What Used to Be

 

 

With grades being finalized and submitted, I am now continuing to work on preparing materials for the start of Spring Semester, which begins this coming Monday.  

Several times during the last few days, I felt a fair amount of meloncholy about how the end of the semester grading and submitting used to be. It was a ritual for decades for at the conclusion of grading, I would head over to my in-laws to have a few drinks with my father-in-law and smoke pipes together.  

As most of you already know, that drinks and pipes ritual was fairly common across the year on a variety of Fridays, but the end of the Semester times were EXTRA special. It felt often like our conversations were even more ribald, fun, and engaging, our beverages more thirst-quenching and relaxing, and our pipes were even more nourishing, robust and nirvana-like.  

I miss that. A lot.

* * * * * 

This morning I received an e-mail from a very grumpy student.  She was suggesting quite strenuously that I was unfair in giving her a C+ as her final grade.  I carefully outlined how all of her scores were in the mediocre range, and that she had several tests where she earned "D" grades.  I also told her that her original final grade would have been a "C"...  had I not, out of the generousness of my heart, decided to apply a slight curve to everyone's final score in the course, which actually was the reason I gave her a C+.... she just barely scooted into that range with my added curve.  

The above is what I told her..... I did not add the plethora of other comments I had WANTED to add.... many of which would have involved several cuss words more vehement than I typically use.....  and I also wanted to indicate that perhaps if she followed directions (which she did not do most of the semester, if she had used the tools I provided for the class (she missed a number of assignments), attended more than 50% of the lectures (I would estimate she probably attended maybe 1/3 of lectures), and if she studied...... she could have done a helluva lot better.  But... I kept it calm.  

* * * * * 

• Only ran 10 miles (~16km) this morning because of a stupid assessment (note the first three letters of the previous word are very appropriate for the goals of that kind of meeting) meeting to "evaluate" our Department.  I did not have enough time to do more.
• PCS = 9.  It is exhausting to want a pipe.  No, I actually mean it is exhausting to keep refraining from a pipe when I want to have one. I still am angry at myself for missing my golden ticket opportunity in Des Moines.  I very much want to smoke my Butz-Choquin pipe now that I have found it again after I was afraid I lost it.
  

PipeTobacco