1. Why is it that end of the semester grading brings out the worst procrastination in me? The level of aversion is unparalleled. Rather than simply replacing grading with time-consuming tasks like cleaning up my office or doing chores, instead I give a wholesale rejection to the task and replace it with doing nothing at all.
2. I had a dream the other night that Bruce Willis was trying to kill me.
3. It has finally gotten cold enough around here to wear a sweater!
4. I started reading The Ongoing Moment, by Geoff Dyer, yesterday and came across a line that I need to adapt and place somewhere in every future article that I submit for blind review:
I suspect, then, that this book will be a source of irritation to many people, especially those who know more about [name of subject] than I do. I'm sympathetic but, if we're to make any progress at all, there's one type of criticism I'd like to rule out of court straightaway. This is the 'But what about X?' or 'Why didn't he mention Y?' charge of inadmissible omission. Can we agree, in Whitman's words, 'that much unseen is also here', that it's not necessary to discuss--or even mention--every [instance of topic ever produced] in order to learn something interesting about [topic]? I hope so, because the person doing the learning is the person writing the book as much as the person reading it. The driver is along for the ride too. (7)
5. I've decided to remove all academic books from my nightstand. From now on it's reserved for fiction, Harper's, and the Utne Reader.
6. I love it when students get riled up and offer passionate comments without that sense of disinterestedness that masquerades as decorum in the classroom. I just wish it wouldn't all hinge on a wrongly interpreted passage.
7. It has been almost 4 years now since I last had a haircut (when I swore to myself I wouldn't cut my hair again until after I had obtained a tenure-track position). It has also been four years since I've written on topics that I know and care about, as opposed to trying to reinvent myself as what I think I need to be to get the t-t position.
8. I have a ton of grading to do today. I think I feel the need to do the laundry and the dishes and some yardwork instead. No, I absolutely promised that I would return these papers by tomorrow. But , I saw some algae on the wall outside and the dogs need walked (and probably bathed). I guess I could always get on the blogs . . .
10 comments:
I just want to know where you're from. Phrases like "Need walked" seem to be from people in the Ohio (like me)/Western PA/WV regions.
And I hear you about not wanting to grade at the end of the semeseter. As a postdoc, I don't have that problem, instead mine is one of not wanting to run another participant in my long and tedious experiment.
crap. Bruce is after YOU, too?!?! We need to exchange escape plans.
I am totally with you on grading procrastination.
#4 rocks.
B*, and he was really mean and persistent and scary too.
SWSHFACYLOTPOA, I've lived in several states in several regions of the country, but my parents and several generations before them are all from central and western Ohio. Are you a linguist?
#4 does, indeed, rock. It's the rockingest quote along those lines I've seen in a long time. Please do include it in everything you write.
#7: Do you remain committed to that haircut pledge? As far as the writing goes, man that really really really really sucks. Is there some way out of that trap, d'ya think?
#4 makes me very happy!
Bruce Willis is a scary monkey, run for your life!
What I really wanted to do up above, with regards to #7, was something like quote you Joseph Campbell about "following your bliss" and tell you that you should just write about the topics you love and that interest and challenge you, and that if you do so then of course doors will open and everything will work out. Then I realized that I am an overly-optimistic sap who should damn-well know better about such things after the number of years I've spent on the far-flung fringes of the academy. But I still sort of want to say such a thing. So can we count this comment as some sort of attempt at pointing in the direction of beginning to think about whether there was any possibility of just, you know, doing what you love and letting the chips fall where they may?
Boy, do I like the vision of the academy that Scrivener is offering. (some of)My senior colleagues tell me that this truly is the path I should follow (do what you love and ye shall be rewarded), while at the same time reminding me that I must get a book contract ASAP...seems as if the thing you love must be the thing that sells...On mornings like this (sitting at 4:30am in the office trying to revise a chapter), I have to wonder how much I am giving up for the elusive tenure...
Hi.
It never fails to amaze me how common it is to give oneself over to the academy because of a love for ideas. Then, after taking the plunge, making the commitment, and finally figuring out what to do, we find that grad school and academic jobs are mainly comprised of mechanisms that seem designed to eliminate everything that made you want to do this in the first place.
Nevertheless, once I figure out this tragic secret, I find the key to fighting it, which is rejecting it and re-embracing the lost and buried love (which is what I think Scrivener is getting at--if I don't like the soulless suburbs, get myself back in the wilderness).
For she dropping identity hints and working at crazy times, it's nice to see you here. My veil of pseudonymity is a bit haphazard, and probably linked to those mechanisms I mention above.
eiwmd--the Bush administration's new version of the ABC's
"eiwmd--the Bush administration's new version of the ABC's"
LOL!!!
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