First, the not-so-good:
- Did I come down with the deadly plague after encountering the cheerful colleagues in the previous post? Why, yes, and I lost a whole week of work in addition to feeling horrible and lying in bed. On the other hand, it's probably not their fault; there's a lot going around at this time of year.
- Getting an article rejection, a grant rejection, and a "where are your revisions?" email was icing on the cake, though it probably serves me right for trying to look at email when too sick to reply.
- The political news, especially on Twitter first thing in the morning, is the gift that just keeps on giving, isn't it? I'm reminded of the line from Mad Men: "They won't stop until they figure out how to steal more bread from the mouths of children."
But then, it's May, and there is some good somewhere.
- The snow is gone, and the rain even stopped for a day so we could see the sun.
- There are flowers out now, though I know that's not a blessing for those of you with allergies. One of the walks I took pre-plague goes by a steep dropoff with fields and trees, and one set of those trees has white flowers with a scent so delicious you can almost taste it. They don't seem to be mock orange (which has a great scent), and I don't know what they are.
- I wake up at 4 every morning now (thanks, plague!), and now that I feel better, it's cool and beautiful when I go outside to get the paper. The birds are singing then though it's not quite dawn.
Time to see if I have a brain left to do some of the work that got neglected this week.
2 comments:
Re your colleague working while with a plague.
I have recently written something like a guideline for new graduate students. One of the items is what to do when you are ill. Most students seem to be concerned only with themselves, whether they feel well enough to come to work; it doesn't enter their mind that they could be making others sick in our airconditioned, perpetually-recycled-air environment. So the item in the student guidelines explicitly says to stay home when they get sick, because a) rest helps them heal faster and b) as a courtesy to others, i.e., so they wouldn't spread the infection.
I'm glad you addressed that with your grad students and told them to stay home. You're right: the idea is always "but I HAVE to go teach my class," with extra points, somehow, if they drag themselves in to do that. No. Stay home!
Post a Comment