By: DustinPosted on

First up, I hope everyone had a Happy New Year! Ours was great, we spent it in Philly with friends watching fireworks in the bitter cold (worth it!) then playing Singstar 🙂

I spent this weekend trying to get a draft of my sylabus for my class next semester finished to the point that all I have to do over vacation is “ponder and tweak.” That is of course move things around, decide if I like how I’ve laid out the readings and lecture schedule, make sure I have enough leeway for going too far over, and figuring out what can be scratched if I so. I did get way excited about planning out the lectures. I mean I get to talk about “Star Wars,” “Clash of the Titans,” and “Harry Potter” (Hero Myths); ghosts, hauntings and dead people (Death and Burial) in the same class; as well as witchcraft, divination (SO bringing in the collection of Magic 8balls) and voodoo? Are you kidding me? I think I might have more fun than my poor students!

I start teaching 2 days AFTER we return from vacation. Yeah, that’s why the rush and my stress level. I do NOT want to be planning on the cruise if I can help it, I have enough to do with planning first week’s lecture and dissertating as is. There goes yet another work free vacation! Maybe next year?

As for the vacaation. Here are the details. We drive to my mom’s on Tuesday at some point to drop the dogs off. We fly to sunny (hopefully!) Orlando on Wednesday. Wednesday through Friday we are doing Orlando stuff, staying at Universal. Last year we did the Disney Parks, minus the Animal Kingdom. This time we are doing Universal with the probability of The Animal Kingdom (Universal isn’t a 3 day even really). We did Universal on our first cruise, but only the theme park, and this was 7 cruises ago. We never did the movie park there. Of course I’m excited to do “The Mummy” ride 🙂 Thursday night will be Disney’s “Pleasure Island” party night, as Manequins was way too much fun last year (gay night). However we are missing our vagina this year as my friend Keith is flying solo (last year he brought a female friend Amber). Dustin doesn’t dance well without vagina! No really, I enjoy dancing way more with the real girls, why I don’t know. I think it’s cause we can put on a show without really putting on a show!

On Saturday we board The Independence of the Seas (Royal Caribbean) from Ft. Lauderdale (making the drive that morning). It’s a 8 day 7 night cruise that visits Puerto Rico, St. Martin, St. Thomas and Haiti. Fortunately given my need to get some work done not only have we been to all these places before, we have NO plans to do any “excursions” on this cruise. Excursions are booked and paid tours, some that can take most of your day. I do plan to get off the boat and look around in the ports, especially Haiti and Puerto Rico, but we aren’t booking anything. Wait make that I’m not, the BF (oh hell I’ve tweeted his name and he has a linked facebook profile at this point) . . . John is going to do this dragon zip line in Haiti and possibly a canopy zip line in Puerto Rico. HELL no am I doing those! I did one 2 cruises ago and was petrified! I do plan on making the most of souvenir opportunities for Voodoo props for the class 🙂

During the vacation I will do my best to Blog as well as post photos. I say that every year though, once I get on the cruise I sometimes fall short. The cruise internet tends to be slow at times, and you pay by the minute, so photo uploads can be tough. One thing I plan to do is re-instate the Twitter Blog posts for these two weeks. I expect to be Twitting a lot, at least while in Florida the first week. We’ll see about the cruise and if I can hijack free wifi in any of these ports 🙂

Categories: School, Vacation

16 Replies to “Pre-Vacation Stress!”

  2. Have fun–you deserve a break! Keep receipts for anything you buy for your class–you might be able to use it for income tax–or maybe the school will pay for it!! Ok–I can dream can’t I! Looking forward to pics and details when you return!!

  3. Have fun on the cruise! Hopefully you’ll get some relaxation in. The class sounds really interesting too.

  5. I hope you have a great time! Don’t worry about blogging. Just enjoy yourself. Your students are going to love your class!! I want to take it…just no tests or papers though:)

  6. First of all… I want to take your class! Come here and teach!

    And I’ll go on that cruise with you. I’ll even go on the zip lines with John. Sounds like a blast. *G*

    Have a great time!

  7. Make sure that you turn off the “data roaming” feature while you’re on the cruise, or else you will wind up with an astronomical cell phone bill. Remember, mine was $450 after using the net for no more than 10 minutes in England/Prague.

    Oh, and also make sure to call AT&T to make sure you can use your phone abroad. I had to call AT&T from a landline in Prague, and that call ended up costing me $60. They have to flip a switch or something before you can use it to make calls, text or anything when you’re international.

  8. I’m sorry, but I don’t appreciate being referred to as a vagina and I’m sure Keith’s friend would not either. It was very crude and disrespectful of you.

  9. Not only do we know his name but we saw him on TV with the full name and his title at the farm (vice-president of fruits?) I remember years ago you posted a picture from the cruise that was cut down the middle only showing your half and thinking to myself “that must be the bf” You’ve come a long way babe. (I hope you are old enough to get that reference and not think I would actually call you babe)

    Have the best vacation ever!!

  10. Heidi, it wasn’t meant to be crude or disrespectful. Sorry you felt that way. It was yet another failed attempt by me to make a funny.

    It’s a joking/loving way to refer to girlfriends among the gays. Nicer than fag hags for sure. The whole paragraph was filled with gay vernacular. I said I enjoy dancing with the real girls way better (as opposed to the girls aka gay slang for gay male friends)

    Again sorry 🙁

  11. Dustin, if you were trying to be funny, you certainly failed.
    If you make such remarks about yourself and others, how can you
    expect to be respected. Many who visit your site are not gay and
    think of you as a young man, first, who happens to be gay. Your
    blog is interesting without the shock element.

  12. Richard,

    I know the quote 🙂 Actually for awhile I never used his name as he always hated it being on the internet, or his picture. However then he got a facebook and is all about the net now lol.

    Ginny,

    Again, I wasn’t going for “shock” value either. I was just typing away and being silly! I guess to some my brand of humor may be “shock value,” but I never thought of myself as Andrew Dice Clay.

    However every time I’m silly on here, I seem to insult someone or piss them off, which is never my intention. Honestly I never thought I’d be the type of person who would do that with this silly blog, but this is the third time I’ve done this, and three strikes your out. At this point I don’t know. If I have to sit here and pick over posts on a personal blog to make sure I haven’t insulted someone; perhaps it’s lost it’s purpose and function.

  13. Dustin, you are such a kind soul–please stop putting yourself down over your choice of words when you were so excited about your trip and being “silly”. You share your life and thoughts with those of us who “choose” to peer into your life. You have apologized to Ginny and any whom you might have offended. These are your thoughts, you allow others to express theirs—please don’t think about not blogging or changing who you are.

    Ginny, I’ve had the privilege of meeting Dustin—he would never intentionally hurt anyone. He actually cares about those who visit his sites and takes the time to warn his readers if he feeling something—words or video clips might be offensive.I hope that you have checked back to see his apology and I hope that you accept it with the same openness that it was extended.

    Dustin, you are a worry–er–don’t let this overshadow your vacation.

    Big cyber hugs,
    WV Nan—Lin

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