Tuesday, November 06, 2007

Another Hotel California

Ever since Maggie so memorably used this song to characterize the great junior/senior divide it has been playing inside my head, along with one of Paul McCartney's late and not great compositions. (Sir Paul wrote a lot of good songs, but this one you don't want to have stuck in your head. Trust me--or, if you don't, look below.*)

As I was locking my door well past the dinner hour and heading out for the long drive home after a cool 10 hours in office, classes, and meetings, one of the grad students said, "You still here?"

The grad students are always around. They hang out and chat with each other (and work, of course), just as I used to do as a grad student. They're on my floor all day long, although I am always in earlier than they are.

But I had outlasted all but one of them. And I had literally just spent more time in my office--and commuting to my office--than I had spent at home for the past two days.

And then the song struck again: "You can check out any time you like, but you can NEVER LEAVE."



[*If you REALLY want to know, here it is: "Ballroom Dancing."]

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