Eye twitch

I do have an eye twitch, literally, that has been going on, sporadically, for some time: I'm not sure when it started. I know it's a sign of being tired. But it does make me think about a friend who had read some self-help book about how our physical symptoms are all indications of our psychic turmoil--and she'd have asked, "What is it you don't want to look at?" The answer is obvious, and they're piled up on my desk, the radiator, in my bag....

I have a handful more revisions and reading journals to mark for the short-story class; I'll finish those off in the morning. Then it's just down to grading final papers--though I do I want to write up brief comments on the in-class presentations by the various groups so the students can see why they get the grades they'll get. I'm stewing now about the time limit thing: a number of the groups were significantly short of the time parameters (I stipulated 14-16 minutes; several groups ended at about the nine minute mark); a few ran long. I had to force one group to stop today: one guy in the group wouldn't let the others get a word in edgewise--and he wouldn't shut up in general. I think he felt he was the only one who had prepared adequately, but in fact, he hadn't prepared very well: he had too much information and no significant organization. On the other hand, he now knows a hell of a lot about the topic and was interested enough that he really, really wanted to tell all he knew.

That's my favorite thing about the presentations: even though students may not actually give a rat's ass about the environment--or even about the topic for their presentations--they end up knowing a great deal and feel comfortable holding forth about it outside of the presentation situation.

One of my least favorite things is the kind of student who resists everything up to the final second of the semester. From a student's end-of-semester self-evaluation: "I never benefit from assignments. ... I just want to get them done with. I wont [sic] learn anything from this that will help me out in the world. I never understood how math and english [sic] benefit my life in the future. ... I did learn many things but ill [I'll] forget them all in a year. I wont [sic] need to know how to write essays in life." My response: "Maybe not, but perhaps you could have learned something about thinking clearly, which could benefit you."

I'd growl and grump, but oh what the hell. Go forth and multiply. Be a happy, stupid consumer. Zei gesund. No skin off my dainty little nose.

I feel weirdly optimistic about getting everything done with minimal tearing out of hair and frantic, glazed-over panic. I wonder how long that will last.

But no matter what, in a week, I'll be finishing off my paperwork, then heading home to pack. Eight days to Montana, sixteen days to Washington. I keep counting them down....