Spring semester: day seventy-five
Today is the last day I have to teach my classes for the semester. I am collecting their papers, giving them their practice exam, and bidding them farewell. And so will end my second semester of teaching Science and Engineering English 102.
I love teaching that class, as I told my bosslady. There's no class I would rather teach. It's so fun. In the fall (provided I end up teaching it again; right now, I'm not sure if I'll get to), we even have a new edition of the book to use, so I'll get to explore a newer version of the text. Also, if I continue teaching it in the fall, it will be the first class I've taught for more than two semesters in a row. I'd be perfectly fine with that.
Of course, I still don't know if I'm teaching it in the fall; if I'm lucky, I may end up teaching online sections of 101 or 102. It depends on how the dice rolls. Regardless, I would imagine I'll find out one way or the other this coming week.
In other news, the massive 681 project is finally finished. I finished it about 24 hours ago. My actual written part of it clocks in at a whopping 47 pages, with about ten pages' worth of extra handouts included in it as well, bringing the total between 55 and 60. It is absolutely nuts. I know I waaaaaay overachieved on it, but I didn't want to create half a lesson plan, or half a set of handouts and quizzes. It would've seemed oddly unfinished. And, after all, my professor didn't give an upper page limit. So, let's see how he likes it. I'm printing out a copy of it this morning and turning it in to him so that if I need to, I can revise it.
In other news, Lady is not only feeling better, but she will be coming in this weekend. It will be our last weekend to spend time together at my place before she goes home for the summer to work her summer job. Next weekend, I will venture across the state line to see her "graduation" from her college and meet her mother and aunt, which should be fun as well. It's sort of frustrating to know that we'll have to spend so much time apart over the summer, but neither of us are thinking about that right now -- in fact, we've both been actively avoiding talking about it. Lady does not yet know where she will be when fall comes, in regards to schooling or living situations. She's currently waiting to hear back from a number of schools and opportunities, but there is certainly the very distinct possibility that she and I will be physically apart (aside from visits, of course) for the next year of our relationship after this summer -- until I graduate from Flat State University and get the hell out of Kansas. Mind you, neither of us want this, but it all comes down to circumstance. I'm locked here for better or worse until this time next year, finishing my MFA program. Graduate school credits don't exactly transfer from one institution to another like undergraduate credits do, so for the next year I'm more or less stuck here regardless of what happens. This is the other reason I was hoping to get the online teaching gig -- if I have to leave town for a few days at some point for visits, at least I can teach my classes from wherever I am as long as I have access to a computer. Next spring this would be even more important as I would imagine I'll be interviewing at several places on the opposite side of the country, providing (of course) that I can afford to fly to these places for said interviews. I also plan to attend AWP in Boston next spring, as well, if money allows me to do so.
Now that I'm rushing headlong into the abyss that is not only summer vacation but my third and final year of graduate school in the fall, I've come to realize that I have a lot of stuff to do, and a lot of stuff planned that I must make happen, including a few very, very large things. I'm going to try to get a jump-start on all of my work over the course of the summer, in-between teaching my classes and writing my thesis, but I have a long long way to go. For example, I've basically given up on spending money to fix up the car -- I'll eventually get the oil changed, of course, and I'll probably put new tires on it, but as for any other major repairs? I won't have the spare money to make them. Ever. Everever. I'll probably end up selling it within this next year in order to get a more reliable, more expensive vehicle that will be able to take me back across the country when I graduate. As much as I love my Monte Carlo, and as much as she will always be the first car I could totally call mine, name-on-the-title-and-paid-for, she sucks gas like crazy and has 222,000 miles on her. I can't depend on her forever, and I certainly can't expect her to make a 2,000-mile trip across the country back to the east coast. What I need is a small, fuel-efficient SUV or a Subaru wagon like Andrea has, even if I have to spend about two or three months' worth of paychecks on it. I won't have much of a choice once next May rolls around -- I don't have any family out here to help me move things; what won't fit in whatever vehicle I have at that time will more than likely have to get trashed, donated, or quickly sold.
No, that doesn't include the cats.
Some other interesting things have been happening lately as well, though they've all been small things. For one, my sleep cycles are regulated now -- they're just regulated in the opposite direction. Due to my constant, crazed work on my 681 project, I've gotten into the habit of staying up until 9 or 10AM, and then sleeping until 6PM or so. During the rest of this semester, this would've been a problem. Now that the semester is over (for the most part) it doesn't really affect me as much. I got up last night at 6PM, and I will teach this morning, go to a doctor's appointment this afternoon, and then come home and go back to bed until tomorrow. Tomorrow (Wednesday) I'm on campus for a few hours in the morning and into the afternoon, and then I am off until Monday (when I give my students their final exam). In the interim, I'll be grading my students' papers and spending time with Lady this weekend, but not doing much else, so time to sleep is indeed pretty flexible at this point. This is fine. I have coffee. I also have two days of downtime to get some rest before Lady arrives.
Tonight, as storms rolled through, my internet went out twice -- once around 11PM and again around 3AM. It was out for over an hour each time. This wasn't really a problem, as there wasn't really much to do anyhow, but it did stop me from being able to talk to Lady for a few hours, until at some point I assume she eventually went to bed. I called to report the outage the first time, and I got a guy on the phone who sounded like he'd been sleeping at his desk. He told me he'd check out the problem and then call me back...and then never did. In the meanwhile it came back on and then went out once more before sticking on for good (currently, anyway). Weird. Usually the cable internet people are totally on the ball when something happens and I call for service. Now watch the guy finally call back when I'm in the middle of teaching class this morning, or something. It wouldn't surprise me.
As I've finished all of my coursework for the semester now, I'm in a bit of what some may perceive as a "lull," at least until I get my students' papers today. With the completion of my 681 project, and my last formal classes meeting last week, I have nothing else to do but grade and give the final before I can call myself done. It's a really weird feeling. I'm not used to having nothing to do -- and instead of a sense of freedom sweeping over me, there's just this sense of...boredom. Of nothing. And it's coupled with an immense desire to just go to bed for a week. That, at least, I will probably accomplish after I give the final exam on Monday, while Lady is taking her own exams next week (however many she has; I believe she has two).
I've paid all of my bills except my electric bill (not due for another three weeks), and I've gone to get groceries that will last me for a good two weeks or so, hopefully. After the semester's over, after I go to Lady's graduation and return home, I am going to do my best to hunker down for a while. I won't have any major expenses, not even gas, until I begin teaching this summer at the end of May. Aside from going to see The Avengers (because, believe me, I'm not fucking missing that) at some point, I'm barely even planning to leave the house if I can avoid it -- especially if it starts getting really hot outside really quickly. The temperature nearly hit 100 last week on one or two days, and it wasn't even May yet. Even with the vast expanse of summer ahead of me, though, I'm only looking forward to the good things in the short term -- I'm excited to see Lady this weekend first and foremost. I haven't seen her in two weeks, and her visit last time was cut short by the tornadoes that hit the region that weekend, prompting her to leave early to miss the weather. Unfortunately, Lady's arrival on Friday means that I'll miss the "end of the year" grad student party, during which everyone sends off the graduating MFA class. Last year it wasn't a formal event and was more or less a "let's go to Rae and Jay's apartment" sort of thing, but this year it's quite well-organized and sort of upscale. If Lady were arriving on Thursday night instead of Friday, we'd probably go together so that she could meet my friends from the department. However, with her coming in at the same time the party's happening, that's not really an option. Rae texted me over the weekend to ask "So when do Jay and I get to meet [Lady]?" or something to that effect, and the sad part is that I really don't have an answer for her -- it'll more than likely be in the fall if they do get to meet her, but then again the possibility is also "never," depending on where Lady ends up going to school in the fall.
I'm beginning to wonder if people think I've just made Lady up, or that she's just a figment of my imagination. No, I haven't, of course, and she's not. Duh. There are, after all, pictures of her on my Facebook, and she even took my profile picture with her phone. We're just private people, and we keep our relationship private as well. As I've mentioned here before, it's nobody's business but ours what we do and when we do it, etc. That doesn't mean I don't want her to meet my friends or that she doesn't want to -- in fact, the exact opposite is true -- it's just that it never happens. Believe me -- Andrea, Shainna, and both of my parents can vouch that the girl is indeed real.
Speaking of my parents, I asked my mother whether or not she would want me to fly back out there over the course of this next month or so at some point for another visit, preferably with Lady as well. There's a small window of available days I could do it, from about May 20 to 27, and from May 29th to June 10 or so. Lady starts her summer job back home in the middle of June or so, but as she'll visit her aunt beforehand in the interim she'll have access to the Prius to drive up for a few days again. For me, it's about the only time I'll have this summer that's completely free and unencumbered by needing to be here every Tuesday night to teach my summer English 102 class, and if I'm going to visit my parents again I want to do it when Lady is available to visit them as well, especially since my parents adore her as much as I do. I haven't heard back from Mom yet, though I would imagine I will either today or tomorrow. Besides, it would probably be best to do it before the summer gets incredibly, crazily hot out here in the midwest, as well as back home.
So that's pretty much all that's going on right now. Coming up? Grading and lots of it, followed by sleep and lots of it, followed by Lady, followed by my students' final exam.
Hooray, this long and ponderous semester is almost over.
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