Inspirations from a Day of Meetings

Yesterday was both tiring like I thought it would be and invigorating in ways I hoped it would be.  The morning meeting consisted of various school officials speaking to us all about issues they thought affected us all.  The afternoon faculty development sessions covered interesting territory that left me engaged and inspired.

Highlights from the day:

--The morning food was better than usual.  Or maybe because of our last several years' of worker lay-offs, we simply had more of it.   I've often arrived in time for crumbs of pastry and dregs of coffee.  Yesterday we had actual choices.  They looked delicious, but I was not fooled.

--Let me be honest.  I was fooled.  I took a slice of something that looked cinnamony but tasted like something bought from a box.  Once, I would have loved an Entenmanns coffee cake.  Yesterday, I took two bites and left the rest.  I got the plate off the table since I knew I would eat it all, nibble by uninspiring nibble, if I kept it by me.

--The morning meeting was full of news of renovations and art festivals and graduate hiring and pleas that we all be more empathetic.  It seems wise not to blog further about those things here--not terribly interesting to most of the world.

--Our lunch was a happy surprise.  I was expecting the typical sandwich-chips-cookie boxed lunch.  Instead we got pizza from a local brick oven restaurant, the best Caesar salad dressing I've ever had on top of a refreshing salad, Italian dessert bite treats, and a variety of beverages including Perrier.  I shouldn't be so influenced by food, but I went into the afternoon feeling so happy about being pleasantly surprised by lunch.

--We had 3 faculty development sessions.  The first one talked about using TED talks in our classes.  Lots of good ideas.

--The presenter talked of her dream of being asked to give a TED talk.  If you were asked to give a TED talk, what would it be about?

--The second presenter talked about climate change and how it will affect the industries where our students will be working.  Lots of interesting ideas on sustainable design.

--Would you want to be made into a diamond when you die?

--Our last presenter talked about color and its influence on us.  We had cups of jello in different colors, cups of pudding in different colors.  I knew the experiment, having seen her do something similar in class.  But I gave myself over to the process. 

--My friend said she has nightmares that smell like brown.

--We're all carbon based carbon sinks.  Lots of fun word play in that sentence.

--And I have poem ideas!