Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star

I want to be a gumdrop unicorn. I want it so frigging badly I could puke in 31 colors, all sparkly. I want to feel special. I want to believe that everyone has to wear shades when they look at me, I’m so bright!

What brought this on? Applications. To get anywhere, I have to drink sugar water with no nutritional value and apply for the terminal degree in my discipline. Between teaching and crafting the perfect statement, I’m losing my mind. Oh, and don’t tell Hiram I’m behind in my grading……

Well-meaning colleagues tell me I need to show that I am a “star” to get in. They don’t understand my application apprehension--apparently I’m an ideal candidate with my article and shiny new grant. I don’t know if I’ve got the magic formula.

I am such a bright shining star that I only got one of the classes I was originally scheduled to teach for the spring—the others fell through. So now I am sending out C.V.’s to the equivalents of academic Siberia in the vain hopes of a position paying pocket change. Twinkle, twinkle little star!

I want to be a gumdrop unicorn—they don’t have days like this. If I put on sparkly shoes and click my heels, will it happen? Please?

LIARS!!!!!!!!

I never - ever - ever do the sodium demo.  I tell the lab tech not to put it out.  There are too many illiterate bottle grabbers in there, and part of the lab of interest has them adding various sodium salts to water.  I don't want sodium metal anywhere near these idiots, not even for a demo.  I tell them "We're not doing the demo, and skip parts 3, F, and III."  I say it out loud during pre-lab lecture that day.  I write it on the board in the pre-lab lecture room.  I write it on the board in the lab.  I write it on a sign on the reagent table.

A full SEVEN out of 24 students have turned in their data sheets with observations for those parts of the experiments completed.

PS:  Don't copy from people with bad handwriting.  If we talk about "chemical" changes and "physical" changes, and you copy "chemical" from Kelly Keener, whose handwriting sucks, I might not ever know.  But if you write down "decimal changes", and you let Crybaby Carry copy from you, and she too writes down "decimal changes", and by the end of the day, I'm grading four assignments that attribute the color change to a "decimal reaction".... I KNOW YOU'RE FUCKING CHEATING!!!!!!!

Done. Worth it?

Done with grading. Done with school. And as I sometimes do, I sit back and wonder if I did any good.

Is it something that comes with the job? Do others have these anxious moments as a semester ends?