Then came the morning sickness. Not much fun, so I'll skip ahead to summer vacation. I went to America and bought a house. By the time I got back, Horyon was larger than I remembered her being. No matter, on October 5th she lost a lot of weight all at once.
My girls spent a couple of weeks in the post-natal recovery room at the hospital, being pampered and properly taken care of, then a couple of weeks at the in-laws home, being well taken care of. Then they came home, and the real fun began.
I've gotten more sleep than most new fathers, I believe. Maxine usually sleeps well at night. Her bedtime has been 11 or 12 p.m., but last night she went to sleep at 9:30, and didn't wake up until about six a.m. Of course, this was after I had spent a half hour trying to feed her through tears and wailing, mine and hers. Horyon and her breasts finally came to the rescue, after which I was allowed to hold Maxine until she drifted off to dream land. I held her for almost an hour, then carried her to her crib. We both expected her to wake up, but she didn't, so we sat in bed and talked for a while, still expecting her to wake up. We figure that if she makes a habit of sleeping like that, we will be the best-rested parents ever.
In Korea, they have a big celebration on a baby's 100th day of being out in the real world. The parents put on special new clothes, take pictures, feed their freeloading friends, and a bunch of other stuff you'll find out about when we hit day 100, which is coming up this month. But for 60 days, it's a modern tradition to get pictures taken. We got ours taken at a studio that has some talent for taking pictures of children. This is one of the pictures they took. It has been scanned, and the name of the studio blurred out.
Horyon made the dress and hat that Maxine is wearing while she was still pregnant. Good thing Maxine wasn't a boy, huh? She had to enlarge the hat just before the picture because it didn't fit. Apparently my daughter has a very large brain. This is one of our favorite pictures. We had copies made for some family members, but the studio charged us $5 apiece for each five by eight photo. Yeah, they're on good heavy stock, and the quality is good, but each picture has their logo on it, and it pisses me off to pay $5 for someone else's advertisement.
Especially when we manage to get some pretty cute pictures ourselves.
Is this not adorable? Our pink princess, hat casually thrown to one side, enjoys a nap.In other news, Horyon is not teaching vacation classes this month, so we will both be staying home for all of January. I have to admit, I was kind of looking forward to having a big chunk of time alone with Maxine every day. I thought it would be good father training for me. Still, I will have February, as Horyon goes back to work the second week of the second month.
In addition, my parents will be visiting us here during the first couple of weeks of February. They are very much looking forward to meeting Maxine, as well as having kimchi again.
And last, today finished the grade changing period. This semester I had six students come to me with problems, a bit of a record for me. The first was a name-switch mistake on my part. Accidentally gave an "F" to an "A" student. Big time red-faced Rob.
The second was a mistake on the part of the guy who enters grades into the computer, but she was from the same class. Also embarrassing. The third was a Junior theology student (in a class full of Freshmen), who is also a husband, father and worship leader at a local church. Of course, he didn't tell me any of this until the end of the semester at his final interview. His total grade was 39%, and that was after I had adjusted his entire class up 6% to make them fit the curve better. I ended up giving him a "D" because I didn't really want to inflict him on another teacher.
I didn't want to inflict him on another, because I've had that backfire on me. This year I had a couple of students majoring in church music. They were juniors, taking this class again because I failed them the first time they took my class. Understand, they could have taken anyone's English class. Why they took mine, again, is anybody's guess. Gluttons for punishment? Masochists? Rob Fans? Only they know, and they're not telling me. Because their English isn't good enough. They came close to failing again, but actually managed to get by on their own merits, much to my relief. Because I probably would have passed them if they had scraped together anything more than 50% in my class. Back to the list.
Number four was a nice girl who was 4 minutes late for her 8 minute final interview. That 50% was subtracted from her interview grade, leaving her a "D". She was very polite, and came to visit me from a town two hours away, so I bumped her clear up to a "C+". I'm becoming soft in my old age, I guess.
Number five was a girl calling from Seoul. She had missed her final interview appointment completely, giving her an "F" in my class. She told me she was sick, but it somehow didn't occur to her to come to my office after getting well. Instead she waited to call until almost three weeks later, at the very last minute. She didn't even call for herself, she got a friend to call for her. I made her talk to me, and gave her 50% of her interview grade, bumping her up to a "D". Once again, why inflict her on some other poor teacher? And besides, there was already a huge crowd of "F"s in her class, which makes me look pretty bad and shovels a big load of doo-doo on some future teacher. Hopefully not me.
And number six had a "B", and wanted an "A". She couldn't explain why in English, but she was from that same class full of "F"s, and she was a hard worker. I bumped her up the 1% she needed to get a "B+". Soft, soft, soft. I don't know whether it is being a daddy, or that I am just getting tired of dealing with the hassle, but I was much nicer this semester than I have been in the past.
Oh well. One thing that influenced me is that next semester I will have a completely different set of majors, so there should be no repercussions of my grading in preparing marks next year.
Famous last words.
So in closing, I would like to wish all eleven of you the most abundant blessings that God can give you for the coming year. May there always be a chicken in your pot, a fire in your hearth, and something good on your t.v.
Peace,
Rob
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