My glasses have been sporting a “temporary” repair
jury-rigged out of items found around the house since before Thanksgiving. Last night, I found myself repairing and
reinforcing key parts of my watchband with duct tape. It really is time for this semester to be
over, and for me to brave a mall (and make an appointment with my eye doctor,
since the lenses, though intact, aren’t doing all they might, either). Or I could search for some of the stuff I
need online, except my internet connection is acting a bit wonky, too.
On a more cheerful note, when I called my students’
attention to our online course evaluation last week, the whiniest, flakiest,
most entitled student I’ve had in years (my institution is more of a magnet for
the basically willing but overscheduled/overwhelmed) asked: “do we have points
taken off if we don’t complete it?” Short
answer: no.
Also, this week’s Car Talk features the chair of a
philosophy department who needs a vehicle that will transition easily between
carrying her and the distinguished guests and job candidates with whom her position sometimes requires her to interact, and transporting the
pot-bellied pigs, goats, and other livestock she rescues. She comes off as decidedly eccentric, but it beats most of the other depictions of
professors I’ve heard in the media lately.
"She comes off as decidedly eccentric, but it beats most of the other depictions of professors I’ve heard in the media lately."
ReplyDeleteThat's because the "Car Talk" guys are MIT graduates and many of their clients seem to be professors and other academic folk.
Plus last year Tom and Ray actually fielded a really awesome calculus problem from a trucker whose gas gauge had broken. I secretly hope that one day they will add me to their staff of experts.
ReplyDelete@Stelnikov & CMP: very true. I think Tom and Ray are "professorial" in a way that many of us recognize, and even identify with (see use of duct tape and other household items, above), but that bears little resemblance to the word's meaning when used to criticize Pres. Obama (or, on occasion, Newt Gingrich). They're more representative of an often-scruffy professoriate that delights in intellectual work, but likes to relax by doing hands-on stuff, and gets really excited and happy when they (we) can somehow combine the two (or, to put it another way, they're representative of the part of the professoriate that qualifies to be contestants on Archie's professor or hobo (or crazy cat/pig lady) contest).
ReplyDeleteFor the record, there are a bunch of professor-salary-friendly glasses sites online these days. I went to LensCrafters and suffered through $400 glasses that would break in 2 years (and would do all sorts of crazy repairs to make them last a little bit longer) for decades before discovering recently you can get basically the same thing online for $20. Say no to duct tape and super glue!
ReplyDeleteI love Click and Clack.
ReplyDeleteAlso, the mall this time of year is to be avoided at all costs.