Grateful no one was hurt when Nu's school was hit by lightning. Some computers sparked, the fire alarms went off, and everyone had to go stand outside in the pouring rain. (And Nu got a good story out of it.)
Grateful for all the hard work my students do. Yesterday, five of them presented their research papers and posters at Honors Day. (And my academic advisee won the graduating senior trophy!)
Grateful for academic freedom (so far). I'm on a few lowkey watchlists, but haven't been censored or censured (yet). The talk I gave was critical of the administration and... I shared the panel with colleagues who were similarly critical. (However, colleagues have told me I should scrub my social media when I travel abroad.)
Grateful for my Boss Day today--we got takeout Thai food for dinner. And lunch tomorrow. (I guess this effectively ends my month of claiming birthday privilege.)
Pic: Grateful for the splash of reds and pink from the very twiggy geraniums I got for free from a local nursery five years ago. (It was the end of the outdoor season and they were going to compost them).
16 comments:
Wonderful gratitudes. The lightning thing sounds scary as all get out. I'm glad all were OK. Probably makes sense on the social media and travel but isn't it a shame?
I hate that you are on any watch lists period. That is so upsetting. And it’s sad you have to think about scrubbing social media when traveling. Sigh.
Your boss day sounded great! I really need to implement that although 3 out of 4 of us have bdays in the first 6 days of the year (Paul on the 1st, Will on the 3rd, me on the 6th).
Lightning??? Glad no one was hurt and yes- Nu will have a great story to tell from now on.
Hooray for your students, and academic freedom. So far. Crazy times, that we have to worry like this.
Lightning? Oh my goodness. No one can plan for that!
It makes me sick to think that you--or any academic--is on any kind of watch list. Nightmare stuff.
OH MY GOD LIGHTNING??? Glad everyone is okay. Wow, that must have been scary.
It's so crazy to me that there are watchlists at all. I mean, one of the first things we learn when we learn about democratic societies is tenure in professors so that they can teach freely and also a free and independent press. It just feels like these things are being eroded, and so quickly. It's unbelievable to me what is happening, and I'm sure I'm not alone here.
ACK! Sparks from the computers? I'm glad no one was hurt (especially Nu)! When we lived in Philadelphia, a building on the PENN campus was hit by lightning, and it sounded like a huge explosion to me, and we were about 2 blocks away. So scary!
Thanks, Jeanie. I'm glad I didn't know about the lightning until Nu got home. Sounds like the kind of thing I would have uselessly fretted over.
I'm going to think about it next month, when I will have to travel.
As the inventor of Boss Day (If you've seen _Mean Girls_, this should be said like "my father the inventor of Toaster Strudel" :), I wonder if you could tweak Boss Day for your fam by having Paul's Boss Day in the Week 1, Will's in Week 2, yours in Week 3,
and Phil's in Week 4. It could be a random weekday like Wednesday? (Weekends might up the stakes and make it burdensome.)
When you put it like that, Jenny--it makes sense that students are doing well BECAUSE of academic freedom! Crazy times, for sure. I didn't not imagine this would happen in America!
Nance--I was watching a show (Paradise) and its sense of apocalyptic urgency felt so familiar. We are living the nightmare.
Nicole--it's the "so quickly" that is truly terrifying. But Atwood already told us how things could change literally overnight, no?
I'm glad no one was hurt too--I can't imagine that trauma on top of everything else for those poor kids...
Your sonic boom story reminds me that Nu said that their head hurt when it happened--I wonder if it was because of the sound, or perhaps the pressure?
Good for you.
Thank you, Gillian.
Lightning? Wow, that's scary.
Is there such a thing as a lowkey watchlist? Now I am scared for you.
Nothing to do with the current watchlists--there's a Wiki "Marxist" one and a "Liberal" one. I better speak up now, I guess.
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