundamentally because of the paper stock and use of ink. Newspapers saturate and need less ink and generally use much less color. Yearbooks, on the other hand, require higher photo quality, more efficient use of white space and knowing when to bleed and when not to. Both require an eye for composition, entry points, and unity – so that readers aren't confused by where to start. Font selection matters and how the fonts are packaged; less is more in my world.
Teaching these concepts has been a true challenge this year. For the first time, I think the newspaper editors get it – more than editors in the past. When I tweaked their pages, they knew exactly what I had done to make their pages look good (i.e., a pica around all screened boxes and between elements; flush right on all photo credits and flush left on the headlines; justified captions; alignment matters.) They saw this as soon as it was done on their pages but not before. "This looks really good!" they exclaimed. "We did this?" Well, not exactly, but almost. I think the next issue will be easier to lock up than the first, and so on. Today, their designs were okay, but some of them saw a need for more grids on the dummy layout sheets, so I made them a new template to redraw their sketches.
Yearbook editors aren't quite so savvy yet. They aren't taking the time to study the clippings they want to emulate on the screens. Too many text boxes all over the place and no sense of space or alignment. Color? This looks pretty. No entry points. Even the folios are random and different point sizes. Outlined type on one-word headlines aren't headlines. They are labels that don't explain squat. And I haven't read the first word yet. It's going to be a long year if I can't get them to see that the pages have no unity. "Let's make a plan." WHAT? A plan? We have a plan. "No, not exactly."
I'm having a hard time with the concept of spending thousands and thousands of dollars on a crappy looking design. I love their cover, endsheet, title page, opening, dividers and folio concept. But the spreads are ordinary and blah. The colors are not enough to tie the designs together (blue and gray).
I need more inspiration and I haven't found it yet. It better come to us soon as we must ship our first 40 pages in the next two weeks. Wisdom, I need you NOW.
I've always had the good fortune of having editors who could easily tell the difference between a good design and a crappy one. Newspaper and Yearbook have two distinctly different design needs - fundamentally because of the paper stock and use of ink. Newspapers saturate and need less ink and generally use much less color. Yearbooks, on the other hand, require higher photo quality, more efficient use of white space and knowing when to bleed and when not to. Both require an eye for composition, entry points, and unity – so that readers aren't confused by where to start. Font selection matters and how the fonts are packaged; less is more in my world.
Teaching these concepts has been a true challenge this year. For the first time, I think the newspaper editors get it – more than editors in the past. When I tweaked their pages, they knew exactly what I had done to make their pages look good (i.e., a pica around all screened boxes and between elements; flush right on all photo credits and flush left on the headlines; justified captions; alignment matters.) They saw this as soon as it was done on their pages but not before. "This looks really good!" they exclaimed. "We did this?" Well, not exactly, but almost. I think the next issue will be easier to lock up than the first, and so on. Today, their designs were okay, but some of them saw a need for more grids on the dummy layout sheets, so I made them a new template to redraw their sketches.
Yearbook editors aren't quite so savvy yet. They aren't taking the time to study the clippings they want to emulate on the screens. Too many text boxes all over the place and no sense of space or alignment. Color? This looks pretty. No entry points. Even the folios are random and different point sizes. Outlined type on one-word headlines aren't headlines. They are labels that don't explain squat. And I haven't read the first word yet. It's going to be a long year if I can't get them to see that the pages have no unity. "Let's make a plan." WHAT? A plan? We have a plan. "No, not exactly."
I'm having a hard time with the concept of spending thousands and thousands of dollars on a crappy looking design. I love their cover, endsheet, title page, opening, dividers and folio concept. But the spreads are ordinary and blah. The colors are not enough to tie the designs together (blue and gray).
I need more inspiration and I haven't found it yet. It better come to us soon as we must ship our first 40 pages in the next two weeks. Wisdom, I need you NOW.
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
Module Six
Oh, how I despise training days. Teaching for the better parts of 33 years, it's hard to teach this old dog new tricks. Even when you give them a new name, they are still the same ole tricks. I have known the tricks forever and they don't really do much for me anymore, especially when there is no benefit to me.
Today's lesson was characterization. I've always been pretty good at picking out the traits of characters and determining the who, what, when, where, why and how they are the way they are. The traits and the characters, that is. So today we spent our time analyzing a few characters, most of which were the bad guys. From my point of view, there are far too many bad guys in the world and we keep letting the bad guys seem to win. But really, they don't win because the good people of the world choose not to let the bad guys overpower us (note: I consider myself one of the good people who refuses to give in.)
On another wee tangent about training: Please don't tell me I'm coming to train on one topic (teaching English, for example) and then sprinkle in a bunch of unrelated/irrelevant technology to make it appear more interesting. It doesn't. It is confusing. If you want to give me technology training, then do that. But stop muddying the waters with co-mingled crap. I don't have a promethean board in my classroom and I don't want one. So I don't need to know how to use it, and you are wasting my time showing me a bunch of tricks I will never use.
I also do not teach grammar while I am teaching literature. Kids don't like it. "Here, write a sentence about this book that has something to say about characterization and oh, add in some participial phrases to that sentence while you are at it." WHAT? Why would I do that? In the editing lesson, maybe, but not while I'm trying to get them to find the motive behind a character's actions. Hello.
Used to be we tried to focus kids on certain concepts and let them delve into them, digging for meaning. Let's generate a list of qualities about these protagonists/antagonists and defend why/how we think so. Let's learn how to incorporate evidence from the work to support what we believe our findings are. THEN, once we write about this, let's learn how to edit and organize, combine sentences, phrases, clauses and thoughts so the ideas that are subordinate become that and our main points become those.
Lordy be. I need to retire.
Today's lesson was characterization. I've always been pretty good at picking out the traits of characters and determining the who, what, when, where, why and how they are the way they are. The traits and the characters, that is. So today we spent our time analyzing a few characters, most of which were the bad guys. From my point of view, there are far too many bad guys in the world and we keep letting the bad guys seem to win. But really, they don't win because the good people of the world choose not to let the bad guys overpower us (note: I consider myself one of the good people who refuses to give in.)
On another wee tangent about training: Please don't tell me I'm coming to train on one topic (teaching English, for example) and then sprinkle in a bunch of unrelated/irrelevant technology to make it appear more interesting. It doesn't. It is confusing. If you want to give me technology training, then do that. But stop muddying the waters with co-mingled crap. I don't have a promethean board in my classroom and I don't want one. So I don't need to know how to use it, and you are wasting my time showing me a bunch of tricks I will never use.
I also do not teach grammar while I am teaching literature. Kids don't like it. "Here, write a sentence about this book that has something to say about characterization and oh, add in some participial phrases to that sentence while you are at it." WHAT? Why would I do that? In the editing lesson, maybe, but not while I'm trying to get them to find the motive behind a character's actions. Hello.
Used to be we tried to focus kids on certain concepts and let them delve into them, digging for meaning. Let's generate a list of qualities about these protagonists/antagonists and defend why/how we think so. Let's learn how to incorporate evidence from the work to support what we believe our findings are. THEN, once we write about this, let's learn how to edit and organize, combine sentences, phrases, clauses and thoughts so the ideas that are subordinate become that and our main points become those.
Lordy be. I need to retire.
Monday, October 25, 2010
Covers: A response to "snail mail"
My dad is an avid collector of covers. What are covers? you might wonder.
Covers are envelopes with their contents intact. What? Who would collect those? Well, apparently there's a huge following of covers in the world of stamp collectors. My dad will pay top dollar for a cover with the Howland name on it. Among his found treasures: a letter addressed to a Miss Deborah Howland in the 1800s. My dad's first granddaughter is named Deborah Howland, so this is particularly relevant.
As it so happened, the cover's contents included a letter from a gentleman who was absolutely smitten with said Deborah and sought her return affections. The handwriting was beautiful, the sentiment even more so. My father was on a mission to find out whatever happened to Miss Deborah Howland - and he learned that she was not as smitten with the letter writer as he was her cousin and that would not be an acceptable liaison.
Dad is an avid genealogist, right along with my brother Phillip - who has to do it as a part of the Mormon church philosophy. My Dad does it because it's fun and interesting for him. He's tracked Howlands all over the United States, particularly from New England to Mexico and the Sante Fe Trail (that one resulted in me finding a book from the Southern Methodist Library in Texas about the Sante Fe Trail to buy for my dad's birthday a few years back); another batch of Howlands who have spent a lot of time in Africa (Cape Fear) with their merchant pursuits.
All of this resulted from hand-written letters from or to a person named Howland ever since the U.S. Postal service began - which I venture to say was sometime in the early 1800s. It has given my father thousands of hours of pleasure researching the whereabouts of certain family members so he can add to the Howland history.
I guess the point of all of this is:
1. Don't throw away the envelope with that letter. It may be worth something someday.
2. If you get a personal letter in the mail, keep it in a special place with the envelope. It's only valuable with the stamp and the hand-written scribe inside.
3. Computers make it easy to correspond on a daily basis, but the "mass" is nothing compared to the personal communication.
4. Good handwriting is an art form that is almost lost.
Covers are envelopes with their contents intact. What? Who would collect those? Well, apparently there's a huge following of covers in the world of stamp collectors. My dad will pay top dollar for a cover with the Howland name on it. Among his found treasures: a letter addressed to a Miss Deborah Howland in the 1800s. My dad's first granddaughter is named Deborah Howland, so this is particularly relevant.
As it so happened, the cover's contents included a letter from a gentleman who was absolutely smitten with said Deborah and sought her return affections. The handwriting was beautiful, the sentiment even more so. My father was on a mission to find out whatever happened to Miss Deborah Howland - and he learned that she was not as smitten with the letter writer as he was her cousin and that would not be an acceptable liaison.
Dad is an avid genealogist, right along with my brother Phillip - who has to do it as a part of the Mormon church philosophy. My Dad does it because it's fun and interesting for him. He's tracked Howlands all over the United States, particularly from New England to Mexico and the Sante Fe Trail (that one resulted in me finding a book from the Southern Methodist Library in Texas about the Sante Fe Trail to buy for my dad's birthday a few years back); another batch of Howlands who have spent a lot of time in Africa (Cape Fear) with their merchant pursuits.
All of this resulted from hand-written letters from or to a person named Howland ever since the U.S. Postal service began - which I venture to say was sometime in the early 1800s. It has given my father thousands of hours of pleasure researching the whereabouts of certain family members so he can add to the Howland history.
I guess the point of all of this is:
1. Don't throw away the envelope with that letter. It may be worth something someday.
2. If you get a personal letter in the mail, keep it in a special place with the envelope. It's only valuable with the stamp and the hand-written scribe inside.
3. Computers make it easy to correspond on a daily basis, but the "mass" is nothing compared to the personal communication.
4. Good handwriting is an art form that is almost lost.
Sunday, October 24, 2010
It's been a while...
... since I've blogged, and I can honestly say I haven't missed it but so much. Life is outrageously crazy in my world. Family situations, friends betraying strangers, work taking up an inordinate amount of my time, and wine and puppers consuming my off hours.
Since October 2008, I have lost faith in America, but not in myself. Each day I wake, wanting to hear good news - yet being disappointed in change that never materializes, a plan for a family in waiting, confidence in a country that I know can be more than it is. I don't fear because I have faith that God will take care of all things good and necessary, but I wish for more than what our society presently beholds.
I have so much to be thankful for and to give. Yet convoluted worlds collide daily - and I can't wrap my arms around it all. So, I just select a piece of my world and say to myself: "Self, today we will focus on this piece." And I do. Somehow that is working for me.
Since October 2008, I have lost faith in America, but not in myself. Each day I wake, wanting to hear good news - yet being disappointed in change that never materializes, a plan for a family in waiting, confidence in a country that I know can be more than it is. I don't fear because I have faith that God will take care of all things good and necessary, but I wish for more than what our society presently beholds.
I have so much to be thankful for and to give. Yet convoluted worlds collide daily - and I can't wrap my arms around it all. So, I just select a piece of my world and say to myself: "Self, today we will focus on this piece." And I do. Somehow that is working for me.
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