The Megastore recommends.

1. Something that is even better than you thought it would be. Of late, I have been facilitating sessions of an ongoing, errant, wandering, itinerant, multi-parted workshop on digital storytelling. This is (yes, again, I'm still talking about it, just deal, GOSH.) partly for that damn lecture I'm giving in April. ANYWAY I decided I needed to have a microphone that would be better than those basically disposable USB mic/headset combos that I have been using for years to make video podcasts for my students.

So I asked my reliable advisor on these matters, the divine Jason M., what I should get.

isn't it cute? like a little robot.

"You should get this a [mic X], if you can afford it," he said. Funnily enough, this very mic happened to be currently co-starring in a novel I was reading. When I read about it in the novel, I immediately looked it up, to see if it was a real thing. Which it was.
And I thought to myself, whoa, why does this teenaged character in my novel have such an ultra-expensive field recorder? And why can't I have one? Which is my usual thought process.

Well, it was too expensive for me, a fact I shared with my reliable advisor.

"Maybe you could get your department to buy one?" he said.

"But then it would be theirs. And I want it to be mine." I said, also totally typical. Right: don't ask the department to get an awesome field mic that I'd be able to use on school-related projects. Obviously, it would be better to have a less awesome mic, because at least it would be mine.

(Actually, that totally makes sense to me.)

"Then you should just look for the best-rated mic in your price range," he said, and that's what I did.

So the other day when I was using it to help a workshop attendee (remember? the workshops? yeah, me either) record the narration for her digital story, I set up the microphone. We have less than optimal recording circumstances in the Pub Center--there's a heavy door (good), but a giant grate in the door (bad), so there was all manner of foot traffic and squeaky shoe soles and even a little chatter out in the hall. I feared the worst.

But when we replayed the recording, it was pristine. Score one for the highly-rated microphone in my price range! And bonus: it is mine!

this is a frying pan...

2. The end of a long, challenging slog, now in sight. These workshops?  The ongoing, errant, wandering, itinerant, multi-parted workshops on digital storytelling? I have scheduled the various sessions over the course of two weeks, and there are just two more sessions ahead of me. Who knows what all I will need to  arrange to help people actually finish their stories.

...and this is a fire.

And it has been fun, don't get me wrong. I've learned some things, I've helped other people learn some things. Their stories will be awesome.

But on Saturday--on Saturday, there will be no more workshops.

On Saturday, there will, however, be grading.