by Jonathan on September 1, 2010
My first semester as a professor was the fall of 1999. What I remember the most was the intensity. It was like a constant sprint except I didn’t always know where or why I was running. Then, sometime in October a Friday afternoon arrived when there wasn’t something I urgently had to do. I had a choice of what to do with my time. Exhausted from weeks of sensory overload, I went to sleep.
Just under 30 minutes ago, the clock rolled over to midnight eastern time. I am now officially on sabbatical for the first time after 11 years of a mad dash. And I’m celebrating by going to sleep. A full report on the trip and the new digs will be forthcoming.
September 1, 2010
by Jonathan on August 31, 2010
As you read this, we (that’s Carrie, me and the cat) are airborne over North America, destined for our new temporary digs in Mountain View (and at Stanford). The last few weeks have been as “full time” as I can remember between work and socializing. It’s good to be back in “normal” but I’m definitely ready for a slowdown. More soon: a few people asked if I would blog the sabbatical. Yes, but I don’t think it will be as gripping as cancer treatment. A small price to may in my opinion but your attention may drift.
In the meantime, a former student (ie, new PhD) pointed me to this. Amazing — I always thought The Audible Past was simply too long to translate. My thanks to whomever spent what must have been a lot of time on this.
I haven’t said much about the Brazil trip and I should, but as long as I’m announcing translations, “The MP3 as Cultural Artifact” is now available in Portuguese, thanks to Simone Pereira de Sà and my translators Lucas Laender Waltenberg and José Claudio Castanheira.
August 31, 2010
by Jonathan on August 13, 2010
Brazil was amazing, as expected. Rio is a very interesting and intense city, my hosts were wonderful, the experience was totally unforgettable and I hope to go back. My visa is good for 10 years.
Yesterday I went to the radiation oncologist for followup. He pronounced me fine and said not to come back; and to email him if I have any issues. Apparently my remaining voice issues (compared with May — the issues I had in May were related to paralysis that’s not going away) are related to dryness that may persist for six months or more. Good to know. Otherwise, things are healing up well and apparently the 85 spf sunblock I put on each day is working. Unfortunately, soon it will be time for new scans — MRI or CT, which means doctors go fishing for problems, which in turn will mean more tests to confirm data found in those tests. Ugh. Probably, though, I will have a respite until December.
Back to catching up on email; it’s going to take days to get through this backlog.
August 13, 2010
