Last Day of Lecture

Tomorrow is my last day of teaching for the 2008-09 year. And did I say "hallelujah," yet? I've got a handful of great students in my intro to cultural anth class--one of whom just came to my office hours on Tuesday, praised my teaching (now why didn't I do evals in THAT class?), told me how I just got her mind whirring, and added anth as a major (doubling in film studies). So yes, there are a few people in that oversize lecture class that I'll miss. My other course, the new prep, I will truly miss. Some bright and outspoken sorts, and some very quiet and contemplative excellent thinkers and synthesizers. And some who are just biding time, but I don't think there is a bad egg in there (although several went AWOL early on because they basically could not keep up with the work due to family issues or personal discipline). We've read five ethnographies and about 15 journal articles. In 2014, I'll get an email from one or two of them telling me how much they learned, despite the reading load (this happens every now and then). But right now? We are all just ready for summer to be here. Today, I baked two pans of brownies, a loaf of blueberry orange cake, bought strawberries and watermelon, and packed it all up for tomorrow. They did evaluations last week, so the day is all clear for celebrating our collective hard work (after they take their final reading quiz). I got ONE personal thing accomplished today (re-organizing my jewelry which has been strewn from drawer to table top to desk), but the entire rest of the day has been dedicated to reading, writing the 11th (and final) reading quiz, fine-tuning their take-home essay, developing a rubric for scoring it (both are now uploaded to the course website), and prepping the final for my intro course. Oh, and dealing with something related to the college committee I chaired up until the last official meeting at which point I convinced MGC to take his turn. Unopposed, we voted him in before he got a chance to really think about whether or not he wanted to drink the koolaid. Well, all I really care about is that I am free at last. Two years of ripping my hair out is over. Or almost, as a series of email exchanges today has proven. I would not have believed I'd get this inquiry/submission today (a month after the deadline), so maybe I'd better bite my tongue--but SURELY no one else will be submitting stuff between now and the end of finals week. We can do nothing with it people, the deadlines have passed. Come and gone. In addition to handing that committee chairmanship off, on Monday I also cut the cord on another commitment/relationship (a museum volunteer) who has been the source of g.r.e.a.t frustration for me. Gah. More to write. But not tonight. I need sleep.