I'm a big coffee drinker. I love the taste and I love the ritual. But for the past while whenever I've had even a small cup of coffee, I've been able to feel my heart beating in my chest like it was getting ready to explode. The caffeine, on top of my pre-APA anxiety, made me feel--physically--like I was going to die. So no coffee for me.
But my interviews are over, for better or for worse. And although I still have a lot of job market shit to do--say, write a job talk I'll probably never give, figure out how to pay Visa for the cost of my hotel the past few days--I don't want to think about any of that for a day or two. I've got a long trip back home, and I'm going to spend it trying to relax. And I'm going to have my first cup of coffee in over ten days.
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Nice blog! Good luck with hearing back from your interviews. (Are there any other APA blogs?)
I hear you on coffee. I cut down to one cup a day a couple weeks ago, and that was plenty...I think I slept no more than 5 hours the night before my interview. Too much buzzing around in my head.
Sometimes I feel like I get this conference-high where I am hyper-functional (similar to how it used to be during finals). I can be "on" both socially and philosophically for 18 hours straight.
And given that, I have now crashed. Sleeping in when you are exhausted is a great thing...(That and after having watched the Patriots go 16-0 with beer and pizza.) I had already left Baltimore, so no Smoker for me. Hope that wasn't an egregious oversight on my part.
Anyhow, hope everyone out there enjoys some well earned days off. I'll be starting up with new applications soon enough...
So, here's a question I know others have been afraid to ask, but I have tenure, so it is mine to ask:
Whatever happened to nth Year?
Drop out, get a job, in jail, all the above?
We love PGS and PGOAT, but bring on the 3rd wheel!
We do appreciate today's title--if ever there was an image of what it can feel like at the eastern division, it's 'He just grinned, and shook my hand...'
Best wishes to all who were there interviewing or seeking interviews. I'm on the other side of the table (but not this year or the last couple). Hope you found and are finding the occasional human connection.
CC
Yes, What happened to Nth Year? Is he, she, or it still around? Just curious??????
Here's a my best Eastern APA story. Since I flew out from the West Coast (having to leave my house at 3AM to get a flight that put me at the hotel by evening), and I had to share a room, I was basically bleary eyed and groggy the entire time. Anyway, at the smoker, some dickhead who'd finished at Rutgers the year before (I'm assuming they're not all dickheads) was talking to some friends of mine and when he saw me, he said, 'You see your face? That's what I looked like last year. But now, I got a job at Florida and look at my face [of course beaming, tanned and well rested]. Maybe one day you'll look like me." So there's no small amount of student complicity in this whole sorry affair.
But the real moral of the story is that living well is the best revenge. I took a big step down in instutional aspiration, but got tenure quickly and a big house in an area that Mr. Dickhead has to pay big bucks to visit. So take heart; there's a life in philosophy for anyone willing to seize a niche--and they are out there.
Good luck.
I hear you on relaxing on the long trip back from the APA. My first year on the market (in the days before grad. students had cell 'phones) I was so exhausted when the APA finished I deliberately choose to ride on the "local" Greyhound service from Boston back to the midwest *because* it took several hours longer, and I just wanted to be away from everything, and everyone, for the first time in months.
That was easily the one of the best Greyhound rides of my life!
I hope everyone has a safe trip backs, and gets lots of callbacks.
Oh, yes--I know a lot of *terrific* Rutgers people, so, no, not all dickheads at all!
I had one interview. I couldn't find out where the room was from placement, because I got in late the night before the interview and placement wasn't open before my interview. So I showed up at the hotel and had the front desk call up to the suite so that I could ask them what the number of the suite was. All I could hear was the chair of the department say "Hello? Hello? This phone is not working." Thankfully, I got the person at the front desk to break policy and reveal the suite number to me. During the interview, one of the committee members was going on and on about "the areas" they were looking for someone to teach in, gearing up to ask me which of them I could teach, and -- because I stupidly hadn't reread the ad and couldn't remember what all the areas were -- all I could think every time they said "the areas" was "Please mention them. Please mention them."
Man, I love the APA. Good times.
I hear that philosophers at Rutgers are all nappy-headed 'hos.
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