Baby Shower!

8 March 2025: Just an absolute joy to attend Hannah and Cory's baby shower today. I am so excited for this little baby boy to arrive; he's already brought such joy and hope to my world and he's not even here yet. 

Spring Break!

7 March 2025: Made it to Spring Break! It wasn't the worst slog I can remember; the semester (absent all the world's madness) has moved along just fine, but a break is a break and I'll take it. 

Kicking it off in true old lady/homebody style: take-out, TV, a bath, and then bed. 

All the other stuff...

6 March 2025: We've got a new hire coming into our program next fall and it has me thinking about my own start here way back when. 

When she got her first job, a grad school friend who was a few years ahead of me told me something I've never forgotten: the thing you can't anticipate about a tenure-track job is "all of the meetings" and the committees--and all the time they will take. She was, of course, 100% correct. This work is important and sometimes interesting and sometimes even fun, but a lot of it is also boring and can feel like busywork. 

Today I've worked all day (from home--which is lovely and a privilege) and maybe 30% of that time went to teaching and students. 

The rest? A search committee for another unit and working on our HLC Assurance Agreement (or whatever it's called). And, as always, so many emails. 

The steady demand of the work necessary to keep the place running? It's so much of what a lot of us do--and the part no one really talks about and that folks outside of academia couldn't even imagine. (Good for them. They shouldn't have to--unless they are complaining about how we don't work enough or are--hilariously--overpaid.)

This isn't a very profound or even interesting post. It's just what I'm thinking about this evening, looking back nearly 18 years into this. 

Practice session...

5 March 2025: Today Tim and I got to hear four of our students practice their presentations for the Sigma Tau Delta Convention. It's such a pleasure to see them shine, even in a practice session. 

When the grading goes quickly...

4 March 2025: You know you've got some good students doing good work when the grading goes quickly. That's what I told myself today as I moved through the first set of ENGL 301 Response Papers. We've got some good readers and writers in this crop. 

Countdown to Spring Break...

3 March 2025: Before I left this morning, I told Jo, "Just one more week, then a week of break, then a big push, and then summer!" That last bit was a bit of an understatement, but the first part--Spring Break--is so close. 

Midterm Grades: DONE!

2 March 2025: Just hit "submit" on the last set of midterm grades for this semester. Not a big lift this time, at least for this particular week; three classes' worth of papers came in earlier, so there were just one set of exams to grade and, as always, some calculating work. But a win is a win so, as always, we chair-dance, this time to "Chains of Love," by Erasure.* 

*starting to make sure that include the song title in posts as URLs have gotten broken or changed over the years. 

Visit from Amy S.

1 March 2025: A very missed colleague (she now works elsewhere) from Shepherd, Amy S., came by today to drop some custom gifts she made inspired by pictures of the girls I've posted on Facebook. She put the picture of Veronica in this post on a beautiful slate, the window picture of Jo from this post on a cutting board/trivet, and also gave me two magnets with pictures of them. Beyond being so touched and moved by her kindness, it was also just fun to catch up for a bit.