What happened to March? I don't even know what I did this month. Actually, I'm kind of serious about that. This last month has been a blur. I wish I could say that it's from partying after tenure, but I haven't even done *that* yet. It's probably good that I'm taking a few minutes tonight to think back through the month.
I do know that I've had my nose to the grindstone trying to finish off those textbooks. I literally have one section of solutions to write before I'm done. I may even do that from home tomorrow just so that I actually have it completely done going into next week. This means we can go full into the proofreading stage, which should hopefully not go more than a couple more weeks. I'm in contact with the publisher to talk through the details of where things go from here. It's kind of strange to think back and realize I was doing this same thing a few years ago, except there are three times as many books this time around. I'm very pleased with how this has worked out with the student workers helping me with it, and there's no way I would be as far along with this as I am without that extra help. I think I'd need at least another month.
But that's not nearly as exciting as the fact that we got our 3D printer up and running today. What started off as a joke is now a reality. Here's a nice video about 3D printing: PBS Video on 3D printing. What this really means is that I've got new software to learn to use in addition to all of the other stuff that I've got going on. I'm not sure how I'll find the time, but I'm going to find the time to learn it. How can I pass up this opportunity?
Classes are going well. They're all small, and they're all easy to deal with. But next fall will be interesting. The students have requested that I teach a class on proofs and proof-writing. I did this a couple summers ago, and the students I had back then found it to be very helpful. This is a class that we have wanted to put into the curriculum for several years, but with various things holding us back we never got around to doing it. So for now, it's being treated as an independent study class. As we move towards getting a pure math major, I think we'll be able to get this up and running on a regular schedule.
On a related topic, we're getting another math faculty next year. This one will be a bridge between the Liberal Arts and Sciences and the School of Education, which will help to shore up a couple weak areas that we've had for a little while. I'm excited because more faculty means that the load of keeping everything up and running can is shared. I'm also excited for the energy that new people bring. I think our most recent hire has brought a lot of very good ideas to the table, and has helped push me in a couple of areas (WebWork, among other things). I think we'll be riding a high for a couple years with the renewed funding that we're getting and all of the new faculty that we're going to be bring on board. And that's about it for the school stuff.
We finished the 40 Days in the Word program. Overall, I'm slightly disappointed with the material. I knew it was not going to be particularly deep, but it was unfortunately not that good. It wasn't *bad* (except for making an application to lose weight out of a single sentence in Ecclesiastes taken completely out of context -- that was VERY bad), but it wasn't that helpful. I've talked about it with other in my small group, and the general feeling is that it's good if you know absolutely nothing about the Bible, but if you know something, it doesn't really help you to get deeper. SPACEPETS? No thanks. Inspired to spend more time studying the Bible? Not really.
But that's okay. As far as its function as a campaign to get the focus of the church in a single direction, I think it was successful. There's more at stake here than just daily quiet times, and we're putting ourselves into a better and better position as we complete more of these types of programs.
Today is Good Friday. Sunday is Easter. He is Risen. Three rolled tacos, indeed. I saw a quote getting passed around which is appropriate and one I hope I can keep in my memory: "Jesus did not come into this world to make bad people good. He came into this world to make dead people live." - Ravi Zacharias
Last week, the Brown family (Cindy et al) came through town and stayed here a couple nights. It was fun to have them over. It was a pretty low-key visit, which is always nice. There was some hanging out, and some of them doing their family time. I learned how toilet flappers work and got some insulation on the pipes coming out of the water heater. It was a really nice couple of days to have some extended community around the house.
Does that wrap up my March? I guess so. The only other thing that I can think of that's going on with me doesn't actually have to do with me. There are just a lot of people around me who have been sick or in surgery or something in the last month. An aunt has a hysterectomy, the 3 month old daughter of a friend needed eye surgery, another friend is contemplating a substantial life/career change, another had serious breathing problems for a while, and a student of mine needed an MRI (they're still not sure what is going on yet) and another student is just having some psychological issues. It just seems like it's been a particularly rough month for a lot of people. But Sunday's coming...
