Yes, I'm talking about you...

Fun moment in RB section of 101 today. Students were working on peer review of papers and signing up for conferences, always a little chaotic to multitask, and one student realized he didn't know where my office was. However, since his brain was obviously in too many places at once, he called out to me, "Where's the thing, Miss Thing?" (Yes, if you're reading this, you know who you are--or if you're his classmate, you know who I'm talking about. Ahem, about whom I am talking. Gack.) I'd already corrected him about calling me "Mrs. Payne" (Mrs??). He had quickly corrected that to Professor, and damned good thing too (she says teasingly), but, I beg your pardon, Miss Thing?? This became a comedy routine of me teasing him pretty relentlessly. Bless his heart, he was a sport about it, and the other students were pretty amused. Levity: it's a wonderful pedagogical tool. One student also asked about whether a phrase he had used was too close to the original, so I did my little "When in doubt, in terms of quotation, paraphrase, documentation, CYA." I always ask if anyone knows what CYA means--occasionally I have a student who was in the military who knows--and when I say, "It means cover your ass" they are tickled. "Omigod, Professor said ass!!" The student who is reading this blog knows I say a lot worse than that.

And I was delighted to find that a student is reading this blog. When I was teasing Mr. Thing, I said I'd have to put the event in the blog. (I do love it when we have fun together; these are moments I live for as a teacher.) Anyway, that's how I found out this young woman is reading it. I have the link posted on my faculty home page, but I have always rather assumed that if students go to the home page at all, they only go to download a needed document and never look at anything else. I came to find out, not only is one young woman following the blog, another in the same class had read the little "about me" section of the home page. Very cool beans. I know they like to "get under the hood" as Paul says (i.e., figure out what makes us work--and indeed, Mr. Think asked why I blog, which I'll have to write about some other time), but I truly felt a little "aw shucks" about their interest--or like Sally Field accepting her Oscar. (Reference the students surely don't know.)

So that was fun--and even better, the class was well attended; only one student showed up without a paper (and was asked to leave once he'd signed up for his conference; I thought he'd begun to turn around, too, so that was disappointing). One e-mailed to say her paper would be late. So that only leaves I think two completely unaccounted for. In KC, however, there were 14 students in the room with papers--and 11 no shows. Not only no-shows for class, I haven't heard boo from them about getting their papers to me. I think they willfully forget that the late penalty for papers is per day, not per class, so they think handing the paper in on Thursday won't be a problem. It will. Two full letter grades off: ouch.

And I've told them that I am so draconian in my late paper policy because I was (and am) the world's worst procrastinator. As an undergrad, I'd only turn a paper in on time if I was faced with a similar horrifying penalty. Ah well. They'll learn. Maybe not in my class, this semester, but in time, they'll learn.

In any event, now I have 12 papers to grade by 10 a.m. Thursday. (I graded one, just to feel I'd done something.) I observe a colleague tomorrow at 9:30, am observed myself at 11, have a one-class break, teach a class--and then have to grind through as many of those 12 as I can. It can take me up to half an hour per paper: try as I might, I just can't seem to get it down much below that, not and feel like I'm giving the students the feedback they need. Many colleagues tell me I mark too much, that students will be overwhelmed, won't read 99% of the comments, won't know what to focus on. But when I ask the students (granted, usually the ones who've made it to the end of the semester), almost across the board they say they like the extensive comments. They may not be able to respond to all of them, but they like getting them. And now that I have them write a little report on my comments--which ones seem the most important and how they will address them in revision--I just can't make myself do less, despite what it does to my nerves, my sleep, even my eating habits.

I got one piece of P&B business done today (read and responded to a first draft of a sabbatical application). I also have a promo application to review, but the draft deadline for those is later (for my promo app, too, thank God), so I'll have to tell that colleague that I'll give her feedback as soon as I can. I'm not sure how this weekend will go. (No ride, that's for sure.) I may have to use my promo folder and my colleague's as my brain breaks from grading (instead of reading more of Barnaby Rudge, or taking a monster nap, which I would infinitely prefer).

I spent a tiny bit of time today talking with Paul about ideas for my own scholarship. I can't do more than dream about that now (I think of what I have to do in the next few weeks and I have panic attacks), but at least ideas are percolating. It proves that my own academic chops have not completely--well, done whatever chops do when they don't work any more. Atrophied?

And now, once again, I'm heading home late enough that I'm going to have a hard time winding down enough to get to sleep early enough to get up early enough.... Ye gods, I don't know what kind of carnival ride this is, but I will be very happy when it stops (December 22, while I'm winging off to Montana, doing final grading and grade crunching on the plane). I'm getting dizzy (sometimes literally: ah, stress, ain't it grand)--but the up side of tempus fugit is that it fugits on all levels: things come up unbelievably quickly but they also will be over before one knows it.

Still, imagine having a 3-2 load instead of 4-4.... I yearn.