Keep Your Hands to Yourself!

I know this is a petty issue, but would the new GTAs please keep your damned hands off of my thumbtacks on my corkboard? Honestly, the bookstore is just down the street. Go buy your own. The tacks did NOT come standard issue with the corkboard. So you should NOT feel free to simply grab one of mine when you think you need one.

This isn't the first time I've had a malfunction with one or more of the new crew. I hope we weren't that obnoxious when we were coming through. (I know a few of us were, but in general, I hope we didn't present ourselves like these people.) Gossip around the water cooler is that many people think they're a bunch of brats. I want to say that I'm sure they thought the same way of us, but I don't think that's true. We talked to the profs, we got to know the other grad students really quickly, we didn't act like the copy room was our personal (messy) living room, and we didn't expect other people to pick up after us. Most of us don't really know the new GTAs at all, and the impression they're giving doesn't make us care. I've met a grand total of one of them, and he's OK with me. But he also seems to be a little older than the rest of them. If you interrupt their social circle, you know, by trying to get to the printer, or something, they give you a rather dismissive look, barely move and keep on talking. Next time, I'll jab one rather hard in the rib cage.

Their antics have even pissed off our Dear Leader at this point. This is part of an email that circulated yesterday on the listserv: "One of you, however, seemed to mis-remember the rules on Thursday regarding the computer classrooms on the ground floor. Someone entered a classroom in which another instructor was still conferencing with students and used the classroom to print out materials--identifying herself only as a "GTA and I have something to print." Har. Apparently, being a GTA confers some special privilege I was unaware of.

My earliest impression of them came when I was switching out offices. I'd been moved to something nicer, and I had moved all of my stuff over except my Safe Zone flyer. The Safe Zone flyer is something we put up if you've been through the training on sensitivity to students who are coming into college as either out (or not) gay students, bi, transgender, etc. It's more or less a show of solidarity that we expect tolerance for people who aren't straight, and that people who aren't straight have a safe place to go if they need it. Anyway, I went and took my Safe Zone paper out of the old display and put it into my new display by my new office (which also has our names on it). Thirty minutes later, after making copies and running errands, I went back to my new office--and the sticker was gone. I don't know what made me think of them first, but I went back to the old office, and sure enough, someone had swiped it out of my new spot and stuck it back in the old one. I guess they wanted to keep it, maybe they thought it went with the office, I don't know what. But it pissed me the hell off.

I know it's just a piece of paper. But it's MINE, and I sat through a training for it. So, I turned on my heel and marched back forcefully, ripped it out of the old place--their door was open, and I think about five of them were in there--and with as much professional hate as I could, I said, "Hmph!" And marched back to my office. It stayed put.

Graduate school, my ass. Some of these folks need to go back to kindergarten and figure out how not to take people's things and to keep their hands to themselves.

-- Virgil

I'm Mad as Hell, But What Can You Do?

OK, I'm pissed. I'm finally at the point as an activist where I feel like education, voting the "right" way, and the occasional visible protest are not enough. Even meeting the representatives and bitching to them is not enough. Obviously they are not enough, because we are still in the middle of a shit storm. At this point, I'm going back to the tried and true method of complaining via boycott of products and pointed letters. This is phase one of a multiphasic plan in which I get angrier and angrier until someone fucking listens. That usually tends to work, but I haven't tried it on a national scale as yet.

The first company to hear from me will be Taco Bell. A sad, sad loss to me personally, but this time of trial calls for sacrifices. I am also going to write letters to my local businesses that advertise during the Rush & Sean Hannity hour on our local talk radio program. I haven't crafted that one yet. Here's what I have so far.

Emil J. Brolick, President
Taco Bell
17901 Von Karman Ave
Irvine, CA 92614-6253
TEL: (949) 863-4500
FAX: (949) 863-409

Dear Mr. Brolick

I am writing to inform you that although it will be painful for me as a consumer, I will not purchase your products as long as you advertise on FOX News. I recently discovered that you are running your advertisements on this hurtful channel. Have you ever watched the "information" that is presented on those shows? It is absolutely shameful, full of misinformation and false labeling. I am so fed up with the way things are in our country, and FOX News is part of the problem. It gives people the impression that sloganism is OK and that tolerance is a dirty word. I have seen enough of the way things are going in this country, and it needs to change. Politicians need to change, the media needs to be more responsible, and our businesses need to consider the ethics of what they support.

FOX News does not broadcast news, it broadcasts propaganda.

If you want my business, you need to advertise in media that isn't so hurtful to Americans. One of your hot sauce packets says "Money talks." That's the truth, and you can make a huge statement to FOX News by pulling your advertising dollars away from them. I know that you need to make money by advertising, but please consider the money that you would be losing if more people like me, who are big supporters of your food, become as disgruntled as I am and start to boycott your products. I am a huge fan of Taco Bell--it is my favorite fast food restaurant. I particularly like the 7-Layer Burrito--I usually order two of them with extra hot sauce and a big Pepsi. Whenever I eat fast food, I eat Taco Bell. I love it. So, it will be a personal and sad loss for me to boycott your products. But I simply cannot continue to support you if you are willing to support something that is so damaging to our national intellect. I don't know what else to do. Please send FOX News the message that you are an ethical and responsible company and that you think about what you pour your money into.

Please end this quickly. I really want to get back to ordering 7-Layer Burritos again. Thank you.

-- Virgil

Words--We Wield Them

So, I had my first department meeting this past Friday. o_O Holy crap. I'm sure most departmental meetings are similar in terms of making sure you're seen and heard by the right people. But I doubt any of the rest of them take such a keen interest in words as we do. Considering that the purpose of the meeting was do discuss the changes to the evaluation criteria, most people had lots to say.

I knew we were in trouble from the beginning when our Dear Leader opened up with, "Well, can I just say that on page X line X, ...well, what does the rest of the group think about the insertion of the word 'or' there?" Therein followed a short and lively debate on whether "or" was needed or not, which was eventually settled by determining we needed "and/or," which was pronounced "and slash or" for about five minutes or more. The amount of time that took for a word that spans two whole letters really seemed to set the tone.

I'm also continually amazed at what low self-esteem people have when speaking. These are professional people with advanced degrees, all most certainly making more money than I do and having achieved some measure of recognition in their field (some having achieved a LOT of recognition in their field). And yet, I continued to hear, "Well, my opinion is worthless, but..." or "I'm sure this will be of no value whatsoever to the discussion, but..." or even worse, "I'm going to ask a really ignorant question here, because I'm generally dumb..."! I guess even at the upper echelons of achievement people never really get over thinking that everyone else is smarter than they are. Maybe we need a self esteem workshop (or brown bag session).

Perhaps one of the most disturbing things I've noticed is the tendency to preface questions with superflous explanation. Saturday Night Live has rightly picked up on this tendency and mocked it, but I don't know how to search for it on YouTube, or I'd post an example. SNL has a guy who looks vaguely hippy-ish come out with a stack of newspapers to talk to us about his opinion on the events of our time. He'll read a headline, like "Wall Street Posts Record Losses," and then he goes into his commentary, which runs something like this: "Here's a good one: 'Wall Street Posts Record Losses.' See, just...just no, because in order to really understand...I mean, if you consider all the history that went into...look, what you're failing to consider is the methodology...because if you don't take into account the considerable, I mean, really it all boils down to the fact that...in fact, it may be THE most important fact, unless of course you count....but of course you couldn't count that before you considered, but anyway, ..." And on and on he goes, never really saying anything at all.

We seemed to have our own version of this going on at the meeting. "I think we really all have to step back and consider...I mean, just coming from my own personal experience, and granted that's been at several different universities...but really the criteria hasn't really... what I mean to say is that the language...or perhaps if you prefer, the guidelines...because before we can really debate that, we need to understand several....I mean, there are relationships we have to account for that delve further back than..."

and on and on and on. Word up.

-- Virgil

RRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!

OK, I'm absolutely at the brink of destruction with a few numbnuts in one section of my English class. I have an openly gay student there. The kind of openly gay student who has a particular kind of tone to his voice. He was a cheerleader in high school (which doesn't automatically make him gay, no, but it feeds into the stereotype some idiot 18 year olds have). He wrote his first paper on the murder of a gay man in his community. He is out, and it is obvious. He's not flashy, or anything. He's just...himself.

Apparently, there are a few students in my class who don't quite know what to make of this. Whenever he answers in class, they have the tee-hee section going on. It's subtle. They smirk at each other when he talks. I caught the ring leader doing a limp wrist motion to his other followers, which sent them into giggles. The first day of class when we played two truths and a lie (where you tell people two true things about yourself and one lie and they have to guess which one is the lie), one of his statements was that he was a cheerleader in high school. When a student asked him if it was the truth, one of the girls said, "What, you think he's a fairy?" I didn't catch it right away--at least, I thought I hadn't heard right, otherwise, I would've tossed her out of class on her ass that instant.

This makes me so incredibly pissed off. El Hijo pointed out that at their age, they might not have encountered an out gay person before, and they're not sure how to react. Which is true. It still makes me want to shake the hell out of the three or four who are responsible and say, "Good God, would you grow up? So the man is gay? So fucking what?" What business is it of theirs, anyway? It's all so fourth grade. I think if I have to say something to them as a group, I will simply say, "Yes, the man is gay. What, exactly, is your problem?"

I debated at first whether to ignore it or not--maybe I shouldn't even dignify it with a response. But then I realized what really pissed me off about it, and that's the atmosphere that such behavior creates. Don't they realize he can probably hear them and see them? It creates a hostile environment for him, and that simply isn't fair. They can be idiots in their own heads, if they want to, but they can't create an environment that makes it unfriendly for certain students to state simple opinions just because of the tone in which it will be received. That is most certainly not their right.

When I first noticed the giggling, I managed to catch it in progress and shoot the main offender the dirtiest look I could manage. That stopped it for a while. A little later, the limp wrist thing happened. When it did, I pulled the perp aside as he was leaving class, and I told him that he was never to do that sort of thing in class again. He acted at first like he had no idea what I was talking about, but when I raised one eyebrow and said, "Don't bullshit me, this is serious," he copped to it and said he would stop. It did for a little while, but now some of the giggling is back. I'm thinking about keeping the whole crew after class and giving them a pungent little lecture on what happens to people who create problematic environments for other people. Or, I'll simply target the leader like the Spanish did the Aztec warrior chiefs with obvious headgear and axe him on the spot.

But this has *got* to stop. It's ridiculous and it's infuriating.

-- Virgil

Why the Future Will Continue to be Screwed

I'm grading around 60 resumes right now, give or take. JP and Batmite, stop snickering.

This is miserable work, because the resumes have been done by freshman, and there are many things wrong with nearly every single one. Besides, there is only so many times you want to read "Fry Cook" before you scream for mercy. On top of that, in an attempt to make the assignment more "meaningful" I had them write a one page reflection about their major and why they chose it. Effectively doubling my workload. Now it doesn't seem like such a smart idea. Actually, it was a very smart idea, but the slogging through the grading process is quite painful. In spite of the abundant templates and examples all over the internet, every single one of them still managed to fuck it up. I chalk that up to the fact that this project is in three phases, with the final grade coming at the end; so they know they have time to fix it up.

While the complete slackers simply haven't turned in the project at all, the ones who are on a slightly less sluggish level above that essentially turned in a resume that was template only. They managed to get their names in the corner, but everything else basically says "Your information goes here," only it isn't there. One particularly asshole-ish student did his work experience in Latin. Babelfish translated Latin, too, not correctly translated Latin. He describes his objective in getting a job as "I'm an unbelievably handsome young man wiht a quick wit and wonderful sense of humor. On the weekends I enjoy long walks on the beach followed by strong drink with close friends. Basically, I am awesome." Quote. I so beg to differ. I wrote as a response a question as to what, exactly, he hoped to gain by his unprofessional behavior besides wasting my time and wrecking his grade. It ought to put some starch in his shorts. The uni 101 class is a joke, but it isn't that much of a joke. Especially if I'm slogging through 60 similar jokes.

But there are less subtle double-takes I've having from these wretched pieces of paper that only come from the knowledge I have as their prof. It's the sort of insight you gain from watching the student's behavior in class, their response to doing their work, their personality, how they interact with their peers--all that stuff that a poor prospective employer couldn't possibly know from that piece of paper alone. For example...

I just threw up in my mouth a little when I realized from Sullen Susan's Objective statement that she is a Secondary Education major. This is the same girl who refuses to do anything but the absolute bare minimum and rolls her eyes when she thinks I can't see her. She's more interested in her personal planner than in her assignments (and it is NOT because I am boring). She packs up her stuff before class is over, and she snickers every time the gay student answers a question in class. (She's actually on the brink of getting a very stern talking-to about it--her other cohort has already gotten the warning.). She'll make a great molder of young minds. Not to mention her writing is atrocious. She did play the kicker for her high school football team, though. Maybe she could teach P.E. Jeezus Krist.

One student reports he simply cannot wait to start putting people in prison.

Ye gods.

-- Virgil

An Academic Ramble

There's a reason why I have an Economics degree instead of a Finance degree.

Recent events in the financial sector create yet another layer of worry in tandem with the credit crunch. I'm referring to the fact that Lehman Brothers had to file for bankruptcy, causing other stocks to fall, and that Merrill Lynch has been taken over by Bank of America. Thousands of people are losing their homes because they can't afford to pay their mortgages, which is old news by now, as in our short national attention span it seems as though it has been going on forever. In times like these, it makes me want to call my Finance profs and simply say, "Mind answering my questions now?"

When I was an undergraduate, I entered the business school as a Finance major. It was more hands on than the other options. I basically wanted to be Suze Orman, who started off as a personal financial consultant helping people figure out their hang ups with money, what they really wanted out of life, and how much it would cost to get there. I had an internship set up withe Prudential before I abandoned Finance for Economics. And the main reason I abandoned it was because of the attitude of the profs teaching the subject.

I remember them going over the basic concept of the "utility curve"--it's a sort of a crescent diagram on an axis that is supposed to demonstrate consumer preference when spending their incomes. Let's say the vertical line is "food" and the horizontal line is "clothing". People can then be tracked on that crescent curve depending on how much more they value food over clothing--it's supposed to be a basic model for how people distribute their income among various wants and needs. But even then--and this was pre-Worldcom scandal--it just never felt "true." I remember saying that model couldn't possibly be a basic representation of what people do, because that's not how people behave. They take their income and spend it on food, and then they take their credit card and buy the clothes anyway. The basic response was, so what, everything else is based on this model, so if you don't use it, you can't work any of the rest of this stuff.

Another big gap I had in trying to study Finance was the cognitive dissonance you were supposed to apply when figuring out how to value a company. There are mathematical formulas you can apply to a company's earnings and costs to determine whether they represent a good stock buy or not, whether to loan them money or buy their bonds, whether they're risky or safe, blah, blah, blah. It's all in the math. But the math is based solely on the numbers that they provide. I got a giant lecture mid-class one day about how we should always assume the company was being truthful--it was the assumed default position. It's not like I think all businesses are by default crooked. But the basic tenet of finance is that businesses are in business to maximize profit. Not to behave ethically. At times I'm sure both things happen. But there are plenty of times when it doesn't. There are also other extraneous factors that just don't figure into the known equations. I tried to argue that the thing that makes, say, a mutual fund more successful than not was the manager who was hired to run the fund. If he had a good performance record, chances were even better that this one would, too. That is a provable fact. He was just as important (or maybe more so) than the calculation. How did the manager fit into the math? The answer is, he doesn't. And so you get things like Worldcom.

I had just switched over from Finance to Economics (and was having a much better time) when the Worldcom thing really blew up. I felt like calling up one particular Finance prof and simply saying, "I told you so." Granted, one bad company does not a pack of crooks make. But it does mean the formulas we use to calculate what's safe and not need to be reconfigured. Quite frankly, a hell of a lot more social science and philosophy needs to configure into subjects like Finance. In Econ, I got to study things like poverty and welfare, labor economics and stuff like that--where the data was applied to beliefs about the way people function, and those theories were evaluated. Being in Finance made me feel like a cog in a preprogrammed wheel. I'm glad I got out when I did. I even continued to encounter that sort of blind faith in the system attitude in my work life. Sitting through one benefits session just out of college on a government contract job, the financial rep was there explaining retirement programs and all that jazz. His company had just been in the news for having major financial improprieties back in 2003. I don't remember the name of this particular institution now, but it would be equivalent of saying "Merrill Lynch." I asked him during the Q&A about the article I'd just read about it and how that would possibly impact our investments. He got red faced, angry and without going into specifics just kept saying "That would never happen."

I'm not surprised that any of this is happening. Part of the problem stems from people taking on more house than they could afford and being unwilling to save money and work for things. Part of it is from predatory lending companies who made loans to people they knew would default three months later because a regular bank wouldn't touch them with a ten foot pole and who didn't bother to explain the fine print or even left the fine print out of the contract. Some of the blame goes to huge and supposedly safe and intelligent financial companies who bought up bundles of these shoddy mortgages because they used the out of date theory that 90% of people pay their mortgages on time--without admitting that model was based on people who had standard mortgages with good credit scores from reliable banks instead of fly-by-night lending companies who issued ARM or interest only mortgages based on lower qualifications. And part of the blame is on the people who promote blind acceptance of the way the financial markets are supposed to work--instead of explaining and exposing how they really work.

Know who agrees with me? Suze Orman.




Good job, finance companies.

-- Virgil

Next Time I'll Google It

El Hijo and I were recently invited to attend an Iftar by my Turkish friend Z. If you follow the Wiki link, you'll see that Iftar is the meal after sundown when Muslims have been fasting during Ramadan, which Z is right in the middle of right now. I knew that there would be food, and that it would be Turkish food, since Z and her friend did all the cooking. So, lured in with food and the promise of a cultural exchange, El Hijo and I picked up her husband M and drove to the mosque for our first Iftar.

I should mention that before we went, I quizzed Z up and down about whether I had to a) wear a dress or b) wear a headscarf. I was opposed to both, and her English isn't advanced enough yet for us to discuss the concept of Kentucky Derby dresses. As far as the headscarf thing goes, no. Just no. I personally consider forcing headscarves on visitors to be disrespectful to both parties--I'm not a believer, and me putting one on is just a pretense anyway, which I would assume Allah would also find offensive--but another time, another place for that discussion. After figuring out that I could go in pants, and I didn't have to hood up, we decided to go. Turns out I should've been asking different questions. Next time, I'll know to Google it.

We arrived amid blowing wind and stormy weather. El Hijo joked that Allah was expressing his displeasure at me for invading his space. Probably true. I always check the roofs of churches when I walk in them to make sure they're not going to come crashing down. I seem to remember El Hijo and I glancing at each other and one of us muttering, "Once more unto the breach, dear friends." We stepped into the first floor, which was a community room. We did attract a little attention, but mainly because we were a tad whiter than most of the people there, and I had no headscarf or matching outfit. Immediately, M shunts me toward this staircase, saying Z is upstairs. I start up the staircase, and he shut the door behind me. El Hijo and I were segregated the rest of the time.

I went upstairs after taking my shoes off, and there were less than a dozen women there, including me and Z, which I thought was unusual, given that there had to be at least 50 men or more downstairs. Most of the women were veiled, at least partially, and there was a lot of variation in the styles, which were quite beautiful. Most of the women were from Pakistan, with about three Turks and a couple of American women whose parents immigrated here from Afghanistan. The Afghanistan women were incredibly beautiful. The women were cordial with me, although a few warmed up to me later and were much more chatty. There were also three kids with us. The staircase led to a big balcony with a high ledge. We sat around. I assumed we would all end up eating together later. Not so. When the call for breaking the fast came, we had our own table with chairs and food. The men ate downstairs.

At some point, the imam (or whatever he is called--their preacher dude) began the call to prayer, the one that seems to start "Allaaaaaah-ooo-Ahhkbaaaar"--that beautiful, melodic, haunting Arabic song, which I find gorgeous even if it disturbs me how people respond to it. Z sat with me, because apparently if you're on your period, you can't pray--Allah doesn't like bloody prayers. It was the first of many fascinating things I noticed. The men at this point were in the chapel area while the man was calling the prayer. They cupped their hands around their ears like it helped them listen better, or something. El Hijo was under the balcony against the wall in a chair. I know, because I was leaning over the ledge to see what was going on. Probably a no-no. The women in the balcony had their hands folded over their chests. They could not see the man calling the prayer--they simply stared straight ahead. This was one of my first problems. Why don't the women get to look at the imam? Oh well, not my religion. There were supposed to be three specific prayers/worshipping/whatever during this prayer call. At each of the three prayers, the women hit the dirt and did the full prostrating, head to the floor thing. This included a woman who was extremely pregnant and was due to deliver in three days. Somehow she managed, while on her knees, to put her head all the way down to the floor. I was impressed. Z told me later that she didn't have to do that, because pregnant women were exempt from that because it could potentially be bad for the baby (they're also exempt from fasting during Ramadan). When she hit the floor like that, I visibly winced. It seemed like a really bad idea.

During the time the imam was calling prayer, one of the children was running around like a Viking beserker the whole time. She was two years old, and she seemed to have her own version of worshipping Allah, which I thought was fantastic. When the imam was calling the prayer, she twirled around in circles as fast as she could--spinning for Allah. She did this the whole time until he said whatever magic words he said to make people hit the dirt. When that happened, she took a backwards dive and laid completely flat on her back on the floor. Playing 'possum for Allah. After several rounds of that, she simply got so excited at the call of "Allahu-akbar" by the third time, that she planted her toddler feet on the ground, spread apart, and opened her arms as wide as they would go, threw her two year old head back, and squalled at the top of her lungs: "AAAAAAALLLLLLLLLLLLLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!"

I'm sure the men's faces below reflected the expression the women had during that expression of excitement. I bit my lip as hard as I could to keep from laughing. It was one of the funniest things I've ever seen. After the prayer and the food, we left, taking Z and M back to their home. El Hijo and I then laughed our way home, comparing notes. Apparently he had screwed up some poor Uzbeki man's prayer by accidentally walking in front of him while he was kowtowing to Allah. Apparently the man has to have a direct line to Mecca, and El Hijo disrupted that line, sending the prayer ricocheting to only Allah knows where. In the line for the food, the Pakistani man in front of him passed a plate to M, who was behind him, but not to El Hijo. M at least had the good sense to give the plate to El Hijo and take another for himself. El Hijo thinks he is supposed to consider that a slight. The Muslims who were there more or less segregating themselves by country; El Hijo ate with the Turks. Apparently the men also got a couple of extra dishes that the women didn't get. That pissed me off, considering that two women did all the cooking. And speaking of cooking women, the imam didn't once come up to Z and thank her for all her hard work. Z and her friend had been cooking for two days. He didn't bother to thank her. Towards the end, there were a couple of leerers at me, which is really weird, considering they live in America, where most women are unveiled. But there was definitely some unabashed staring going on, which was uncomfortable. I can't help but think if they had more experience interacting with women on a regular basis, they wouldn't be so awestruck with one in person. But maybe I'm just awesome.

I should've figured we'd be separated. It's one of those cultural things you know, but you dont' really think about until you're piecing it together later. But it certainly solidified my choice not to become a Muslim. Why can't the women pray with the men? Why can't they even eat with their husband? Why doesn't Allah want prayers from women who menstruate (he created them that way, anyway). Why can't the fucker in the little white hat thank my friend for working for two days to feed his community?

Not really a place where I'd fit in. Obviously.

-- Virgil

Success = Not Failing

Stumped by that? Me, too.

I've recently gone through a discussion about my expectations in this job, which I'd hoped would make the outcome a little clearer. The way academic jobs get judged is a review process based on a portfolio you turn in of your activities for that year. Usually they're due in August for the year before, and they're broken down based on the percentages of what you were hired in to do. Because our raises are merit based and because they're decided on in the Spring for the next year, I have to turn in my evaluation package by the end of December so they'll have something to judge me on. It's extra work on me, but it's in my best interests to do so, because otherwise I won't get a potential raise for a full year. It was explained to me that I'm 80/20, with 80% being teaching responsibilities and 20% being "service" (which means committee work, basically). So, I don't have research requirements per the Higher Up Dude, in spite of the Midway Dude insinuating otherwise. I could publish, but it wouldn't count in my evaluation. So, while that's something of a load off my mind, it's still a factor for me, because that's how you prove you're better than average, and that's how you nail an even better job. Probably will still be something I have to deal with. Anyhoo.

Once the explanations of what I turn in, when, and what it looks like were out of the way, I decided to broach the topic of how long my job would stick around. On a basic level, I care about this very much. This is the most money I've ever made in my life (which is pathetic, really) and I like my job very much. It's work I want to keep doing and I want to keep making this money + benefits & retirement. But on another level, I don't really care that badly if it goes away--I got the chance to do it, and I wouldn't have done things differently even knowing beforehand that my job would go away 9 months later. My main concern is figuring out what constitutes "success" for this program.

This is an experimental project. The goal, ultimately, is to see if grouping the students from families whose parents have never been to college in the same classrooms with consistent teachers makes a difference in their retention rates. Nobody said from the outset that this was a "five year study" or something helpful like that. No one has given any percentages, like "We would like to see retention increased by 5% after this semester." No one, in fact, can tell me what the measure of success for this project is at all. When I asked point blank about it, I got a response as to what happens with most contract/experimental jobs. I was told at some point, the experiment will obviously be declared over (at what point??), the results will be looked at (what kind of results??), and then it will be determined whether it "worked" or not. If it worked, the job will be regulated into the institution as proof that we need a post like that. If it doesn't work (what does that mean??), we shrug our shoulders and say, "Well, we tried," and the job goes away. No one will come out and tell me straight what any of this means.

But I'm pretty sure he was trying to tell me this: Your measure of success is not failing. Ah, Academia.

What is failing in this situation? I think it means either maintaining the status quo or doing worse. I think it means that if I maintain the status quo, it makes no difference to have this special position. I think it means if I do worse, i.e. molest a student, rip one's head off, poop on my desk, do something to cause people to start dropping out rapidly, I fail and the job goes away. Success basically means just not fucking up.

Unfortunately, fucking up is pretty much something you don't know you've done until it's already happened.

Argh.

-- Virgil

The "Advocate"

I mentioned in the post about my uncle's funeral that many people in my hometown had already seen an article about me and knew that life was going pretty decently for me right now. Well, what I should add about that article was that it never occurred to me to put it in the local rag until Director/Buddy (is she just Buddy now??) suggested it as a retaliatory tactic toward my Mother. I know how petty that sounds. But it honestly has turned out to be so much fun. It's like human chess. You do this, I make that move back. It's snarky, but it isn't destructive. As much as I'd like to be destructive sometimes and watch somebody just flame and burn, I try to restrain myself. Do you know how hard it is to have a social worker personality and the kind of temper I do? You should pity me. Seriously. Anyhoo. Mom made the opening move--I just countered.

You see, she got me a subscription to the local rag, called the "Advocate". That's not its full name, but that's what the locals call it. The only things it advocates are poor grammar and the woefully backward policies of its geriatric publisher, who probably uses it as a tax write off. The man makes McCain look look a whippersnapper. El Hijo and I read the columns aloud for mocking fun purposes. It was in this local rag, which Dante's dad also reads, that she fired her opening volley.

I found out about it when his dad called and started the conversation with: "Yo mom's a piece of work!!" To which I responded, "This is hardly the news of the year. What did she do now?" Turns out she submitted Dante's picture to said rag with the caption of "Dante X is shown playing basketball for X Elementary, where he received an award. He is the grandson of Nana From Hell and The Other Good Grandparents." No mention of actual parents was anywhere to be seen--she'd orphaned him, basically, as she is loathe to be associated with either of us. This being a small town, it was something of a snub. It's not like the people in that town don't already know who his parents are. So, it looks like she is intentionally cold shouldering us, and people were talking about that. His dad found out about it through the grapevine before he even got his paper.

In discussing this with D/B, along the lines of "now guess what she's done," D/B suggested I submit the trifecta to the local rag: the award (with awesome picture w/ Secretary of State), the graduation, and the new job--all with the same treatment, of course. I thought that was the most awesome idea ever. Because it was so petty and so funny. I don't give a crap that people back home know what I've done--I have no intentions of ever moving back there anyway. But it was a sweet little chess move, and I don't have enough scruples to avoid it. So, I submitted it.

Now, it took a while to hit the paper, because they are technological morons. But it finally hit. And it had the same damned effect on the town, if the reaction at the funeral is any indication. And you know what? It felt pretty damned good to toot my own horn, mainly because nobody back home ever does it for me. Back home, the only real "Advocate" you have is yourself. Here's what it said:

Dante's Virgil (pictured right) was recently awarded an Fan-freaking-tastic Award That You Probably Didn't Get for her groundbreaking teaching methods in the college classroom.Virgil taught freshman college writing that stressed writing for and with the community. West Virginia Secretary of State Betty Ireland presented the award. Virgil graduates Land Grant University in August with a Masters degree in English. She has been selected to head a pilot project aimed at increasing retention of college freshmen who are the first in their families to attend a university. Dante's Virgil is the granddaughter of Evil Nana's Parents and the late Better Set of Grandparents. She is a 1995 graduate of Mostly Moronic Local High School (what've you fuckers been doing lately??--that was an added bonus). She currently resides in Someplace Much Better Than Hometown.

Petty? You betcha. Sweet? Totally.

-- DV

Apparently, I'm Not Immune Either

Here's one for the "numbnut" category.

For the past few months, I've been fretting about this spot on my right foot. It looks like an indention around my leg just above the ankle, kind of like when your socks come off at night and they've pressed into your feet. It's not that obvious, but I first noticed it on a day when I wasn't wearing any socks at all. It sparked a "What in the hell is wrong with my foot?!" conversation. This has re-puzzled me every so often when I'm getting dressed and happen to notice it again. "What in the hell is going on?" was still the basic reaction I was having.

Well, I figured out what it was tonight. Call it an epiphany.

It's a fucking crease in my skin. Because I'm aging. It's a "pre-wrinkle."

LOLOL. It's not that I thought I was immune to aging. I get the occasional white hair. I'm still not sure what I'm going to do about that--my position right now is to do nothing unless it comes in like a skunk stripe. Even then, it depends on how it looks. I don't really care about aging. I guess I've just never really thought about it period, or what it really looks like as it's happening.

I'm already used to the crease. I'm sure I have more in other places I'm not used to studying. But it still took me aback. (How many college degrees does it take to figure out what's going on with your body??) I'm just happy I didn't go to a dermatologist demanding to know what the hell was wrong with my foot. I saved myself some embarrassment.

-- Virgil

Go Figure

I'm sure it's completely unrelated, but after the onslaught begins, Navy Buddy calls. I asked several times if someone told him to call me, he claims no. As relieved as I am, I'm almost disappointed, as I was ready to hack into the administration in charge of a fleet of subs tomorrow morning at 0800 sharp. I may do that for shits and giggle now anyway. He checked himself into a hospital and sounds SO much better. I'm so proud of that.

New problem is that apparently his therapist thinks I'm part of the problem. Sigh. Probably true.

That'll probably cause a malfunction when I visit him tomorrow.

-- DV

Virgil vs. USN

Sigh. It always seems as though when my own personal life is coming into balance, the lives of those around me get thrown out of whack. Maybe that's just Life. Sometimes I feel a little guilty about enjoying my own life when the lives of some who are close to me are painful. I get over it, but I still feel that little twinge. My latest dilemma is over Navy Buddy. And dude, I'll take down these posts about you just as soon as you contact me. Okay?

Navy Buddy is having a hell of a time in the Navy. He's fallen victim to the culture of destructive behavior that so often happens to sailors, and it's landed him in hot water. Twice. Because he's so highly trained (and expensive), he's just been getting slaps on the wrist. This last time around, though, he got restricted to the boat. Then he just decided he was finished with the Navy and from what I understand just refused to work anymore. The men in charge of guarding him, because, let's face it, he was basically under house arrest, have been less than helpful, to say the least. They got to decide whether he got to talk to a therapist, and the problem with therapy in the Navy is that information could potentially be used to discharge you instead of help you. As far as I know, his guardians told him they'd "think about" letting him talk to one.

The last I talked with him, he was incredibly bitter about his situation. He was also extremely angry at the people in charge of watching him. He thought they were taunting him and denying him medical access. He was mentally finished with the Navy, and he didn't care what being dishonorably discharged might do to his ability to find work later. He's got about three years left on his contract, including a six month deployment, which is always rough on him. He really was too bitter to talk to. He was so miserable there was nothing I could say or do to console him. We got off the phone, and I haven't heard from him since.

I've left messages and emails. I've sent email to his boat account. Nothing. I'm pretty convinced he's sitting in the brig right now for assaulting his jailors, or otherwise flipping out. So, in an attempt to figure out where he is and if he's OK, I've had to try to contact the United States Navy. Har.

I started by looking up the base information for where he was. There was a phone number. I called it, it was no longer a working number, and I got another number from that message. I called that number--it's an automated system with different departments to choose from. I picked one and left a message. Nothing. I called it again the next day, straight to voice mail. I picked another department. I finally got somebody, and explained that I was trying to contact a sailor. "What for?" Was the basic response. I didn't ask for a nuclear secret. So, I explained that we'd lost contact with him, I was 99% sure he wasn't deployed at the moment, and I had good reason to believe he was in a lot of trouble. I wasn't asking for particulars, but I did want to know where he was. I didn't think that was too much to ask. They said they'd check on it. I waited a while, and they gave me two more numbers to the administration over the submarines, which is what Navy Buddy does. I haven't called them yet. I expect more of the same. I basically just want to know if he's a) dead b) jailed c) deployed and d) needs help. I don't think that's too much to ask for. Depending on the answers, I may want other things like access to medical care. But for now, I just want an answer. I do expect to get a lot of flak before I get to the answers, given the cageyness of the man who answered the phone first.

I'm not even sure what my role in this is. Navy Buddy is dear to me. But he's almost too upset to help. When I was younger, helping people was so much more clear cut. You either could or you couldn't loan somebody $100 or let them crash in your pad for a couple of nights. Now, I can but the question is whether I should. And I have to say, that's one area I've not resolved for myself at all. I feel like if I can, I should. If I don't, who will? But sometimes people need to be free to make their own mistakes, I suppose. Navy Buddy isn't really very willing to examine his own role in this great big mess--it's always the excuse of the environment and the community around him. He doesn't know how to make lemonade out of lemons, to use a metaphor. He just complains about having been given lemons. I'm not sure how to help him. I'm not sure if I'm supposed to. I don't know what to do.

I do know the Navy better answer the damned phone, though.

-- DV

T&A--the Bad Kind

I have three Teaching Assistants.

I'm sure JP and Batmite! are laughing their asses off right now. But it's true. It's one of the "delightful" things I've discovered about the job--and the discoveries just keep building. My job is a "bridge" position (that's not official, I just made it up). I'm technically teaching in/for two departments right now, and as much smack as we liked to talk about the English department, all that pales in comparison to the other department. The near complete lack of communication is driving me crazy. I send emails that get no reply. There are new requirements of the job that weren't a part of my original description. All that happened a couple of weeks ago, and adjusting to the new situation is part of why I was gone from blog-world for so long.

So, I show up to teach my very first ever class in, let's call it, "student life 101" (a thankless job in itself that deserves its own post later), and in each of my three sections there is one noticeably older person in there. Not a freshman, but certainly not a grad student. From each one, I got the same line: "Hey, I'm your T.A. for this class." You are? When did that happen? What are you supposed to be doing? They had no answers for these questions.

All they did have, actually, is 45 minutes worth of training and a syllabus. Actually, only one of them had the syllabus. Two of them had no clue what they were supposed to be doing and when. I had no answers for them either--first I'd heard of it. So I sent an email and took the syllabus of the one student who managed to bring it so I could copy it later. My email is still unanswered. It's been two weeks. Turns out, they're supposed to participate and attend each class, write "reflections" several times throughout the semester--which I am supposed to grade--and lead class once. I pieced this together from the syllabus and from talking to the third T.A., Miss Abby, who has done this once already. Essentially, I'm doing three independent studies on top of teaching three sections of English and three sections of student life.

I was not happy about this, as you might imagine. I'm already finding it difficult to work on my own research and plan for the new classes I'm teaching in the Spring in the span of a regular day. I work a regular work week, and most of what I do gets eaten up during that time. I promised myself one of the things I would start doing differently in life is that I would go home when it was time to and I wouldn't bring work home unless it was an absolute necessity. This is a first for me, and I'm still adjusting to it. So, adding this new crap on was not something I was willing to do. But, some more digging and piecing together revealed that these kids are both required to and are getting credit for doing this--if I send them away, it shafts them on college credit. Sigh. So we're all stuck together.

Techie J.D. is my first T.A. He's pretty laid back. He's into computer science, and I suspect Star Trek as well. I'll ask him about it later in the year. He's pleasant, very cooperative, likes my brand of sarcasm and seemed relieved when my social-worker gene kicked in and I said, "I'll find out what happened--you're not getting screwed in this deal." Nigerian Anthony is my second T.A. He has no clue what's going on, and he needs a lot of babysitting. I have to spell things out for him very explicitly. His English is great, though. And, he's a student. He's used to having things spelled out for him, and it's my job to do so. It's just that nobody told me it was my job to do so. My third one, well, that would be Miss Abby. Miss Abby walked into the room on Wednesday, and it was pretty clear she wanted to be the HBIC. Look it up, if you've not heard that acronym. Seriously, Google it and pick the first entry. Once you know what it stands for, you'll realize where the problem lies. I'm the HBIC, and there is only room for one. We had some serious fluffy-chested prancing behavior going on during the first class.

When I walked into the room, I heard her say, "Do you know who your professor is for this? That's OK, I'm your T.A., I'll take care of you." Bitch, please. She introduced herself and then sat in the corner and talked to two of the girls. The others kept looking over like she was releasing secret information that only those two would know about. When I was explaining things she kept interrupting me. It was really quite distracting. After class, she came up to me and asked me right off the bat, "Have you ever taught before?" I looked her up and down and said, "Why, yes I have." Then she said, "Are you a grad student?" To which I responded, "While I'm flattered you think I look that young, no, I'm not." She seemed a little taken aback by that, and just said that she had done this once already and so she "knew how it was supposed to go." I told her that was great, and it was wonderful to have someone with her experience in the classroom (god, I'd like to fuck professionalism sometimes), and that I'd be planning a meeting for all of us to sit down and hash out what we wanted out of the semester. Which proved to be difficult to do. All the meeting times that were suggested and agreed upon by me and the two other T.A.s got responses like, "Oh, I'm just so terribly busy, that just won't work, sorry to be a bother, so sorry, so busy." Bitch, please. So, I went one step further--I took it to my HBIC.

JP and Batmite! know just who I'm referring to when I say that. Yes, she can be a terror if she doesn't like you, but if she has something riding on you or she likes you, my god she's an incredible ally--and she really does know everybody and has great little strategies for getting things done. So, away I went to sort this whole mess out. I got some suggestions, but the main goal of going was to make sure the people in charge knew how haphazard this whole thing has been so far. Something along the lines of, "I'm sure they didn't tell you either, or you certainly would've mentioned it when hiring me." If I'm going to fight the "other" department, which it feels increasingly like that is going to be the case, I want a big gun--screw that, I want a V2 rocket launcher going in with me.

After getting my battle lines drawn, I came back to the situation with my T.A.s. For my boys, they met for coffee, felt like part of "team student life," and made plans for the rest of the semester. All hunky-dory. For Miss Abby, I made sure I had plenty for her to do when I came in for the second class meeting (we only meet once a week). I praised her in front of the whole class, told them how lucky they were to have her, and I had what I called a "Dear Abby" session during the last ten minutes, where they could ask her anything they wanted about the "real" student life questions they had, which largely involved surviving the Saturday opening football game. (Surviving is the appropriate word at this school.) She was positively glowing after class. She came back to my office, we hashed things out, she's a whole different person.

I also found out why she initially came on so strong. She volunteered the name of the prof she had last year. LOL. He's the spouse of someone in the English department. JP and Batmite! will recognize him as the spouse of the woman who, because of her poor planning, ended up making us take a manuscripts course instead of what we really wanted to do. With a "prof" like that, no wonder she came on strong. That's alright, though. The pecking order has been reestablished.

-- DV