Posts Tagged ‘Miscellany’

Twitchy


2012
08.23

Five days. That’s it took for my left eye to start randomly twitching.
Seven days. That’s all it took for the insomnia to kick in.
Eight days. That’s when I needed a G&T after work.

In this time: lost paperwork, students who self-advised themselves into a problem, three classes with low enrollment, an annoying colleague.

The good news: The students in my methods class seem pretty okay about our service learning project, I managed to get someone to buy me a camera so I can tape some lectures, and I avoided paying to park my car in the pay lot.

Welcome back from sabbatical, T, Ph.D.

Hellmouth, Week 2


2011
07.18

It’s hot. And WordPress hates the browser on my new computer. Seriously, it ate my original post. Blah.

Summer Saturday: Office Edition


2011
07.09

It’s my last obligatory Saturday in the office for this summer … and I have yet to see a single student for advising, even though I am covering for three departments. What’s a girl to do while waiting to be released from the bonds of orientation?

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Tap, Tap


2011
06.11

Hello … is there anybody out there?

Taps on screen …

Has the social media revolution ended or something? Feeling a bit lonely here.

Back to the Present


2011
05.04

Subtitle: The Good, The Bad, The Ugly – Exam Week Edition

The Good: This week is the first week in a long, long time where I haven’t been buried in a blur of meetings. I have actually been able to cross lots and lots of stuff off my to-do list. I’ve had time to go hide in the library and do research reading. Heck, I’ve already knocked off two books this week and am deep into a third one. I have a little time to run over to Louisville to visit a friend – and I’m even going to bake her birthday cake (shhh!!!). I took some time out of my schedule to have a leisurely lunch with the Awesome Mentee and got a tour of her new digs over in the renovated Business building. All in all, this is the kind of week that reinforces my happy feelings about working in academia.

Where Indiana meets Kentucky
Can you say holy crap?

The Bad: What is going on with this freaky flooding? The Coach has been out of school since Monday because the roads are impassable in his county. According to the principal, the flood waters are already up to the second and third base on the high school’s baseball field – and the Green River hasn’t crested yet. It’s looking like my hubby might not be going back to work until next week at the earliest. On the upside, he has been my personal slave all week.

The Ugly: My garden is mud. My corn seeds rotted in their plugs. The eggplant never came up. Seriously, I am about to give up on having a garden this year. And don’t even get me started about the fact that all of the rain and wind damaged one of the gutters on my house. {Sigh}

Guilty.


2011
03.31

I am guilty of blog neglect. I apologize. This semester is kinda’ kicking my ass. I haven’t even had a chance to write about my marvelous trip to Berlin to see TQE. I will, eventually. I promise.

But first, I just have to survive until the end of the semester.

Only five weeks and one day to go.

While The Coach is Away …


2011
03.28

… the wife worked her tail off: cleaned the clutter off the dining room table; did the dishes; wiped down the cabinets; did the laundry; took the comforter to the laundromat; sorted the recycling; cleaned off the top of the dryer; picked up all the used dryer sheets that The Coach had shoved between the washer and dryer; made Spanish Rice; made pesto | tomato | onion | garlic | spinach | feta pizza; took the cat to the vet; pilled six out of eight animals (and i have the war wounds to prove it); and spent numerous — and I do mean numerous — hours begging | pleading | bribing the evil puppy to come inside.

… the wife will play: went to see Sucker Punch* with my friend, the English professor who loves all things steampunk and her hubby; ate Indian food with my friend and her hubby; spent another $75 at the Borders close-out sale.

I guess it’s a good thing that The Coach comes home tonight. I need him to carry up the towering bucket of clean clothes.

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Two Good Things


2011
02.07

Two good things that happened while I was in New Zealand:

  1. I received my fellowship for Summer 2011. Let the research begin! 
  2. I was appointed to serve on the Redevelopment Authority. I need to dig out my steel-toed Doc Martins before our next tour of the arena.

Both will look excellent on my dossier when I apply for full professor. I’m psyched.

Updates from the Home Front


2011
02.05

Well, my New Zealand retrospective has come to an end and I am still battling some mild jet lag. Sad, but true. I think that part of the problem is that I am a night owl, so I am naturally “wired” to stay up until 3 in the morning, then sleep until 10 or so. Since I’ve been an administrator, I’ve trained myself to go to bed early because the sadists who run my University just love to have 8 a.m. meetings. So, getting off my schedule has been a bit of a disaster. The last time this happened — back in 1988 when I returned to Alabama from Alaska — I ended up having insomnia for eight weeks. Let’s hope that doesn’t happen this time [1].

I have now been home for over two weeks … and it has been a zoo! I came home to find our search for a new dean going strong. I had journal acceptances (and rejections) to send out. A graduation application to approve. Budget forms to fix. Annual faculty reports to review. Taxes to prepare. Bills to pay.

How did I handle this? I decided to go to Bloomington for a long weekend to visit my pal, TQE [2]. Oh, and I overslept one day and completely missed a meeting — but that’s a story for another time.

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On Doing Laundry in New Zealand


2011
01.15

January 14, 2011 –Today, I came back a little early from my adventures in Christchurch to do some laundry. I still have six days left in my trip and I was running out of my favorite socks. Plus, who wants to drag around a bag full of stinky dirty laundry, right? So, I grabbed my bag of sweaty clothes, headed down to the basement, and loaded up the machine. What is so great about the machines here in New Zealand is that they come equipped with laundry soap. That’s right, you don’t have to find a vending machine to buy a box of Tide. It’s so simple and easy.

Even cooler, this particular hotel has a library in the laundry room. So while the machine was running, I browsed through five bookshelves full of rejected books – in Chinese, German, and English. I had to laugh when I came across a copy of the Bobsy Twins. I haven’t seen those books since I was a little girl and my Grandmother gave me my mother’s old books to read! I ended up pulling a copy of Lorna Doone off the shelf to bring back to my room.

My question is: Was the book written before the cookies were invented or vice versa?