Time for a Break

I finished up volume 11 tonight. I wrote a total of 1862 words today; the late session yielding a short one scene chapter of 424 words. So that makes one volume in 8 days, 11 if you count the three days of planning that went into it. Tomorrow starts a new planning cycle.

Or maybe a day off, I don't know. I suppose I could use one. I suspect I will likely take the rest of the week off to do my planning as well as start work on my teaching portfolio. I had wanted to start that in late July or the beginning of August right after the Tour de France, but I've been writing up a storm for the past 6 weeks or so.

Of course, that means I have to start thinking about a job. What a depressing thought? How do people make it through the day knowing that they have to bust their nuts to make someone else money, and for the honor, they get paid crap, disrespected, and treated like they're disposable. Oh wait, I still remember how it feels.

Congrats to those who like their job, get paid appropriately, and are treated as an asset.

I have to admit, teaching on the college level was easily the best job I ever had. Obviously, that is my main goal for employment though I will look at other options.

I like the whole college scene, mostly the communal aspects, wrapped in an environment of growth. I like the perpetual self improvement. I couldn't handle an industry job for more than a few years. They are way too repetitive and stagnating. At least the college environment is ever dynamic, with new students and evolving attitudes.

But like any office environment there are politics that clash and egos to endure. I was mercifully sheltered from most of this as a grad student. Essentially, my thoughts and opinions didn't matter. I was simply left alone to teach and learn. It was very nice. If I manage to get a professor position I will be forced into the bane of office politics.

I wonder if it is better or worse than your standard office politics? My guess is that it is merely different.

As you can see I have a bad attitude. Or so I would be labeled. Not because I don't have a similarly large ego to throw around, but a lack of desire to match it up against anyone else's. I'm content with my own self improvements and my own projects to focus on. I don't need to seek out other people to validate my ego like most people do, and once they realize I don't like to play, especially in an office environment, then I get labeled (somewhat appropriately) as someone who is not a team player.

And it's not that I am not a team player, if someone has good ideas I'll go along, it's when people start creating work for the sake of looking like they're accomplishing something that I get annoyed. I've got my own projects to keep me occupied, I don't need to be encumbered by someone else's ideas. As far as I am concerned, if they have an epiphany, they should attend to it themselves.

Are they going to write a few chapters of my book and let me take 100% of the credit? No, of course not! Their egos are too big.

So why should I have to deal with their ideas and let them take all the credit? Isn't it enough that I just teach well? Isn't it enough that I manage to get a large portion of my students excited about math of all things? Ugh....

Yup. Looking forward to the whole job thing....