We spent much of our final day of September on a trip to and from Eagle River High School and Anchorage. Our morning started entirely too early for a Saturday so that I could get Connor to his bus on time. He was headed to his final football game of the season; Janelle and I packed and headed up as well. On the way, we did some shopping and picked up one of our friends--who has much more extensive knowledge of football than I do. We enjoyed the game (even if we were a bit cold) and then brought Connor back with us to Anchorage where we did a Costco run as well as had dinner and played Catan with our friends. Connor then drove more than half of the way back home, getting experience in dark and wet driving conditions. We just finished unpacking a little bit ago. It was an extremely pleasant day on which to end this month.

Here are some of the other highlights from the rest of the month:

• The month started with a blustery day that had a tree fall in front of Janelle while she was driving and that knocked out our power for a while (although not as long as some of our friends).
• My temper has been running short this month, and my filter has not been as secure. I know that this is at least partially due to my multiple obligations this year, but I think that my frustrations with myself at being so frustrated is decreasing my tolerance for things that frustrate me.
• Some of my students made a poster of my face superimposed over Ken's body from the recent Barbie movie. I still have not seen the movie, but I've now learned enough about it that I'm a bit concerned about what the picture and the title "Dr. Marks' Mojo Dojo Casa Classroom" represent.
• I quite enjoyed the multiple activities during Homecoming week which included dress-up days, the Bonfire, the Tailgate Party, the Homecoming game, and the Homecoming dance.
• I expressed my anger at the horrible tiered healthcare system as the rates were risen (as I predicted), unfairly targeting employees with families.
• We've enjoyed watching Taskmaster (we're now on Season 8), One Piece, Lower Decks, and Ahsoka. 
• I organized our growing DDF team to take part in the Chugiak Tournament where we had a good showing and an even better time. 
• I've had two Topic Dumps.
• Rowen and I shot a few baskets, with Rowen beating me at "Around-the-World."
• I was not in the correct frame of mind to properly handle a recent professional development, but the experience may have pushed me towards writing my own book on my educational experience.

Those were the big items. There have been other things going on that I haven't recorded for one reason or another, but it's safe to say that this was a busy month. We will see if I can catch my breath a bit in October.

We had a presenter visit our school today who made the comment that he never expected that his book would sell as well as it did when he wrote it. Honestly, based on his presentation, I'm in agreement with him. My guess is that people responded to his heart-warming anecdotal (if unrealistic) stories about his approaches to grading and student evaluation. Otherwise, many of his notions were truly out-of-touch with the realities of classroom teaching today. In fact, his ideas seemed to be straight out of conferences that I attended almost two decades ago. 

To be clear, there were ideas that had merit, and I could see teachers with particular teaching styles adapt them and encounter some mild success with them. There were others, however, that were absolute garbage based on the worst tropes that surround teaching--not to mention being utterly impractical. What was left was repackaged branding of "standards-based learning" which has its merits but did not provide methods of how to implement it meaningful ways other than "we're skipping over the 9-12 grades."

I wish our presenter well, and I'm glad for him that his book and marketing have met with success. I hope that his good ideas inspire receptive teachers to action. I equally hope that no one is ever forced to follow his suggestions.

I was reminded that I haven't, for all of the daily blogs that I have written, given much in the way of practical advice for the mystical practice of combining art and science into educational theory. The fact is that I know that my book wouldn't sell. Rather than uplifting stories about reaching the impossible student, my book would begin with something like: "If you believe that this book will solve the problems with our educational system, or even your difficulties as a teacher, finish reading this sentence, slowly close this book, and put it gently back where you found it, trying to forget that there is no perfect way to educate human beings." Now, I do believe that I have insights to share, but I can hardly get my colleagues to listen to me for five minutes without them rolling their eyes and talking to their neighbor about a different topic entirely. 

For that matter, I've been recently reminded that most people don't make it to the end of these daily posts. 

Due to my frustration with the intense ignorance, and often gross stupidity, of those people who follow Donald Trump and his ilk, some people incorrectly believe that I am a supporter of President Joe Biden--or the Democratic Party in general. The truth is that I have been genuinely surprised by the successes of Joe Biden's Presidency as I believed that he was going to be a lackluster, and perhaps outright embarrassing, President. However, despite him promoting and signing into law some of the most impressive infrastructure legislation since Eisenhower's administration, I still do not want him to run in the upcoming election. In fact, I blame him for a great deal of the turmoil in the U.S. at the moment--not due to anything he's done during his time as President, but because he did not run in the 2016 election. 

Instead, he stepped aside (for whatever backdoor promises that were made) to allow Hillary Clinton to make her historically terrible run for the office. Clinton was the epitome of the corruption at the Capitol, and her nomination (and tactics behind "earning" that nomination) were just more fuel to add to the fire that would see Trump sent to the White House. Worse, it was her campaign strategies that boosted Trump to winning the Republican nomination in the first place. Allow me to explain.

The 2016 field of Democratic candidates had a number of viable challengers. Biden's announcement that he would not seek the office (which was a bit of a surprise, but a relief to those of us who remembered his many gaffes as both Senator and Vice President) made it so that Hillary Clinton was the most politically experienced candidate in the field--with the exception of the radical Bernie Sanders. Unfortunately, Clinton was surrounded with legitimate corruption issues (and I'm not talking about the false-flags of Benghazi or her emails). In particular, she had been neck deep in Savings and Loan scandals, "healthcare" shenanigans, and iffy campaign contributions. Then there were the backdoor deals that lifted her as a contender. I was personally furious for the NEA's (teacher's union) endorsement of her (especially over Bernie Sanders) prior to the Democratic National Convention considering that, as a Senator, she voted for the No Child Left Behind Act and later for the Every Student Succeeds Act (both of which sound great but actually gutted funding for public education by placing unrealistic and unfunded federal mandates in place). I was told that the NEA was looking for a more electable candidate, but that kind of garbage line was the frustration that people were having with politics. Also, we see how well that turned out.

Her campaign then started its fateful tactic of using campaign funds to discredit Donald Trump's Republican competitors. These smear campaigns were so effective that Jeb Bush (who had been the presumptive Republican nominee) and others dropped out of the race. The DNC's conviction was that no one in their right mind would let Trump take office, making his nomination Clinton's best chance at having her own desk in the Oval Office. Her campaign helped spread misinformation that would solidify Trump's base and lead to his rise to power--which has been the "gift" that just keeps on ... well ... destroying the fabric of America.

In doing so, she alienated independent voters, provided a lightning-rod candidate for the Republican Party, and failed to rally Democratic voters to her side, losing the electoral vote by especially insulting rural Americans with multiple poor-worded phrases when she realized that people were seriously voting for the man who would become the worst President in history. In hindsight, the outcome was almost obvious. Her campaign highlighted the corruption behind her candidacy, spread misinformation that empowered a terrible candidate, and alienated Americans who were tired of that sort of politics. Thus, Joe Biden, by stepping aside in the 2016 election, directly contributed to the devastation that Trump's Presidency brought to our nation.

Two weeks ago, with an impending government shutdown coming due to inaction from his office, the Republican Speaker of the House, Kevin McCarthy (no relation to the slightly more infamous Joe McCarthy), decided to cede to extremist demands and begin an impeachment inquiry on President Joe Biden. In the time since, there has been almost no progress in either the inquiry or the bills necessary to avoid a governmental shutdown. The inquiry is entirely show as not only has there been no evidence to connect the President to wrongdoing (unlike Trump, who was just convicted of financial fraud--only one of many evidence-based cases against him), but the events in question around his son are from the time before he was President (unlike Trump, whose children directly received gifts of over a billion dollars while he was in office--oddly, this isn't even one of the things for which he's being tried).

There are twelve spending bills that need to be passed (or some sort of short-term spending resolution) before the end of the week if the government is not going to shut down. A package of these bills--which includes the bargained spending limits agreed upon to avert the debt ceiling "crisis"--was already passed with an overwhelming bipartisan vote in the Senate. McCarthy has refused to bring them to a vote in the House (where they would likely also pass) because far-right nut-job ReTrumpAgains have threatened to remove him as Speaker if he does. The Republican Party, once led by Lincoln who said that the "house divided against itself cannot stand," has divided against itself in the House.

Almost comically, right-wing "news" sources are trying to spin this as the fault of Democrats. Sound bites from House "hearings" are leading those who only listen to right-wing sources to believe that President Biden is going to be impeached (which is unlikely with the House this divided) and removed from office (which simply won't happen if for no other reason than the Senate wouldn't make that vote) soon. Trump has taken to social media to say that the public will only blame the President for the shutdown, so Republican had might as well shut it down.

I would like to think that the American people are smarter than the Republicans are hoping that they are.

Once again, I haven't been able to choose a topic from the list that's rolling around in my mind for more than the fifteen minute that I give myself. Thus I'm just going to lay them out in no particular order.

• AI writing as both a powerful tool and as a hobbling mental crutch
• People posting pro-Russian propaganda that is against aid to Ukraine make Reagan and Eisenhower spin in their graves
• I need to spend more time relaxing
• The mounds of things that I still need to get done for school this week
• Some of my favorite starship designs
• My eagerness to watch Ahsoka's next two episodes (the last two of the season)
• How The Last Jedi got so many things right, but also some major things terribly wrong
• I still haven't put up this week's jokes on my board
• Starlink's increasing reliability
• My guilt at supporting billionaires

There were a couple of other things that I seem to have forgotten, but that gives a general idea.

As our pastor noted in his homily, today's Gospel reading can be a difficult one. In it, a landowner gives a full day's wages to everyone who worked in his fields, even if it was for just a short time near the end of the day. The laborers who worked for the full day were resentful that they did not receive more than those who worked for a shorter amount of time, but the landlord rebuked them for being envious of his generosity to the others.

As pointed out in the homily, this section is often used as an explanation for "deathbed" conversions. People are often frustrated that they spent all of their lives trying to be good in hopes of deserving their place in heaven while others might have filled their lives with decadence only to convert at the last moment and yet still get the same reward. Those who want to "game" God's system argue that this encourages people to ignore God's teachings until they are about to die (like Tom Walker attempts to do in Washington Irving's "The Devil and Tom Walker"). However, I think that Jesus was making a different point.

While He was certainly warning against envy of others as our pastor pointed out, Jesus is also making a statement about pride. The landowner intentionally pays those who were working all day last. He had them wait the longest while also making certain that they saw how the others were treated. Jesus even ends the parable with the line He often repeats: "Thus, the last will be first, and the first will be last." He was warning His disciples (and us) about feeling superior to others because of our accomplishments. The laborers in the story were like Jesus' disciples who were arguing over who would be greater in heaver; they felt as though they deserved some sort of special treatment because of their closeness to Jesus. Instead, Jesus teaches them the importance of humility as well as the need to be thankful for what one has been given.

I need to work on my own envy and pride, for I certainly suffer from both of those afflictions. 

I'm heading out with my DDF (competitive public speaking/performance) team and two chaperones in the morning tomorrow. We are going to Chugiak for their two day tournament and will likely be quite busy from the moment we get there. I have a good team even if they are all feeling rather unprepared going into this earlier than normal competition.

Because of the tournament, I will likely be more focused on my team than I will be on the changing of seasons tomorrow. I will say that I'm grateful for this opportunity to drive through the pass while the trees are showing their fall colors. Actually, I like almost any opportunity to take that usually scenic drive, but the changing of the season will make it even more impressive.

Normally, the start of autumn is one of my least favorite times of year. The days are shorter than the nights. The weather is colder, but usually not cold enough for snow. Everything smells like mildew outside. Still, there's something about tomorrow's equinox that has me feeling quite hopeful. 

Understanding what makes me tick is pretty simple: I want to be right. Some people misunderstand this motivation and think of what I do as a type of sophistry--that I want people to think that I am right (which is a common human motivation, and thus certainly a part of my own). However, I'm much more concerned that I might be truly wrong than I am that someone might think that I'm right. Perhaps this might be better understood if I said that I hate being wrong--but that's not quite as true as the fact that I want to know the Truth.

Because I want to know the Truth, and be correct in my beliefs about what is true, I have a difficult time with those people who spread mistruths, disinformation, and outright lies. The more flagrantly a person disparages the Truth, the greater my frustration with them grows. I get particularly angry with those try to hide their falsehoods behind ideas like moral relativism. Although it is True that our perceptions influence what we can understand about Truth, and thus we only comprehend the corner of reality that we inhabit, there are still objective Truths in our universe--even if they are beyond our ability to comprehend them. People who use this concept to distort the truth by claiming to "control the story" are thus some of the most dangerous people in our world.

The problem is that everyone does this to some degree. We all try to bend reality to fit the way we believe or (more often) fear the world to be. I have certainly fallen for this more than once--that I will believe the version that I prefer to be true than the one that is True. Each time I discover this, I am filled with embarrassment and self-loathing. As the years and decades have passed, I have compounded my efforts to make certain that the Truth I believe is not just the truth that I desire or fear.

In the end, I realize that there is so much that I do not know--and possibly cannot know in this life. Perhaps Socrates was right in believing that the only true wisdom comes from realizing that we know nothing. Still, I want to be right and do right as best as I can.

It's still over three months away, but I've already been struggling with what movie marathon I want to do for my birthday this year. There are a lot of possible options, and there are a variety of factors to consider. Not all of them piece together to point to a perfect option.

One of the big factors is that all of my children and grandchildren will be up here for Christmas--which has not been the case in a few years. Having young ones around puts a few limitations on any series of movies that I would watch throughout the day. I had been thinking about doing a Guardians of the Galaxy marathon, but I think it would be both a bit long (as the last two Avengers movie and at least part of a Thor movie need to be included) and a bit too scary--especially in certain parts. On the opposite side, I've long considered doing a 1990s Disney musical movie marathon starting with The Little Mermaid (technically, it's a 1989 movie) and ending with Tarzan (which isn't really a musical, but Phil Collins' songs are absolutely on fire). There are some scary parts there, too, but my larger concern is being able to handle that much animation in one sitting (I haven't run the numbers just yet, but that's nine movies--which means somewhere between 14 to 18 hours). 

Meanwhile, this birthday is when I hit the half-century mark, so I would like it to be special. This could mean going back to the movie series that started these marathons: the original Star Wars trilogy (which I first watched as a full marathon for my 18th birthday) or perhaps The Lord of the Rings (extended) trilogy which was the first birthday movie marathon from my current trend of birthday movie marathons (and which happened to be 20 years ago this year). The problem is that I've done both of them within the past five years (twice for Star Wars in the past 8 years). Ten years ago, I did the Pirates of the Caribbean movies, but has to be willing to watch a clear drop in quality after the first one (although, I do like how they tied it all back around at the end of the 5th one).

Clearly, I've given this some thought; although, I have--as of yet--no conclusions.

I've never been able to get into watching anime or reading manga despite loving so many things that are Japanese. The closest for me has been video games (such as some of the Dragon Quest games) that have used an anime style as their art medium. Considering that several of my children quite enjoy multiple anime and manga stories, I've had the opportunity to watch or read some of the more popular ones, but none have really sparked my interest. That's why I was surprised that I not only enjoyed the Netflix live adaptation of One Piece, but I was interested enough to watch it in the first place.

I would say that the main draw for me was just the positivity displayed by Iñaki Godoy as he plays Monkey D. Luffy. While he is optimistic to the point of naivete, Luffy's good-hearted and loving nature is downright infectious. He sees his world as a better place than it really is and, in doing so, makes his world a better place than it was before. I want him to become the "King of the Pirates" if for no other reason to see him change piracy in his world into a force for good.

The entire cast was wonderful, feeling like manga drawings come to life with anime action pieces. Sure, the plot was a bit juvenile, and there were parts that dragged, but it was still engaging and managed to have some interesting twists. Meanwhile, the world itself was fantastic, in the literal sense of the word. An ocean-dominated world is the perfect location for a fantasy, pirate(ish) adventure.

In short, I'd be happy to watch more seasons of this series.

"Forgive your neighbor's injustice; then when you pray, your own sins will be forgiven." This quote from the Book of Sirach predates Christ's teachings by nearly 200 years. As radical as Jesus' message seemed to the people of the time, He was teaching people what God had been asking for the entire time: that we need to learn to love as God loves. Sadly, even having Jesus spell it out for us, so many of us ignore the simple task He asks of us and instead hide behind ritual and false righteousness.

I definitely need to work on being more forgiving. One of the downsides of my normally excellent memory (even if it has been failing more of late) is that my mind replays events in which I feel that I have been wronged in some way. Thus, I can hold onto grudges for an extremely long time. 

However, Jesus calls on me to forgive not once or twice or even seven times, but every time that I feel that I've been wronged. While the reading from Sirach and today's Gospel talk about forgiveness in terms of debt, I think of it also in terms of the weight on my soul. The grudges that I carry weigh me down, keeping my thoughts from making their way to greater purposes and designs.