Just Another Thursday Night

I'm sitting in my living room while Latin beats (and Spanish lyrics) echo throughout my house. My handyman is installing my new back door, so I will tolerate the music. As far as I can tell, the only thing the songs on this station really have in common is that they're all in Spanish. That got me thinking; are there so few Hispanic stations that if one wants to hear music is his/her native language, that person has to settle for whatever the channel offers?

Meanwhile one of my sons is texting me about coloring his hair. He's been on the fence about this for some time, and I'm cautioning to proceed -- well, cautiously. His hair is very dark but not quite black; using color that is too dark will make him look older rather than younger. (He's trying to cover gray.) I'm thinking about doing my own color -- and maybe cut -- since I haven't been happy with my last three salon experiences. I know it's a bad idea (the cut, especially) but I'm tired of spending a lot of money for looks I don't love; if it's going to look bad, it might as well look bad for free. If I could find a short look I liked, I'd get rid of at least half my hair. My face is round, though, and I'm concerned that a short cut would only accentuate that. I tried bangs once and looked like the moon.

Lastly, just before writing this I opened my work email and saw the note (below) from a student. It was actually in the context of a weekly response I have my students write. Usually I ask them to respond to something they read; sometimes I ask them to do a particular kind of writing (description, compare/contrast, etc.). This week I let them choose their own topics and I expect to read approximately forty rants. If they're all like this one, it might not be so bad. Here is what she said.

"I would also like to say thank you. Thank you for really helping me gain a better understanding towards English. I am not bashing any other professors, but I really do appreciate how you work with your students so that they will have a better knowledge at what they are doing. You actually take your time to explain it, rather than just giving us an assignment and leaving us on our own to do it. You are very specific at what you want to see in our work and you do not make things harder then what they have to be. I am still not the best, but I have seen an improvement in my ability to write the correct way. To top things off, you are far from boring! The interactions that you have us do in class, such as the mini grammar lessons or getting together in groups are better than just sitting in a chair for nearly two hours."