75 Essays: Done!

Today I finished grading the last of the first set of 75 essays I needed to grade for my three classes this quarter. I have two English 101 classes and one English 100 class. The English 101 students were analyzing photos; they could pick from this gallery I created using images from Flickr Commons (a very cool collection of photos from libraries, archives, and other institutions all over the world). I change up the gallery a bit from quarter to quarter as this helps eliminate plagiarism and makes the reading/grading process more fun for me as I get to read and think about different images.

So the students got me thinking about photos, and as a result, I remembered to take my camera along when Trish and I went to the Arboretum for a little walk this afternoon. But then I forgot the camera in her truck when we got home, and she's asleep, so I'll have to post photos of autumn leaves in Seattle some other time.

I'm still waiting for my books to arrive from Lulu. They shipped via media mail, which I guess means that they've been riding along in the slow lane in the back of some ancient mail truck? I really need them to arrive in time for the Short Run small press fest next weekend, and I thought I ordered them in plenty of time. They should turn up sometime this week, hopefully tomorrow or Monday!

Oh, and speaking of Short Run, I mounted some collages to have for sale there, too. I focused on ones with comic book images since a lot of the vendors are comics artists. It would be a pretty great thrill to happen to sell a collage. I've sold greeting cards and magnets which incorporate collage work but never just a collage itself as a piece of art.