Chad's spot for various thoughts, musings, poetry, ideas and whatnot

Friday, January 12, 2007

I thought I'd post a brief update about what's been happening in these parts and how I might feel about that.

School: We've started back up here at the ol' College. My classes look pretty good at this point, less than a week into things. There's still some "popcorning" going on in my rosters where students pop in and out during drop-add. I have to say that for right now at least, this semester's physical science class looks better than the last couple, at least in terms of interest and getting work done. One interesting note is that I offered another well-advertized time management class during our "dead period" during the frist weekhoping to attract students that had done poorly last semester and had a overwhelming four students. It's stunning to look at my advisees and see how many of them are earning below 2.0 and then not have anyone take advantage of an opportunity. I guess I'll file it under the heading of "you can offer a student enlightenment but you can't make him drink."

Cycling: I'm fat but I'm riding a lot. So far this year I've ridden almost 500 miles which is good and needed. I'm still about 15 pounds over my race weight (or more importantly-my race body fat percentage) so I definitely need the miles. I've been doing everything from 100 mile LSD rides to CTS audio workouts and hopefully I'll soon see the results of my work in my waistline. The weather here has been unseasonably warm which has helped but it makes me fear for what the summer riding and racing will be like. I still haven't decided on my race program. I'll be doing some time trials for sure but I can't decide how I'll split my time between the road and the dirt. After last year's season was lost in May to broken ribs and exhaustion, I'm thinking that another season on the dirt might not be the best plan. I certainly won't be riding any rainy races. A big part of me wants to just totally sell out and do every race in our statewide amateur race series, the Georgia Cup. They have a class for Cat 4/5 Master's riders and maybe I'll do that and get some upgrade points. I regularly beat most of the Cat 3 riders in the time trials but I can't seem to place highly enough in the races with the Cat 1/2/3 Master's to get upgraded so I think I'll focus on paying my dues.

Personal: On the personal side of things, I'm reading a lot of different things. In GCF we're studying the Apocalypse of John so I've been working through a variety of commentaries on that. Interesting stuff. The really great thing is how truly hopeful the book is. A lot of the neat things are swallowed up in the modern obsession with the weird apocalyptic imagery. As an example, there are nine "Blessed are..." statements in the Apocalypse. When you go to church you hear sermons on the "Blessed are..." statements from the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew all the time but you never hear a beep about the ones in Revelations. It's a shame really.

Also, I'm teaching a colloquium on Chaos Science so I've been reading and reviewing a lot of that sort of material. That's been enjoyable as a way to stretch my brain. Finally, I indulged my desire to do some reading about how we got our present calendar and how we developed the ability to tell time. While both books I read were definitely written by non-scientists (historians or English major types) they were enjoyable to read. The problem with these sorts of book is that unless the research and fact checking is really rigorous, there are always errors that slip through the writing to bug guys like me. On top of that, the authors of both books were pretty humanistic so they tended to significantly downplay or marginalize the positive effect of the institutional church in both arenas. Still both book were pretty good and I learned a few things here and there about the evolution of both the calendar and the clock. Such is the vacation reading of a physics geek.

Anyways, thanks for reading, happy New Year and all the best to you and yours.

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