I thought I was relatively observant.

Really, I did. It turns out I'm not as with it as I thought... let me set the scene.

I teach a design studio, and tonight was the second class of the term, but the first time I was with my own 8 students. The class began tonight with yours truly giving a project intro lecture to all 48 students. Afterwards we went upstairs, and they pinned up their work. I noticed I only had 7 instead of 8 (observant!) but started anyway. A few moments later, student 8 arrives. He apologizes, and them looks at another student and sort of nods and smiles... I assume they are friends.

Fast forward....

2+ hours later, student 8 presents his work. The whole group has been presenting and conversing for a while now-- I've learned all their names. So this guy is presenting, an someone makes a comment, and I sort of turn to see and hear it. It is at this very moment that I realize that student 8 and the student he exchanged glances with are WEARING THE SAME SHIRT! I couldn't believe that a) I hadn't noticed, or b) that it was actually happening! I'm losing my touch for detail.oh, and did i mention the shirt in question is plaid?!?!

if only i spoke french...

i got stuck on the train this evening after teaching for a full 30 minutes between the stop at which i boarded, and the next stop. the experience was entertaining and surreal, due in large part to the ENORMOUS number of French tourists ready to go clubbing.

i only wish i knew what they were saying.

yellow

i matched the walls in studio.

[thanks for the photo, tessa]

vocabulary

yesterday i was talking to someone about their design project, and as he described the organizational strategy to me, he referred to both the "hierarchy" and the "lowerarchy" of the design.

i did not correct him.

more weekend fun

this weekend-- tonight actually-- we're headed down to the New River Gorge for an extended weekend climbing trip! we will be driving starting tonight (yikes!) after the class i teach-- dan will drive the first leg of the trip while i sleep (i hope) and then i will start driving sometime in the middle of the night... in addition to climbing we'll be watching official bridge day! i hope it's fun and the drive doesn't kill us... now i just have to make it through work today, tying up a bunch of loose ends, and then it's off until tuesday night!

another year

today i had my annual review at work... it went really well, which is cool. i felt pretty confident, and i got positive feedback. at the end of the day i met with one of my students from this semester so she could use my office's large format color scanner to document her drawings. apparently rich told both she and i that he intentionally placed her as my student, as he thought we would get along. i could see pieces of myself in her throughout the semester, and then today after we left my office, she was chatting about her summer plans, and i swear it was an echo of me several years ago... i'm really going to miss having her in my class. i finally realized today that i really want her to do well because of this similarity-- i hope that didn't come out wrong. seriously, though, it's like i want to warn her of things, and encourage her to try things, and i just want her to be great, without her thinking i'm creepy for having an interest in her well-being. :)