Busy week

Sure, it's been well more than a week since I posted anything on here but that's just the way things go, they get busy but rarely interesting enough to take the time to blog. But this week was a bit different.

First off it was the most hectic week of the semester, thus far. I'm sure things will get busier later on but this one stands out so far. The two classes have me constantly occupied with something: lectures, homework, sample problems, solutions and not to mention the midterms that I need to prepare for Tuesday. On top of all that there is a deadline for a grant submission this Monday and I had to give a seminar presentation on my research to the department this past Friday. So I've been just a little stressed with trying to find time to squeeze everything in.

Oh, I was also hit by a car. That part really sucked, but at least I wasn't badly hurt. It's one of the little miracles in my bicycling "career" that I have learned how to fall without hurting myself. The incident happened on the ride home from work on Tuesday night. With class ending after 6:00 pm it's pretty dark over the last bit of my ride (I typically get home around 7:00). Anyway, what happened was an idiot pulled out of his angled parking spot when I was rather close to him. Not close enough for me to run into him, but I got right up to him very quickly. Obviously this pissed me off a bit, so I started to pass him on his right, since I was still moving faster than him. Unfortunately that was when he decided to turn into a parking spot four spaces down from the one he had left! At that point I was pretty much fucked, I yelled, tried to cut further away from him, but ultimately I hit his right fender and probably flew over part of the hood. Fortunately, I know how to fall and only ended up with some minor scrapes on my right knee, my glove saved my left hand from a lot of damage.

Luckily there was no damage to the bike. Maybe I should have got the police involved but I don't see what they can do or would do, I'm sure it could be seen as my being reckless in my actions. But it does suck that the idiot didn't see me, because now I have to go out and buy more lights for my bike, even though I know it won't make much of a difference. I wonder if it would be effective/legal to hook a green laser pointer to my handle bars? If I can bounce that off your mirror you'll know I'm there.

It's nice to make a difference

So it's the first day of classes here. I'll be teaching my usual 200 level class around noon today, followed by my first grad course this evening. But my teaching doesn't end there.

Just this morning as I was entering the bathroom I witnessed one of the wonderful undergrads throw his used paper towel into the urinal, because that's just how smart they are here. Fortunately I was there to point out that the large brown box with an opening is a garbage can. He kindly removed his paper towel from the urinal and put it where it belonged.

I'm still conflicted as to what made me happier: that I said anything and managed to educate the young lad, or that I had him pick something out of a urinal... wait, I think I know which one it was ;)