Sunday's Walk

A grey day still given over mostly to grading today... Eric and I had our usual brunch in our usual neighborhood diner, then a lovely but shorter than usual walk among green lush living things... A few of my stragglers have come through already for this course behind me and so I have all but a couple of the final papers I need to submit grades on time tomorrow (this deadline is usually a nailbiter for me, as I usually have to cheerlead a few students past the finish line and never feel quite sure all the effort will succeed or not until the final work actually gets handed in, often horrifically right under the wire). As I mentioned before, another summer intensive is beginning at Berkeley next week, right after the completion of this present one, and so I haven't really got a break to get all this end of term stuff done in (at the risk of getting done in myself), but the July 4 holiday is smack dab in the middle of the week this year and is relieving a lot of the pressure of the first week of this upcoming intensive, since going over the syllabus on day one is usually no great pressure and on Thursday we'll be screening and discussing a film and this should generate lively discussion with minimal lecture-preparation or fuss. So, the prospect of a nice week ahead, enraging headlines documenting our ongoing slide into fascism and climate catastrophe notwithstanding.