Being a grown up

I'll be 27 in about a week — well six days to be exact. I don't feel 27. I don't feel like an adult, but I've come to the realization that I have been doing adult things lately. For instance, I am making the attempts to cook at home more and doing my best to be even more frugal than I usually am. But these aren't necessarily adult things, just things that I guess I've upgraded. I keep a tidy apartment and worry not only about bills, but what I'm going to write about for articles and research. Maybe this gradual shift in maturity +20 is due to the ever awesome Awesome Sauce in my life. I want to set a good example for her I suppose. Ever since she was born my schedule has been hectic and sometimes it becomes damn near impossible to get anything done. I don't know if the chaos that is my schedule and life is due to my trying to make sure I see her nearly everyday or what. With school, tutoring, and doing research it sometimes feels that I have no time for anything. The only thing that I look forward to is seeing Awesome Sauce and keeping her for the weekend. *Sigh* I'm so tired even now as I force myself to write this. I need a nap. I really don't have much else to say. I guess I'll try to come up with something later to entertain you all with. Later!

Working as a test scorer

Lameness ensues. They can't decide what the hell counts and what doesn't. Spelling sure as hell isn't important. If I was to try and list the many different ways you can actually spell "apologize" I think the internet would crash. The education of today's youth worries me greatly. I mean, if a child cannot even spell "like" at the fourth grade level... I mean what are the teachers doing? I know many a great teachers and I know that educators cannot follow the children home to make sure that they are doing homework and reinforcing what they've learned. Home environments should be taken into consideration but how exactly do you stop a neverending chain of limited education? It's a bit bleak, but something needs to be done. The most discerning thing about my job is that I am not making a difference. The higher ups come and tell us to essentially lower the standards so that more kids are able to pass. There's no way to alert anyone about the absolute inability for a student to spell words to make a coherent sentence. ...And this is why we are all screwed if the zombie apocalypse hits us when we're old and the children of tomorrow unleash hell on earth and open a fire exit which then lets the zombies in to devour all of us stuck in wheelchairs because they couldn't read. But seriously, these kids need some hooked on phonics or something. Ish.

Say whaaa?

Okay, so obviously keeping up with stuff is not my forte. Anyway, a lot has happened since I graduated. I have a niece named Addison whom I call Awesome Sauce. I am a graduate student who is also a professor/part-time lecturer, and I work as a tutor for Japanese language and Humanities. For the summer though, I am working at this lame place that grades the standardized tests that kids have to take in school — more on that in a minute. I have been nothing but busy busy busy. Unfortunately, I am still an unpublished person, but I did manage to present a paper at a conference. Come fall I will be attempting a panel at an anime convention with two of my friends who share my interests and are mostly sane too!

Right now for the summer, I cut grass on the weekends, and keep my super awesome niece on the weekends. During the week I grade those tests I mentioned. They are horrible. If you really want to know if your kids are learning anything...let me just tell you that no they are not. For every 20 stupid kids there's like one smart one. I wish I was making this up. Apparently kids are not on the same level I remember being on. Come on, I mean in the fourth grade I could spell "special" and "poisonous" — granted I was at a high school reading level, but still! It's quite tragic to be reading what they have read and seeing their responses! I would like to talk more about the hilarious responses but I signed a thing that said I wouldn't talk about the tests outside of the company. ...Because I'm totally going to sell this information to the other countries that are much further ahead of us in education (PLEASE NOTE that this sarcasm). We can't even take our cell phones into the building because there is "sensitive" material. I'm sorry, I can't take these policies seriously because when you hire people that have 40+ hours of college and no degree, I'm a little leery about how legit it can be. Don't get wrong though, I love $11 an hour, but this is one of the most tedious and boring jobs I've ever had. I had my "table leaders" as well. They suck. They're like managers only they're worse because they're not even really managers. When we grade the tests we have to do so by following a criteria that we are trained on. Well, it doesn't help when my table leaders always disagree on the grade I want to give (which I grade using the rubric given to us) and they insist on not following the rubric. Let me give you an example that I am totally going to make up:

Me: So this student says that "Tigers are orange with stripes to help them hide in a Wal-mart gardening section." The rubric states that if they at least infer that the animal they have chosen is the way it is then they get at least a 1. I gave them a one because they obviously understand that tigers' color and stripes help them to blend in...granted Wal-Mart is the last place I think I'd find a tiger.
Them: No it's a 0.
Me: *looks at rubric* Um, well there's this example that they gave in training. This example has the student saying that "Cheetahs have spots to help them hide in Target when they go through the home and garden department." This kid got a 1 because it was inferred that they were referring to a cheetah's spots being camouflage. ...Isn't this sort of the same thing?
Them: Nope. Not at all.
Me: ...Fine. *swallows rage and urge to flip a table over*
***Twenty minutes later*
Them: Kendora, why'd you give this a 0?
Me: What is this a trick question?
Them: What?
Me: Nevermind. Because you told me to give it a 0.
Them: Well it's actually a 2.

And that's how lame my table leaders are. Did I mention that they are bitches? Because they're total bitches. At least I get to talk to the super effeminate gay gentleman that sits next to me and we totally have awesome conversations about Victorian literature, how big of bitches our table leaders are, and vintage horror movies. Win.

Well I think that this is a good comeback post. I am going to make a better effort to update because I think my niece needs a chronicle of just how awesome I am and how mega awesome she is. ...And on that note, she has awaken from her 20 minute power nap and is now demanding that I cater to her. Later!

I can do it...maybe.

So, I would like to make some effort to keep an updated blog. Unfortunately, I don't think I have anything really funny or awesome to contribute. Meh, I'll keep trying. I graduate in the spring and I'm hoping that maybe I'll have more time to write here or something. Currently, I haven't given up the ghostly spirit of writing and still intend to somehow become a published and well paid author! *strikes pose* ...It may be a while, but I'll get there. I may have to be a super cool professor first.

...Today's post was really meant to just let everyone know I'm still alive. I'll try to update again when I have something productive to say. Later.

No way?! Nearly a year?

Hmm indeed. It has been that long. I guess I just got busy. Life, work and college. Per usual, I'm busy and stretched thin. I still want to be a writer and hope to be one of those cool professor writers who teaches because I have nothing better to do. My chihuahua Copper died, and this past July I got a new Chihuahua puppy. I named her Juliet, but I call her JuJu. She's a merle chihuahua. I also have four ferrets; Alice Liddel, Eva, Fritz and Ernst. All Disney names of course. Ferrets are most awesome. What else is new...Oh that agent ended up getting promoted and never responded to me, so it's back to editing my novel and sending it back out to agents. It'll be fine though. Everyone seems to think I'm depressed, but I'm not. I'm just tired. There's so much going on in my head and I'm trying to keep all my balloons together. I will graduate this upcoming spring and it's back to college to get my master's in the fall. I can do it. I'll be a Doctor of AWESOME.

In more boring news, I really want to see "Where the Wild Things Are." I also need to finish reading "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies." Oh, and I need to figure out whether or not I'm going to do a picture of Jay Gatsby (from Fitzgerald's book) as a zombie. Anything to get zombies incorporated into my daily life. Did I ever mention I took a Victorian English class where we discussed the undead? It was sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet.

Well it's a crappy update, but I'm alive. I'll try to keep everyone updated and maybe get back into the habit of writing fun and interesting stuff. Yay! Good night guys.
Oh...here's a picture of my newest addition:


Juliet being cute!

Kendora lives!!!!!!

So, it's been awhile. How is everyone? Me? I'm exhausted and stretched thin as always. I wonder if anyone ever stumbles across this blog and actually reads what I have to say. I don't really care, it's a good outlet to get things off my chest or to randomly spout nonsense into the open plains of the Internet. My book is now under consideration with the agent I sent it to. I finished the second one to go in the series and I'm starting a third one. I've got three to four papers due soon, a speech, two tests and two take home tests. Words and punctuation are the sea that is beginning to pull me under and I wonder if I should drown amongst the diction and prose or if I should stay afloat and master the monsters swimming beneath. Slowly but surely I feel as if I'll snap at any moment and wreak havoc upon the inanimate objects surrounding me. It's like I'm a caged beast or something... Even though I'm stressed out and tired, I can still accurately observe the people around me. Stupidity is the only thing that even the blind can see.
The girls, my ferrets Alice and Eva are doing good. Grover, the dachshund my mom and sister got is starting to be cool. I miss Copper terribly though. I took the girls to school because I gave a speech of fact about ferrets. They're so cute and I think that really helped my grade. It was fun carrying them around with me, but I swear some people are so ignorant. I lost count of all the stupid people that shouted, "Omigod, she's got rats!" or "Omigod are those rats?" NO. Ferrets are not even in the rodent family, they're in the weasel family. My girls are clean and playful and full of energy, not to say that rodents aren't. I can't wait until I get my own place to give them their own room. ...If that ever works out for me, =).
Not much is really going on right now in my life except for the above stuff I've mentioned. Tonight I'm going to see the midnight opening of Twilight. I'm not too excited about to be honest. I have nothing against Stephanie Meyer, but the books and movie just don't sound or look that interesting to me. But hey, she's making money, not me. I just hope my books become as famous if not more. Then I can have people hate that I'm so mega awesome, lol. I guess I just hate that vampires always get so much preferential treatment. Zombies, werewolves and the other monsters in folklore and mythology need some lovin' too. That's why I gave them love and props in my book. So hah! Man, I need some rest. I have to go to work tonight and then straight from work I'm going to see Twilight. Let's hope I don't fall asleep. Later guys!

Louisville, KT

So, went to see Indina Menzel at the Kentucky Center for the Arts...I think, I always get our theatres mixed up, but anyways I was looking at her t-shirts since she's touring. Yea, tell me why they had Kentucky abbreviated as KT? Ohio was OD. I suppose they don't have a spell check on the machine they printed those things off of. It was sort of funny, because people are always making fun of my fellow Kentuckians. Guess what folks, we're not morons. Even Indina Menzel made a comment on us because she supports Barack Obama and everyone in the theater did too and she said "wow, you're surprising me Kentucky!" Geez people, give us some freaking credit here. I can't wait to become a super awesome writer so that I can own the whole of America and make them realize that people here are the most awesomest people EVER. Yea. Moving along, I am slated to graduate next fall in 2009. Woot! Exciting yea? I'm starting to get a little nervous about graduating because what am I going to do when it's all over? I really honestly can't see myself in yuppie attire going to a caged in cubicle everyday. I refuse to. It's as if I'm being backed into a corner and my future is feeling so uncertain. I just keep hoping that by some stroke of luck, that agent will be all like, "OMG! Bestest book evah! Let's get it published now!" ...He's had it since July and I feel like maybe it's not going to happen but who knows? In a couple of weeks I'm going to ask one last time if he can tell me where it is in the process of being reviewed. I just feel like it's not going to happen and this waiting is killing me, ya know? I'd rather be told "sorry we can't do anything with this" instead of pretending to not to care. I'm not trying to be a bitch, I'm just frustrated and stressed out with life and feeling like I'm lacking control of everything around me. Shannon liked my second book, and I figure if the people who read it are liking it, then isn't that a good sign? Okay, I need to get my mind off of things and play some video games. Later!!!