Time for a Deep Breath

I had the best weekend in Norwich, as I told you. I haven't told you about one of the little things that added to the goodness. I bought a book and started reading it.

Now, of course, you think, duh, you're an English professor. You read LOTS of books. And indeed, you would be right. But usually I read books to teach them or books about books, which are all very interesting, but, to be frank, not always fun.

I grew up reading for fun, and one of the things I've discovered is that I don't read as much for fun any more. For one thing, reading is physically tiring (the eyes, the sitting so you can see and take notes, or at least see), so it isn't what I tend to want to do for fun as much. And there's so much work reading that I don't always get beyond it. (The big surprise for me this semester is how much I enjoyed teaching PL and FQ
, at least the parts we did, and how much the students seemed to like them as well.)
But this weekend, I didn't take grading (I didn't have much, and most of it got done yesterday, with one thing yet to grade today), so that left my evening free (because I'm a boring so and so who doesn't go out clubbing after a day of medieval church visits).

So I got a book. For a while now, I've been hearing about Terry Pratchett and that he's a good and funny writer, and since I didn't feel like anything serious (I could have brought PL along for serious, or reread the rest of the FQ), I found Terry Pratchett's books among the young adult stuff, and got one, I Shall Wear Midnight.

And it was good! Lots of fun, relaxing, and amusing. It wasn't the first book in the series (Discworld), but it was the one they had, so that was that. I'd like to read more, but will probably mostly hold off until I get back to my own, homey, public library. (I live my public library.)

Now, I have about 6 more hours of teaching this week, and then it's finals time. But for now, right now, I'm not prepping any big new works (because I know making students read a big work for the final days adds stress, and because Blake and Milton wrote some excellent short poems and such, and also one class is finishing up the second book of PL). And that means I have some time to breathe. It's not that I don't have stuff looming, but I feel a bit relaxed. I went for a short playing session outside today, and I feel so much better for it!

Here's the to do list:

For today: grade 2 papers and prep 2 classes (relatively easy preps and I have a 3 hours to get these done)

And then:
Write and grade 3 finals
Grade papers (when they come in, not huge numbers left)
Write my SAA abstract (for Dec 1)
Mail a sock monkey hat to one of my cousins

My excel grade books are ready to go so that I'll enter the last grade numbers and the final numbers will be there. (I love excel grade books.)

I have a few "duties" here (going to a dinner, a concert, and so on) along the way.

And then there's packing, which I will start on Monday, I think. And finish a couple hours later. And then I'll have to dig through to get my toothbrush out again, since that always seems to happen.

I wonder if there are any more Pratchett books around the Abbey? I've also got a hankering to reread The Hobbit and LotR.