Going to visit Kory and Amy last night was a nice time.  It sucks that our best friends in Ohio now live so far away, but we try to hang with them every chance we can.  We had some Red Robin (cheap unlimited fries!) and talked about various random things.  We also got to ride in their awesome new little car, a Honda Fit.  We had been invited to the departmental Halloween party, but we couldn't really afford to get decent costumes, and I just haven't been in the mood to be around drinking lately.

I don't have much to say right now.  Today was a gray and rainy day outside, and since Amy was swamped with homework, I didn't have a terribly active day.  In fact, in order to be generally inactive, not working on my research, indoors and not interfering with Amy's work, I worked on my personal website for the first time since December of 2006.  I updated a lot of things... I still haven't added reviews or essays since December of 2006, but whatever.  I'm a busy guy.

I justified spending a Saturday doing this (and not other work) by remembering that keeping a decently up-to-date website is a good professional development and promotion tool.  My name is getting out there in the world of geographers, and I need to have a professional portal open to the world.  I

Anyway, check it out if you like.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 12:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I've never been one to be terribly creative, though I admire creativity more than most people.  I think it's my lack of creativity that makes me respect that characteristic in others.  And then, much like my doctrine of microphilantrophy (which I support and try to follow), I like creativity in little packages as well.

Ernest Hemingway wrote a six-word story: "For Sale: Baby Shoes, never used."  He thought it was his best work, which, oddly enough, involves a certain amount of audience participation.   That's funny and just a bit ironic, since his "best work" requires additional input, especially since I always thought Hemingway was totally overrated anyway.

But, isn't this interactive story evidence of his genius?  Bah, whatever.

Anyway, where am I going with this?  I got the idea tonight (from someone on a bulletin board) to mess around with haikus.  Sure, haikus aren't anything new; actually, they're an old Japanese form of poetry.  But like Hemingway's six-word story, this three-line poem consisting of a five-seven-five syllable structure is a tidy little box for creativity that's difficult to use effectively.

Not to say that I used it effectively or creatively, but it was an interesting little exercise to communicate with haikus.  I only did it like six times, but it was like doing sudoku or whatever, giving parts of my brain a little exercise it doesn't normally get.

I also did the same thing by playing the Wii tonight while Amy was working the Halloween thing at the zoo.  I kicked Ashley and Yuko's ass at tennis, skunked in baseball, golfed at par, and bowled a 231.  I rule.

Now, if I can just rule at writing methodology sections... 

Also, if I could just add this:

(Courtesy of TJ)

Christmas season is here.  No, not really, but every corporation in America wants us to think it is so we'll buy people crap they don't need.  There's a reason the day after Thanksgiving is called "Black Friday," and it's because the production and sale of goods is so bloated that most businesses are in the red until they convince people to buy crap for Christmas.

Spend time with your friends and family for Christmas.  Cook them dinner.  Take them on a trip somewhere, or to a museum.  Don't spend it on crap they don't need, which they'll just sell at the Memorial Day yardsale anyway.

Unless it's from Gnosis in Indianapolis.  Or your local artist.

That's fine, too.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 09:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Must be a full moon or something.

The dogs this morning were terrible.  I know we have seven right now, and I know that three are completely untrained.  But let's just say that this morning was a horrific cascade of turds, and we'll just leave that alone.  Having woken up around 9:30, I didn't leave the house until nearly noon.  When I did get to leave the house, Amy and I were shellshocked by the events of the day thus far. 

No good deed goes unpunished, and we were about to take back our good deed from those three dogs we saved by having them humanely euthanized.  Not really, but it crossed our nearly-insane minds for a few minutes. 

We cleaned ourselves up and went to the Chinese buffet to recover our wits and existence.  At the buffet, as I ate, a chunk came out of one of my wisdom teeth.  That's a problem, since we have no insurance and no money.  It still doesn't hurt or anything, but it may soon.  My dad, from what I understand, had the same problem of simply rotting wisdom teeth around this age.  It's really stupid for it to happen right now, and more than a little disheartening. 

It's weird to be losing body parts.  And scary.  I won't have decent insurace for a couple years yet, you know...

The only real piece of good news was that my Iraq war piece was accepted by Antipode without revisions or anything.  Sure, it's short, and sure Jim helped me a lot with it, but it's in, it'll soon be published, and I will then officially rule.  I can see that publishing will become very addictive....

Speaking of more bad news, our poor little old Italian neighbor died on Friday, I guess. We knew he was in bad shape since his ripe vegetables in his garden rotted without harvesting.  Amy found out from his daughter, who lived next door.  She also offered to sell us his house.  His obituary is here.  Interesting life, though, from a couple paragraphs, really....

Pio, the neighbor, was a little old fellow who loved to garden and tend his lawn, he spoke absolutely unintelligibly (he mixed his native Italian with his English) and he gave us vegetables every fall.  He was 85 years old and had been dealing with the effects of some weird spinal cancer for years.  He had been remarkably active until just this summer when he fell and broke his back.  A couple months after even that, he was out tending his garden with the help of a walker and a few strategically placed chairs. 

I'm pretty sure he knew the end was coming.  The last time I spoke with him, he talked about how he didn't really care for being around since gardening was so hard now, as he filled a bag with tomatoes and cucumbers for me.  When Amy last asked him how he was doing, he said "oh, not so good." When she told him she hoped that his health would improve, he simply said, "no."  He was a very nice little guy, and I'll miss seeing him around.  He loved to keep his lawn super short, and would rush to his shed to start mowing if he noticed ours was shorter.  He openly coveted Charley because he is "a good-a dog" and he openly hated his granddaughter's dog, "Oscar," who he would punish with a newspaper, using calls of "c'mere" when Oscar was bad.

His garden still sits out there, almost like a ghost.  The fruits and vegetables have been left to rot.  Every other year, all of the produce would have been harvested and the plants removed already.  It's almost eerie to see the fruits of his labors abandoned, knowing that his hands won't groom that plot anymore.  I really hope his kids mow it over...

But that's not as important.  May Pio find a place with acres of of the best soil, where he can garden long hours and produce the biggest vegetables with no pain or fatigue.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 12:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I've had a strange desire that's popped up a handful of times in the past few months, and it's really something that defies any kind of rational explanation.  It's also somewhat embarrassing....

I've been thinking about taking a trip to Walt Disney World in Florida.

Yes, I know Disney World is an incredibly fake place.  Yes, I also know that it's the epitome of capitalism, the production of crappy tourist space specifically designed to part me from a ridiculous sum of money ($60 each for entrance plus overpriced meals and souvenirs, which says nothing for hotels or transportation).  Yes, I realize that it's designed for children, and not only children but children of people wealthy enough to afford such an adventure.

See, the problem is this: every year, from the time I was born until I turned 19, my family went to Disney World for Ball State's spring break.  Each year, we went with my grandparents, and it was a good time, generally speaking.  My poor old Oldsmobile 88 from back-in-the-day, when it was under the care of my grandpa, made at least 16 trips to Florida with us and others.  It was a tradition, and I knew the Disney parks like the back of my hand.  Even the time I went in the eighth grade with a school class trip, I knew the parks like no one else, and I managed to get my "learning at EPCOT" workbook done before I even went to the park.

Now, since my sophomore year of college, I've never been.  That last time, my big mistake of an ex went with us, too.  But since then, nothing.  It's weird to have something so strongly a family tradition pulled out from under you.

I won't lie.  I've liked the other spring break trips I've taken with my parents since then a great deal more than I was liking the Disney thing, especially towards the end.  It was great to expand horizons elsewhere, which usually involved trips to Las Vegas or the Caribbean... equally touristy, but at least a change of pace.  It's odd, probably, that something so fake as Disney World is a place so ingrained to my personal biography, the site of so many significant moments (and other far less significant moments that just happen to be more prevalent in my memory because vacation always means cameras, which create pictures for later reference).

Of course, wanting to go to Disney World puts me in a horrific dilemma of sorts.  For one, by the time I put together enough money for such a vacation for Amy and I, I could probably use that money to get us any number of much-cooler places for a week or two.  The short list: New York, Yellowstone, London, Alaska, Hawaii, Mexico, San Francisco, New England, and possibly Iceland.  Point is, why the-fuck would we ever spend that much money to go someplace lame like Disney World when we could hit someplace far cooler that we've never been (or only been a few times, or not for a long time)? 

Besides, going to Disney World and the telling other geographers about it would sooooo make me the laughingstock.  Seriously, who spends serious money on Disney World that doesn't have kids?  

I have an image to protect!

At the same time, at least part of my interest in going is academic.  See, in some ways, I blame Disney (as well as my mother) for turning me into a geographer.  It was at Disney that I first started thinking about manipulation of spaces and such. During my eighth grade trip, the science teacher that took us told us about the visual illusions and such that Disney uses to make money and create the perfect environment for tourist delight, and hence, spending.  Without that primer and without going to this place repeatedly to see these things in action, who knows if I would have ever pursued geography.

I certainly wouldn't've written an AWARD-WINNING presentation on manipulation of spaces from May 4 for this years ELDAAG! 

(Shut up, you stupid fucking narcissist!)

Now that I've had, gosh, at least six years of formal training as a geographer (depending where you place the starting point), I'd like to revisit these places to see this manipulation of space when I can better absorb what's going on.  I would like to think that I'd get a tremendous amount out of a vacation like this, because it would engage my mind in a totally recreational way.

Or, for the same money, we could fly to Europe.... and I'm embarrassed to think that about which I might choose.

We had something of a breakthrough with the foster dogs today.  Amy took Butters, which we were starting to worry about being a problem child and really emotionally ruined, and cleaned out a couple of hundred little burrs he had in his fur since we picked him up from the pound.  After an hour or so of working on these things (many of which had sunken down and were rubbing his skin) he was burr-free. 

And when he was burr-free, he suddenly acted like a new dog!  Seriously, most of his neurotic little tendencies (the ones that made him seem possibly unadoptable) were gone.  He was acting like a dog, walking around normally, not being a grump, not protecting food bowls or humping other dogs.  He obviously felt much much better.  So, I decided that we're not going to call him by his somewhat humiliating nickname of "Butters," but now he's going to be his real name, "Carleton."   

Sure, he's still got some problems we're going to have to iron out.  He still tries to mark (read: urinate) inside, which is a less-than-favorable habit.  He still has trouble when people grab his collar, and gets scared of shiny floors.  But, he's a lot better in a lot of ways, just by cleaning out his fur.  Once he began acting normal, all of the other dogs, who had been acting tense ever since his arrival, all simultaneously calmed down, and the dog social tension was suddenly far less.  Everyone instantly laid down, and snuggled up for naps, almost as part of an agreement or something.

They all drive me nuts, but it's little things like this that make foster parenting for dogs worthwhile.

I sound as if Carleton is my foster-child. 

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 11:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

What an odd weekend.

I went up with some folks from the department to ELDAAG in East Lansing, Michigan.  I wasn't terribly excited to go because several people that I had been looking forward to going with bailed at the last second.  Those of us who did go were relatively quiet people, and the van we traveled in wasn't terribly conducive to conversation.  So, the trip there was pretty quiet and boring, as was the trip back.  I got to take some time to read, which was a nice change of pace.

The hotel in East Lansing was oddly modern, with a bathroom apparently inspired by IKEA.  There was nothing really differentiating the very small bathroom from the shower except a small wrap-around curtain that attacked the showerer.  Of course, being chic didn't make up for the fact that, upon taking a shit, your pants were made wet by the soaked bathroom floor, since the shower and the bathroom were the same thing.

I found out after arriving at the convention (around 9:00 pm, and having not eaten) that I was in the student paper competition.  I hadn't intended to enter any competitions and am unsure how I became registered for it.  The bad news, though, was that this student paper competition meant that my presentation would be early, like 8:30 am.  On top of that, I was presenting research in the exceptionally early stages, meaning the "I thought about this a few nights before I went to bed and have thrown something together" stage.  This was not something I wanted to enter into a competition with my name on it.

So, after going to a bar/grille where they showed Michigan State hockey in HD (and after the game, the players came to eat) and eating a massive amount of onion rings, I went to bed around 1:00 am.  I was up by 7:30, searching for some cheap coffee (the hotel had nothing less than $3.00 a cup, which is beyond my threshold for cheap one-time use drugs) that I never found.  I read through my notes a few times, and eventally gave a solid presentation.  Nothing spectactular, but solid, I thought.

After the session, I went back to the room and for some took a massive dump, wetting my pants with remnant shower water (stupid fucking IKEA).  I held it a while as to not gas out my roommate, and I needed to drop it.  After changing pants, I gathered my belongings, took them to the van so I could check out of the room and hit the poster session.  It was weird, though, because as I started to gently wander around looking for interesting posters (there were two on the list that I actually cared to see), people that saw my presentation began cornering me to talk about it.  I talked to at least seven random people about my "research," (which, as I said, was simply developing figments of my imagination combining with historical evidence) all of whom seemed to receive it very well.  I only got to talk to one of the poster presenters, who had a thing on "queer spaces" of Chicago that I found very interesting.

So, after that surprising, confusing and somewhat disorienting adventure into the poster session was a patently odd lunch highlighted by a string quartet that played for 20 minutes and abruptly left during the entree.  The food was surprisingly good: three slices of "veggie wrap" that reminded me of some weird cross-breeding between fajitas and beef wellington, an absolutely amazing stuffed tomato, steamed carrots, a salad (which I passed on), rolls, and a piece of sugary sweet carrot cake.

It was after lunch that I discovered the incredible.  Apparently, my presentation, which had accidentally been entered into the student paper competition..... won.  When they announced, I didn't hardly take it seriously because I wasn't expecting it at all.  It seriously took me like ten seconds after they announced it to stand up and accept the award.  But, I won $75, which was a tie with someone else.  Normally, they have a first ($100) and a second ($50) place, and they thought I tied with someone.  I don't care that it's a tie, because I was just damn happy to get a prize for a competition I entered by accident.

Winning an award made my weekend.  I used some of the proceeds, indirectly, to buy a Michigan State refrigerator magnet.

The way home was mostly just as boring, but at the same time remarkable.  While I was in a similar state of silence in the van (I was toward the back with another quiet person, and we were separated from the more-talkative folks in the front seat by a buffer of distance and Dr. Zhang, a very quiet professor), I was absolutely enthralled by the landscape we passed on the way home.

Sure, it was southern Michigan and northwestern Ohio, which means very very flat and generally "boring."  But lately, I've had determined this: I'm unsure whether there's a more beautiful autumn landscape than the good-old, boring-old, flat-old midwest, with big fields near harvest or being harvested, separated by islands of colorful trees, all of which is happening during a nearly clear but breezy day at sunset.  There's something that autumn sunsets are capable of doing to this kind of a landscape that I've never found an equivalent of elsewhere.  It's almost as if the brown and dry corn glows in this sunset light, almost a messenger to the coming winter.

Blowing by this landscape in a giant white rental van, rising above the landscape as the van climbs over bridges comprised of borrowhills, watching the vegetation's reflection of the sun roll alongside the van, and flying past people having barbecues and bonfires out on their land, all while listening to that one Frou Frou album... that was a nice cap to the weekend away.

It only took me a move away (to a region with the far "superior" scenery of hills and valleys, no less), plus two years more, to truly respect the landscapes of that part of the midwest, the very kinds of space I used to imagine as my own personal prison during my days as a disgruntled youth. 

Of course, once I came home, Amy and I were so happy to see each other that we bickered about her right to eat cheese "every great once in a while when my body craves it" (now that she's a vegan) for the next 18 hours or so.  Oddly, I was on the no side because I was trying to support her through a time of temptation, which I thought was my job.  Actively opposing her on this point was something I paid dearly for, and may still have some outstanding bills to eventually remit.

Luckily, that bickering eventually ended, and we filled our home with groceries today.  And dogs on Friday.  We took on three fosters who were about to be killed.  I think I mentioned the possibility before?  Amy sometimes gets emails detailing dogs who are about to be put down at pounds.  Sometimes, she sends these to me, which I hate because when I look at them I decide that they are all coming to my home for salvation.  There's a reason that Petfinder.org has pictures with their listings.

Seriously, if I lose a little bit of inhibition in my older age, I'm going to become a hoarder.  And that scares me, more than a little.

Anyway, we've welcomed three doomed dogs into our home for a new lease.  Mona is a big coonhound mix, and is sweet and docile.  She's a great dog, but she's practically starved and heartworm positive (a potentially fatal disease that doomed her to the "unadoptable" category at the pound, but is fixable with two injections six weeks apart).  Lily is a Catahoula Leopard Dog (read: colorful hound) mix who's young, energetic and also starved, both for food and attention.  Butters (or officially, "Carleton") is a white shepherd mix who was left outside chained to a pole for a long time, and has burrs and sores in his fur and has no idea how to behave inside.  Butters has some serious problems with food aggression and is scared of everything, but he seems smart and generally sweet enough and hopefully we can help him adjust.

This means, of course, that we currently have seven adult dogs living in our house.  This will change soon, because the dogs are signed up for the prison-dog training program (where inmates teach dogs and vice versa, far more modern than using license plates and anal rape for reform) and will be out the door by November, if not earlier to forever homes.  They just need a place to crash for a while because they were on death row at the Ravenna pound and didn't have any chances left.

But let me assure everyone that reads this crap about one thing: having three untrained adult dogs in the house is a lot of responsibility and a lot of nuisance.  However, I know that having a damn kid is much worse, and this past 36 hours has done nothing if not reaffirm in my mind that I never ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever want to have children.  If dogs are a hassle, I would possibly commit suicide at the prospect of parenthood.  So, never ever.

Never.

Ever.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 10:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I'm happy that the Indians are doing well.  I've been a Reds fan as long as I can remember, but it's nice to watch and sorta-root for a team that hasn't wasn't the past 10 years on shitty picthers and the "Player of the 1990s" that keeps losing body parts on Opening Day each year.

Bush's approval rating fell to below 25%, which is good and bad.  It's good because peole are finally (finally!) realizing that twice now, they've elected the world's biggest jackass to the world's most important executive office this side of Steve Jobs.  It's bad because he's talking about invading Iran, apparently hoping it will improve his approval ratings.  Sure, you laugh at something so simplistic, but it's worked for him twice, and he's just not that smart.

I took my class of freshmen out to the May 4 memorial today.  For one thing, I felt like playing the part of the mysterious professor, as I told them "let's go for a walk."  Lame as that was, the current condition of the world was getting me down, and I hoped to make some random connections between events of yesterday and events of today.  Plus, it's a part of campus culture of which I certainly hope they would take the time to become aware.

I've really been feeling like a worthless, incomplete person lately.  My brain always begins to falter a bit once the day lengths start getting really short.  Sadly, I like autumn and everything about the season, but it fucks me up.  I'm realizing that right now in my life, I'm failing at things (specifically, concentrating on writing quality dissertation proposals) that I have no reason to fail.  While this is totally my fault, I am starting to wonder if other nagging deficiencies in my life are taking their toll.  I haven't done anything really outdoorsy, terribly remotely social, musical, or spiritual in weeks, if not months.  I really am a social person, I'm just scared of socializing, and I'm bad at it, so I get rejected a lot.

It also worried me because my brain has been stuck on park. It's not that I'm stuck on my dissertation or other projects.  I know exactly what I need to do.  It's just that my brain right now is incapable.  I'm worried.

I'm starting to think about selling our Wii, at least a little.  We never play it, and we haven't played it in months.  I don't know how beneficial a $350 video game system is when it does nothing but collect dust.

Maybe I should recharge my brain by playing a little Wii Tennis?  We'll track that....

I would like to make friends.  Work people are sorta friends, but it's hard for me to mix work and personal, because I don't like letting people into myself when our relationship is professional.  I have no religious participation to speak of, and I'm not dealing with Amy's to avoid the non-member tension.  I don't drink.  There is no hope for me to find friends with those limits.  It's a bed I've made for myself through being generally obnoxious and emotionally distant for 26 plus years.

My computer is dying a slow death.  It's doing some weird thing where it dies when I unplug it for around 20 minutes, even though the battery still shows nearly full charge.  I would think it's the death of the rechargeable battery, but I read accounts from people online who have the same problems, and it's not the battery but some funky wiring.

I love watching the Colts, but they are boring anymore.  I mean, it's great that they won the Super Bowl, and I hate to sound lame (especially to Browns or Bengals fans) but the constant winning gets a little old.  It's like when you've beaten Madden so severely that it's no fun anymore. 

I am really disappointed with television this year.  My four standbys have all declined significantly.  "House MD" has been really awkward, "The Office" has converted to 60 minute episodes and its pacing sucks.  "Scrubs" has been nowhere to be seen.  On "Friday Night Lights," Landry broke character more than any character in history and killed some guy.  

Damn, TV Turnoff Week isn't until April.

Amy just called.  She's coming home from the zoo.  She's working some stupid Halloween event as a temp, since her summer job ended at the end of September.  She's finally coming home, which is good because it feels like we've been really distant lately too.  That's mostly stress, too, I know.

I really don't know what my brain's deal is right now.  I spent like an hour tonight staring at the computer, going through like ten different websites over and over and over.  It'd been interesting if I was stoned, but that hasn't been the case since the early 2000s.  I just can't concentrate on anything, so I concentrate on nothing.  Should I start smoking weed again?

I am irritated that we haven't done any of the Fall Hiking Spree this year.  Last year, we did 11 trails and we only needed to do eight to get the little badge.  This year, we've done none and it sucks.  I really want to do some this weekend but there's probably no way, since I'm going to East Lansing for East Lakes.

I've gained 10 pounds this semester.  Something needs to change there, no doubt.

I looked at my Pick-a-prof.com profile today and realized that I've given a significant number of students As in the past year.  I don't like that.  In fact, I really dislike that.  I need to change that.  When did I become such a pushover?  The materials in my class are difficult!  The tests are certainly not easy!  Maybe I offer too much extra credit (okay, now this is definitely true).

They're now advertising a "new Chevy Malibu."  What is this, the tenth redesign in the past ten years?  Amy's parents had one of those things and it was a piece of shit.  I suppose, if they keep redesigning it, that they still haven't gotten it right. 

I got an email tonight saying I can be in a pretty cool session about discourses of nature in urban areas at AAG in April.  That makes me pretty happy, I guess... in an oddly empty way.

Amy sent me an e-mail today containing profiles of dogs who are on death row at the Ravenna shelter, scheduled for euthanization tomorrow morning.  I hate hate hate it when she does that, because I am hopeless when I see the pictures of the dogs.  I can't tolerate it. 

We may be getting one or two dogs from this to foster on a short-term swing.  

With that in mind, I'm getting sick of the fact that I can't change the world, let alone save it.  I'm starting to think that my "living the change" stuff is totally bullshit anyway.  It doesn't matter in the grand scheme whether I don't eat meat for years or whether I help 10 dogs off of death row or whether I convince 10 students to think a little. 

The world is still shit, always will be.  Maybe this is what the fucktard Republicans have going for them.... they know that this world sucks and they want to suck every last drop of goodness for themselves, and damn the consequences.

I need to listen to happier music. 

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 07:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Somedays, you just feel like you've been run over by a truck.

Or a 15-passenger van...?

Anyway, we're back from Mammoth Cave now.  We returned late last night, bringing five very tired students back to the real-world of campus life after a nice temporary escape. The trip was a good trip, I think.  I feel like I made it both educational and enjoyable for the students.  It was a little stressful on my end, being the responsible party for a group of people and getting all of those intricacies accomplished, but I got everyone home safely and without incident.

One thing that I tried to stress to the students throughout the trip was that travel is a good time for personal reflection.  I had them keep travel journals in which they wrote not only the details of the trip, but also their personal reactions, feelings and experiences of the events that took place.  I asked them to draw on their own personal histories, because I wanted to see the trip we took through their eyes.  With that in mind, I'm really looking forward to reading what they wrote, even if, because I'm me and not them, I can't understand what they're saying because of the lack of shared personal context.

I mean, I'm just excited to maybe have a window into seeing their growth as people.

Eight hours of driving back from Mammoth Cave to Kent gave me plenty of time to reflect on the trip myself.  I didn't have much option about this driving, though, because I had to do it.  I was the only one of age, on payroll and properly certified.  But the time to think made up for that minor inconvenience, I guess.

For one thing, a student asked if, somehow Kent State were to offer me a job, would I stay?  Well, I tried to explain the whole awkwardness of being a faculty in a department where you were a student and whatever, but then I realized, the answer would be "yes."  I like the school, I like the department and I like the area.  If I had been someone coming in from outside, this would be a great scenario for me to land in.  Of course, I have indeed cooked my own goose in terms of ever getting hired here, since I attended here, but still.  I guess Kent would be a good measuring stick for my future job prospects.

Of course, at the same time, that made me think about what my future goals are.  I definitely want to be in a place to do some research, but at the same time, taking this trip and teaching students in "the field" was a pretty cool experience.  Yes, I realize that with a different group of students this would have been a difficult -- if not horrific -- time. 

I'm coming to terms with the fact that teaching and research are twin loves of mine.  Some people would consider this to be academic bigamy, because as I well know, there are people out there who teach only to get research funding, and there are people who research only to be assured of their teaching jobs.  I dearly enjoy both.  I was getting a bit burned out on instruction, since it was taking so much of my time and energy to do it.  I was convinced that students didn't give a shit, and I was wondering why I should.

This trip helped me rejuvenate that teaching energy, and hopefully I can keep it going.  All I needed was a pair of eight hour drives in a 15-passenger van.

Now, maybe I can rejuvenate my stalled research as well..... if I can just physically and mentally recover from driving that fucking van 1,000 miles during the course of a weekend.

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 09:16 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Read "Entry No. 600" »

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 12:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Read "Until Kentucky..." »

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 11:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Read "Not bad, friends." »

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 09:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Read "Stupid Everything" »

Posted by Your Friendly Neighborhood DJ at 12:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)