Wow.

It had been almost a month when I wrote all them questions! Anyway, here is where we are...

We should be closing on our house any day now. I have to start teaching again, so I would like to get settled, but I am sure we won't be moving until after labor day. The mortgage guy is talking with the bank today, and the seller is getting an affidavit from one of the neighbors acknowledging that their fence is on our property. What a way to make friends with the new neighbors. Doesn't matter, tho. We aren't going to make them take it down.

I am starting to dread teaching. I wasn't, but I am. Before I started this grad school thing I had been teaching (mostly) freshmen for several years, and I was ready to run far far away in order to make a change. Now I only have to teach a couple of classes a year, instead of 10-15, and that is pretty nice. But I still kind of hate it sometimes, and particularly now that it involves leaving my baby at home.

You might ask, why go to PhD school if you hate teaching, and that is a fair question--for an idiot. Ahem, kidding. First of all, the love of teaching is probably the worst reason to go to graduate school. (Go be a middle school teacher if you 'love teaching' because college kids will make you hate it right quick). You go to be a scholar--for a living, unlike armchair scholarship, it doesn't involve much TV or internet research--and because you are good at teaching, maybe, which I am. Also, the intro-level classes that they make you teach as an adjunct and during grad school are not in your favorite aspect of the field, they are not in your student's subject area, and they are no fun for anybody unless you try really, really hard to make them fun, and even then you probably won't succeed. I will blog in more detail about how this works when the studenten make their appearance in about two weeks. IN the mean time, check out the blog Rateyourstudents if you want to see what undergraduate teaching is really all about.

So, I have to teach. Blahh. Okay. I will do it, and I will do it well. I hope. As far as everything else, my advisor is annoying the crap out of me and wants to talk to me about everything except my work. I have a paper that is three days late and three quarters written, and major issues surrounding in-laws. (They don't have issues with me but I am involved and trying to support). Also, in case you have not heard WE NEED TO MOVE. NOW, before we are taken over by our stuff.

Oh no, the giant baby (21 pounds!) is awake.