New stuff - at last!

Okay, I know it has been a REALLY long time since my last post . I apologize for keeping all my many fans (?!) out there waiting, but I have just been super busy in April. For starters, I had to finish a book chapter that I wanted out of the way by mid-April, and - mission accomplished. Second, I wanted to submit a proposal to the AACE E-Learn Conference in October and that deadline was looming as well. Again, done. So lots of writing. Now for the fun stuff...

Easter here was very nice, but very quiet. I must mention that the Spring weather here has been pretty much PERFECT - to me anyway! Since around the first week of April we have had high temperatures reaching the mid 60s in the day, but night temperatures in the 40s. I like that kind of variation. This last week it has only reached the mid-to-upper-50s for high temps, but still lows in the 40s. Oh, yeah, and did I mention? SUNNY! Almost every day, actually. Yes, I know that in Memphis it has reached the 80s and all I can say to that is - I'm sorry. Sorry that you must endure that sort of early Spring meteorological anomaly, while I am quite happy to have missed it.
Oh, yeah, back to Easter - they have a special Easter bread, so I bought a small version of that along with a special wine and liqueur that came as a package with the bread. Very nice - had a nice stroll along the walkway that forms the median of the main boulevard in Poltava, Zhovtneva street. I live only a few blocks from there, and my Institute is there as well. This whole town has taken on a new and very pleasant look since the snow and ice melted, and Spring has arrived. Getting greener all the time...

In other news, my little Dell 2100N netbook more-or-less died around two weeks ago. I just got it back from a reputable computer store who determined that there were two virii on it that somehow managed to get through the Norton Symantec 11.x AV that was installed... so much for Norton being "the best". I have been borrowing a very nice large ASUS laptop from the Institute. They are SO incredibly nice, and extremely supportive to me here - I am truly humbled. I definitely made the right decision in choosing the Poltava Institute as my Fulbright location.

Also, I have finished up teaching classes - only a few presentations/workshops left. For the last two groups, in March and April, their group products were, respectively, a Wikipedia entry on informatics education in Ukraine (on Wikipedia Ukraine site), and a Google Sites website for the class and as a resource for other informatics teachers. You can have Google translate it although some of it comes out rather odd... All of the teachers were great, and it was an honor working with them.

One last thing - I didn't like the way that Blogspot posts photos, so from now on I am posting all photos here (and there are some new ones). More on an upcoming trip soon - I promise! In the meantime, you can catch my Tweets - which I have managed to have real birds transmit to you subliminally, as I don't actually use Twitter... so listen closely to them... they're right outside your window. Right now. Look! And listen...