I guess I run now

Things are already nutty at the end of the semester with all the grading & with committees trying to get work done all at once, but my department is also searching for two new faculty & yours truly is the chair of both search committees…we’ve had more than 90 applications & will do 13 video interviews next week followed by campus interviews in January (each of these is a 2-day interview with non-stop meetings and eating, btw).

Just to give some context, the last time we did a search for 2 positions, I wasn’t the chair of the committee, but I still ended up in the doctor’s office with panic attacks & I gained about 10 pounds. It’ll be amazing to have two new colleagues, but the six-month nail-biting process that is the academic job search drives me to drink (she wrote sipping on a rum & diet pepsi).

On top of that, we’re moving offices to a new building. Every day my chair walks into my office to observe, “you’re not packed yet?” Tomorrow you will probably hear about me on the news, sad story of a junior prof who throws a lamp at her department chair’s head & goes to jail for it. Argh! Who has time to pack? I haven’t even started grading final portfolios or final projects!

So everything is happening in the same 2-3 weeks from hell. I’m sticking with bootcamp, eating at least one salad a day, watching my portions, but mostly just keeping my head down & powering through until “break” begins & I can start prepping my classes for next semester & try to get something out to a journal for review before these dern campus interviews start taking up all of my time.

So, long story now longer…I might be posting only intermittently for a bit because every time I’ve come here to write, I’ve ended up writing something very similar to the rant above…& it’s all very boring. But I’m not gone & I’m still going to read & respond to everyone else. I’ll just be a better reader than writer for a couple of weeks.

Happy Days Chicks!