Monday, July 26, 2004
I Don't Like Mondays
First, how exciting that Professor B. and Profgrrrrl have posted comments! Blogging is very strange.... On the one hand, one can imagine that millions of people are reading one's grand musings, but on the other, well, it's entirely possible that nobody's actually interested in one's grand musings. At any rate, thanks for the comments, my sisters!
So, on this Monday, I got yet another in a series of emails from one of my students from last semester. This student has been hounding me since May to grade work that she turned in late. Now, the fact that this situation exists at all is my own stupid fault. I generally don't accept late work, but I bought her sob story and so now, at the end of July, I have to read this crap and potentially change this student's grade. I must remember how annoyed I am right now so that the next time this sort of thing comes up I will be entirely unsympathetic.
In other news, work on my manuscript reached a standstill on Thursday, a day earlier than I had anticipated breaking for the weekend. You see, I had made plans earlier last week to visit my hometown for the weekend, and I had this notion that I would have a mellow Thursday night during which I would give myself a manicure and a pedicure and look over what I've got so far so that I'd be ready to finish the chapter I'm working on today. Well, that didn't happen. As for what did happen, well, let's just say that having a Ph.D. doesn't necessarily mean that one has good judgment. Furthermore, the fact that a friend-of-a-friend is seeking his Ph.D. (not at my university and not in my field) does not mean that he has good judgment either.
The weekend in the hometown was good, if exhausting, and I'm not sure how exactly to describe it. Suffice it to say that I got really drunk with the hometown crew (which on Friday night translated into going to 5 bars and then late-night drinking until we ran out of alcohol around 6AM), saw an old crush from high school (whom in spite of my best efforts never acquiesces to my advances, even though he claims to have had a crush on me all through high school, has googled me in the past to get in touch, and acknowledges that there has always been "sexual tension" - his words, not mine - between us), and went shopping with my mom. Good times, but hardly worth the immense feelings of guilt and anxiety that are now fueled by the fact that I accomplished nothing of any worth in 4 days.
So, the democratic convention begins today (and I so love the conventions, even if they are just big productions that don't really mean anything) and I have high hopes that my desire to watch the convention will inspire me to stay home, get enough sleep, eat properly, and write. I realize this is a lot of pressure to put on a (sham of a) political event, but clearly I cannot count on myself to do what I need to do without some sort of outside impetus, and this is the best I've got.
So, on this Monday, I got yet another in a series of emails from one of my students from last semester. This student has been hounding me since May to grade work that she turned in late. Now, the fact that this situation exists at all is my own stupid fault. I generally don't accept late work, but I bought her sob story and so now, at the end of July, I have to read this crap and potentially change this student's grade. I must remember how annoyed I am right now so that the next time this sort of thing comes up I will be entirely unsympathetic.
In other news, work on my manuscript reached a standstill on Thursday, a day earlier than I had anticipated breaking for the weekend. You see, I had made plans earlier last week to visit my hometown for the weekend, and I had this notion that I would have a mellow Thursday night during which I would give myself a manicure and a pedicure and look over what I've got so far so that I'd be ready to finish the chapter I'm working on today. Well, that didn't happen. As for what did happen, well, let's just say that having a Ph.D. doesn't necessarily mean that one has good judgment. Furthermore, the fact that a friend-of-a-friend is seeking his Ph.D. (not at my university and not in my field) does not mean that he has good judgment either.
The weekend in the hometown was good, if exhausting, and I'm not sure how exactly to describe it. Suffice it to say that I got really drunk with the hometown crew (which on Friday night translated into going to 5 bars and then late-night drinking until we ran out of alcohol around 6AM), saw an old crush from high school (whom in spite of my best efforts never acquiesces to my advances, even though he claims to have had a crush on me all through high school, has googled me in the past to get in touch, and acknowledges that there has always been "sexual tension" - his words, not mine - between us), and went shopping with my mom. Good times, but hardly worth the immense feelings of guilt and anxiety that are now fueled by the fact that I accomplished nothing of any worth in 4 days.
So, the democratic convention begins today (and I so love the conventions, even if they are just big productions that don't really mean anything) and I have high hopes that my desire to watch the convention will inspire me to stay home, get enough sleep, eat properly, and write. I realize this is a lot of pressure to put on a (sham of a) political event, but clearly I cannot count on myself to do what I need to do without some sort of outside impetus, and this is the best I've got.
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LOL re. convention. I myself am looking forward to the Olympics, and I am telling myself that if I am a Good Girl and work hard for the next couple weeks, I can watch them. Of course, I will be a Bad Girl, and then I will watch them anyway, is what will happen.
Skim the student's work and slap a grade on it. No comments. You can probably do it in half an hour, and good riddance to her.
Skim the student's work and slap a grade on it. No comments. You can probably do it in half an hour, and good riddance to her.
I hate grading, but I really hate late grading. I've started telling my grad students (undergrads don't get to take incompletes at our U) that while they're in my class, they're my top priority; and once the semester is over, they're my lowest priority. So that if they take the incomplete, they will most likely have to wait months to get it back. Not sure it dissuades any of them, but it gets me off the hook a bit once they turn the thing in.
Dude, of course we're reading. Blog on, blog on!
Argh, students who come back later are such a total pain in the butt. I'm with prof b ... give it a quick looky and then be done with it.
The weekend sounds like fun. No biggie about not getting the work done. As a wise friend once told me "In life there are emergencies ... but I've never heard of an academic emergency."
Argh, students who come back later are such a total pain in the butt. I'm with prof b ... give it a quick looky and then be done with it.
The weekend sounds like fun. No biggie about not getting the work done. As a wise friend once told me "In life there are emergencies ... but I've never heard of an academic emergency."
I know it is right to just read the stuff and slap a grade on it, and I've been telling myself to do just that since she got the papers to me, but I hate her and I don't want to do it. Why do today what you can put off until tomorrow? That said, I think I will have to get this taken care of by the end of the week if only so that I will never have to speak to this student again.
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