Gripe session

I'm not happy with the way anything turned out today. I got to work nice and early only to find I'd left the "script" for my presentation at home. I put up a sign letting my students know I'd be late, drove home, got caught in terrible, slow traffic, got the damned thing, came to work--and the class is down to three (the student who has been AWOL is still gone; I think she's too embarrassed to even contact me about what's going on). And not one of the three was remotely prepared for class. So we talked about their next paper--even though they've not turned in the last one yet--and I let them go early, hoping I'd have two minutes to reread the presentation. Nope: student wanted to talk to me after class about what would happen if she didn't submit essay 2 at all. At this point, it looks like the grades for the class will be a couple of W's and F's, one mercy D, and two incompletes. Fucking hell.

Then I raced to the library to do the presentation, again hoping to have a few minutes to go over my script before I had to present: nope. Senior observer was there and wanted to chat with me about absolutely nothing, even though I patently had my nose in my paper. The Bright Young Man from last term was there, and about five other people, maybe seven by the time I finished presenting. Somehow, even though I'd made the "script" short, so I could extemporize some, I was given the two minute warning long before I expected. I found I was stammering and misspeaking a lot, very annoying. I also think the presentation was circular and repetitive. Fuck again.

In Advisement, what felt like a parade of morons, who couldn't understand even the most basic things about how to pick a schedule, and most of whom hadn't done any preparation. I've not yet developed Paul's technique of shooing them off to look at the course catalog on their own; I need to work on that.

And I'm down to nine students in 102. One withdrew (the one who was so glad last week that I told him he had potential); the stoner was there and said he didn't even know that first versions of final papers were due today, so that was his sixth absence (withdraw or fail time); and another student is now at seven absences, so she's gone, too. And I need to talk with a student who was there today but who didn't have a paper to turn in. Technically, he should now be told he needs to withdraw or he'll fail, but I'll decide how fierce I want to get with him. The ones who were there were doing OK, but the flame-outs left a bad taste in my mouth.

And only three people showed up for the ecocrit group--and I'd bought food and wine for at least twice that. Two bailed on me at the last second, and a couple who'd said they might come didn't. Nine people had said they wouldn't be able to make it--even though the consensus earlier was that Monday nights were good. Further, among the four of us who were there, the discussion was interesting but had very little to do with the actual reading, so I got a bit frustrated with the whole thing. Not to mention I now have a ton of food and wine that I hardly need to have in my house. I'd leave it here, but the office is closed, so I have no access to the necessary refrigeration. Fuck again.

So all of that was decidedly irritating to already somewhat raw nerve endings--and yet I don't feel as cranky and snarling and bitchy as I might, just a little bit around the edges.

I think my favorite moment of the day was trying to open one of the wine bottles with Kayla: I just have a little el-cheapo T-shaped corkscrew, and it just wasn't happening. But Kayla, bless her, works in a restaurant, so she had her wine key in her car, got it, and came to my rescue. We got giggly trying to open the bottle before resorting to that simpler solution: it would have been about as easy to try to pull an entire football team out of a concrete mouse hole.

And--in my usual "let's look on the sunny side" re-frame of the day--the people who did show up for the ecocrit group were very happy with it, and grateful for the experience, and want to do it again--and sooner than I'd have guessed. Plus, losing students in droves does mean I have fewer papers to grade, which is not at all a bad thing.

That's what I'll be facing tomorrow, so I'd best sign off now and get home. I refuse to take any work home with me tonight, so I'll need to get a good jump on tomorrow.

And up it goes, posting without revision or proofreading of any variety whatsoever. Mistakes be damned.