Orts & Ephemera:

I have administered my Final Exams for the semester. Proctoring the exam, attending a departmental meeting, and showing up in court, all in a day's work.

Now the Final Exams need to be graded. Understand that these are essay exams for the "Writing Across the Curriculum" courses I teach. And, oh yes, there are also Term Papers to grade.

In addition to grading papers and exams, there are some submission deadlines for a group report, and I must also begin to draft the written materials for a continuing professional education course to be taught in a few months.

And then, there are the clients, one of whom I just spoke with this evening at shul. Yes, I am busy, busy, busy!



The posting of 6 December 2010 wondered how certain news rags aimed at the insular religious Jewish communities would deal with the story of Haifa police chief Ahuva Tomer and her death while trying to rescue victims of the big forest fire in Israel. Hamodia didn't mention her at all, but Yated Ne'eman told the story relatively straight. As always, neither of those papers publishes pictures of women, so Ahuva wasn't pictured in either.

Given all of the things going on in the world at this time, Ahuva is no longer front-page material. It would not surprise me, however, if she comes back to life, so to speak, in the news media, during the coming months.



I don't claim to be adhering to any formal 12-step program, but I am now in my 13th day of freedom from playing Killer Sudoku and Boggle online. These wasteful activities were keeping me up into the wee hours of the morning, detracting from my efficacy, and sapping my creative energies. I decided that I needed to curtail these activities. And so, after oversleeping following too many hours on the Boggle website, I woke up and decided that, just for that day, there would be no Boggle and no Killer Sudoku. My creativity has begun to recover, I am accomplishing more in a day, I am sleeping slightly (but only slightly) better, and I am less irritable.

There is an excellent chance that I will get through tomorrow without any Boggle or Killer Sudoku, thus achieving the 2-week mark.

Orts & Ephemeris

Lots of things are going on now, so I am not postured to do any deep intellectual blogging -- at least for the next 24 hours. The following items and events have occurred, are occurring or are slated to occur:


A. A new law review article of mine has been published. Another article in a different law review is in its final editing stage and is slated for publication shortly. And a third article, not nearly as research-heavy as the two just mentioned, has been accepted for publication in a legal periodical, and is slated to appear within the next 2 months.


B. I have a court date tomorrow, and need to prep for that.


C. I have just completed administering my Final Exams. Well, almost. A greater than usual number of students didn't show up for the exams. Most of them contacted me in advance with their situations, and for these I have made or will make accommodation. Those who did not contact me in advance (and indeed, have yet to contact me) will receive a big, fat "zero" for their final exam grade. And they will go to the Department Chair and whine. But my Department Chair has almost always backed me up on this type of thing, and I would expect him to do likewise. After all, the syllabus handouts, distributed to everyone on the first day of class, explicitly lay down the rules about the need to contact the professor in advance if any accommodations are to be made for missed exams.

[This is a cultural value I picked up from my days with the Internal Revenue Service. Untimely tax returns are penalized, and extensions (at least the first one) are granted for the asking if requested before the due date. A similar world order is imposed upon my students.].

I think that the flu epidemic is playing at least some sort of role behind the higher numbers of absentees. But the rules are uneffected: Apprise the professor in advance that you are missing the exam, and reasonable accommodation can usually be made. Don't come to me after the next semester begins, as a few have been known to do, and for the first time tell me how sick you were! How long do you think you would last if you pulled that shtick with your gainful employment?

In any event, I am now grading the exams. I am going blazooey, so posting this is my much-needed break.


D. Speaking of Final Exams, our son has completed his, and is now moving his chattel goods from the dorms and back home. There goes the privacy my wife and I had enjoyed. Awshucks!!


E. Notwithstanding item D above, our son will be away with friends this coming Shabbat. Not to feel lonely, though. We have four houseguests slated to come over and visit, including our fatso friend, referred to as "He" in prior postings (here and here and here and here). As for the dining dynamic described more fully here, we will sort of be evenly matched: 3 fatsos and 3 non-fatsos (though the excessive adipose tissue on one of the guests counted in the "fatso" column has only been acquired relatively recently). We're looking forward to it.

Burnout

I'm all burnt out, after a busy week. In no particular order:

My Final Exams are finished -- sort of. There are still 4 students who need to take their Final Exams, what with conflicts and medical issues and the like. I'm not much on making the special arrangements, but these four all had legitimate situations.

Actually, the exams were originally scheduled for first thing this coming Monday morning, but none of the students were too keen on the idea, and I was even less keen on the idea (and I had a conflict, to boot). So I was able to get a room (ironically, the same room in which the class had normally convened during the semester) in the late afternoon to the evening, so I held two exam sessions, and covered all but 4 students. That's not bad. And, what with the snowstorm(s), I guess that the students and their instructor really lucked out.

But now, I need to grade the Exams. That's my project this coming week -- along with grading the Term Papers.


2. Our fatso friend, referred to as "He" in prior postings here and here and here, was our houseguest this Shabbat. He initially had set out to go to the city to visit his son and daughter-in-law, but the snow was coming down and he saw the aftermath of a collision, so he called our rabbi, with whom he also has an open invitation. The rabbi's daughter had 3 friends staying over, and one of the rebbitzin's friends was also there, so the rabbi called me to ask us to put He up for Shabbat. It was no problem, especially because our son was still away at school (his last final exam is this coming Tuesday).

The best thing is that He didn't have a chance to stop at the bakery for his usual fattening cakes and pies, so my wife wasn't tempted to eat those things (believe me, she ate enough as it was, especially for Shabbat lunch, when the Ivy League lawyer mentioned here also joined us, thus replicating the same situation -- and results -- as the Shabbat on Sukkot when I was the only nonfatso at the lunch table. But we all had a good time, as usual.

3. A law review article of mine, written and published a couple of years ago, came to the attention of a lawyer with whom I am acquainted. Turns out that it is relevant to a case he has. The upshot is that I got paid to do an hour's research regarding related issues in his case. If he plays his cards correctly, his client stands to gain a nice piece of change from some of his former business associates.

4. Tonight is the first night of Chanukah. It was just me and my wife, being that our son is still away at school. But that's not so bad either!

Happy Chanukah (to all those who celebrate it)!