Wednesday morning things

* Still more on the Mount St. Mary's college flap. Allegedly a tenured professor has been fired for criticizing the president's comments about "drowning bunnies."

That sort of thing is why I continue to defend the existence of tenure, even though I know a great many people disagree with me. Just as there are Constitutional safeguards in place to prevent our nation from becoming a dictatorship*, tenure should be a safeguard against a dictatorial president.

(*I hope.)

Also, tenure is not a sinecure. Most campuses - mine is stepping into doing this now - have some kind of annual or every-three-years review process, and if someone here is found to be lecturing from 20-year-old crumbling notes, skipping out on office hours, abusive to students, refusing to do even minimal service and/or not keeping up with the changes in their field - they can have tenure revoked after two or three bad reviews of that sort.**

(** As always, your mileage may vary: there may be that one guy (or woman) who knows exactly where all the bodies are buried and so can get away with stuff that the more honest and earnest types like me couldn't, but I do point it out as a "Yes, I actually do have to put continued effort into teaching/scholarship/service")

I just...can you imagine, giving 15 or more years of your life to a career and then being out on your backside because you, speaking from experience, publicly disagreed with someone in a high position who doesn't have the experience you have had? "Speaking truth to power," indeed. It's kind of chilling and I wonder if this means a lot more faculty on a lot more campuses are either going to keep their mouth shut about things they disagree with, or else if there are going to be a lot of anonymous things in the vein of "A Modest Proposal" published.

ETA: And apparently the guy was dismissed without even a hearing or a chance to appeal his firing: told to clean out his desk and Security would be there to escort him off campus, and if he came back, he'd be arrested. Oh, maybe that happens in some industries but really? For just disagreeing with the guy in charge?

I confess, this is where I would go a little lily-livered: It's just me out here in the world, I have no Significant Other to see to it that I have a roof over my head, so if things got like that here, I'd just shut up, keep my head down, and desperately try, on the QT, to find another job. And that's sad, I know, but I have to look after myself because almost no one else is going to.

Fortunately I do not think that will be an issue.

* I will also observe that a few - not many, but a few - students we've had who seemed to be in the position, early in their first year, to be Bunnies To Be Drowned, with a little guidance and a lot of tutoring, they managed. And some of them went on to successful careers. And anyway, small regional state schools tend to wind up in the business of trying to rescue students who are flailing a little. Granted, not all the students who struggle can make it, and we shouldn't be pushed for 100% or even 80% retention - that could be done, but it would require an adjustment of standards to the point where college attendance would be pointless. (And would you want to be worked on by a doctor who got mercy-passes all through?)

But sometimes there are people who flounder early on who can pull themselves up and make it. Or sometimes there are people who try college, drop out because they are floundering, but vow to come back some day - and they often do, after some years in the workforce and some gaining of maturity. One of my best students ever commented about how she was "So stupid at 18" and that led to her chasing after the wrong things and ultimately failing out. But coming back in her 30s....she was ready, she wanted to do the work it took, and she did very well (and is still doing very well; she has one of the more-prestigious (if not well-paid) jobs in the conservation world)

* And again I will note my gobsmackery that the school involved in this brouhaha is a nominally Christian school.

On to happier, or at least more interesting things:

* There is going to be a Titanic II. I think it's an interesting idea from the standpoint of the history (and the photos show it as quite beautiful) but I admit I am superstitious enough that I don't think I could travel on it without a serious frisson of worry.

And at any rate: I doubt I could afford even a steerage ticket.

* Maud Pie has most of a body now.

* I also started a pair of simple socks to work on while I read. I dug out an old, old skein of Opal - it was a bee-patterned one. Stripes of yellow and sections with black flecks. I remember ordering this AGES ago from an online seller; she had a waiting list for people who wanted it and she wrote my name on the label of the yarn so that her stockers/packers knew that it was for me.

I think the yarn has to be more than 10 years old. (It has the "old" brown-paper Opal label; the newer labels are shiny and usually have a photograph of the finished design on them).

I don't know. It seems strange to me to be able to look back and go, "Wow, that's the 'old' Opal" but I do remember a lot of things from the "resurgence" of knitting - I had some of the first of the self-striping Regia sock yarns when they came out; I remember the excitement about those. (I STILL like them. I know some knitters snark about them, because it's fun to snark about things and especially fun to set yourself up as superior because you only ever do "real" colorwork on things). I remember "Woolworks" and Sarah Bradberry's website and the Free Knitting Patterns Webring.

I remember Socka and how the company was sold to another company and Socka changed, and also became a lot less available. (Not even sure if they still make it)

And I remember the coming of the knitting blogs, which was what pushed me to found this. Even if I don't talk as much about knitting any more, and even if a lot of the knit blogs I "talked back and forth" with or referenced are now long gone, and a lot of the other ones are far less active.

* And sadly, in one way I'm back to how things were 10+ years ago: the local yarn/fabric shop closed, so if I want stuff, I either now have to mail order it or wait for my rare trips out of town. I miss the local quilt shop. I hope some day our economy can support another one. I would also like to have a real bookstore - the paperback exchange downtown closed, I think there's another one out by the lake but I haven't been there in ages. Again, I have to either use Amazon or wait for a trip somewhere for book-buying.

* I need to get out of town this weekend. Am debating whether to just do "the usual round" (Jo-Ann's, bookstore, natural-foods store, Kroger) or if to try to add in going to at least one antique shop.

I think some of my distress and unhappiness comes when I feel too constrained, like my life is nothing but shuttling from home to work and back, and then to church on Sunday, and maybe a run to the wal-mart. It's like being in a very small Habitrail.

I STILL have plans to go somewhere fun on my birthday. Probably Whitesboro, though I might look into whether the McKinney construction mess has ever been resolved.