A strange calm descends


It’s very strange. Classes start tomorrow, and I’ve got a tough semester ahead of me with both our core cell biology course and an upper level cancer biology course…and I freakin’ know what I’m doing. Syllabi are all laid out, my lectures are all planned, and I’ve got my first assignments loaded into the blunderbuss, ready to be fired out at the classroom. It’s like I’m organized or something, when usually I’d be bouncing off the walls, panicking at all the stuff I have to get done at the last minute. Is this what it’s like to be an old teacher?

So I’m going in to work this morning. I have to fuss over fish, and I do have one planned meeting with my new advisees, but otherwise, I think I’m going to tidy up a student lab, clean up my office (it looks like a library walked in and exploded right now), and sit back with a cup of tea. Weird.

I might get anxious because I feel too relaxed for the day before classes.

At least I’ve got that interview on Christian talk radio tomorrow, right before my first class, to get me jazzed up and wired. I don’t want to be too mellow when I start lecturing.

Comments

  1. DLC says

    It’s quiet. Too quiet. They’re out there, somewhere. . . The Students ! (dun dun dun!)

  2. Ogvorbis: Purveyor of Mediocre Humours! says

    Pants? Crap. Now I’m wondering what else I forgot.

    Gown and mortarboard?

  3. siveambrai says

    Well I wasn’t feeling panicked about not having my syllabi completed until I read this. Thanks a lot PZ. :P

  4. DLC says

    Oh just wear a nice knee-length skirt a nice button-down shirt and a sweater, if it’s chilly.

  5. rnilsson says

    Whew! That headline sent a terrible chill down my spine, hoping that UMM keeps an adequate supply of atropin handy. These times, these times indeed!

    Please don’t scare us like that, PZ.

    All, have you thought of donating to MSF?