The Georgetown Chronicles continue

17 October 2022, being the Eve of St Luke the Evangelist

Mid-afternoon flight back to DC (verging on late-afternoon flight thanks to a half-hour delay for a tire change). Tucked inside the notebook in which I drafted this post—much as Thomas Aquinas drafted his blogposts longhand, except that my handwriting is legible—is a schedule for the week to come.

There are probably five people in the world who can read this, and I feel quite certain that none of them will see this post.

It's a week between writing assignments in Intro, and prep should be minimal, since I'm teaching Anselm's On the Fall of the Devil. (If my students can trip me up on On the Fall of the Devil, I need to find another line of work.) So I've made up a chart to help me make the best use of my time.

One column is marked "Appointments," the other "Tasks." Anything with a definite time goes under "Appointments." This includes class, office hours, and the usual routine stuff, but also some new things. I'm sitting in on a colleague's class as part of my department's commitment to evaluating teaching. Having looked at her syllabi, I already know she's a better teacher than I am, but I have tenure and a fancy title, and that's how these things work. (To be fair, I also have a teaching award, but that award is older than some of my undergrads.) I also have two appointments with my terrifyingly jacked new trainer. I approach these with a mixture of hope and trepidation.

Trepidation predominates.

Under "Tasks" I have work to catch up on (work up on which to catch). The most pressing of these is a long-languishing edited volume. Yesterday I sent a barrage of emails to delinquent contributors; this week I should at least read and comment on the chapters of the non-delinquent.

What I should really have under "Tasks" is a standing note to myself always to decline suggestions that I should edit a volume.

The final entry under "Appointments" offers a lovely capstone to the week:

Radcliffe Preces and Responses, Stanford in A, and C.H.H. Parry, "I was glad."

Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace.