truth and beauty brigade

i made a totally hilarious joke about architects, truth and beauty and the decemberists in my large lecture course this morning. four out of the 50 in attendance laughed.

here's a pathetic image...i arrived on campus at 6 a.m. today for the first day of classes to ready and run my syllabi. i watched the sun rise (from the faculty work room with the fast computers and scanners) and thought it so totally beautiful.

i actually used colin meloy as a the criteria for overriding and oversubscribing people.

the lecture hall in dana is a-ma(i)zing. it is seriously the best outfitted room i have ever taught in, great sight lines, great acoustics, great appliances. even a built in timer on the podium to countdown the time til the end of class. they even have some of the same machines i knew and loved at maryland.

my afternoon caas class was good. but one the students after class asked why i wasn't my goofy self. her phrase, not mine. goofy self is to be revealed at a later time.

i log in now because it is before the conference. i am going and i am going to be on my best behavior. except that this afternoon, quite inadvertently, i caused a major kerfuffle. i asked whether anyone had hired security to contend with the anti-israel protesters who go to many public events in ann arbor. no one had. and people started getting worried. the thing is despite the publicity, this probably won't even register on their radar not political enough and not enough attention. it's a pity -- i mean not that they won't come with the anti-semitic rants and huge banners, but more that tcaup has spent all this money and for what? really for what?