Professor Lazy McSlacker

That's my new name.

Here's the skinny. Here in Dream Academyville, we've been having well nigh torrential rainstorms the past day or so. They were really bad last night when I went to sleep. Apparently, during the night the power went out for me and almost 600 of my closest friends. Now, I have a battery back-up alarm clock, but a couple of weeks ago I took the batteries out to put them in my remote control and forgot to replace them. So, I woke up about half an hour before my first class this morning and started rooting around in the gloom trying to figure out what happened.

Now, did I rush up to campus with my hair in a rat's nest, no make-up, and two unmatching shoes just to teach my eager young minds in my morning class? Hell no. I called the power company on my cell (b/c my cordless phone didn't work) and found out that it wouldn't be on for another couple of hours. Then I called the dept. and told them to put a note on the door saying it was cancelled.

Do I feel guilty? Not a bit. It's only one 50 minute class. We'll have tons more of them.

Slightly off topic, but sort of related to natural phenomenon and sleeping in, I was having a dream about doing research at a famous research archive in an earthquake-prone zone. You know the one I mean.

It reminded me of the first time I did research there as a graduate student. I was getting my reader's card, etc. and the lady went over the earthquake procedure with me.

Lady: This is where you'll meet up if there's an earthquake. If you don't come there, we'll know that something's happened to you.

MW: Great. Sure. No problem; good to know.

Lady: And don't try to save the manuscript.

MW: (*guffaws loudly at the joke*)

Lady: (*gives MW a tart look to communicate that this was no joke*)

MW: ...um, I just mean that I could see the headlines:

"Dedicated medievalist's corpse found lying atop a slightly smooshed but still intact fifteenth-century manuscript."

Lady: (*replies deadpan*) We would name a small travel grant after you.