Welcome to the Roller Coaster.

Aaaand, after complaining last night about my lackluster day of tutoring children with no attention span, today was better!  (Thanks, Rapper L for the suggestion!)  I need to learn not to mentally surrender and call it quits on a moment-by-moment basis.  Stop and smell the roses and all that.

Lo and behold, look at my latest response paper for class:

Yes, folks, that's not one but two "rare and elusive" CHECK PLUSES in a ROW.  I just may survive grad school after all.  That's a good thing because I've already registered for a honkin' summer class and am about to register for a fall one.

Also, I now live out of my car.  I have just enough time between work and class and my tutoring sessions to sit around in parking lots and try to get ahead on my reading.  Today I was almost run over by a cement truck while trying not to look like a stalker outside a playground, but you know, all in a day's work.

The increased time plus increased tutoring sessions means increased junk in my car.  Academic junk, but still.

Tonight was Literary Society and the book was marvelous.  Just marvelous.

And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini

Put this one on your reading list immediately.  Do not pass go, do not collect $200.  It's the story of a young Afghan brother and sister who were suddenly separated in the early 1950's.  The book begins with a legend and proceeds to follow a variety of characters through the rest of the twentieth century, weaving their life events with those of the family members who lost each other.  Hosseini is a lyrical writer with a wonderful mixture of restraint and illustration.  The perspectives he chooses are unique and measured.  Not too much of one thing or the other, and he keeps the story moving.  While you're at it, pick up The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns.

This one is going back on the bookshelf for another read, eventually.

Enjoy!