Goodbye

It might have been so genetically fucked up it had to go, but I weep for it.

Nightmare City

I have to go to the doctor today to get a shot. They're also drawing blood for some tests. Then I have to go back tomorrow for a different test. Why they can't just do everything tomorrow, when gas is at a f'ing premium, and they're 15 miles away, one way, I have no idea.

I Stayed Late Tonight

I didn't leave campus till after 8--I absolutely wanted to finish grading the first class' design exercise, and I did finish that. I have great plans for staying late tomorrow and Wednesday, and getting them all graded so I can give them back on Monday. Then I'll only have their damn memos and audience exercises to grade, and I'll be all caught up...

Of course, I realize how ridiculous that sounds... I mean, these damn things have been waiting for weeks for me to grade. They sit in condemning piles around my house, filling me with loathing. If I could just grade the papers when they came in, it wouldn't be such an ordeal. But my behavior never seems to change.

I wish I could teach, but not grade. I suspect all teachers feel this way. But I know there are conscientious, ethical teachers who really do their jobs, read and return papers in a timely manner, and don't hate every single day they're in the classroom. I don't know how they do it. I really admire them. I can't seem to manage it.

Oh, this is a rambly, useless post. More of the same. Sometimes, I can't even stand myself.

Another Weekend Wasted

Great, it's 7 p.m. Sunday evening, and I've not done a damn thing this weekend except brood about my shitty life and wish all the grading I haven't done would just mysteriously disappear so I wouldn't have to look at all those piles of uncompleted work.

I've decided that what I need to do is start staying at school till 8 or 9 pm--just grading. I'd like to be able to go home for T'giving without carrying home 300 papers to grade. It's quite obvious that when I'm home nothing gets accomplished. Part of that is the depression. Part of it is just hating hating hating Tech Comm and everything to do with it and not being able to motivate myself to get it done. It's terrible--I'm practically phoning in my work. I go to work, but I'm not there. I'm not answering student e-mails. I'll probably get the worst evals of my career. And I can't even seem to care, not even a smidge.

It's really, really bad. I've never LOVED grading--who does? But at least when I was reading comp papers, there was the POSSIBILITY of finding something interesting that engaged my intellect. But there is no such experience in grading effing memos.

I wish to Goddess a miracle would happen, and they'll hire me full time for advising. I pray for it.

Out of It

I've been struggling with some news lately that I'm still trying to deal with, and trying to decide what to do. When I come to some conclusions, I'll write about them here, but until then I have to be mysterious.

In other news, school is dragging me down. I hate Tech Comm like you can't believe. I'm glad it's November because I have like 4 or 5 group work days scheduled and that means 4 or 5 days I don't have to teach. I am so depressed about being scheduled to teach it again next semester. I asked for Comp 2, but apparently they needed me to teach it. Well, that's what they said anyhow. But the bright side is, of course, that I'm continuing to advise. Which I love.

Maybe I've said this before here, but I liken advising to "emergency room academia." I still get the benefit of talking with students, but there is no grading involved. They come in, get what they need, and then they go. I mean, how great is that? I keep praying that this will turn into a full-time job. It will mitigate some of my current worries if I knew I was going to continue to be employed. But more than that, I'm good at advising. I actually care about these students in ways that I could give a rat's ass about the students in my Tech Comm classes.

Which is not to say I don't like my TC students, because some of them I like very much. But it's the subject matter that is just dreadful. And I hate the Guru's book. I'm just going to come right out and say that. Her book is so tedious and so dull--and it breaks a lot of the "rules" that she's so tediously explains about what good technical communication should do. I mean maybe TC has a possibility of being interesting, but her book kills it for me. And those students who aren't doing even just the bare minimum in class--they're killing me too.

Anyway... not much on tap today. I have 1000 papers to grade. Oh, joy.

Hmm, I have so much to do, I think I'll go read a book. Heheh.

The Halloween Book Ain't Happening, Guru Be Fucked

So, it's the 11th of October, and I haven't done any work on the book Guru wants done. Initially I was all freaked out about it, and now it's like I can't try to teach a class I hate, meet my advising obligations, meet with my writing groups and the Tech Comm Seminar every week, be a good girlfriend, try to grade (which, by the way, that ain't happening either), and keep sane. I'm kind of depressed about everything.

In other, unrelated news, I am sending prayers, good vibes, and kind wishes to my friends Doggerel and Butterfly Cauldron... I worry about them, and send them my love.

Job Things, The Sequel

So, today I had a meeting with Guru (the New Writing & Communication Coordinator, who is a Full Professor, and a Professor Emeritus from her previous school), and she looked over my C.V. and talked to me about my future plans, and mentioned ways that I could improve the C.V. and how I articulate my teaching and the kinds of things I do in the classroom so as to make me stand out when it comes to people picking through job materials.

But among the things she said: a) only listing 3 examples of work under review is poor--I ought to have 10(!) listed, so as to demonstrate I am an active poet who actively submits work; b) that I need to write at least 3 essays (on place, spirituality, and family) since those are areas I focused on in my diss; c) that I need to cull about 30 poems from my diss, package them with these essays, and send this manuscript out to publishers by Halloween (!); and d) that I begin the research to write a collaborative paper with her about Tech Comm. I came out of the meeting ready to slit my wrists.

More than that, she said that while it's quite obvious that several people in the department would LOVE to keep me on as an advisor, that this is a "safe" job, and it's about time I spread my wings and leave the nest. That I should be a teacher, since that's where my heart is.

And what I said to her is that I don't know where my heart is. I'm not sure what I want to be "when I grow up." And what I didn't feel like I could admit is how absolutely little faith I have in myself. And why should I? I don't write. In some ways, I think going on the job market would be a waste of time because I really don't think that I would be an asset to any program. No matter how you package my C.V., there's just not anything there. Certainly not anything that would get me hired.

Of course, if I do all the work Guru wants (and as an aside, let me mention that a First Year came to me about writing a collaborative paper in Tech Comm about video games which I agreed to do way before this onslought of work Guru has piled on me), maybe I could get a job somewhere. I mean, there were quite a few creative writing jobs on the MLA list... but where would that leave me with Boyfriend?

If it's not one thing, it's six.