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Month five starts
I’ve started my fifth month. Hard to believe that in November I will be half way through my first year. This month I made a tracking device to be able to monitor my work and what I’m spending time on. I’d like to be able to put some metrics to work in my first evaluation. I’m not sure when that is exactly going to be. I will be up in June, so the decision needs to be made before then. Annual reviews aren’t done until June-July. So I’m not sure what the contract determination will be made on or if I will have to go through the process early. In…
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All downhill
That sounds like a bad thing, but really it’s a good thing. The peak of my schedule was last week, and while I am still busy this week, It’s a slower, gentler workload. Additionally, the personal events and obligations are slowing as well. I have to take a good look at the caledar to make sure that I don’t miss anything, but overall, not overwhelming. This is good, because this type of schedule always drains me mentally, physically, emotionally. I end up as a washed out shell of myself. I still need to get some restorative time in, and the work around the house is never done. For now, I…
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It’s Fall
This morning if finaly felt that fall had arrived. I have been wearing my fall/spring coat for a few weeks and the sun has been getting up dangerously late; but I didn’t feel that it was here until I parked at the train station this morning. The combination of cool air, heavy dew, a slight, low fog, and the dusting of yellow leaves that were starting to accumulate at the curbs brought on the hope that I feel every fall. And it is hope. I’ve been in academia for so long that any give year feels like it has two beginnings: one in January with the start of the calendar,…
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Adaptation in practice
I had done some revision to my lesson plan for today. The last three classes I had taught were workshops and the attendees were self selected and therefore (presumably) had a reason to be there. For today’s class, this was a assigned class period. In terms of teaching, this was a luxury. I had a full two hours and it was written into the syllabus. The ambitious part came when I decided to roll some orientation concepts into a full Pubmed orientation. I had a series of six exercises each building on the previous concept. We covered known vs unknown searching, using boolean to construct, filters, and intro to MeSH,…
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Adaptation
Tonight was the third of three classes. I tried to get a little more attendance from posting informal flyers around the library with reminder sticky notes attached to them. The tactic was successful in the sense that two people dropped in due to them. The third was already registered. One other contacted me about missing the class. He was also registered, but mentioned the notes that he saw. I’m following up to see if he is willing to attend another group or make an appointment. So far the marketing that I am using is either generating more attendance or other consults. So overall, postitive results. I;m tracking them to get…
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In a flash
The end of another day. These few weeks, starting back in mid August have been a gauntlet of things professional and personal, with only the shortest of breaks in between. Earlier this week I had wondered if I was getting enough done at work. And instead I have had not only the scheduled work for myself, but a couple of fill-in consults for colleagues at the last minute. Today was one such day. But I’m grateful to have the work and, personally, I am insisting on still going little camping trip breather. Restorative only to a degree, because it will be too short and it will condense the time that…
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Waiting tables
I had a good class this evening. I expected no one and got four attendees, half of which were just drop-ins. Class participation was great. The exercises seemed just enough of a challenge to get them thinking differently. All the material I prepared timed out perfectly. I think everyone had a positive experience. I’ll check the evals tomorrow. But yesterday no one showed. I followed the marketing “tricks” that I knew to gain interest: make it simple and engaging, make it relevant to them, push a reminder, have good signage (and on this I welcomed drop-ins). It didn’t make a difference. I waited 20 minutes and then called it. This…
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Bipolar results
Today was good and disappointing. I picked up an extra class to cover for a colleague. It went well and I felt prepared enough for such short term notice. I’m grateful that I spent the time earier these months to create templates that look good and are easy to swap out information. I usually have a trio: my outline, the class worksheet, and the evaluation. This class was a small group of visiting nursing students, so I found I had to scale back. Better to be over prepared than under. The second class was the disappointment. I spent a week creatig the curriculum for an introductory Pubmed class. The activities…
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Flooring
My husband has been waiting thirteen years for this day. It’s been roughly thirteen years since we moved into this house; and since that day he’s hated the carpet. So today is the day the the crew from Carpet One is coming to put in new. The carpet we had we could never tell if it was dirty and we couldn’t get it clean or if it was bought a dingy grey. Now that weve taken it up, we still cant tell. The old carpet covered the hallway, both stairs up and down, and the lower level family room. It had it’s advantages however. Since it was nothing we cared…
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Check in with random thoughts
As I look back, my last post was on the 19th of August–exactly 18 years that I was at my previous job. I’m just ending my 14th week at the new job and I find that I don’t think about my old job much. Overall the new job is going well. I turned in my goal targets for the year. These included committee work, expanded liaison work to previously unserved departments, workshops to design, and more. Pretty typical. Interestingly, in the last few minutes of the day, I got an email to be on my first search committee from our UL. So that will be added to the list as…