Things seem like they let up, but they don't really let up.
I thought yesterday was good. I went to the farmer's market here in the morning (amazing produce), then met a student that requested an appointment, got an email saying 'hey I think the class you teach is my favorite so far' (their assignment was to email me from their preferred email account and most didn't bother with content in the email) and even the sweet potato fries I set off the smoke alarm making didn't turn out too bad.
But today. Today is and was long. I spent the whole morning prepping for the class I taught in the afternoon (and yes teaching, since I do not know what I am doing, is taking over my life) and then the class started to go more like a college class. I am watching them physically zone out and fall asleep. Now, if that's how you wanna spend your money then sleep through my class. I do not have enough sympathy to wake you up and I will not have sympathy on your grade when you botch shit up later. But it affects my psyche. I go faster. I fly through things for fear of losing the ones who are still awake and I might just be losing them in my haste.
The good news is that there is an "oh my god what the fuck am I doing" get together scheduled for tomorrow and led by a grad assistant who's sole job assisting with the 65 sections of this class being taught on campus right now.
Individually the students are great. They come up to me and ask really pointed questions and they have good ideas. But I think the group mentality makes them dumber. But that's true of all groups/mobs.
Then the migraine settled in. I haven't had a headache like that for four years.
And, delightfully enough, between the migraine, class prep and sweet potatoes, I have about 70 unread pages of stuff for my teaching methods class tomorrow. Boo.
And I missed Project Runway. Double boo. (Don't tell me who goes home, I'm hunting for the rerun time.)
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To answer a question from the comments section previously: the writing workshop has one other person in her first year of her MFA, one in her second, and a bunch on their third, in addition to the four or so PhD candidates. I think the fact that the people who have been there the longest are the most vocal is skewing my perception. And while that is a logical conclusion it doesn't make me feel better.
Aquarius: I will not mess with my hair anymore. Although everyone should read Rebecca McClanahan's lovely essay "Loving Bald Men."
