The Day of Bean-Counting that Just Was: Sabbatical Report, Laundry, Recyclables, Socks, & Face-masks Found on the Side of the Road.

I am borrowing a term used by colleague Sonya Huber who said upon receiving Full Professorship, "Does this mean the bean-counting gets to end?" 

Actually, I know academic work is always more than bean counting - it's making a stew over several projects, publications, evaluations, and accomplishments throughout year after year work. Because I was fortunate to receive a '20 post-tenure sabbatical leave, I've also been given 6-months to report on what I accomplished. Because of the nature of my work, I know it's best to get such a report done, otherwise it would go to the wayside as the new semester, with teaching, takes off. The one thing sabbatical offers is a reprieve from courses and meetings, and anyone who works in academia knows that its the meetings that do us in....endless, blood-sucking, good-intentioned, but rarely delivering, meetings. The highlight of my sabbatical was the fact that I was excused from all meetings.

I've been slowly chiseling at my sabbatical report for a few weeks and decided to send it in last night. I guess I was tapping my inner Count Dracula from Sesame Street so I could look ahead to another week of service and the syllabi that are screaming my name. In summary of a much more extensive report, (the bean-counting....thank you, Sonya)

Sadly, I did not complete the book manuscript as expected. I did, however, bring six pieces to publication: three peer-reviewed book chapters, one peer-reviewed journal article, an invited piece for an online teacher publication, and a collection of student writing from participating youth in Summer ’20 CWP programs. In addition, I have three other pieces sent out for review, including two poems (which is a new outlet for me) and a research article co-written with a teacher from Central Middle School in Greenwich, CT. Further, I wrote curriculum guides for nine middle-grade books and one high school memoir, produced seven episodes of the National Writing Project podcast The Write Time, and presented four times in digital platforms (conferences and invited workshops). Finally, I secured an additional $43,500 in grants for CWP-Fairfield.

I started thinking about having to bean-count like this in our everyday lives. What if every night before we went to bed we had to tally up our accomplishments for the day and send it to the Great Whatever for his or her approval.

Today, I walked Glamis and she peed twelve times, sniffed various objects eighteen times, and pulled towards other dogs four times. In addition, I counted seven covid-related face masks that appeared to be tossed from cars, all along the streets (giving me great hope for the human species). Later, doing three loads of laundry, I folded and put away eleven pairs of socks, eleven pairs of underwear (obviously, it's been eleven days since the last time I did laundry), eight pairs of sweatpants (I never want to return to any form of button pants again), fourteen t-shirts, six sweatshirts, four sweaters, three hats, five towels, two pairs of winter gloves, three dish towels, and six sweaters. In addition, I threw three fabric softener sheets away in the garbage.

Of special note, too, I spent thirty-five minutes restringing my University of Louisville hoodie, as every time I wear it, somehow the hoodie string comes out. In this period of time, I cussed nine times with frustration of restringing a hoodie. Anyone who has had to restring a hoodie or pair of sweatpants understands the need for cussing.

At dinner, I reheated food from last night for two  minutes, ate one salad, twenty-two pieces of Ziti pasta, one sliver of chicken, and seven mushrooms in marsala sauce. I also had one diet coke, and for breakfast one bagel and two and a half cups of coffee. At lunch, I made one sandwich, with three slices of roast beef, two pieces of cheese, two slices of tomato, five basil leaves, one hoagie roll, and one romaine lettuce leaf. This was cut in half and shared with the kid.

During the day here were approximately two FaceTime calls, three conversations with Chitunga, one conversation with Edem, and twenty-three sent messages. Also, I sent three Facebook birthday messages and received three books in the mail, along with one bill that needs to be paid. I took a shower in the evening and applied one shampoo, one conditioner, and one body wash.

Of course there were numerous other things I could count from my day (regrettably, I bit one fingernail) and did think of Sonya Huber's bean-counting humor around fourteen times. As usual, I read fourteen newspapers from around the world and cringed one hundred and eight times from posts on social media. I did not count flatulence or the number of times I belched. I did, however, use the loo five times (and now I'm wondering if that is high or low for a man my age and if I should be ecstatic or highly concerned). I'm also thinking my mother said, "For crying out loud, Butch," around one hundred times during the day and that my father said, "I didn't hear you, Sue," each time.

Finally, I thought about this blog post for today once, collecting my ideas for approximately twelve hours. 

And I understand, too, that by the time you got to this last sentence (that's the way it goes) you asked yourself three times, "Why am I reading this?"