20150504.0713

Yes, yes, yes. May the Fourth be with you again. And, yes, this blogroll is once again marking an anniversary, having begun (although not in earnest) in 2010 on this day. I probably ought to attend to some of my other online materials, though; it has been some time since I have done so, and links in the linked posts may not be as live as they ought to be. Perhaps after I get done the other things I need to get done, I can attend to it, but that will not happen for some time yet. It may not ever happen; new tasks arise as quickly as I discharge old ones, which is good in that it keeps me in work and thus in bringing in money, but it is less good in that it makes clearing my docket a difficult thing to do. Such is the cost of life in academia.

One of the benefits of that life, though, is that things have discrete beginnings and endings, and one of those endings arrives presently. It is exam week at the school where I am employed, and while I am not actually giving exams today--mine are Wednesday and Friday--the sense of finality, of crossing a finish line, is very much in evidence at Sherwood Cottage. To continue with the racing metaphor, there is one final sprint to undertake, since the line is in sight and its tape waits for me to break it. I hate to run, of course, although there was a time when I did so well and swiftly, but for such an occasion as comes twice a year (or more, in some places), it is worth doing. That the sprint is only a sprint helps with that.

I am more or less ready for the exams. They are already written and need only be administered and graded. The grading will have to be in some haste, admittedly, as I have travel plans which commence the day after exams are done, but it should not be a problem for me. The students' submissions will likely be brief, and they will all be treating the same subject matter. I do have a freelance piece to which to attend, as well as a conference paper to complete within the week, so there will be a bit of a juggling act to negotiate, but that ought not to be too much of a problem. The piece I will read for the freelancing ought to go easily and quickly; I think I will handle the conference work first. Exam proctoring, after all, allows for other things to happen--as I have attested before, and more than once, in this webspace.

There are benefits, after all, to maintaining a single stream of writing, even if it has not always flowed as freely as it ought to have done. Being able to look back with ease on some, at least, of what has gone before helps to frame thought and promote evolving understanding. If the channel is sometimes diverted, that does not mean the flow must stop forever...