Apparently the Canvas program marked my answers wrong because these notes had come from our substitute, and not our teacher. What. Considering that our substitute was a professional who has worked alongside our teacher for years, this is an odd mistake to make. Also, saying that they had come from the sub doesn't explain why Canvas thinks the answers are incorrect. I hope he fixes that. I can't afford any slip-ups in this class. This is where my grade is lowest.
And that third question was definitely my own fault- the PowerPoint merely says 'Soil pH', but apparently my teacher had verbally mentioned that mulch decreases pH, if anything- not increases it. We verbally say a lot of things. And of course I didn't have this in my notes, despite all the other notes I had. This teacher loves his trick questions and his True or Falses, too. Well.
I visited my plants in the greenhouse straight after class. To my delight, they all pulled through for me! Only two of them never sprouted: the Christmas cactus and the jade plant. The jade plant had previously been afflicted with mold. Possibly that damaged it, or possibly I hadn't planted it correctly (perhaps I'd cut too small of a section to plant).
After some hesitation, I dumped it. Hey, my teacher said that A) We should dump plants infected with mold, and B) We would only be marked down for plants that didn't root if we hadn't done the planting correctly (not if they simply didn't grow even though everything seemed to be in order). It's much harder for him to prove the fault lies in me if it's in the trash, mwahaha...
No, in all seriousness, that pot had been blanketed with mold the last time I'd come in (as had a few of my creeping charlies, which I threw out). I left the dirt and identifying tag so at least my teacher can see that I had a pot labeled jade plant at one time, and I'd marked my worries about the mold on my visitation sheet earlier too.
After being at home for awhile, I gave Mom a call because she hadn't updated her blog for a week, and I hadn't heard from her in all that time either. I wanted to make sure she wasn't dead. Of course, she didn't pick up the phone, much to my surprise.
She got back to me later (still alive) and we talked for a long time. Almost an hour and a half, which is the longest phone conversation I've ever had. Sounds like my family (minus my Dad, who'll be busy at Overstock with Black Friday) is planning to pay me a visit just after Thanksgiving. That will be neat. It'll be the kids' first time coming up to the campus.
I made macaroni and cheese and spent the remainder of the afternoon studying for my chocolate quiz on how chocolate is processed. As previously mentioned, this class has been difficult for me. It's irritating: I'm used to having a keen memory for details. I can identify hundreds of quotes from various shows I've seen only once and years ago, I can describe in detail the body language of most of my favorite cartoon characters in almost any scene you ask about, after over a decade of writing I can still describe the appearance and personalities of the vast majority of my probably upwards of 2,000 characters, down to eye color and mannerisms.
Especially, I was on the Reading Bowl team for multiple years in Georgia, where I read some dozen or so chapter books each year and participated in a buzz-in competition (in a team of five at a time) against other schools on tiny details of each book. I guess some information just doesn't stick well.
Out of pure curiosity (and procrastination), I Googled "chocolate class quiz" in the hopes that I'd randomly find a Quizlet or similar study tool that might give me a leg up here. Instead, I stumbled across my teacher on Rate My Professor. I was not happy. Many of her past kids who commeted boasted that this was "the easiest class they'd ever taken", that all her quizzes were open-note, and she was willing to re-open assignments past the deadlines if her students asked.
Wait a minute. She said our quizzes had to be closed-book, and our deadlines are viciously on the dot, absolutely no exceptions even by a wavering minute. How is that fair?
Policies change with time, I guess. It wasn't the most inspiring thing to read shortly before the quiz. And no matter how much you study, little can prepare you for ten questions all like this:
That's what I thought, anyway. Luckily I got it right and it turns out that I did well on this quiz altogether. I might have a chance at pulling an A in this class after all. I'll take it.
Demetria and I watched the Buster Keaton short "The Playhouse" tonight, along with several Mickey Mouse cartoons she's been wanting to show me for awhile. Nice.
