Joining the blogging world...

Hey there. I recently decided to join the rest of the world in the blogosphere. Actually, I've blogged before, but only about beer. Yes, that's right, a blog about beer.

Anyway the title for this blog is "Stuck in Paris," because as Bill Waterson would say, we are anything but stuck. In fact, we're here quite voluntarily. It's what we are doing to get by that we could do without. Case in point...today, I got into a quick discussion with one of the English teachers at the high school where I teach. When asked about my research and graduate school in general, I told her it was going well but slowly. She then asks, "What are you doing in this dump?" referring of course to the high school where we both teach. After I replied, "I have to earn money somehow..." she goes on to say that she's sending me some of her worst students tomorrow, most of whom have some sort of ADHD and at least one of whom was recently expelled. What surprised was not that I would have to see students like this, but that a teacher would be so forthcoming about the value of her students as human beings. "They're just awful," she continued.

The point of all this, of course, is that I might rather be a trust-fund baby hanging out and enjoying Paris' sights and sounds, but instead most of my life is spent in libraries, archives and classrooms much as it was before. Don't despair, though...with only 12 hours a week of official work, both Kelley and I still get to have plenty of fun, although it's been about a month since we've done anything that would qualify as "going out." Instead, we're saving our excitement for a trip to Turkey in 18 days and counting. Then, we've got visitors scheduled about once every three weeks until June, when we'll tripping to Iceland to see its shattered economy, its natural splendor, and of course my extended family. But until then, I'll just raise my glass of wine and enjoy my time.