I hope you've received my first letter by now (Canada Post definitely qualifies as 'snail mail'). Here's another update on my life.
I took all the gorgeous handkerchiefs over to Mom and Dad's on Sunday and showed them to my sisters (everyone but Claire and Frannie was there). Mom brought out some handkerchiefs she had too. I think each of us took some, Teresa and I choosing ones that weren't too fancy for nose-blowing. Teresa set aside five that she had assembled into a nice arrangement, and left them with Dad so he could take them to the framing shop and choose a mat and frame (his artistic judgement is probably best). But after I left I realized that, if I want to have the framed ones I'd better take some responsibility for the framing, so next time I'm over there I'll go with Dad to the framing shop and pay for the framing.
Tonight my faculty-women bookclub gets together. We read a novel and then meet for dinner at one of our houses. We rarely spend more than a few minutes talking about the book we've just read, and a few more choosing the next one. Instead we mainly talk about our lives and families and work (we're all biologists of some sort - botanists, zoologists, a forest geneticist, a human-pregnancy researcher), and admire each others' cooking. Tonight Wendy says she's making squash ravioli and just needs to figure out how to get the filling inside - I think that may be a similar problem to getting the caramel into the caramilk bar.
I'm (finally) up for promotion to full Professor; it took me a long time to feel I had enough publications and support from my department head to make success likely. The promotion has already been approved at the Department and Faculty levels, and now I'm waiting to hear the decision of the president-level Senior Appointments Committee. They've had my file for a couple of months now. They had sent back a query about graduate students, asking why I don't have any at present and why two of my former students had left without finishing their degrees. I think they're worrying that I might be a poor supervisor, so I sent the dean contact information for former students who could contradict that. I'm not worried about my publication record any more, as I've published four journal articles and two book chapters (way more than my usual output) since the file was submitted, and I've sent an update to the Dean. So the only other hurdle is my teaching evaluations. Despite being one of the most committed and thoughtful teachers in the department (lots of evidence for that), my student-evaluation scores are the lowest in the department, apparently because many of the students in my first-year biology classes think I'm mean. I don't care deeply about the promotion, but I'll be very annoyed if I miss out because of these evaluations (annoyed at the Senior Appointments Committee, not the students). I should find out soon, because the committee needs to make its decision by the end of the month.
Next week I'll write about running my lab,
Love,
Rosie
p.s. My apartment is STILL a pigsty, but the cleaning ladies come on Friday so I'll need to pick everything up before then.
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