Interrupt-a-cow

Even though husband-dear is probably the only human in the world who could put up with me and love almost every minute of it, there are, naturellement, certain points of contention between us. There's husband-dear's tendency to hang his used towel on quilt racks, bathroom, closet, and bedroom doors (and really anything but the towel rack), my desire to put everything away if it has gone untouched for more than five seconds, and the seemingly never-ending "you interrupted me again" versus "well, you talk way too slow!" debate. Because there's possibly nothing more entertaining than reading about other people's issues, let's talk about that debate, shall we?

Before I go into more detail, I should probably explain that, in case you do not have the happy fortune of living south of the Mason-Dixon line, southern speech does not just use interesting words and funky grammar, it's also known for a propensity towards.....oh, who am I kidding, southerners talk slow. Some of them really slow. So slow, in fact, that I've been able to update my Facebook page in a pause between words. I've completed grocery lists in the time it takes some to finish a sentence, and have perfected my ability to read a book while keeping my ears tuned for the "uhm" that indicates the end of a long drawn-out syllable, and the beginning of a new thought. I've actually had a few occasions where I've had to tell colleagues/students that they'll have to hold their (seemingly endless, lengthy) thoughts for one second as the inkling from five minutes ago that I might, in the near future or so need to use the bathroom, had turned into a very immediate urge. And although I'll gladly admit that the speed of my speech can sometimes be best compared to a New Yorker on crack, waiting for some southerners to finish talking can feel a lot like pulling taffy.

Anyway, husband-dear, although he has some awesome Yankee characteristics (he actually uses his blinker, and I've never heard him use the word "doohickey", ever), is partly southern, You see, he
spent the first half of his childhood in the north, and the second half on the Gulf Coast in Florida. Subsequently, he has some northern, as well as some southern traits; he always drives like his behind is on fire, and he can't stand people who take their time doing anything, but at the same time he loves his fried chicken, collared greens, and black-eyed peas. And he takes his time saying things. When we first met, I thought he was so thoughtful. And he is. But he also just takes forever to say the most basic things. Seriously.

So when husband-dear and I are talking, a lot of our conversations contain an exchange that goes something like this:
Husband-dear, So that's what I said....(silence)...and...(silence)...yeah...
Me: Well, OK, have you considered....
Husband-dear: Why do you always interrupt me?
Me: Well, I thought you were done talking!
Husband-dear: I was thinking!
Me: Well, then you take a break talking!
Husband-dear: No you don't!

Or like this:
Husband-dear, So then I told him that was OK...(silence)...yeah...(silence)
Me: ...(silence)...
Husband-dear: Why aren't you saying anything?
Me: Oh, well, I didn't think you were done talking, you know, as you like to take a looooong tiiiiiiiiime saying things.
Husband-dear: You're such a turd.

I would love to be able to tell you that all of these interactions are the result of husband-dear just talking far too slow, but I should probably tell you that my inner New Yorker also assumes that everyone who doesn't talk as fast as I do probably doesn't care if they are interrupted, because, well, isn't that obvious? If you got something to say, you spit it out or keep it to yourself. 

Anyway, I have been trying to work on this, and make sure husband-dear (and all other southerners with him) are done before I open my mouth. It means lots of tongue-biting and deep breaths, but you know, love and all that good stuff. I have also noticed that husband-dear has tried to leave fewer loooong pauses in his speech, so I'd like to think we're making good progress. Or perhaps good....ehhm...progress. But sometimes we butt heads anyway, and last night was a great example of that as well as why we go so well together.

We were lying in bed, and husband-dear was telling me something, I assumed he was done, and started talking. Well, of course he had not yet finished what he wanted to say (we were talking about why men don't shave their armpits, and I can't tell you how much I regret that I will now never find out what he thinks about that...really..). So, husband-dear did the usual, slightly pouting, "You interrupted me" (to which I might have sighed something about how we were talking about armpit hair, O-M-G), and then he asked, "Do you know the interrupting cow?"
"The what?"
"The interrupting cow joke."
"No."
"Oh, cool. Knock-knock"
"Who's there?"
"Interrupting cow"
"Interruptingco.."
"MOOOOO!!!!"

Seriously people, I thought I was going to die. Or pee myself. Or possibly both. I laughed so hard I think I might have hurt myself. I laughed so loud, the dogs came looking to see what was wrong with me (when I laugh, really laugh, I sound like a fire truck, volume and pitch, blaring down your street).

And then, like a five-year old, I wanted to do the joke again. To which husband-dear said "sure", and for some reason I thought he added on, "knock, knock". So, still laughing (the fire truck was five miles from your house), I wanted to say, "Who's there", but instead my voice shot out of control, and I boomed so loud the blinds shook, "WHO'S THERE?",
Startled, husband-dear replied, "What the heck...? Wait, wait, I haven't even said 'knock knock' yet. What is this, some kind of clairvoyant knock-knock joke"
And the fire truck was back, right in front of our house (in other words, I'm still laughing as I type this).

So does husband-dear annoy the tar out of me sometimes? Yes. Do I love him for it? Of course!

MOOOO!!!

Pet Peeves

The semester is about two weeks old, and I've already collected a list of pet peeves. As I'm sure you love nothing more than reading about the things that bother, as my southern friends would say, "the tar" out of me, here they are:

1. The ultimate helicopter parent. When you're 22 years old, and you failed to register for classes in November, and also failed to notice a gigantic in-your-face-transcript hold on your account, please do not ask your mother to call the president's office to override said hold the day before classes start. And if you're that 22-year old's mother, please, for the sake of all academic advisers out there, do not pick up that phone. Why, you ask? Well, there are several reasons: 1) It makes your darling child look like a baby, 2) it teaches your lovely offspring absolutely nothing about this pesky little thing called personal responsibility, and 3) it puts several hours worth of work on people such as your child's adviser, the department chair, the dean, as well as the president. In other words, people who have a lot of other things on their mind, one of which is whether or not your child has acquired the necessary skills to graduate. Do you really, really want those people to call each other to discuss "the case with the student whose mom called the president's office"?
I didn't think so.

2. The total snowflake. The student who thinks their personal situation is so very, very special, they are not only allowed to miss every single class in the first two weeks of school because they "had financial aid issues to resolve", but that they're also entitled to a "personal meeting" with you, their instructor, to catch up on "everything they've missed". This student also firmly believes that by ending or starting the email with a capitalized compliment about how they're REALLY looking forward to your AWESOME class, they make up for the fact that they've effectively missed enough classes to lose one entire letter grade in the class.

3. The anxious over-achiever. Now, before I start in on this one, don't get me wrong, I love nothing more than dedicated students. Students who have read the material, done the homework, stop by your office with intelligent questions, and pay attention in class. But there's something about this type of student that drives me absolutely batty. The anxious overachiever will have called anywhere from two to five times the week before classes start to make sure they are enrolled in your class, that the book is available in the bookstore/on amazon/in the library, to make sure you know about their, legitimate or not, special needs, to confirm the class room and meeting time, or to just check in and make sure you know they're in your class and how much they're looking forward to it. Then during the first week of class, they will stop by your office every single day asking questions about the first homework assignment ("write down your goals for this class"), how they're supposed to turn it in (it's in the syllabus and has been discussed in class), how long it's supposed to be (ditto), when it's due again (ditto), and then turn the assignment in early (now, granted, there's nothing wrong with that, although it's a little eerie to hear it's because they're anxious about handing materials in in class). It's possible I'm slowly becoming an old curmudgeon, but next to helping said student shop for groceries and tucking them in at night, I'm pretty sure I've done all the hand holding that's humanly possible.

4. The eye-rolling back-row-hoggers. In short, the students who really, really don't want to be here. They only took the class because "it was the only elective that would fit their schedule", or they thought they were going to graduate, but realized they needed nine more credits, or they are just of the modest opinion that they have proven their worth somewhere halfway through their sophomore year, and should just handed that degree already. Every assignment makes them roll their eyes, sigh, or grumble about how much work this is. They've developed the annoying habit of shortening my last name to a ridiculous nickname, show up late, and use their phones to make sure their hair still looks good.

Only fifteen more weeks until the end of the semester, and I so help me God, I will turn every single one of these little darlings into my very favorite student: The Critical, Engaged Thinker.

Winter slump

Before I type anything else, I should probably warn you that this is my very first post from my most awesome Christmas present (cue drum roll), my IPad, so it's very possible that the entire layout is going to be incredibly weird. Sorry about that, but right now, I love my new toy too much to go get my laptop.

Anyway, as you all know, I am big on writing what you know. And so today, that is what I am going to do. I am going to tell you about my winter slump. You know, that time right after Christmas when you just don't feel like yourself. And just like millions of other people, my 2012 started off with a winter slump.

But, once again, I have the sinking suspicion that I am probably not experiencing your average winter slump. Maybe I'm wrong, but when you experience a slump, does that usually not entail lying around, not feeling like doing much, and letting your usual routine slide? Well, in my case, I feel like I'm suffering from a winter-slump-slash-OMG-Armaggedon-is-upon-us experience. In fact, I'm pretty sure that I currently more closely resemble the Tasmanian Devil than a hibernating bear.

So what does a Dixiechick winter slump look like? Well, instead of waking up on Friday morning, and realizing that yay! You get to swim instead of teach unwilling undergraduates today, you wake up, snarl at the clock, grumble at your husband, and spend a half an hour in the pool wishing you were in bed. You spend every mile of your ten mile run the next day wondering why!? The!? Heck?! You?! Are?! Doing?! This?!, and hate every single mile of your 36-mile ride today. In the meantime, you still clean the kitchen cabinets, cook for your small group, and do laundry, and you in fact look for more chores to fill your days off, as sitting around only makes you realize you are in The Slump, and therefore Nothing is fun. At all. Subsequently, the baseboards have been dusted, the corners in the bathroom scrubbed, and the blinds are dustfree. But are you able to sit back and enjoy all your hard work? No, as that is The Slump.

And then your poor husband asks what you would like to do instead, since what you're doing now is obviously not making you happy, and you snap, "You know as well as I do that there is nothing fun to do around here, except exercising, and I already did that.".

That, my dear readers, is my winter slump. Let's all hope it passes quickly.

It's Black, It's White

"You've got to be a little bit more careful, when you talk about the sensitive subject of race."
Everyone's a little bit racist ~ Avenue Q

"I'd like to teach the world to sing, in perfect harmony! I'd like to hold it in my arms, and keep it company"
I'd like to buy the world a Coke ~ 1970s Coca Cola Commercial


I never realized I was white, until I came to this particular school. Obviously, I was aware of the fact that I had white skin (or pink, or tan, or something in between), but I never thought of myself as a "white woman". I suppose you could argue that makes me obtuse, but I'm more inclined to believe that that's just how it is for white people. In the US, white is the norm, and therefore does not require awareness, while anything else is called "ethnic", is considered an exception, and thus entails a greater awareness.

For the past four years, this is how I start our class discussion on race in my course on ethnic minorities in the media. I never really planned this little speech, but four years ago, when I first taught this class, and asked my students to define "race", I realized how awkward this situation could be. I mean, here I was, the only white professor in our department, teaching the one class that talks about the representation of African Americans in the media. Now it never actually was awkward. At least not for me, as I knew very well that the reason I was teaching this class was that I am the only professor in our department who can say anything sensible about race and media. The fact that I happen to be the only white professor is irrelevant. To me, anyway. But standing there, in 2008, in front of 28 African American students who had all consciously elected to attend an HBCU, I suddenly realized how to them, this might be very relevant indeed.

So I did the only thing I could think of; I was honest. I told them exactly what I just told you. As a white person, I have the incredibly luxury of being unaware of my race, something they don't have. Then I explain how odd it was to realize what it's like to be the minority. And all the interesting things you suddenly run in to.

And, really, it is very odd. Everyone I meet, for one thing, remembers my name. It doesn't matter if they met me once for five seconds in a crowded room, they'll call me by my very long and complicated last name the next time they see me, while I'm desperately trying to remember where on earth I met them. For the longest time I thought that people here just had awesome memories. Or that I was probably being so socially awkward, it was easy to remember me ("oh yeah, that's the woman who (insert random social gaffe here). I remember her!"). But then, last year, when a police officer I had spoken to a week prior called my name across a busy atrium, I suddenly realized how these people all knew who I was: I am the only blond, white woman campus. There are other white women on campus, but none of them have blond straight hair. Just like my friend A tells her blind dates, "I'll be the one Black woman in the bar", I have suddenly become identifiable by my race. Very odd.

I also find myself surprised when I see another white person on campus. And no matter how hard I try not to, I know that my "Hi!" to them is a little more enthusiastic, because, Oh! Wow! There's someone who looks like me! How cool is that! I suddenly understand why, the one time husband-dear and I went to an off-base church, we noticed that all the African Americans (all six of them - out of a 1500 person service) sat together. That doesn't mean I can explain why, but it somehow seems to make sense to me.

So I can understand why, when you attend an HBCU, you might find it slightly strange that the one class that directly addresses sensitive racial issues is taught by someone who is not just not Black, but is actually a member of the race that you know, tried to keep you at the back of the bus for close to a hundred years.

That leaves the professor (i.e., me) with the interesting task of convincing the students that in a class on race, race really should not matter. What matters is expertise. And so far, I've had no problems doing just that. I'm sure it helps that I'm Dutch, brutally honest ("So let's talk about your prejudices"), and asks students to elaborate on everything they come up with, using the ever-dreaded, "Using the theory we just discussed, tell me, why?". And the one year none of those tricks worked, I simply borrowed a milk crate, and carried all the books I had read in relation to race and media into class. Dumping all twenty or so books on my desk, I said, "Once you've read all of those, I will let you challenge my expertise the way you did last class. Until then, if it's not focused on your personal learning process, I don't want to hear it."
And it worked.

Here's to another interesting semester.

Egg, faces, and bathrooms

This past Friday I had the perfect blog topic, or so I thought. And, believe me, it was perfect. About an hour before my first class of the semester was about to start, I decided it was time to locate this mysterious "Room 240" that had appeared on my schedule for the very first time. In my department, we tend to teach our classes in the same wing (with all the fancypants equipment), and as those room numbers run from 150 to 190, I knew room 240 had to be somewhere on the second floor. But where? So off I went. And very quickly found rooms 240A and 240B.

Room 240A and 240B are the faculty bathrooms.
Yes, I said bathrooms.
Those exact same bathrooms I waxed lyrical about a few years ago, as places of silence, warmth, and with a complete lack of student interruptions. Now although I love those bathrooms, and my opinion of our current administration has been through its ups and downs, I refused to accept that someone, somewhere decided that the best place to meet for our senior capstone course was in the bathroom. Besides, didn't the "A" and "B" clearly indicate that there had to be a non-lettered "Room 240" somewhere in the building?

So I kept looking. And looking. And looking. But no room 240. So I enlisted the help of the dean's secretary, who happened to see me wandering the halls, and we wandered around together for a while, without any luck.
"Yeah, Dr. D.", she eventually sighed, "I hate to say this, but it seems to me like you really are scheduled to teach in the bathroom."

Now don't you agree that that would have made for a great blog post? Can you imagine the sarcasm dripping off this page as I pondered whether to teach both male and female students in the girls' bathroom or whether to separate the class by gender? Or the wrath I would have bestowed upon the new, improved, totally awesome scheduling program so proudly introduced by our administration last year?

Alas, it was not to be. For after I had asked the secretary if she would mind posting a note on both bathroom doors that obviously (and I insisted she include that word), Dr. D.'s class would not be meeting in the bathroom today, and made my way back to my office to email all of my students to meet in my office, I ran into Carrie. Carrie is a very quiet, but incredibly bright student. And right in the middle of my mumbled rant about incompetent schedulers and southern ways to indicate you needed to just quit, she quietly asked, "Uhm, Dr. D? I'm in your three o'clock class, and I was wondering if we were meeting in the Health building."
"No, we're not meeting in the bath...." Wait. Did she just say the health building? That big square monstrosity across the street? I stopped in my tracks, "I'm sorry, Carrie, what did you say?"
"Well, on my schedule, the building code says we're in the health building, but I just wanted to check with you."

The building code, you should know, is a wonderful little three-number code that is added before each room assignment, designated the building said room is in. It's something English professors will dread, as their classes tend to be scheduled all over campus, while lucky faculty members like myself never consider, since we always teach in the same wing of the same building. Always. Except this semester.

So, with the blush creeping on to my neck and cheeks, I checked my schedule, and indeed. Instead of the familiar "228" building code, the code next to the infamous room 240 was "229", a.k.a the health building. So it appeared as though my class wasn't meeting in the bathroom after all.

Do you remember that post I wrote a few months back, about my students not reading their assignments, their books, their notes? Yes, well, it appears that their professor is not much better at it herself.

So much for a cool, ranting blog post.
I'm sorry.

De opkomst van het cynisme

Vier jaar, vijf maanden, vijf dagen, en pak en beet vier uur. Dat is ongeveer hoe lang het heeft geduurd voordat het cynisme over mijn werk toesloeg. En nee, ik was niet eerder cynisch, echt niet. OK, ik schreef wellicht cynische stukjes over de hopeloosheid van sommige studenten en ondersteunend personeel, maar er school altijd ergens een sprankje hoop. Er was humor, zelfspot, of een onderliggend optimisme. En vanaf vandaag zo rond twaalf uur zal het nog hard werken worden om dat vast te houden.

Nu vraagt u zich misschien af of er is groots, meeslepends, monumentaals is gebeurd vandaag dat tot deze vaststelling heeft geleid, en, nee, helaas is dat niet het geval. Gisteren was ik weer begonnen, net als elke eerste week van Januari, met frisse tegenzin, maar stiekem ook wel weer flink wat enthousiasme over hoe ik dit semester de colleges zou veranderen. En vanochtend kwam het cynisme in een keer op zetten. Ik was bezig case studies uit te kiezen voor mijn filosofie college, en was hardop een beetje aan het mummelen, zo van "This one looks boring, oh, that one might be OK. Oh, I bet they'll love that one" (sorry, ik mummel altijd in het Engels, behalve wanneer ik droom over Nederlandse vrienden en familie, en dan mummel ik, volgens manlief, in het Nederlands).

Maar goed, zo was ik gezellig bezig, totdat uit het niets een luide stem in mijn hoofd het vrolijk gemummel overstemde met een donderend, "Ja, doe eens effe normaal, je denkt toch zeker niet dat die studenten van jou dan ook maar een van je case studies leuk gaan vinden he? Je krijgt weer net zoveel gezeur en gezever als vorig jaar. En het jaar daarvoor. En het jaar daarvoor, en daarvoor." Blijkbaar spreekt mijn cynische ik onvervalst Nederlands. Met een licht bekakt accent. Maar de stem was nog niet klaar; "Je weet precies hoe het gaat, "Oh, Dr. D., I couldn't do the case study, because my car broke down." "Oh Dr. D., I couldn't do that thing you assigned, it was JUST TOO HARD! Waarom doe je in hemelsnaam zoveel moeite?".

Sjips. De stem had gewoon gelijk.

Het hielp niet dat ik erna een telefoontje kreeg van onze secretaresse met de vrolijke mededeling dat omdat onze coordinator niet bereikbaar was (lees: hij had zichzelf nog een paar extra ongeoorloofde verlofdaagjes toebedeeld op een mooi, wit, zonnig strand), ik nu al zijn "advisees" zou krijgen, en of ik de vijf die bij hun kantoor stonden, even overnemen.

Oh ja, en ook hielp het telefoontje vijf minuten later niet, van een advisee van mijn coordinator die vroeg wat ze moest doen nu het computerprogramma waarmee je je voor je colleges inschreef eruit lag. En toen een telefoontje van een student die vandaag een formulier van A naar B moest hebben, maar pas Maandag op de uni zou zijn, en of ik dat dus even wilde doen. En toen een vraag van een student waar Professor H. toch was, en of ik wist waneer hij terug kwam, en of ik wist hoe zij hem kon bereiken, en of ik wist wat ze moest doen als Professor H. haar advisor was, en ze toch echt formulier Z nu door hem ondertekend moest hebben.

Meteen kreeg ik allerlei visioenen over hoe het semester weer zou verlopen. En hoe ik er weer allerlei komische blogjes over zou schrijven. En hoe ik weer elke avond doodmoe op de bank zou neervallen.

En op eens was daar het cynisme. En had ik er allemaal even niet zo'n zin meer in.

Dus nu heb ik een taakje voor mezelf, en voor u, mijn altijd geweldig optimistische lezers: Hoe krijg ik dat cynisme weer terug de doos* in? Want uiteraard heeft niemand iets aan een cynische Dr. D., ikzelf nogwel het minste. Alle adviezen zijn welkom.

*van Pandora wel te verstaan.

The first

All it takes is a few grills, one enormously varied collection of fish, one fire pit, eight assorted neighbors and their children, a variety of alcoholic beverages, and before you know it, poof! another year has passed by. I was debating writing one of those nostalgic "oh, look at all the cool stuff I did in 2011" posts yesterday, but then an invitation to a friend's house and a fondue party got in the way, and it never happened. As I'm fairly certain that blog etiquette eschews writing a nostalgic post recapturing all those winning moments any later than the first of the year, and I really don't have enough winning moments to write about anyway, I threw that idea out the window.

But then I realized that today is the beautiful date of 1/2/12, and I really had to post something on that day. Now for those of you living in countries where they actually organize dates in a logical, hierarchical manner (you know, day, month, year), my apologies. I realize you have to wait a whole month before you all get to write 1/2/12, so I'm sorry for whetting your appetite this early on.

However, when posting on the -second- day of the year, a day which was pretty much spent doing nothing (and battling an epic storm on a 30 mile bike ride), what is there to write about, besides some sort of entertaining analysis of the previous year? So, as I was doing the dishes just now, I realized that although I talk to you guys about all the races we do, the papers I present, my students, the review-nightmares I go through, I never really talk about my smaller, yet equally important triumphs. Upon consideration, I have done a number of things in the past year that I never thought I would do, and what better to way to waste the next five minutes of your life than to read about them.

1. I've started to bake. For real. As in from scratch, with recipes that involve more than "add water an two eggs to content bag and stir". As in I now have several index cards written by me in my recipe book (and in case anyone is interested in a good carrot cake, apple pie, or peanut butter cookie recipe, I got them!). And to top it all off, I just, after finishing up another bag of chocolate-covered pretzels, decided that is going to be my next project.

2. I am the proud owner of a sewing machine. I don't know how to use it, and I have still to put on my buttons, or sew up my own throw pillows (why struggle when one's husband is so skilled with needle and thread), but, people, there is a sewing machine in my house. And I've voiced a desire to learn how to use it. And as my mother can tell you, that has been a long time coming. I'm not sure when I'll find the time to piece all those quilts I will learn how to make, but, people, there is a sewing machine in my office. That in itself is a miracle.

3. I'm sort of over the baby thing. Not sure why or how, but this summer I realized that for the first time in two years I was really OK with the whole "you can't have any kids" reality. I still don't do baby showers, and please don't ask me to change your baby's diaper, because, yeah, I won't (seriously, if I can't have the pleasures, why would anyone think I'd love to share in the misery?), but I can actually walk into a kids' clothes store without tearing up, and revel in the fact that if I don't sleep well, it's all on me.

4. I am finally the proud owner of a well-organized dresser. You may remember that last year, one of my new year's resolutions was to organize all of my pantyhose and knee-highs. Well, not only am I now the proud owner of a well-organized pantyhose-drawer, but thanks to a sudden outburst in organizational madness, the other five drawers could serve as models in an Ikea catalog. There's enough little containers and boxes to keep several toddlers occupied for an entire Christmas morning, and although sometimes getting out a specific pair of pajamas requires moving the contents of the entire drawer the floor, it's organized.

5. Those scars I earned at that adventure race back in 2010? The one that involved bushwacking through acres of thistles and brambles where my legs came away looking like a patchwork quilt? Well, thanks to some serious anti-stretchmark cream (and thanks to #3, I no longer get upset when purchasing it), they're gone. I can now show my legs without wondering what people will make of all the lines and scratches, or worrying that the sun will permanently burn them into my skin.

Well, there you have it, 2011 summarized in five minor triumphs. I would love to tell you I have some seriously lofty goals for 2012, but apart from winning the lottery so I can pay a chauffeur to drive me to work every day, I'm really just fine.

Happy belated new year!