august 26 in twenty-eight

I think the dogs are settling in alright. Yesterday while I was at work we had an incident. One of the dogs (not sure which one, but we are guessing Lincoln, who C has owned for over nine years) bit Cadence’s ear and there were drips of blood all over the floor. Looking at the blood, you’d think it was a big bite, but he just nipped her ear so he must have hit a vein or something. All the dogs are fine, but Cadence did seem a little less enthusiastic this morning and wasn’t really up for eating. Also, her ear is just a bit swollen. I’m not too worried about it, and they have a wellness visit scheduled for this afternoon anyway, so I’ll mention it then.

I woke up at 5:30 again for the morning walk, and I have to say that while I don’t really enjoy waking up earlier than I have to, it’s nice that I’m getting all this extra walking in. We walked a mile this morning, and I thought that was a nice distance.

Last night was pretty busy. I’m taking piano lessons every other Monday night, and last night was it. I’m learning a song I used to compete with back in middle school (Flying Leaves in A Minor) and also learning a new song. It’s a hymn, Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing. It’s a relatively easy verision with a lot of repetition, which is nice since I’m trying to ease back into this and I’d like to play music that I like, or that challenges me, but not necessarily both. What’s the point of playing music at this stage in my life if I’m not enjoying it?

Tonight I am tutoring a 10th grade girl in Algebra II. She’s an honors student, and her mom contacted me. I’m on Wyzant.com. I signed up a while ago just because I thought it wouldn’t hurt to get some extra income if that opportunity presented itself, but I have never “applied” for any of the open tutoring jobs. A few people have contacted me. I tried to make my rate high enough that people wouldn’t contact me all the time. It’s $45 per hour, and right now I take home 60% of that. As I tutor more hours, that goes up. Once I get to 20 hours, I get to keep 65%, then at 50 hours it goes up to 70%, at 200 hours it’s 75%, and past 400 it’s 80%. Plus, if I introduce new tutees to the site, I’d get to bring home 95% of my rate (but I’d probably just tutor them independently and keep my full rate). The nice thing about the site is that it vouces for you…you have to take tests to prove you are competent in a subject before tutoring it, and it’s just an easier way to network than to hang fliers around campuses (plus I don’t want to do this more than a few hours per week). Also, you can get a background check done on yourself, or people can order one on you if they want, and it just feels a lot more secure. Regardless, I prefer to meet at libraries at first, just because I’d rather not worry about it.

I guess the new school year is causing a lot of people to go looking for tutors, which is why I’ve had some activity all of a sudden. I’m thinking that since this girl is in honors Algebra II that my job will be pretty easy. Obviously she understands math in general to a certain extent. So I have that tonight from 7 to 8.

If I get more interest, I’ll probably have to increase my rate just to try to get people to back off. I can only handle a few people at a time; my job is very demanding and I don’t have the ability to be working a second job. I can handle a few hours here and there, and I’m hoping most of it falls either on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, or Thursdays, or else in the morning on the weekends.