4th of July in San Francisco

I spent the 4th of July in lovely San Francisco on a boat! We knew some folks who had chartered a fishing boat to spend the evening on the bay and watch the fireworks, and the more the merrier (and the less everyone had to spend to cover the charter). It was a blast, and I actually used my camera and took pictures for the first time in years (outside of a theater). Here's the view from the boat earlier in the evening:

And here we are during the fireworks:

The night was very clear (clearest in 15 years according to our captain) and the fireworks were awesome. Also, at at some great restaurants (Absinthe Bar and Brasserie was very good and awesome atmosphere) and had cocktails at some excellent bars (Rickhouse was a fave).

And then I got home, and bought a new bed (retiring the futon I spent the last almost 20 years sleeping on):

Next week I'm off to Minnesota.

Hello from San Francisco

I'm in a coffeeshop in San Francisco taking a short break from working on one of my fall classes. It's been a while, to say the least, since I've updated this, but I thought I'd just go ahead with a short post anyway.

I'm between busy school years at the moment. Last year I went through my mid-tenure review (basically I put together a tenure application file at the halfway point to actually going up for tenure and a few people read it and let me know if it seems like I'm on the path to tenure, or if I should be doing things I'm not doing). The response was positive, which was great to hear. Putting together the file is a big undertaking (you try documenting and describing in detail everything that you've done on your job over the past 4 years...it adds up). I'm glad it's done, and I'm glad they make us do this at this point as it makes it easier to finish off the file when I actually apply for tenure. But it did take up a lot of focus.

And next year won't be a return to business as usual. We are hiring two new faculty members, and I'm leading one of the searches. It's very exciting to go through the process, and at the end of it we will have one more full time faculty member than we've had before. And while organizing, reviewing, all those files in the fall, in addition to the interviewing and deciding in the winter, is going to keep all of us busy.

But right now I'm happily in between. Trying to get as much done this summer to prepare for next year as I can to take a little pressure off. But I'm also having some fun. I'm in San Fran visiting Lindsay while she's in a summer acting program. So far we've wandered the city a bit, and spent the 4th on a boat in the bay with a bunch of bartenders watching the fireworks (an unusually clear night, it was awesome), and hitting some great dinner places. Next weekend, more wandering, some museums, and then I head back to Portland. Lindsay comes back to Portland in August for a bit before she moves to New York City.

Otherwise I've spent my summer producing a new play workshop, which went well, and working on stuff for next fall in coffeeshops. I'm typing this on my newest toy/tool, my iPad2, which is a lot easier to lug around than my laptop, although there are a lot of things I still need to haul the laptop out for.

Anyway, hope you all are well, and I'll try to write more again soon.