Monday, March 17, 2003
 

Update from SlamLand:

My prospective ended up not staying with me after all, which was probably for the best. By the dinner Thursday night (for recruits and mentors-- and I did continue to mentor), I was exhausted. The insomnia had been bothering me again, and I had given a high-stress conference paper in-class presentation that afternoon. One of the recruitment co-chairs, also winner of the Most Hated First-Year Award (and definitely contending for "Most Hated Overall"), commented that I seemed "effervescent" (she's terminally incapable as saying something so simple as "she's tired"), which my prospective apparently interpreted to mean "drunk." A friend in the department took him for me that evening. All of this was decided without consulting me, mainly because I had absconded to the bar to gripe with a fellow student, winner of the Keep Your Freaking Hands off Me Award, because griping of this magnitude seemed inappropriate in front of potential students. So, when they came over to tell me that he was being removed from my care, I was sitting at the bar (not drinking anything), thus lending credence to the drunk myth.

By the next morning, I was considered an alcoholic. The current students knew this not to be true, of course, and the prospectives quickly realized what had happened. Just in case, though, I tacked on the rumor that I was a slut. Hey, there are 10 new male recruits-- fresh meat! Gotta be ready here. Got some healthy pickings, and a couple of those guys aren't half bad. Which, by grad student standards, is pretty doggone good. Anyway, by the evening's party, all these rumors had all evolved into alcoholic slut ax-murder.

I never had a reputation in high school, except for general nerdy freakishness. Frankly, I'm enjoying this.

Anyway. In spite of not putting anyone up at my house, I remained in high circulation and spent most of the time they were here with them. We had a couple of parties, which were fun, and went out to hear some live music. Plus dinners, breakfast, coffeehouse runs, general entertaining. It looks like a good group, and I think I successfully scared them (though I was also called "charming," twice, by two different people. what does that mean?).

The most hated professor here, who's up for tenure, got utterly smashed at Friday night's party (actually, he arrived somewhat drunk and went downhill from there) and told a recruit that if his tenure application, still under review, didn't get approved, the department would be sorry. Intrigue! We're all hoping he gets put out on his butt, anyway. He's a horrid twit.

And in further academic gossip: As I said, the student with whom I was griping (also a first-year) has a bad habit of touching absolutely everyone. I, however, have been singled out for what another student has called "special touching." He's semi-asked me out twice now, and twice I've evaded. He was getting especially touchy Thursday night, and, as I said, I left the dining room to go to the bar with him to complain, which, in retrospect, was a bad move on my part (I was perfectly sober, but I was so tired that my judgment was certainly clouded anyway). Also, he gave me a ride home, given that I wasn't up for the mile walk, with heavy books. Anyway, the rumor seems to have started circulating then that the two of us were involved. Accck! Noooooo! The friend who took in my prospective squelched it when she heard it, but I have no idea how widely it's spread. I have a feeling that the answer to that is "pretty far," given who my friend heard it from. I know of at least one other person who knows my true, uncensored feelings on Touchy and will say it ain't so (and thus defend my honor, which must be preserved for the sake of all those incoming males), but I'm not sure who else I've been, shall we say, fully honest with (you have to be careful who you gossip with about what). Oh, dear.

Okay. That's enough from Academia. Don't you wish you could all come join me in this ever-so-intellectual bliss? We do more than gossip. Really. I promise.

Elvisette philosophized at 10:40 AM