Whew! It's been a busy week, and the next will be much the same. Besides the usual teaching duties, I've been spending time in building-planning meetings. Designing my ideal astronomy lab is fun, but would be better if we had more guarantees any of our suggestions would be taken seriously.

I'm also part of a hiring committee, and we conducted interviews this week, with more to follow next week. It's interesting from a purely academic viewpoint - develop adequate interview questions and rate the applicants on how they respond to those questions. However, I can't enjoy the process. I feel bad when people get answers wrong, get frustrated when I know they could sell themselves better, feel wretched when someone so eager and enthusiastic won't make the cut. Blah. I just don't feel like I should be making decisions that affect someone's life so profoundly. I don't understand how anyone could enjoy hiring people.

But in a few weeks, the hiring process should be over. Just in time for the fun that is finals week. Woo.

This semester has been lightly contained chaos, and I think the containment field is failing. Aiiee!!!!