Taking stock

This has been a busy week. There was a parental visit and a full-day new faculty orientation on top of the various other stuff I regularly do.

The start of the semester seems more real now due to the orientation. I staggered home from it with my brain full of information and a tote bag jammed full of event schedules, contact information for student and faculty support services, pamphlets on writing and grading, etc. I've also acquired keys to my new office and verified that the bookstore has my books in. Today I finished up my syllabus. So I'm just about ready to go with classes, and I still have a full week to plan class before I need to teach. 

I need to not let teaching swamp the writing and other aspects of my professional life, though. Therefore, I'm going to take stock of my summer accomplishments as well as goals for the fall.

This summer I did the following:

• finished a conference paper
• participated in a very lively conference session
• agreed to co-edit a project which should see print in the spring
• finished and submitted an article (entirely separate from the conference)
• began revisions on the conference paper
• began to think about the paper I'll write after that
• read assorted & sundry volumes
• planned my fall course

This fall I'll need to do the following:

• review a manuscript, as recently requested to do
• finish revisions on the conference paper
• do my responsibilities as co-editor
• submit an abstract for Kalamazoo and work on the ensuing paper
• apply for jobs (I may submit as few as two applications)
• teach my fall course

That all sounds reasonably manageable. The hitch is I have two projects out and under submission, and if they come back with revision requests and short deadlines, things could get much more complicated. As things currently stand, I can be satisfied with my summer and optimistic about the next 3 months.