Stoking the Fire

My schedule is out of wack. Courses for the Fall 2005 semester just ended last week. And tomorrow I begin teaching for the Spring 2006 semester. Teaching is a difficult job, and I don't feel like I was able to muster the energy and enthusiasm I'll need to be an effective instructor for this upcoming semester. The few days I had off were spent trying to get a handle on Katrina related issues such as insurance and lining up engineers to see if they can straiten our house. Other teachers at Xavier look more run down than usual, and the students looked burned out as well. We're facing a semester where we'll probably have to evacuate at least once due to storms in the gulf, and we're trying to fit in 15 weeks of material in just 13, and besides, summers in New Orleans are damn humid, too humid to do hard work. It's the Big Easy after all. So hopefully in the next few hours I'll find a muse.