Professor Mommy Zombie Reporting for Duty

Yup, still here. I know you were worried.

The Creative Writing Festival went well. There were some problems: the usual SCCC facilities/bureaucracy nonsense but nothing insurmountable. Allison Seay's reading was so lovely. I really love To See the Queen, and her preface to the poems and her subsequent delivery of them was intimate and clear and kind of raw, in the best way. Kelly Daniels is awesome -- A. and I had him over for dinner the night before the festival and they traded stories about breweries and craft beer and he was assaulted by my dogs and my children and not only survived, but seemed to enjoy himself. Colum McCann, too, rock star author that he is, was charming -- extremely down to earth, endearing everyone with his sense of humor and his self-deprecation. It was a good day after all.

I've been doing some writing, but none of it here (obviously) and little of it on my creative work, like poetry, like the verse play. One of my duties at the college is to write a blog for the union. Between the festival and my role as advisor to the literary magazine, not to mention grading and last-minute desperate class prep, I haven't even been keeping up with that like I should -- but I kind of like the last post that I wrote, for the most part. At least it's some form of writing, right?

I was fortunate to have another poem published in Stirring: A Literary Collection, but the acceptance/publication was followed fast by two rejections, and rejections from things I'd really wanted to be a part of, so it all evens out, eh? Yay for the Universe! Yaaaayyyyy . . .

My youngest child, Vampire Toddler (whose teeth are growing in really oddly -- two on the top right side of her mouth, two center bottom, and nothing else) hasn't been sleeping very well, which means that I haven't been sleeping very well, which means that nothing is really making its way back to my students (i.e. graded assignments). This is of concern because next week is the last week of school. I'd say this with some relief, except that I had to take on a 5-week summer class and that begins on May 26, and the week in between is filled with meetings. Blerg, and double blerg.

I know that the rest of the world works 12 months out of the year, but the rest of the world doesn't have to grade papers after business hours and on weekends for 10 months out of the year. So the rest of the world can suck it. (Just kidding, Rest of the World! I love you. I'm just grumpy and tired and self-pitying and envious!)

I need a nap. Or a whole series of naps sandwiched on top of one another so that they resemble a three-day long sleeping binge. Preferably outside, in a hammock, 'cause it's finally getting pretty and warm and spring-like out there.