tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.comments2023-11-16T15:56:23.153-08:00Bob Hughes' BlogBob Hugheshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01041716180060539827noreply@blogger.comBlogger55125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-36579123032280799672023-11-16T15:56:23.153-08:002023-11-16T15:56:23.153-08:00I had thought about including a sample creation an...I had thought about including a sample creation and decided that this is an abstract statement and should remain that way. But since you asked, here's a picture of the potting shed:<br /><br />https://www.bobhughes.info/potting-station.jpegBob Hugheshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01041716180060539827noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-29055491415098646992023-11-16T09:12:59.813-08:002023-11-16T09:12:59.813-08:00Great post, Bob. Like you, so much of my professio...Great post, Bob. Like you, so much of my professional work involved engaging in abstractions, which I also valued and took satisfaction in the levels of mastery I could achieve with them. None of that, however, offered the visual rewards I’ve known from even after the relatively simple act of painting a room, or the joy I get when working at my desk in a room I helped transform from a garage to a lovely living space. For me, feeling deeply healthy requires a lively balance among how I use my head, heart, and hands each day. And I’m always heartened by living in community with folks like you whose lives reflect a similar perspective. Curious, too, that I missed seeing as companion to your fine writing, a picture of the beautifully functional garden table you recently built for your wife. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-6742319343131914772023-11-15T14:58:27.923-08:002023-11-15T14:58:27.923-08:00You're capturing the complexity of the human c...You're capturing the complexity of the human condition. We live, we play, we build, we love, we strive -- and so much more. Hard to define that as one characteristic, despite the anthropologists' seeming need to do so.Bob Hugheshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01041716180060539827noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-61740146744672477552023-11-15T14:55:54.199-08:002023-11-15T14:55:54.199-08:00Thanks. I think your Hegel reference is spot on. ...Thanks. I think your Hegel reference is spot on. Seems to me that many cultures, traditions, and philosophies have mirrored the idea that the maker imbues what's made with a part of the maker.Bob Hugheshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01041716180060539827noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-17808779000920047232023-11-15T07:25:50.531-08:002023-11-15T07:25:50.531-08:00I also have always loved the notion that rather th...I also have always loved the notion that rather than being Homo sapiens, or Homo sapiens sapiens, that we are more like homo ludens, or, directly on point, homo faber.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-52319495614351199562023-11-15T05:21:53.138-08:002023-11-15T05:21:53.138-08:00Bob, as is so often the case, you have articulated...Bob, as is so often the case, you have articulated something that I wish I had written. I share with you this love of building and some of my most cherished projects still occupy space in my home, affecting the way I move through the world. My bedside lamp was turned on my lathe in 8th grade shop class (yet another loss from contemporary life that contributes to the trend you describe.) My youngest child uses a double-decker guitar amp stand I designed and built because I couldn’t find one to buy that met our needs or my vision. The mental manipulation of the creative design process is my favorite part of building. My wife’s built-in spice rack, my tie rack in the closet, the potting bench I spent an entire pandemic staycation week designing and building from found, reclaimed wood from the side of the road, the frame hanging in our bonus room holding the poster of our family’s favorite TV show (Parks and Recreation, for the record), the bookshelf I spent an entire Thanksgiving weekend building in Montana that now fills one end of our bedroom and holds our television, and on, and on. It’s goofy, but in the creation of tangible things, I can’t help thinking of the Hegelian notion of spirit made manifest. <br /><br />This love of building is also an orientation to life, and provides structure during otherwise unstructured time. I’m looking forward this Thanksgiving weekend to building a shoe rack for the entryway and a jewelry rack for my oldest kid, modeled on the one my wife uses every day that I also built. Building is how I imagine structuring my retirement years, should I be fortunate enough to live that long and to be healthy enough to indulge this interest. I also think we might need a bigger house to hold all the junk I build! Thanks for tapping into something that resonates with me, Bob. You’re the best. Keep the pictures of your creations coming!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-65919963136528580162023-04-26T13:43:58.960-07:002023-04-26T13:43:58.960-07:00I'd forgotten his use of "ratfink." ...I'd forgotten his use of "ratfink." Don't know if he coined it, but he sure used it a lot.Bob Hugheshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01041716180060539827noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-66814364115616672072023-04-20T19:23:41.015-07:002023-04-20T19:23:41.015-07:00As a teenager in nowhere Burien WA ...he was an id...As a teenager in nowhere Burien WA ...he was an idol! Didn't he also coin or use "ratfink"? The 'letter before N has disappeared or ran off the keyboard as has the punctuation known as co**a. Thanks for this! Pat Pedersenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07040303066362923461noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-5719591297215288972023-04-15T09:37:24.237-07:002023-04-15T09:37:24.237-07:00Required reading for every high school student! ...Required reading for every high school student! I couldn’t agree with you more.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-84106050898604792372023-01-31T21:17:59.589-08:002023-01-31T21:17:59.589-08:00I agree with your hopes fully, Pat!I agree with your hopes fully, Pat!Bob Hugheshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01041716180060539827noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-14490956284230505702023-01-01T11:18:33.258-08:002023-01-01T11:18:33.258-08:00Excellent and thoughtful analysisExcellent and thoughtful analysisAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-262486090047222352022-10-21T10:03:16.607-07:002022-10-21T10:03:16.607-07:00Great, Bob! So often grant money is seen as "...Great, Bob! So often grant money is seen as "institutional midol". People know just getting the money won't really "fix" the problem, but hope it will get them through. Whatever "the new" is: a staffer, curriculum, procedure they seem to believe that just thinking it up was enough, when the integration is the real issue. You may get a replacement heart, but it's the surgeon's skill connecting it that's the magic. Everyone needs to be that surgeon. My favorite evaluator was a person who preferred to be standing in an icy river, pulling salmon out by hand and throwing them up on the bank. There is risk, you might slip on the wet rocks and disappear, the fish are in charge, we only have these few days to get this done, keep an eye out for bears. None of the groaning and tedium of some evals. It was that hard work you love, exciting, immediate, intense, purposeful. It was great! It changed things. We changed. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-2884123306583941052022-10-20T21:09:18.778-07:002022-10-20T21:09:18.778-07:00This is excellent, Bob. Having done my fair share ...This is excellent, Bob. Having done my fair share of evaluation work at universities, I saw more often than not the type of ‘compliance-based’ models that you counsel folks to avoid. Seldom was I included early enough in the project design and proposal phases to help them build the evaluation infrastructure you so nicely articulate. In the projects that did include me from the beginning, evaluation ended up an organic part of the project rather than an add-on. Moreover, bringing evaluation in at the beginning helped the program design by focusing on the processes that they believed would be the change drivers. It helped them think more deeply about aligning program outcomes and goals with program design, structure and function.what you have here would make a great note in an appropriate journal.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-12235647797901630292022-09-12T10:47:46.892-07:002022-09-12T10:47:46.892-07:00Hi Bob,
Thanks so much for this...as another perso...Hi Bob,<br />Thanks so much for this...as another person from the land of long ago, I appreciate the clarity in your article...It's all laid out, the problem and what we need to do to fix it. I know many young teachers whose dedication, intelligence, and empathy make them outstanding educators, but I worry how about how long they will be able to live on untenable incomes. My grandson is finishing his B.A. in nursing and wondering where he would need to live to be able to ever afford a house. (probably outside the U.S.) In 1968, I worked in the factory at Boeing and started night school. My daughter was four year old. I was a single mother. We lived in a new house, the mortgage $95.00, we had a car, and I paid for childcare. My ex husband rarely paid the $50.00 child support. I made $3.50 an hour. I retired in my 70's. At no time in my working life, did my salary stretch as far as it did then. We owe teachers so much. I hope, among other hopes, that people will run for school boards and challenge the archaic amounts of money our teachers get and pay them what they are worth...to all of us!<br />Pat Pedersenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07040303066362923461noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-23328263174979618622022-08-18T21:48:51.818-07:002022-08-18T21:48:51.818-07:00Unfortunately living at that time poor. I did reli...Unfortunately living at that time poor. I did relizase all of that. I being naive did not realize what other people were going through. Human race is all of us<br />thought homasapians were all Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-28423469830464637502022-01-03T22:54:53.440-08:002022-01-03T22:54:53.440-08:00What amazing work we did in family literacy in tho...What amazing work we did in family literacy in those days. You were a great partner!Bob Hugheshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01041716180060539827noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-71534588936771805622022-01-02T11:36:03.034-08:002022-01-02T11:36:03.034-08:00Nice. Thanks Bob. I'll always remember your en...Nice. Thanks Bob. I'll always remember your encouragement to me as a program coordinator and in finishing my own doctorate.Mark Sabol, Ph.Dhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09038409705848002089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-39610160520199933962021-11-24T14:14:18.296-08:002021-11-24T14:14:18.296-08:00Thanks, Shash, for the comments and the links. Pe...Thanks, Shash, for the comments and the links. Perfect examples of these issues. Bob Hugheshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01041716180060539827noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-44042267810584899552021-11-24T09:38:19.524-08:002021-11-24T09:38:19.524-08:00https://www.peninsuladailynews.com/politics/a-new-...https://www.peninsuladailynews.com/politics/a-new-majority-coming-on-sequim-city-council/<br />(Sorry Bob; I think half these links have FB code trailing behind. Let me know which ones I have to re-do, if necessary)<br />Shashhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04041337961925662737noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-48817358514010459812021-11-24T09:35:29.696-08:002021-11-24T09:35:29.696-08:00https://www.knkx.org/politics/2021-10-28/as-sequim...https://www.knkx.org/politics/2021-10-28/as-sequim-votes-conspiracy-theories-and-far-right-politics-swirl-in-the-background?fbclid=IwAR0TRB_54rix0t70-p2uicBw_d6embqysyY7bBdvq_LtRp4XSOmFq_5BgzkShashhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04041337961925662737noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-32119215928640067252021-11-24T09:34:49.081-08:002021-11-24T09:34:49.081-08:00https://www.dispatch.com/story/news/2021/11/02/wor...https://www.dispatch.com/story/news/2021/11/02/worthington-school-board-results/6235286001/Shashhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04041337961925662737noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-39672333991931838762021-11-24T09:33:15.845-08:002021-11-24T09:33:15.845-08:00https://www.cnn.com/2021/10/21/us/ohio-school-boar...https://www.cnn.com/2021/10/21/us/ohio-school-boards-contentious-elections/index.html?fbclid=IwAR3_daoxMnqNg1575OBI7JCtsj0HXo4CI_vzVJepOZlxruT87zQHobYbuR0Shashhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04041337961925662737noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-21004273626611034282021-11-24T09:32:12.560-08:002021-11-24T09:32:12.560-08:00Hi Bob! I had to think awhile about what I wanted...Hi Bob! I had to think awhile about what I wanted to say to this. I grew up with my family feeling the John Birch Society was a threat. This was in Ohio in the 1950s. We are white, but my father’s category of offense was being a university professor. In the early 1950s it was the McCarthy hearings, a witch-hunt for communists, that made all of the academics feel under siege. Later in the early 1960’s, the John Birch Society resurrected or continued the same sort of innuendos and threats and were very scary for us. Barry Goldwater, the presidential candidate, accepted the endorsement of the John Birch Society, and it seemed that the fringe craziness had gone national. So fast forward to now and I felt the same thing happening again. In my childhood home town of Worthington, Ohio, the local school board race of 2021 was extremely vitriolic, including threats. (See article link.) Organizing seemed to be both local and national. Closer to where I live now, Sequim and Forks, Wa have been roiled by ideological fights that are similarly opaque in source, funded both locally and from larger entities, and laced with angry rhetoric and the feel of potential violence. Forks feels like “my” town because even though my family‘s cabin of 4 generations is 35 miles away and we are only parttime residents, Forks is our closest supermarket, hospital, and resource for anything. In summer 2020 a multiracial family from Spokane was terrorized by local citizens who believed their white camping bus was an Antifa bus. It was discovered that the hysteria was fueled by a nearby Sequim gun shop’s Facebook account. Looking further into the politics of it, it was discovered that the mayor of Sequim was a Q anon enthusiast, who had gone from being a hairdresser to mayor in quick succession due to outside money both national and from county organizations. I’ve attached some articles about it. More recently a good governance group of citizens decided to fight back and a slate of locally focused people who simply want to see an opioid treatment facility (which had been planned and proposed to be implemented by the Jamestown S’Klallam tribe, another focus of racist hysteria by these opponents) opened, fix roads, support schools, etc. were elected. But the idea of a clandestine national organization fueling local hatreds with noticeable effect is with us again.Shashhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04041337961925662737noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-71571287851810789202021-11-04T20:45:36.728-07:002021-11-04T20:45:36.728-07:00Well spoken, some of this I knew of the past and s...Well spoken, some of this I knew of the past and some I did not. I am glad that we survived that time and we able to make some change. Change starts by little steps. Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12722210270832508834noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2610947807979750813.post-38351620170762473192020-11-01T11:58:57.844-08:002020-11-01T11:58:57.844-08:00First, I really appreciate all the thoughts and in...First, I really appreciate all the thoughts and insights you shared in this post. I believe it's vital that people look into the roots of this bizarre masquerade and explore and understand, from a white and academic point of view, the ongoing and ever present theft of black and brown identities/cultures/etc. Also ongoing: the missionary approach of so much of the academy regarding 'others', and how that perpetuates othering. I have been so fortunate to attend the UW for free (Access program for geezers) and studied with academics who are blowing up out dated approaches to humanity and revealing the colonial aspects that continue. How not odd that colonialism can continue, without a country, in a world that controls finances and debt. Thanks for your blog.Pat Pedersenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07040303066362923461noreply@blogger.com