I quit my job today (WARNING: rant)

I work in academia, which is a very hard job.  Today I quit.  Now in academia this means that I informed my department head that I will not be returning next semester.  Since he is never available, this means via email.  His response "Thanks for the short notice," and then continued from there.  Next semester doesn't start until the end of January, three months from now.  In what world is this short notice? Only in academia.  On the other side of the coin my hire dates have been a week before the semester starts to my most recent the day after the semester had started, even when continuing from one semester to the next I usually have not even received my contract for the semester until after I started teaching it, I only know I'm teaching because my name appears on the schedule.  I am adjunct faculty, I know it sucks to have to find more of us willing to work for a fraction of what the full timers get and without benefits but lucky for you it doesn't take a committee to hire one of us.

It's not that I'm giving up on students, I'm giving up on the people pretending to be students.  When my students overall average homework grade is failing and homework is graded on completion and did you turn it in on time, I can not be surprised that they fail the tests.  On a 10 point quiz where I told the students to check their answers with their neighbors before turning in the quiz, I had a student score 5 points, I can NOT think that the problem is with my teaching. The problem is with these people pretending to be students.

And I'm done.

There I hope I got that out of my system at least for a little while.

Thank you

Thank you everyone for your support. I think I can really do this. I hope so.  If you have any suggestions of things I should do along my way or places I shouldn't miss please let me know.  If you are would like me to visit you, please be sure to read my Barter: Will Sew for Shower post, and contact me.  I can add you to my map of places to visit, I just need your name and a general location.

Current plan is to start out of southern California on the first of January, quickly get to Washington DC area to visit my sister and our nations capital; DC feels like the appropriate start point to my wanderings.  From DC I'm not yet sure although as it will be winter I probably want to head south, or stick to the coast.

Barter: Will Sew for Shower.

My offer:  I will come to your house with sewing machine and make you (or someone else in the near area) garb out of some fabric from your stash or even help you find some fabric to purchase if you haven't a stash.  Or if you just need some help with parts of something you already have going. Or moral support to make that garment you have been trying to make yourself start.  I am flexible on this, but I want to do something so I am not feeling like I am just mooching off the generosity of this extended family we call the SCA.

In exchange:  Use of your shower (not something I can really fit in my truck), and information about your area.  I wouldn't mind a few meals, are you willing to feed me?  Look at my dietary restrictions, are you still willing to feed me? If not, I'm ok with that, just let me know.  If you have them, use of washer/dryer.  I don't necessarily even need a place to sleep as I will have that in my truck.  Really I'm just looking for some way stations along my way, because I want to go to museums, national parks, landmarks, and see this place we all call home.  I will need a space to work, while I make something. This can be as minimal as a small sturdy table and chair, or as elaborate as a giant sewing room.

I have a major wanderlust going on and I want to wander around and not be tied down to anything.  Do you have a idea/project that you need help getting off the ground?  I can help.  I know that one of the biggest problems I have is finding someone that can help me fit me, and I want to help others that have this problem.

At this point I could easily be enticed to go anywhere, and that is what I'm going to do.  While out there may I visit you? 

The plan, actually more of a scheme

1. Decide what features I need/want/willing to pay for and buy a shell.
2. Quit my job, ok so really it is more just inform them that I won't be teaching next semester, I plan to do this approximately November 1, gives me some time to think about scheme and decide if I really think I can do it while still being enough before class registration that students are not already planning their schedules.
3. Design and build interior to camper shell.
4. Finish the semester, grade finals.  I give finals the second week of December and grades are usually due the first of January, but maybe if I'm lucky I can get done really early this semester.
5. Pack, go through stuff, get rid of stuff, decide what I want to leave in storage and what I want to take with me.
6. If all of the above goes smoothly, I should be ready to head out on the first of January.
7. Drive fairly straight through to be in Washington DC area for the Joint Mathematics Meetings Jan 15
8. Visit with little sister, see some sights.
9. Live the dream.  Make sign "Will sew for shower" and do it.  
10. Write blog post about exactly what I will be wanting when I visit people and have some fun.

I won't necessarily do it in this order, as activities like number 5 should start now and continue until I leave.

Dietary Restrictions

One of my concerns with staying with other people is that I am actually a very picky eater nowadays.  I didn't use to be nearly as picky as I am now but with my strange food intolerance I have had to become much more picky.

Nightshade:  If it is in the nightshade family then it gives me indigestion and other issues, amount and severity depend on how good I have been being on avoiding it and exactly what I'm eating.  Nightshades include: tomatoes, potatoes, all of the peppers (not peppercorn), and eggplant.  The hardest part is that there is paprika in everything.  It is nature's red coloring, I can not avoid it.  I do try, because I can tell when I have had too much.  One nice side effect of avoiding the nightshades for me is that most of my skin allergy issues have cleared up, thus convincing me that yes indeed I am intolerant.  Peppers cause me the most issue, with tomatoes a close second.  As for food substitutions potatoes are easy because sweet potatoes are not part of the same family.  The ironic part of this intolerance is for the medieval re-enactor these are outside period and I finally put two and two together to get four from the after effects of a medieval feast that had one too many jalapeno dishes.

Fish products: For awhile I thought I was allergic to tuna, I have since realized that it probably is not tuna but actually one of the chemicals used in canned fish products.  Canned tuna and canned shrimp have both given me an allergic reaction.  The being raised vegetarian means I have not been exposed to much and I am indifferent to it as a meat source so I usually just choose the chicken.

Peanuts/Peanut butter: Although I'm not allergic, I have never liked these but after being raised vegetarian and my father basically saying all we were allowed to take for bag lunch was pb&j, I am over it.

My Vehicle Scheme

Polar New

So a few years back when replacing my old car, and my SCA habit was well underway and I wanted an easy way to get to war, I bought a little Ford Ranger, Wasn't he just so nice and shiny when he was new.

Polar is a good little truck, he helped me move and has gotten me and an entire encampment worth of stuff to war.  He's not as nice and shiny now, has a couple dings from parking on a college campus. He is still good.  Although, clearly if I want to drive across the country in my truck in winter I'm going to have to do something so that whatever stuff I take with me is protected from the wet and snow.

Polar Now

I could buy a camper top. It would basically turn my truck into an RV, but they are heavy and bulky and will kill my gas milage even if I can find one small enough for my truck and not designed with the idea of sharing it with another human.  The lightest ones require you to pop them up once you are parked and are still very bulky.  When looking at the used ones of this style all of them have holes in the fabric part that covers the space after pop up, worrysome.  New costs 12-15K, so that is out.

Next idea, build my own camper top.  Make it look like a little castle and then I can live in a castle and drive it around.  I don't have the knowledge or time to do this unfortunately, so what's next?

Buy a shell and build my own camper into it.  Much more affordable.  Just a regular shell is much more affordable and I then need to get some wood and design an interior to it.  This is harder than it sounds.  I want some sort of platform I can put a bed on, and thus store stuff under it.  And around it.  Then there is the window problem, I will need to figure out some sort of curtains, to keep light out and help keep warmth inside.  Off to buy a pickup butt cover as I like to call them.

Garb I have made

Groom's Brother and Groom

So one thing I think I should do is post some pictures of garb I have made.  If I plan to visit lots of places and sew for people in them, then they need an idea of what I can make and what I have made in the past.  This is somewhat hard for me as I don't actually like pictures of myself and most of the time I'm hiding behind someone or I get not great pictures because it is what other people take while I'm not paying attention.

Me and the Bride

First off and most recently I have been doing pirate garb.  My best friend was having a pirate wedding this last summer and I of course was helping out.  Here you have a picture of two of us in our pirate garb. The red coat is me, I made the coat, all the rest of the clothes and even my hat.  And for the lovely bride, I did not make it but I helped pattern and was moral support along the way (not her hat, that was an amazing find).  Also my profile picture is a much better picture of me in my pirate coat.
And then there was his coat, there were two versions to this coat to help him get a better idea of the finished project, before we cut into his fabulous fabric.  In the picture we have his brother in the first version (stripes) and him in the second version.

Fencing Doublets

I have done some fencing doublets, and helped pattern many more from period styles to more modern styles for women (those boobs just get in the way).  On the right here is a couple of boys nicely modeling their new doublets, and behind them as an added bonus is my day shade that I designed and built.  I didn't actually sew the canvas on this one, but I have done other day shades and even helped with a tent.

Early Italian Renisance

Fencing shirts, chemises, skirts, pants, sashes, hoods and t-tunics oh my.  I do not have many pictures of just those items but I have made so many and as for the underthings, most of the pictures on this page probably have underthings I made, but again very hard to find pictures of people in just their underclothes.  I have made these things in many different sizes from normal sized to large women and even the large men.  Also have experience with alterations and making clothing that is easy to alter so that if you fluctuate a lot you can easily adjust it later on.

What I like wearing is early Italian Renaissance, so also included is a pictures of me in this, with my period short sleeves.  Unfortunately I have not made a lot of sleeves for my Italian garb as in southern California it is usually too warm for them and I overheat.  Also I really do enjoy all the looks I get when someone that knows something about Italian garb (usually a friend) loudly exclaims "hey, you're naked."

Houpelande and Waffenrock

Court Houpelande

Hand made German

I also went through a cotehardie and houpelande phase, really I just wanted to make and wear a henin (a princess hat.)  I really like the looks from the non-SCAdians when I run around in a henin. I have also made waffenrocks like the pink fighter next to me, although I only assisted on this one (or was it the previous version? you know how fighters can destroy their fighter garb).  The houpelande in both pictures on the left is the same garment, but not taken anywhere near the same time.  It is one of my favorite pieces of garb for days when I feel like wearing a train and floor length sleeves and something with fur trim (good quality fake).

There is that day I went german.  After making a bunch of fighter waffenrocks

Bear sized Waffenrock

including the bear sized one shown. I made myself the matching period. The one on the left sewn entirely by hand mostly because I wanted to be able to say, yes I've done that, after that though sewing machine all the way. I also made the giant shade hat.  I am always looking for new and different ways to avoid the direct glare of our day star (the sun).  I have issues with skin allergies and sunscreen, but those are not as bad as they use to be because finding out about food allergies helps.  I just realized I have made a lot of hats, I actually like making hats, I have even crochet a few in my life.

I have also done a whole lot of viking but can not actually find any decent pictures.  Must pull out garb and do a photo shoot soon or you may just have to wait until I make garb for others.

Visualizing

So I was thinking after the amazing response that I need to organize my potential offers so I made a map of approximate locations. Look at how spread out you all are:

I'm excited about all the potential places I could go.  Plus I really needed to take a break from grading.

More Scheming

Now the thoughts of what am I going to do for showers and how can I keep my costs down to make it an extra long road trip, since I will be spending my savings to do this.  In enters random thought, I've been following barter town over on facebook, maybe I could barter "Will sew for shower" and thus I posted to barter town the following post:

Ok Barter town I have a strange question, my personal wander lust wants to wander gypsy style. The Scheming me thinks hey I belong to the SCA and am a decent seamstress maybe I can put this to use. So really I ask if I were to propose the following barter would people take me up on it?

I would like a place to stay for some predetermined time (I'm thinking couple days to a week) and in exchange I will make you garb. Some clarification: I would need a space to set up my sewing machine (no I don't do it the medieval way), and really I want to meet people and see the country. You provide fabric and ideas of what you want and I will pattern and make you something awesome (if I know how).

I'm currently located in Caid, but want to see the rest of the country.

So would I potentially get any takers?

The response was amazing. Thank you, barter town.  Just overnight I got offers from all over the place (including Italy, maybe one day.)  Now I just have to figure out where I want to go and do it.

Early Scheming

As a remedial college math teacher (my day job) I try to teach a whole lot of people some math.  This is hard in that for the most part they don't actually want to learn or understand math, and a good portion of them have been taught to hate math or that they can not do math.  It is a very hard job.  Some days I find it very rewarding, like when a student from a few semester back runs into me on campus and tells me that they wish I was their math teacher now (I even got this from a student who failed my class) or when I'm out and about and someone stops me in the street to thank me again for all my tutoring help.  But then there are the days where I have to process the paperwork for the student using their cell phone during a test and get an email from someone on their friends account telling me what a horrible teacher I am.  And yes I know that I need to not let that bother me, but it still sucks.  I know I would enjoy teaching if all I have are students that actually want to learn and maybe one day I will find that, but it is not at my current job.

So I would like to quit my job, there is more to it then just what is mentioned above and I will probably at some future date rant about that, but not now.

The spark:  One day I was reading facebook and one of my friends posted this article http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/06/magazine/why-are-there-still-so-few-women-in-science.html?_r=0.  If you have the time, it is a very interesting read.  On the same day another friend completely unrelated actually quoted some information found in this article. When I did read it, I found that there were too many points in there that were true for me.  One of the big realizations I had was that even having been a graduate student in mathematics for 4 years I had never actually been to a math conference.  I told my uber smart little sister (who actually finished her phd in mathematics) and she invited me to visit her this January when the joint mathematics conference is being held really close to her.  This isn't just any old math conference, this is the largest math conference.  I'm not the intended audience as I do not have or am currently working on a phd so I can get in for a lot less money.  I can do this, I can go.  Then my brain said "what if I don't come back?"

Next thought: What would happen if I turned my little truck into something I can camp in and drive? I like to think that as a SCAdian I know how to camp and handle not having everything or a shower everyday.  I have a tiny bit of savings, I could drive across country.

The scheme:  Buy a camper shell for my pickup truck, add some things and make it so I could live in it.  The first of January head out. I would start here in southern California and drive to Washington DC, I have about two weeks before the conference and it would be winter so I would want to plan extra time to get there, and then take the longest road trip home I could possibly take.  I do need to be back in southern California for a couple weddings in summer of 2014, but no dates as of now.  I could spend six months traveling.