Here’s a fun slideshow from Spiegel.de — you don’t have to read German to figure out that these are pictures of people partying at Octoberfest.  And according to the Economist (back in August), wearing tracht (traditional dirndls and lederhosen) is becoming increasingly popular, not just at Octoberfest, where we saw, seven years ago now, that it was quite common for young people to dress up for their night at the Wies’n, but for a wedding, or even at a night on... Read more

I have to say, the topic of adjunct professors and Margaret Mary Vojtko in particular seems to be bringing lots of people to this small blog (at least, lots, comparatively) — though it’s disappointing to be accused of being unfeeling and speaking ill of the dead (and I don’t know how many are actually reading anything). No, I don’t actually believe that she buried her sister in the backyard, though I wish I could have found something more on her... Read more

This is quite a downer:  according to Stern, charities are failing, in multiple ways: Their programs are ineffective.  For instance, multiple charities promise to deliver water to Africa by drilling wells.  But they don’t spend any time ensuring those wells are maintained over time, or that the well is constructed in such a way that local villagers can repair it.  Hence the gains are short-lived and illusory.  The D.A.R.E. program of anti-drug education, so ubiquitous in schools, was finally, after... Read more

True story:  I was an adjunct. My husband and I left grad school, got married, and came to the Chicago area, where he had a job waiting for him (having studied math) and I didn’t (having studied history).  I knew that I wasn’t cut out for finishing the dissertation — I was at a dead end — and I didn’t really have a good idea of what I could do instead.  Maybe something having to do with writing?  There aren’t... Read more

So a friend of my shared an article on Facebook, “Death of an adjunct; Margaret Mary Vojtko, an adjunct professor of French for 25 years, died underpaid and underappreciated at age 83“, which apparently has been making the rounds, placing her as a poster child for the plight of adjunct professors. The story goes like this:  Vojtko had been teaching French at Duquesne University for 25 years as an adjunct, earning up to $25,000 per year when she had a... Read more

So I promised myself that I wasn’t going to blog until after work today, but very interesting article in the Tribune (outside the paywall) today: “Former Couple Take Fight over Frozen Embryos to Court.” Now, look, I’m pro-life. I find the idea of creating embryos in an IVF process, only to cryo-freeze them in perpetuity, or flush them down the drain, or donate them to science to be destroyed in the research process, to be disturbing. And once they have... Read more

Remember honeycrisp apples?  They first appeared a couple years ago, I forget when exactly.  Wow, were they delicious.  I’m usually not a fruit-eater but this apple was extra-tasty:  juicy, sweet, crunchy.  Yum.  Sure, they were $1.99 a pound instead of $0.99, but I’d splurge.  Then they disappeared.  Now they’ve reappeared — but at $3.99/lb this is far more of a splurge than I ever imagined an apple would ever be! ********************** Who remembers Pre-Cana?  Catholics among you may remember the requirement about... Read more

So I’m not a gerentologist. I don’t even play one on TV. But this is what I see on a personal level: my parents live in the home that they raised their family in. Two stories. The house is somewhat chaotic — it could use a major de-cluttering, but we (that is, the children) haven’t yet gotten as far as intervening, though I’m sure that’ll happen soon. Even though they’re comparatively young, as aging parents go (age 74), they struggle... Read more