Persons of Some Small Importance
I SO do not have time to blog this morning, but here I am anyway.
The nice thing about this week is that after it's over, there's no work for a while. But while this week is happening, it's Pretty Intense. I've got a meeting this morning, a final to give, finals then to grade, then another final tonight. And tomorrow I need to get the grades in and bake Things For the New Mexicans (family members! don't read that part! be surprised by the box of food stuffs such as are the same things you get every year!), and then on Thursday I have to wear the Fancy Stuff and go to graduation, so as to say goodbye to some beloved students, and then on Friday I have to finish up that pile of paperwork on my desk.
The meeting this morning concerns the class schedule for Fall 2004. Great, how if you're a Person Of Some Small Importance you get to be working on such things during finals week. Scheduling is such a pain. You've got, on the one hand, a list of classes that your colleagues would like to teach, or believe -- rightly, I might add -- that students should be taking; and then you've got, on the other hand, however many students there are who might actually sign up for these classes, and whatever requirements they might be trying to meet, and whatever little rumors might be going around that affect enrollment. (Such as for instance, the one about the professor who used to be a Deadhead. That could skew the enrollment numbers, I think. Though which way I'm not sure.) You've got, somehow, to balance all these things out in such a way that, though you will be unable to keep from pissing people off, you might be able to keep them from actually coming over to your office and beating you up.
And somehow, though I am indeed, as mentioned before, a Person Of Some Small Importance, I found myself scheduled for two new classes which I volunteered to invent. This despite the fact that I was actually in the meeting. But! Contemporary Drama! Somebody should teach it! Yes! And it should be ME! Also! We need one of those classes that non-English majors want to take, so as to fulfill their Liberal Arts requirement and make our numbers look better! Yes! And the professor who taught the science fiction class left! Yes, he did! But! We have somebody who could teach Horror! Indeed we do! And it's ME!
Actually, I've discovered, since suggesting this class -- which, in all fairness, I should say I've been suggesting for YEARS, we just didn't need it -- that one of the junior professors could teach it, as well.
But! She wasn't in the meeting, was she! Nope! I was!
And so that's the advantage of being a Person Of Some Small Importance. You get to schedule yourself for things you then have to invent.
Wait a minute....
The nice thing about this week is that after it's over, there's no work for a while. But while this week is happening, it's Pretty Intense. I've got a meeting this morning, a final to give, finals then to grade, then another final tonight. And tomorrow I need to get the grades in and bake Things For the New Mexicans (family members! don't read that part! be surprised by the box of food stuffs such as are the same things you get every year!), and then on Thursday I have to wear the Fancy Stuff and go to graduation, so as to say goodbye to some beloved students, and then on Friday I have to finish up that pile of paperwork on my desk.
The meeting this morning concerns the class schedule for Fall 2004. Great, how if you're a Person Of Some Small Importance you get to be working on such things during finals week. Scheduling is such a pain. You've got, on the one hand, a list of classes that your colleagues would like to teach, or believe -- rightly, I might add -- that students should be taking; and then you've got, on the other hand, however many students there are who might actually sign up for these classes, and whatever requirements they might be trying to meet, and whatever little rumors might be going around that affect enrollment. (Such as for instance, the one about the professor who used to be a Deadhead. That could skew the enrollment numbers, I think. Though which way I'm not sure.) You've got, somehow, to balance all these things out in such a way that, though you will be unable to keep from pissing people off, you might be able to keep them from actually coming over to your office and beating you up.
And somehow, though I am indeed, as mentioned before, a Person Of Some Small Importance, I found myself scheduled for two new classes which I volunteered to invent. This despite the fact that I was actually in the meeting. But! Contemporary Drama! Somebody should teach it! Yes! And it should be ME! Also! We need one of those classes that non-English majors want to take, so as to fulfill their Liberal Arts requirement and make our numbers look better! Yes! And the professor who taught the science fiction class left! Yes, he did! But! We have somebody who could teach Horror! Indeed we do! And it's ME!
Actually, I've discovered, since suggesting this class -- which, in all fairness, I should say I've been suggesting for YEARS, we just didn't need it -- that one of the junior professors could teach it, as well.
But! She wasn't in the meeting, was she! Nope! I was!
And so that's the advantage of being a Person Of Some Small Importance. You get to schedule yourself for things you then have to invent.
Wait a minute....
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