Well, I'm writing this on Sunday the 30th as a text document to be pasted into "Updates" whenever my interenet service comes back up. It was getting dodgy Friday night, and cut out entirely yesterday. I'm not sure if it's for the whole campus or just my building (the lab downstairs is also out.) Anyway, yesterday I took the MSAT (Multi-Subject Assessment for Teachers) which was certainly the most preposterous test I've ever taken, and quite likely one of the biggest wastes of 8 hours ever. The exam (2 hr. multiple choice test and 3 hr. essay test) kicked off with us riding a schoolbus to Christopher Columbus H.S. at 6:45 am, and we didn't get back until around 4 in the afternoon... a blast. Everything on the test was ridiculous and nitpicky, from history questions I wasn't sure on to phys ed (mechanics of spiking a volleyball) etc. The most ridiculous was a "visual arts" question with a picture of a sculture called "Bird in Space" with the description that its author was interested in "movement through time and space." My answer was a triumph of bullshit--I said somethign about the gracefully sweeping art of the left side of the statue being reminiscent of the contrails of the space shuttle in flight or something of that sort. The highlight of the afternoon was the appearance of the ice cream truck while we were all waiting on the steps of the school waiting for the busses to arrive (must have been quite a spectacle for the locals, wondering why there were so many white folks there). A few of us decided to abandon the bus altogether and walked home. Got ahold of PB and EH and took the metro north up to bronxville for dinner, good times. Got back and was looking around for something to do, but a bunch of the guys had already taken off to Manhattan to a club, and the lack of useful door-propping equipment makes it hard to see who's home, so i just ended up crashing. Weather continues to be hot, took a stroll with some folks up here to get a few much-needed supplies at a drugstore. Apparently tomorrow we actually start doing something, so I should have some more info then. Almost finished w/ "Truman" for Mrs. O, excellent book. The more I read, the more I admire the man.


Sunday, 30 June, 10:45 pm
I have 7 hrs exactly until the alarm goes off, waking me up for my first real day of this teaching deal, although we're not actually teaching tomorrow, just meeting our schools and groups, etc. Fairly nervous, but I've been getting antsy not really doing anything, and I'm looking forward to getting started. Coming back from my run tonight I strolled onto the quad, surrounded by fireflies (they're really plentiful up here) and saw a group of my soon-to-be colleagues playing ultimate on the lawn, as though we were all college freshmen again. There seems to be a unity of purpose here that I don't sense many places... we had it on the campaign, but it seemed to be more common among interns than staff. This seems to be that feeling writ large, everybody is open and friendly, you can stroll up to somebody, sit down, introduce yourself, and ask/answer the 4 big questions: "where are you going" (LA), "what are you teaching there" (elementary), "where are you from" (upstate, usually with a jerk of the thumb toward someplace else, presumably north), "where did you go to school"(Hamilton, usually have to explain where/what that is) and occasionally the extra question about whether I know where I'm teaching yet. This has surprisingly lead to getting to know people pretty quickly, which is quite nice. I can't help but feeling, however, that none of us have any clue what we're getting into.