the heat must be getting to the people in albuquerque. just got through eight wonderful days in new mexico at the
summer synthesis imaging workshop, also known as the VLA summer school. Seems like I've been away a lot longer than a week. Missed out on seeing Marc and Carol while they were in Evanston, and probably missed a few graduation goodbyes (can't wait to see pictures from the karaoke party). Goodbyes from Albuquerque were actually pretty sad. Funny how well you can befriend a handful of people at these things. I would say that this group was the best set of "conference friends" so far though. I feel like I got half a dozen people I'll try to stay in touch with. Hopefully run into them again at some other astronomy meeting. I'll write up a post about my trip this weekend. Suffice to say, I had a great time.
Getting back into Evanston tonight. Sunday is
Intonation with Tim, really the beginning of my summer in Chicago. It'll be great to see everyone! Seemingly to finish out the Spring, Northwestern put my TA CTECs online. For the most part I'm pretty happy with students' responses. I think this may be mostly a function of how great Mike Smutko and Dave Meyer are as professors. My biggest weakness seemed to be not being enthusiastic enough (all the time) and that smarts a bit. There was a "TA is enthusiastic" comment for every "TA was not enthusiastic" comment, so it's pretty much a wash. But I certainly think I should be better than that. Chalk this up to a good learning experience: it's tough being enthusiastic every day (I don't envy school teachers)... Bottom line: I felt good about how I did TAing this past year. And hey, a few people even claimed to like my sense of humor! (I suppose a thank you is due to all CRCers who took Intro Astro courses this year.) Just for kicks, here's various snippets that made me remember I had some great students this year:
(the very first comment!)
He also bared with me when I made fun of astronomers
First off, his name is Jack not John...
He never really did much. I see that as a strength.
Jack is really cool and chill. He enjoys the subject but doesn't have to rub it in your face.
Ok, so maybe these would play better on facebook than for a teaching job, but i'm contented. The overwhelming negative comment was that the TAs should appear at lectures thus making us graduate students somehow "more approachable". I'm not buying that line. We have our own classes and work and 60+ hour weeks. But I'll grant them that maybe there's something to showing up for the first half dozen lectures and putting in some face time (which I did do for two of the three classes).
Everyone seems to be complaining about their laptop, so I'll throw in my 2 cents. I can't stand how the touchpad goes haywire all the time (cursor running and hiding in the corners of the screen) and the keyboard now likes to refuse to let me type anything on the bottom row. To fix this I've discovered I need to bash the "C" key until it starts to work again. At least the hinges work. (Remember when you tore my laptop in half, Marc Lummis -- you brute.) Of course I'd love an Intel/Apple notebook... but
who wouldn't. Perhaps I can just use Farhad's from time to time. In the meantime I will continue to finesse what I've got because I've much better things to be spending money on (like food, rent and fun).
And just to make absolutely clear, yes, I've been sleeping plenty since that last crazy post. Cease with the worrying!
