I can finally say that I am done with the spring semester! Today I finished emailing students the breakdown of their grades, and a memo of my thoughts on the class. I don't know why it took me so long to get finished. Actually, I do. In my four classes, I had 119 students this spring. For some reason, there were more than usual that I felt the need to send more than the generic merge memo with grade details; I wanted to write some specific comments. That was kind of hard, and a few weeks distance was a good idea in terms of gaining perspective. Most of the remarks were complimentary, but I had one student that I really disliked. That's odd for me. I usually like all students, even the slackers and ones who cheat. But this student really rubbed me the wrong way. That smirking face in every class. The obnoxious, nearly insane comments in journal entries. The student had a major impact on the atmosphere of the class. Amazing that one person can have such an impact. I tried hard not to let it influence the grades I gave, but I had to address it in some way in the end of semester memo.

Finally it stopped raining and the weather is nice - time for pool opening and planting! (My summer class starts June 26.)

More on the geese. So he thinks Scotia's approach is refreshing? Does that refer to the planned killing, or the efforts of the volunteers?

Hey, I know...since all solutions are at best temporary, let's let the Geese have the lake. People can find somewhere else to swim.

Here's a more promising article in today's TU on the Scotia geese. Way to go, volunteers! The mayor comes off as an even bigger jerk than I originally thought - and that says a lot, because his jerkiness was already well established. So he's received letters from Kansas and other places across the country, but he believes it is solely a local issue? I guess he doesn't mind that this planned atrocity has made Scotia a nationwide joke - and a very unfunny one, at that. He doesn't mention Rensselaer County, but hailing from there, I am close enough to conduct business in his town (and have in the past) - rest assured, I will not spend one dime in that community.

Here is a website where you can sign a petition against the killing of, and get other information about the Canada Geese in Scotia.

Sam is 1.



Actually, we don't know his birthdate, but it is around now. I designated June 1 as the date. So yesterday, we sang "happy made up birthday to you, happy made up birthday to you" to him.

It is hard to get his picture. He sticks his nose in the camera and doesn't pose. It took me six times to get these two. I think he is not that photogenic, he is much, much cuter in person.

I have (almost) officially put AY 2005-06 to bed. I don't want to wish my life away, but I am not sorry to see this year over. Work-wise, it was good - with a few notable exceptions, my classes were great for the most part, but otherwise, not so much. The loss of Rudy looms large...eight months ago last week. Anyway, today I submitted my faculty activity report; the deadline is tomorrow. I've never gotten a raise based on it, but I think reflecting is still worth the effort.

I wrote "almost" because I still have to email all students in my Spring classes with a breakdown of their grades. An all-time low record this semester, only three students emailed me to ask why they got the final grade they did - one B+, one A-, and one E (failing). The failing guy didn't ask why, he wanted a second chance (which is impossible after the fact). I was surprised by the small number of emails, because in all except one class, the grades were somewhat lower than in past semesters; I gave quite a few more C final grades than usual. I guess they knew what they deserved? In addition to those three, two students who had Incompletes in prior semesters emailed me. I wonder why they wait so long to do anything?

Very, very hot here...40 degrees to 85 degrees in just a couple of days. But now I should have time for yardwork, hooray.

I submitted grades at 6:30 pm on Tuesday (the deadline was midnight). In all except one of the classes, the grades were significantly lower than in past semesters. I fully expected a ton of complaining emails as a result (the grades became available to students at noon yesterday), but only one student has contacted me so far. That has to be a record.

Yesterday was our anniversary, so we went to Lennox, MA. The weather was beautiful. On the way, we stopped at Prime Outlets in Lee, MA. Now, I hate shopping so this is really saying something - it was great! The deals are awesome, and the atomosphere is pleasant. Definitely worth the 40 mile trip from Castleton. We stayed at the Yankee Inn, in a room with a spa bathtub and fireplace (both were disappointing - the Duraflame log would hardly burn, and the jets in the tub were pathetic), but they also have an indoor pool and hottub, which nobody was using except us, and they were nice. We ate out (twice!), had to make a round trip back to Lee (because I left a bag from the Hanes store in J Crew), and then got up in the middle of the night and came home, so that the animals didn't have to be alone for too long. All in all, it was a really good time.

Still working away on evaluations (it always takes me longer than I predict) but something in the news has been bothering me. Why is it when a school budget fails - the administrators always blame apathy of the people who supported the budget - that they stayed home and that is why the budget failed. But when a budget passes, they don't say that people who didn't support the budget stayed home and that's why it passed. Now it is true that not enough people vote in school board and budget elections, but that is so, regardless of the outcome. It seems to me that when budgets fail, it is the district's administrators' and boards' fault, not the voters!

John Gray hits the nail on the head about the goose situation in Scotia.

I am busy with end of semester evaluations. My deadline is May 23 (midnight) and it will take every minute until then to finish!

So far, the powers that be in the Village of Scotia refuse to budge on their horrible plan.

My classes ended yesterday. For the day class, the students asked if we could go outside, and I said yes. It was a good class, and I thought they deserved to do what they wanted. The weather was beautiful. I have never held class outside before, and many students said they had never had a class outside, either. My classes often met outside when I was an undergraduate, but Oneonta was a more relaxed environment, and those were different times. I can't say I liked it as a student - it was distracting, my papers would flutter in the breeze, there was no way to write, and very often I wound up sitting in something and getting my pants dirty. But for the last class yesterday, it was OK.

I wrote to Assemblyman Tedisco (who isn't my representative, but it is in his district, and I know he likes animals since he sponsored the Buster Bill), PETA, and the mayor of Scotia about the planned killing of the Canada Geese in Collins Lake Park. I've heard from PETA, and they are aware of the situation. They said Goosepeace, a nonprofit group, offered to assist Scotia with non-lethal options, and they were rebuffed! I sure hope it can be stopped.

This is horrifying. I am so upset I don't know what to do. How can they consider the option of killing the Canada geese? So that they can go swimming this summer! If this happens, I wish tragedy on every person who uses that park, and every person involved in this atrocity. People are so mean to animals, it makes me sick.

Yay! Christmas Paper(s) is online.

We had a busy weekend, almost like being on vacation at home. Friends were visiting, so on Friday we had dinner at Lombardo's, our favorite Italian restaurant. Saturday, we had lunch on the patio at DeJohn's (the weather was gorgeous), and afterwards we checked out the Albany Aqua Ducks boat. It is a historic bus tour of downtown Albany, and then the vehicle drives down a ramp into the river! It was great! Definitely recommended. For dinner, we went to a venerable Albany landmark, Jack's, and then, because it was so crowded that a trip to the bathroom was difficult, we went to a nearby bar, Franklin Square, and stumbled across a 50th birthday party, complete with a musical show put on by drag queens. It was a riot! The guy who was celebrating his birthday even gave us some of his wonderful Vanilla Bean birthday cake. On Sunday, after our friends left, we went down to Hudson, where we had Chinese food at Spring Garden, and then saw United 93. That is a movie that is definitely worth going to see; it was very powerful.

I couldn't wait, so Wednesday night we drove down to Hudson, which is the closest place to Albany that the Freeman is sold. I got three copies of the paper. It came out good! Something funny, they didn't alter it or cut it at all, except they changed the title to "Christmas Papers." When I sold it to Chicken Soup for the Veteran's Soul, they made the same change. But they made a few other changes too, including adding junk such as "a big barrel-chested burly man" as a description of the major, or maybe it was the superior officer. That irritated me, although the change from singular to plural in the title didn't, and still doesn't. That much. The end of the Chicken Soup episode is that I got the rights back, because they cut seven stories at the last minute, including mine, to make room for celebrity-written stories. I'm glad now, because I'd rather it was published by the Freeman, and also because it would have been a mistake to sell all rights, as Chicken Soup requires.

My story is in the Freeman! I'm linking to the newspaper's website, but the story is in a special section, and it doesn't seem to be online. I haven't seen it yet, because I can't get the Freeman in Castleton, and after calling around to some newsstands I have determined that the closest place to get it is quite a drive. So I will have to wait until I go to Samsonville to see it.

I thought I had a PDF of the story, but I can't find it. So here it is:

Christmas Paper

Drafted into the army at eighteen during World War II, Dino had never been away from his brothers and sisters before. He did his basic training in Stark, Florida, a place as alien to a kid from Brooklyn as Mars. He was terribly homesick.

Thanksgiving came, but he did not get papers to go home. Impulsively, he went AWOL. For three days on the train ride north he hid in the bathrooms from the MPs. When he arrived in New York, his brother Joe and brother in law Richie were horrified and urged him to return to Florida. But he was stubborn, and instead, he spent the holiday with his family and then resumed hiding in bathrooms on the long train ride south.

When he slipped back on base, his friend, a gentle guy from Newburgh, New York told him he was in big trouble. At roll call the next morning, his superior yelled at him for his absence and told him that he was fortunate he'd returned. If he had been gone just a bit longer, he'd have been considered a deserter and when caught, would have gone to prison. Out on bivouac later that day, the major pulled up in a Jeep and called Dino over. He had his file on a clipboard and as he flipped through the papers, he sternly asked Dino how he had avoided being caught by the MPs. "I hid in the bathroom on the train, sir," Dino replied. Then he was asked why he'd gone AWOL. He said he was homesick and had to see his family. The major studied the clipboard and said, "so you're an orphan?" "Yes, sir." "And you live with your older brother in Brooklyn?" "Yes, sir." "You realize this means you won't be getting papers to go home for Christmas?" "Yes, sir." Dino knew he was lucky to have drawn such a light punishment.

A few weeks passed and the young privates were assembled to receive their papers to go home for Christmas. Each name was called in alphabetical order by the sergeant and then the major handed the magic documents to the eager soldiers. Dino was doing O.K. even though he knew his name wouldn't be called. They got to the Gs. "Corrado Giuliano," hollered his superior officer. And with a smile the major handed Daddy his papers to go home.

**********

Yesterday, I showed excerpts of Country Boys in my classes. I have a "smart room" for my day class, and unfortunately the DVD player is in the PC. It is not very efficient to operate; to get back to scene selection I had to stop it, eject the DVD, and start over. So that took up a lot of time. Then, the day class is so interactive that I never get through as much material as I plan. I'm not complaining, that class is filled with bright lights and I will be sorry to see the semester end. But as a result of the clunky DVD and the interruptions, I still have about 25 minutes of scenes to show on Thursday. I can't wait to hear what they think of the film. There is only time to show about 1/4 of it, since the full program is over five hours long in its entirety, but it is still powerful, and I could tell from the way they reacted at certain points that the discussion is going to be good. In the night class, we watched the entire 85 minutes that I had selected. The room has a regular TV and DVD player, so it was a lot easier to manage all the scene skipping. The discussion went better than usual. You'd have to be totally disinterested to not have some thoughts on the program.

The officer called who was here on Thursday. He said they arrested a guy for DWI who said he has information about the car robberies. Also, it is a felony because it involved stealing credit cards and checkbooks. He said that we may never get our stuff back, but that they might be able the catch the crooks. So that is good. Bob is very pleased with the treatment we have gotten from the town police. You always hear how unprofessional local cops are, and that hasn't been the case at all. He plans to make a donation to them.

Yesterday morning before work Bob came inside and said that someone had stolen his briefcase from the car. I could hardly believe it, I figured he had put it somewhere in the house, but it turns out that the night before he forgot to lock the car, left his briefcase on the backseat, and it was obvious that someone had been in there, because they went through the glove compartment & left the contents on the front passenger's seat, also rifled through the pocket behind the driver's seat, moved his coat and messed up a blanket that we have protecting the backseat from dog hair. In addition to the briefcase, they stole 3 or 4 CDs that we had in the glove compartment (one was 1776 the musical).

So, the police came right away. I thought that it was probably some juvenile delinquent teenagers - the kids are on Easter break and they always get into trouble, but the cop said that there have been 50-60 car robberies in the past few weeks in Castleton and Schodack, and that there were 6 on our street - in fact, there were three on Green Avenue, including our car, the same night. So he said it is likely to be professional criminals, not some kids. Which of course is worse, because that means Bob has to be concerned about identity theft.

So yesterday after the police left, we spent almost all day calling banks, credit card companies, and the credit bureaus. Bob also had to go to two banks to close accounts and and open new ones. His major credit cards were in his wallet, which was in the house, but his checkbook, the Samsonville home equity checkbook, a joint checkbook that we rarely use, our savings account number & information, his social security card, his credit union ATM card (which has a Visa logo, the cop said that was the most likely thing to be used), and three store cards were in there. Also a pair of his eyeglasses, a photo CD of our nephew's graduation pictures, the voucher he got from Southwest airlines for being bumped, a souvenir and photo he bought in Florida, a bunch of paperwork (including his colonoscopy report) and my Margaret Atwood book were in there (between Atwood and the 1776 CD, these must be educated crooks)! There may be other things, but of course we will probably notice as we go along. The most expensive things were the briefcase (it was a leather LL Bean), the voucher for air miles, and the glasses. But our homeowner's deductible is $1000, so there is no point in putting in a claim.

Anyway, we took care of everything, so there shouldn't be a problem, but he will have to watch his credit report and statements for a while to be sure. Since there have been so many thefts, the police want video tapes from the banks in case they try to use the ATM visa, withdraw from the savings account, or forge the checks, so all of the accounts have teller alerts on them now. They took the contents of the glove compartment that were on the seat to see if they can get finger prints (it was mostly maps).

The cops checked the school and the fire department to see if maybe the briefcase had been thrown in the weeds or a dumpster after being emptied, and we checked the cemetery, but no luck. So I guess I will get him a new one for our anniversary. You'd think there would be something in the paper or on the news about this to warn people since there have been so many wouldn't you? But there hasn't been a word about it yet. Anyway, I was glad it wasn't me who forgot to lock the car (also that my pocketbook wasn't in there!).

I am shocked that the dogs didn't hear something. But then Sophie's main purpose in life is sleeping on the couch, and Sam is still such a baby that he doesn't spend time monitoring the street. I know for sure that if Mr. Wuj was alive, even when he was very sick at the end, he would have noticed, alerted us and scared off the creeps with his piercing wooooo.

I'm finally caught up with grading. Just in time for all the end of semester papers! I've been struggling this semester with one of my classes. They really don't seem at all engaged, no matter what I do. The goal seems to be to contribute as little as possible, so that I will end the class early. In past semesters, when this happened, I let it go and it just got worse. At that time I resolved to be more diligent in the future. So, this semester, I decided that "freedom" wasn't working - so maybe "structure" was needed. I have brought copies of multiple choice pop quizzes on the reading to class for the past few weeks, and I figured, if they aren't participating, I will spring a quiz on them. I haven't had to resort to doing it yet, because I also designed very structured exercises for them to complete, and I have made sure that every minute of time was taken up until the end of class - no opportunity for getting out early. It is working OK, but I can see they don't like the class any more now than they did before, when the atmosphere was more free. It isn't everyone in class, but the idea of a work culture group - where no one will work harder than peers - does seem true. Contrast that with another of my classes, who thrive under the freedom approach. I guess the engaged students have the same influence on their peers, just in the opposite direction.

Finished the taxes! The most annoying part this year is that NYS has added a new required form - you have to copy the information from your W-2 to it, and include that instead of the W-2. I'm sure the reason is to make the document scannable - but really, how irritating.

So that is how I wrapped up my Spring break. There are still some essays to grade, and maybe I will get to them on Monday.