Boom!

On the weekend I got a phone call from the dissertation director informing me that my committee members would not be providing me with recommendation letters for job applications.

Needless to say, it feels like my world has just imploded. I realize my world is more than just a job, or more than just a dissertation, but if I blogged a couple of weeks ago about having the wind knocked out of me by the work load, then this week it would be more appropriate to suggest the proverbial broadside-by-semi-truck.

My first reaction was to question the point of it all. It felt like my whole project, my whole degree was in question. It still feels that way.

I also felt humiliated that I had thought, and told people, that I was going on the market only to have the people who hold my fate in their hands pull their support. I still feel like a fool for having gotten excited about the prospect and for spending so much time over the last month preparing the things I needed, only to find that the thing I need the most - recommendation letters - I would not be getting.

Just to clarify. I had spoken to each of my committee members who had indicated they would be happy to write letters. Two of those committee members even discussed my list of postings within the past two weeks and helped me revise them. If that doesn't send the message that I should be expecting their support, I must be crazy... or dense... or both. And they have admitted that they "regret" that they told me yes and now are telling me no. Regret? That's not the word I would use for it.

I also feel despair. I mean, what the hell is the point of all this if my committee think I can't do it? Or worse, when I have a committee that jerks me around like this? I feel foolish for trusting their word, for thinking I was ready, for spending all this time and energy this month (and the months leading up to it) preparing, planning, drafting documents, all to have it pulled. Well, either foolish, or made a fool of. But being made to play the fool doesn't feel any better than having been a fool myself.

They tell that this doesn't mean the dissertation is the problem. But it is. Or if it isn't, I am. Either way, I'm pretty invested in both of them - the dissertation, and myself. Either way, it feels like a slap. Either way, it feels like I've been judged as lacking. That I've been told I'm not capable of this. That hurts in ways that I'm having real difficulty moving past. It's shaken my self-perception in very fundamental ways.

But mostly today I'm angry. I'm angry that I was told one thing, then another. I'm angry that I haven't gotten the support I need to be ready for this thing. I'm angry that the way I've had to work because of my committee's preferences in dealing with my long-distance work has delayed me, leading to this decision. I'm angry that I've gotten more email communication about this denial of help in the last three days than I have gotten email support of my work over the last three months.

I'm angry that I wasted the month of October and much of September doing work that is now utterly useless. The job letter will need to be re-drafted next year, and the hours and hours of researching schools is all a waste since the schools next year will all be different.

I'm angry that I spent hundreds of dollars on postage and non-refundable airline tickets to the conference where interviews would take place. I'm angry that I pushed the four other members of my family to book off specific dates for our Christmas celebration just so I could go to this conference that I now have no reason to attend. I'm angry that this messed with my family's plans, not just mine.


I feel betrayed. I feel like I can't trust any of these people anymore. If they're willing to change their mind at the last moment about something so critical (at least to me), what else are they willing to do? I understand that it's their prerogative to put their names to a recommendation letter or not, but I'm having problems with the way it unfolded. If they'd said this in July when I first asked, it would've been disappointing, but not nearly as earth-shattering as it feels right now.

I can't work. I've tried. I need to recover this lost time (I can't recover the lost money after all) but I can't write. I start crying or cursing when I try. The only thing that keeps me from obsessing over this setback is watching movies. I can't even read, which is my favorite mode of escape. Every time I read, I can't help but think that I'm a failure at even this, at the literature that I love. What good am I if I can't even do this thing that I love???

I know I'll get through this - I'm too damn stubborn to give up... even when it might actually be prudent to do so.... But right now, I'm just not able to move on.

What's in a Name?

Or, more accurately, what's in a title?

When I grow up, I wanna be a professor.

[remainder of post deleted - after this weekend, it just seemed utterly ridiculous]

[I realize there's a blogging convention that you never actually pull something after posting it, but I've always felt that seemed a bit restrictive since each blogger controls his or her own space, which should include being able to change the material on the site. If I have offended in doing this, I'm sorry. I just can't bear the thought of leaving the original post up any more. It just feels too humiliating]

oofff!

In case you're wondering, that's the sound you make when life gently broadsides you, knocking the wind out of your sails, just when you thought you were merrily getting by.

[Like how I managed to mix metaphors AND sneak in the blog title? I thought you would.]

My office looks like something exploded in it between the dumping of things when I got home from Georgia, and the digging out of other things in order to start generating the job letters I need to get sent out very soon. And speaking of job applications - wow! - does it every take a long time to properly tailor a letter to an academic job. Just wow. At this rate, I'll be ready to apply for these jobs NEXT year. Wow.

So blogging will likely continue to be sparse while I dig my way out of this mess. Wish me luck in all of it, k?

Georgia and back

Okay, well I haven't left Georgia yet - I head out in about a half hour. But the conference here was fabulous, and my wonderful friend who organized it pulled off a coup in that everyone absolutely enjoyed it despite what she saw as all the things that went wrong.

But I have made a note to myself not to try to organize a conference in the first couple of years as an Assistant Professor (provided that's where my life and abilities take me!) My panel went very well and we had some good conversation after the presentation. I feel like the time frame was a bit of a problem because it felt like I glossed over some of what I wanted to say in the interests of fitting within the time, but overall, I think I made my points.

The panel I chaired was great fun too - well, except for the fact that we had a non-topic related panelist added on in the last minute, and the conversation about that paper threatened to erupt into a heated discussion that really would've taken us away from the purpose of the panel. But we got back on track so it's all good.

I'm just trying for the next few minutes to enjoy the warm sun and air here before I head back home. I know I'd hate the summer heat, but boy is it nice down here in October! More later.

Auto Blogging!

Holy Snapping Duck Do! I just got a bajillion whiny emails saying I have not updated this since they invented sliced bread... You would not believe that my hands were chopped off and I was waiting for bionic ones. Apologies to my regular readers! Even the little blue ones!.

I am hopped up on caffeine with setting fire to people wearing Crocs, watching Dexter, just generally being a nuisance to every Lost Boy that crosses my path, my day is full to bursting from the first cockadoodledoo from the rooster till I run out of alcohol. I am putting money aside so I can run away. and that I can take that big badge off my head that says bad mother.

I won't promise anything to you but I will write something that makes sense soon. No, really! Don't hold your breath though, you're likely to turn blue.

Courtesy: The Lazy Blogger

Wow! That's intense (and scary)!

In the past few weeks several parts of my life have come to the fore, each vying for importance and attention. In my darker moments, I think it's more like ALL, not SEVERAL parts!

This has meant I've been working almost non-stop for several weeks, over very long hours. But it's not the working that's getting to me. What's getting to me is the accompanying sense of anxiety that at any moment I will forget something critical and all those juggling balls will come tumbling down. Working long hours is tiring, but that's all it is. Working long hours with the constant suspicion that you're forgetting something even more important is anxiety-provoking.

I did forget to photocopy some materials and bring them to a class I was teaching. But since I always overprepare for classes, I had plenty of other things to do and will bring the photocopies (and the activity they're for) to the next class.

And I've been fairly good about continuing to exercise, so that helps keep me on track.

But then something happened earlier this week that scared me. And I know it happened as a result of this persistent juggling trick involving staying on top of everything at the same time.

I actually had a moment - just a moment mind you - when I pulled up at a red light and something along the lines of "what is that? red light. okay. wait. does red mean stop? yes. it means stop. green is go - red is stop. okay. gotta brake" went through my head.

Yikes!

The "scientific" proof of my genius!

What Your Socks Say About You

You Are: - Simply outstanding - Brave to the core - A person of depth - Infinitely wise

The Socks Personality Test

The agonies of fashion

Ladies, want to know why men rule the world?

Because they don't spend almost 4 hours to get their hair done and buy a new work outfit! That's why.

4 hours!

Mind you, it's a snazzy new do and I love it. But with the time and $$ it cost, I'm glad I only do this once every 7 or 8 years. How in the world do people manage it on a more frequent basis? After all, that's 4 hours less that I had available for course prep, or marking, or writing, or reading, or job letters... or even something more enjoyable... you get the idea.

Hokey doodles!

Mixed messages

Has it ever happened to you that right at the time you need to be the most productive, you start to question whether you can do what you need to do? I don't mean questioning if you can get it done in time - I do that all the time. I mean questioning whether you're capable of it?

Right now I'm getting mixed messages from my committee members about my progress. No, not about my progress. About my ability to do this thing. Advisor #1 has given me good feedback - some of which was a bit distressing because I hadn't realized the glaring problem was there, but good. Advisor #1 is also fully supportive of the run at the market this fall, which is reassuring.

Advisor #2 just sent me some feedback, but it seems to suggest that the two chapters that I've just spent six months sweating over aren't necessary and might not be included in the dissertation. !?! Advisor #2 is also supportive of the job run, but this latest feedback suggests some doubt about the schedule I've set for myself.

[Advisor #3 is silent and has been on all fronts for a long time, which I'm trying not to worry about]

But the latest response from #2 is making me wonder who I should believe. Is #1 correct that I'm on the right track and have a reasonable schedule? Or is #2 correct that my work isn't on track and might not be manageable given the schedule I have set for myself? Whose vision is more accurate?

I know what you're thinking, and I've told it to myself as well. The person who knows best how it's going is me. I should be able to tell which view of this project is most accurate. And my answer is that I'm doing fine and can get this done on my schedule.

But if that's the case, why doesn't #2 see it? I am still a student after all. Perhaps I have the wrong idea of what is needed? Perhaps I don't really have what it takes to write a dissertation. I've successfully written seminar papers, but maybe I can't translate that to the book length project that is the dissertation? What if I'm not really cut out for this career?

I tell myself I've come this far, I've presented conference papers that have gone over well (for the most part - there was one fairly notable stinker in the lot, but overall they've been well received). I've got a couple of things published (I've also had a rejection, but everybody does, right?), and I even won a student prize for an essay. So I must be capable of this, right?

But there's that nasty little voice of doubt that tells me that was all luck and then I start thinking ridiculous things like: What if #2 is right and I'm the first person in the history of the department to fail the defense? I did have one rather spectacular failure during the degree already, maybe the rest has just been people not wanting to tell me the truth.

Ugh. Why is it that I doubt myself now? Is it just continued fall out from that earlier failure? Is it because I really am prescient and can see that this won't work? Then I wonder just how much validation I need to know that I am supposed to be doing this. How many successes will it take to counter those couple of negatives?

And all of this is coming to a head right now in the midst of job material preparation. Self-doubt isn't a great selling strategy for the job search now, is it? I've got to get past this!

Harper is a Cylon

Ha! I had to laugh at this Canadian-election-as-Battelstar-Gallactica parody!

look-ee, look-ee!

The dissertation meter is a whole 3% higher than last week! Woohoo!

Ugh.

Procrastination

I receive an email newsletter from Tomorrow's Professor that often has interesting articles. But today's article felt a bit condescending to me, and I found myself wondering at its effectiveness. That got me thinking what my response would be to each of these procrastination thoughts.

Ten Ways of Thinking that Lead to Writing Procrastination -and Rebuttals to Those Thoughts

* I need to warm up first by writing some email.
** Rebuttal: You can warm up by starting the work slowly, making a list of what you will do, reading over your notes or writing from yesterday.
Okay, go for it then! Email might be a way of getting "warmed up" but it can also eat up a huge amount of time, so make sure you limit it in one way or another. But if that's what works for you, do it. If writing email distracts you and you never get to the writing, then it's not a good strategy and you need to find some other way to warm up.

* I'm not in a good mood and I don't write well when I'm not in a good mood - I'll do it later when I feel better.
** Rebuttal: Nothing will make you feel as good as getting something done. The main reason for your bad mood is that you don't really want to do this task, so getting it out of the way will feel great.
I understand not wanting to write when in a foul mood, but mostly those moods convince me that I don't have the ability to write. This is where I need to encouragement (read kick in the ass) from a good friend to get me going. Telling myself I'll feel better after writing something seldom seems to work. Alternately, if my friends' collective feet are getting tired of kicking me, I undertake some non-writing, writing-related activity, like cleaning up notes, or annotating a text that I'll be using. At least then the project is moving forward.

* Life is so hard - I can't believe I have to do this unpleasant task. I'll even it out by doing something more fun first.
** Rebuttal: Yes, life is hard, and it's terrible that you have to do this task. That's why you will reward yourself after you do the task. Otherwise you're applying backwards conditioning, which doesn't work. And don't forget to plan enough fun and relaxation time into your schedule.
'Fraid this one doesn't apply to me. My parents and life already taught me that the unpleasant tasks are better to get done and out of the way as soon as possible so they aren't hanging over me. So I don't know what I'd say. I know if someone came to me saying "life is hard" I'd be sorely tempted to reply "suck it up, buttercup! you think you're the only one who finds life hard? get over yourself and deal with it!" But I don't think that would necessarily be helpful!

* I'll definitely do it, in a minute or so
* Rebuttal: Set a timer, or that minute could last 2 hours. When the timer goes off, do the task. Even better, do it now!
Ugh! Having a timer jangling in my ear because I'm doing something else and need to limit my time? I can't imagine doing so - the thought of a timer irritates me so much I just couldn't do it. I understand the impetus behind the thought, but I suppose my suggestion instead would be to do the writing right away and save whatever you wanted to do for "a minute or so" as a reward.

* After this bad thing is over in my life (midterms, meeting, in-law visit, etc.) my life will seem easier and I'll be able to do my task on a daily basis. So I'll wait until then.
** Rebuttal: Life is always like this. You can afford to do 15 minutes of work today, can't you? This is the one small act you can do to make your life a little better.
Okay, quitting smoking during spring finals week taught me that there is never a good time for anything, so not an issue. But I must say the rhetorical "you can afford...?" strikes me as a bit condescending. Perhaps my answer to someone with this procrastination would point out that the anticipated daily basis will likely never arise, and even if it does, the wealth of time now at your disposal can be just as disabling as the "bad thing" you're waiting for to end. A sort of "be careful what you wish for" where wishing for a wealth of time and then getting it can be incredibly frustrating when what you write during that wealth of time is either miniscule or worthless!

* I just don't feel like it
** Rebuttal: So what? Do it anyway! If you wait until you feel like it, the task will get done in 10 years if you're lucky. They only way to make yourself feel like it is to get started and get into the flow of the work.
This one I get. There are some days I just don't feel like doing it. But beating myself up by telling myself that it doesn't matter that I don't feel like it invalidates my actually feeling of not wanting to do it! It does matter - it's my feeling and telling myself that I shouldn't be feeling it just invalidates my own experience of it. On these days, I figure it's okay to acknowledge I don't want to do it IF I do something else that is productive and will get me there. On a day like this, I might give myself a choice between the writing project and course prep. Even if I don't want to do either, I still have a choice, and regardless of which one I choose, I get something productive done. If I choose course prep, then on the day I do feel more like writing, I won't have to stop to get the course prep done, and if I write, then, well, I write!

* Why do just a little today - I'll do double tomorrow - I work better when I feel pressure anyway.
** Rebuttal: It's a fallacy that you work better under pressure. It's not true, because anxiety reduces creativity and clear thinking. And doing double the next day will backfire. You will feel less like doing it tomorrow because you've decided you must do double the work, and it will seem more overwhelming and less appealing, so you're even more likely to put it off until the next day.
Okay, I do fall victim to this one sometimes, though not because I think I work well under pressure, but because I just want to do a little today. But deep down, I know that what I'm really saying is I don't feel like doing it, or I'm not in a good mood, and I need to address the underlying reason why I don't want to do it today, or that reason will double in size the next day!

* I can only work in one place (the library, a café, my office) and that place isn't available or I can't get there - so there's no point in working at all.
** Rebuttal: You'd be surprised how much work you can get done no matter where you are. Even if you don't have your laptop with you, you can pull out a scrap of paper and write down a few notes on what you'd like to accomplish in the section you've been working on. Try it!
I've never really felt constrained to only write in my office for example, though I have felt like only writing there can be stultifying sometimes (I have a desktop computer). It is important to learn to write wherever you need to be, and this is just simply a skill that needs to be learned by undertaking it. I suppose if I knew someone who had problems writing elsewhere, I would encourage them to set a weekly challenge of writing in one different space each week to get over that feeling of being only able to write in one space. So I guess my advice would reflect the writer's advice.

* I'm not sure how to do this - I don't know how sitting down and writing will enable me to do it -- it's just hopeless so why even start?
** Rebuttal: If you're not clear enough on what to do, writing may be the only way to get you out of this state. If you truly need help from someone else on this problem, you need to write down the questions clearly. The process of writing them down may clarify the issue for you.
Yes. The process of writing MIGHT clarify the issue. But it also might cloud the issue. I recently read a fairly convincing argument over at Not of General Interest about the potential dangers of writing before you have a clear idea of what you need to write. I realize this answer isn't advocating free writing, but writing out questions, though I really get the idea that sometimes an idea needs to gestate. One of the things I've always loved about conference papers is that there's a huge lag time between proposal and paper, so the idea can gestate for a very long time, which for me means I produce a better paper than say a seminar paper that gets written over the space of a couple of weeks. The downside to "gestating" is that it's hard to tell the difference between it and simple procrastination, so I think you have to be a more experienced writer to know which one is which.

* I didn't write well yesterday, so today will be terrible.
** Rebuttal: Often bad writing days are followed by better ones. The reason to write daily is that your brain is still plugging away on it while you're doing other things or sleeping. So you may surprise yourself today!
Do people really believe that a bad writing day is the start of a string of bad writing days? I suppose my suggestion might be to go back to what you wrote and see if it really is that bad. It might have only felt bad and in the light of a new day might actually have been good. And if it really was bad? Erase all trace of it and start from scratch!

Out of Touch

As you can tell by the dearth of posts lately, I've been busy.

Yes, I know everybody's busy right now. I'm not different.

It's been causing anxiety on and off, which means everytime I try to draft a post, it ends up a whiny, angst-filled screed on everything from academia to traffic. So I won't post them.

I am alive, just a bit overwhelmed at this point and posting will resume once I get through this... problem is, I don't know how long that will take - maybe days, maybe months.

Changing road conditions

In trying to think of a phrase that expresses what it's like to move from vacation mode to home/work mode, I found myself feeling very cliched - things like switching gears or coming down to earth just didn't seem to cut it. Because coming back from this vacation didn't feel like a sudden change.

I think that's because we drove for two days to get back, and then my first day back was spent visiting the new schools I'll be teaching at, picking up books, signing contracts, and such. The travelling gave us the opportunity to start thinking ahead to the upcoming week while still officially on vacation, while the first day of running around wasn't my typical work day.

It wasn't like an abrupt gear switch. In keeping with a transportation metaphor, it would be a bit more like as if you were driving on a four lane highway that then became a two lane highway that then became a gravel road and then a dirt lane. Or maybe more accurately the reverse - moving from a dirt lane to a four lane highway, with each transition giving you a chance to adjust.

I don't know really. I just know I would've been happy with another week away from the daily routine! But we had a good time - we relaxed, we undertook some activities we don't normally do (and had the sore muscles to prove it!), and I got to see a friend who I haven't seen in years, so, yeah, overall, it was a good time.

The instructional design process

Most of our clients are much more reasonable than this, but there are times when I totally get the designer's frustrations!

Vacation!

We're off on vacation in a day or so... until then, I have a huge list of things that need to get done, so I'm busy, but then I'm looking forward to doing next to nothing for a week!

We've decided that each member of the family is responsible for researching and finding one activity to do on one of the days. So far, we've got an interesting mix of activities - can't wait to see what the last one looks like!

Catch ya later!

Casting about

This week I sent off a chapter to my dissertation advisor, and a different one to my other committee members. So that feels good. And I've officially finished all the edits that I've gotten feedback for this summer.

But now I'm starting another chapter, and I'm casting about for a way to get into it. If you've ever seen a fly fisherman fish (or done so yourself), you know what I mean. In fly fishing, it's important to get the fly to land just right, so that it looks realistic as it sits atop the water. The more it looks like a real fly, the more likely you are to be successful in catching a fish.

What this means is that the fly fisherman will cast multiple times, until the placement looks right. The cast is always upstream so that the fly can float with the current, looking just like an insect that has landed on the water. Then the fly fisher waits, watching how the fly moves along with the flow of the water. If it doesn't look realistic, a re-cast is in order. If it looks good, the fisher lets the fly continue downstream till the line is taut and then recasts upstream again, casting until the placement looks right.

For me, starting a new chapter is a lot like fly fishing. I cast about for a way in, first trying this source, then that, contemplating if I should start with a re-read of the theory, a close reading of the primary source(s), a summary of the themes, or another chapter-specific method. What this means is that I tend to jump about a lot. I read a chapter here, another there, review some notes, jot some ideas down, and generally progress rather haphazardly. It's not that I don't know what I want to say or do in the chapter, I just don't know what I need to do to get me started.

When this happened each time I started to write the first few chapters, I got quite concerned. I figured that if I didn't know where to begin, I had no business trying to write a dissertation. Even now, I'm struggling with accepting that this is the way that I find my way into the chapter. I berate myself by comparing myself to all those (possibly imaginary) dissertators out there who sit down with a clear plan of attack for their chapter and start writing, pouring out wisdom every time they sit down at the keyboard.

I'm sure there are dissertators out there who don't need to cast about like I do. They probably finish their dissertations in a year or two, rather than the 3+ that it's taken me to write this thing (so far). But I'm not one of them. I flounder when I begin a new chapter, trying to figure out what will help me get started.

I'm not despairing. After all, I've discovered that this seems to be the way I need to work to get started writing. I tell myself it is not a colossal waste of time if it results in a successful defense at the end. But I sure am jealous of those people who don't cast about time after time before finally getting a bite worth working for!

Grateful

My neighbor's house burnt down last night.



Right down.

I've been lucky in life so far to not be so close to a house fire. I've been near grass fires, and even helped fight one (I was pretty young, so I don't know I did much good, but I did whatever I was told to do). But this house went up fast. The flames were shooting up 30 m above the housetop within minutes and the fire had spread to the second house before the fire trucks even got here, and they were pretty quick.

We're three houses down from the original house and two from the one that the fire spread to, but when you look out my kitchen window, you realize how close the second house it to ours. If the next house had caught, ours would've gone because we're very close on that side to our neighbors house. But it didn't. They did have some water damage through an open window, and they say their house smells of smoke like ours does - we all had our windows open; it was 30 degrees yesterday - but the damage is minimal for them, and everyone is safe. I didn't talk to the other neighbors who were involved, but the policeman we spoke to said they were fine and had called family etc.

One of the boys in the original house was slightly burned and his father had a bad gush on his arm that we helped wrap up till he could get over to the paramedics, but no one was seriously hurt. Considering how fast that house went up, that could easily have not been the case.

We were in the middle of a thunderstorm when the fire broke out, (but the rain stopped just after that unfortunately!) Since there'd been a crash of thunder that seemed very close just before the fire broke out, I assumed the house had been hit by lightning. But the paper said two teens were messing around in the garage with matches and gasoline. That would explain why I saw the 13 year old being led away in tears by a policeman.

Because we were so close, we were evacuated from the house while the fire crews worked the fire.

I had always wondered why police showed up at a fire. Fire crews and paramedics I could understand, but I never really understood why the police showed up until yesterday. They come to manage people. They were the ones who told us to get out, and they went through our house to make sure everyone was out. (We figured that out when we returned and bedroom doors that hadn't been open earlier were standing open. Good thing we followed fire protocols and left the door unlocked so they could get in to check without breaking in.)

The police also commandeered a city bus for us to sit in while we waited, got water and food for evacuees if they needed it, and kept the crowds of onlookers back. And there were crowds! We of course evacuated out the front door, and we stood about ten houses away, behind the police cordon watching for a long time. When it looked like they had the fire under control in the front, we went around the back to see what the damage was like there.

It looked a carnival or something going on.

There's a major thoroughfare running behind our house and we back onto a large parkland area (yes, it's very nice). The place was covered in people. Covered. It looked like they were all there for a festival or something. There were people sitting on the hill watching, standing on the bike path, on the boulevard, across the street, and up the road. There were people everywhere. There were also cars everywhere. The entire boulevard was covered in cars that people had parked on the grass, stopping to watch, but even though some of them had pulled over, two full lanes of traffic going one way was at a standstill. As we watched, police had to come and clear all the vehicles out of the way and then cordon off the road to allow additional rescue vehicles through.

Three hours later, with the sun down and not much to see, I could still just make out groups of people sitting on that hill watching, I don't know what, since there wasn't much left to see.

Even this morning, the place is busy with onlookers, not just the fire crews finishing up their cleanup and inspection. And even though all the news crews were out last night - hubby was interviewed and made the evening news - they are all here again this morning. It's quite the show. I understand human curiosity, but it was still surprising to see how many people spent their entire evening watching someone else's tragedy unfold. I'm just glad it was only property that was damaged. That can be fixed. People can't.

Job market search

Yesterday I made a binder of all the stuff I've been collecting about conducting an academic job search. There's a lot of information provided both by my department and out there on the web, but all of it says the same thing, and none of it answers the magic question "Will I find an academic job I like this year?"

I guess I'll only know the answer to that question by the time next year's hiring season rolls around, at which point, I'll either be moving, or preparing to do the whole thing all over again.

The more official sources talk about how the "big" list starts coming out September 15th with dossiers due in October and interviews (if you get them) at the conference in December. But the more I read, the more I realize there's a lot of hiring that goes on outside that schedule. For instance, on the Canadian academic sites, there are already a couple of listings that fit my qualifications.

But before I get to the point where I'm ready to start sending out materials, there's a lot to be done. I'd been forewarned by my lovely friend who went through this process a couple of times already, so I've started some of it, but there's still much to be done.

The dossier requires a c.v., which is up-to-date except for those two articles I edited this summer which I'll need to see if I can find a publishing ETA for. So that's pretty much done. It also requires a teaching summary of student evaluations and a teaching philosophy. My advisor likes the teaching philosophy I wrote, so that's pretty much good to go, and I just need to enter the last of the student evals. Then I just need to write cover letters for each position as I find them.

The bigger problems are the writing sample, and the letters of recommendation. Two of my committee members are willing to write letters and said so when I met with them last month. The third committee member has much less confidence in me, probably because we haven't worked together as much, and so I worry about what that letter will look like.

You see, I know that I have a very good chance of finishing on time, but because of the backlog of chapters I now have I don't know that they're convinced that I will be. And they need to indicate in their letters that they have confidence I will be finished by the time a job would start next September. So that might be a tricky negotiation.

The other concern is the writing sample. If they like your application enough to consider you for an interview, the first thing they will ask for is a writing sample. This should be about 20 pages and from the dissertation, which means I will need to do some serious editing of a selected chapter to get it to 20 pages since most of my chapters so far are in the 40-60 page range. It also has to be indicative of the kind of scholarship I'm doing, and so far, most of my writing has been in the chapters that set-up, or provide an alternate approach to the core of the dissertation's argument. Yes, for the purpose of the writing sample, this was not a good plan of action, but for the purpose of the dissertation, I think it was the perfect way to tackle the material. So if I get to the point of needing a writing sample, I'll have to do some serious scrambling. But no sense crossing that bridge till I come to it.

So I'm sitting here with a binder full of information that I'm going to hopefully fill with wonderful job opportunities that I will then apply for. I'm both nervous and excited... but mostly nervous...

Murata Boy, the Robot that can Ride Bicycles

So you thought it was cool when robots could walk? How about bike riding?