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I sit in my office staring at my pile of grading. If by some fluke in the law of conservation of matter, my pile were to suddenly decrease in its present volume, I would be more than happy (albeit a bit confused). When moving I managed to fall behind in my grading and I haven't been able to catch up since. Usually these response papers take about 15-25 mins each, and I have well over thirty. The simple math means that I could finish them up in a week with plenty of time to spare, were that the only thing I do. Unfortuntely, after about half a dozen I need to do something else, for I begin succumbing to the monotony. Not that each individual paper on its own is frustrating to me (athough some are); but reading the same argument, justified by the same quotations, expressing the same concepts, thirty times over--my brain begins turning to mush.

I can't really complain about my job. I love it. Grading (but perhaps also the low salary rates for adjunct faculty) is one of the only downsides of an otherwise perfect situation, especially at the breakneck speed that these summer courses run. Every week I have a new batch. Which means if I take a bit more than a week to grade the previous stack, I'm already behind.

This is the last week of my summer class. I have two more lectures to prepare, and another batch of papers coming in tomorrow. After that, I'm thinking about nothing but Wittgenstein for a few weeks. And also perhaps drinking some beer, and getting back in contact with some people I have been ignoring since the beginning of the summer. Sorry, everyone! I'll be picking up my phone again next week.

I have had so much fun reading and talking about Marx. I think my epistemology class this fall will actually be a letdown by comparison (not to mention having to go back to grading freshmen-level writing--its/it's, their/there/they're, etc.)

Oh, well. It's a living.