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Back to the Routine

Published
by
Alfina the Vague
on August 20, 2008
in Paedagogy and Television
. 0 Comments

After the first day of Real Teaching (i.e. not just taking roll and going over the course objectives), I am unsurprisingly exhausted.  At the end of a day like today, I feel like my insides have been emptied out with a giant ice-cream scoop, and all I have left is the damp and slightly rumpled shell of my formerly perky self.

My schedule this semester is particularly annoying– have I mentioned I am teaching three days a week instead of my typical two?  How galling, to have to show up to work three days a week.  Can you imagine the indignity?  More than that, though, it’s the hour-by-hour schedule that is so taxing.  Rather than teaching both writing classes and then both literature classes, or vice versa, I have a scrambled-up schedule that has me shifting gears every hour.  I know! Life is hard!

All sarcasm aside, though, it is truly fucking exhausting, this standing in front of a classroom and lecturing and trying to facilitate discussion and guiding and moderating and encouraging.  Especially the first week, when you haven’t gotten to know any of your 120 students yet and so far they all seem like relatively blank, staring faces, many of them dead behind the eyes.

It’s a good thing I have the evening to relax, which I’ll be doing tonight with friends and the newest episode of Project Runway.  I’ll likely post some thoughts on that later on the media blog — where, currently, you can see my favorite items from the latest Mad Men episode, if you’re into 1960s fashion and household goods.  (And frankly, why shouldn’t you be?)

And now, I think I will sit here and stare at this wall blankly, dead behind the eyes, for a few more minutes before I make my way home.

Twitter

Published
by
Alfina the Vague
on August 18, 2008
in Meta-Blogular
. 8 Comments

Hey, are you on Twitter?  I am.  Let’s be Twitter friends!

If you’re not on Twitter, you can still see my little Twitter updates there in the sidebar.  I mean, I KNOW you are dying to hear about my every move, right?

Students Enjoy Reading

Published
by
Alfina the Vague
on August 18, 2008
in Books and Paedagogy
. 11 Comments

Every semester, on the first day, I ask the students to fill out a questionnaire to help me get to know what their concerns are before the course begins. I ask them about what sorts of things they enjoy reading and writing about, their past experiences in English classes, their strengths, what they want to work on, and that sort of thing. I am always fascinated to see the things they list — it’s worlds apart from the way I would have (and likely did) answer the same question as a freshman in my own World Literature class, oh so many long years ago.

Here’s what they enjoy reading, in their own words (and their own spelling, and their own punctuation, etc.):

- science-fiction/fantasy, historical fiction, war genre
- The Bible
- things by Christian authors such as Francine Rivers
- fiction novels
- topics that I have prior knowledge in
- any type of novels by African-American authors
- novels, especially suspence
- fiction mostly, lots of old stuff, like Treasure Island.
- technology magazines, such as Popular Mechanics
- TERROR, MYSTERIES, MURDERS
- books written about the past
- fantasy type readings
- the basic magazines (almost any)
- suspenseful topics
- Christian novels, fiction (Harry Potter), ‘action’ novels
- Religious Writing: Bible, Christian living books, Christian novels
- Health related articles, things about animals, sports articles
- Golf & outdoor magazines
- John Grisham
- murder-mysteries, bibliographies, and news articles
- novels about life
- Harry Potter and TWILIGHT!!!
- Bible, devotional books, personal finance
- self-help and inspirational books
- sci fiction and war
- Modern Fantasy/Epic Fantasy/Supernatural
- stories or tales that are of truth
- Books with action or comedy
- Inside stories about athletes
- Chick lit, Jane Austen, Books on Italy
- Survival, Outdoors
- Suspense,

The last entry there is brilliant, isn’t it? Do you think the writer meant to use that abandoned comma to create suspense in his reader? I’m sure of it.

For the record, here’s how I imagine the 18-year-old me would have answered that question: “The Lost Generation, The Beat Generation, E.E. Cummings, French Surrealists.” I am so out of touch.

Case of the Worst Salad Ever

Published
by
Alfina the Vague
on August 17, 2008
in Food and Drink and Gumshoe
. 11 Comments

I was out in the country seeing local music and eating barbeque when I was confronted with a compelling mystery. The mystery sat unassumingly in a bowl beside my plate of ribs, and it appeared to be garnished with bacon bits.

This shady character had assumed the alias of “Five-Layer Vegetable Salad.” Ignoring the apparent redundancy at the end of that phrase, I decided to try it. From the bottom of the bowl to the top, here are what the five layers seemed to be: iceberg lettuce (and we all know no good salad begins with iceberg); obviously canned peas; onions; a thick, puddingy layer of white stuff that didn’t have any distinct flavor but might have been mayonnaise; chopped hardboiled eggs; and the aforementioned bacon bits.

This detective was baffled. Where were the five vegetables promised? What was the white goo, and why was there so much of it? Why was flavor conspicuously absent from every corner of the bowl? And seriously, what was that, mayonnaise?

I needed to consult my assistant Jameson for, you know, assistance. For one thing, I had never been faced with a case this impenetrable, and for another thing, the pain and torture I underwent as I tried to investigate the salad through repeated mixings, pokings, jigglings, sniffings, and (unfortunately) tastings had been unbearable. In my weakened state, I could not rely on my own judgment to scrute this inscrutable dish.

It turned out that my assistant was of little help, cringing and producing only the sounds of gagging when faced with my bowl of mystery. At least with Jameson at my side and in my glass, though, I would be able to wash away the gooey residue it had left behind.

Case Status: Suspended, also Repugnant

Tedium, Happily Interrupted

Published
by
Alfina the Vague
on August 14, 2008
in Academia and Cheese Sandwich
. 5 Comments

So, yeah, school is starting again on Monday, and we are all in denial over here. The honorable and dutiful part of my brain kept telling me I was going to go into the office today and finish designing my writing course, but the sleazy and unreliable part of my brain kept me in bed until 12:30 and then chained to the couch after that. The most active thing I did today was head over to B.’s house to watch the latest Project Runway (regarding that: the show is quite entertaining this season, but many of the clothes are simply le suck).

Whenever the start of a new semester rolls around, it becomes time to start orchestrating the New Routine of Awesomeness. This is always far too ambitious, and the plans, as excellent as they may be, always wind up getting pushed aside in favor of lazy underachieving. Here are some examples of plans I have briefly considered, which have never come to fruition: waking at 5 every morning to go running, packing a gym bag for post-office-hours workout, packing healthy lunches every day, planning and reading a week ahead of time for classes, grading papers within a week after they’ve been submitted, avoiding happy hours during the week, coming into the office early to prepare for class, and showering every day.

Instead, of course, what evolves is more like this: waking just in time to throw on clothes and get to school, only walking/jogging with the dog on weekends and then only if the weather is in a specific 10-degree range, buying overpriced sandwiches at the coffeeshop for lunch, planning for classes at the last minute if at all, grading papers approximately two weeks after they’ve been submitted and only on the night before they absolutely must be returned, hitting 2-3 happy hours per week, and showering only when legally required.

Which is all just to lament that the best laid plans yada yada yada. Christ, I am boring myself now.

—

Well, my self-indulgent rant on the intricate disappointments of my personal schedule just got pre-empted by a few hours of phone-talk with friends C. and C. Lucky for us all! And now, with thoughts of school happily shuffled off for the time being, I shall sign out and leave this as it stands.