Beginning Again

As of yesterday, another school year began. Barely noticed it creeping up on me, despite having spent much of the summer preparing new classes. It really doesn't feel as if I've crossed some kind of hard boundary. Days blend into one another. But soon life will become very different from what it was for the last three months; the first stack of papers to grade will drive the point home.

One of my new classes--the environmentally themed freshman writing course out at the Lake Erie Research Center--has only two students enrolled. It's going to proceed, but with writing classes overbooked at the main campus, future iterations of it are in doubt.

I did get fishing last week. Wednesday and Thursday I headed up to the Au Sable below Mio. Got there in time for the ephoron hatch Wednesday but it fizzled. Floated to Comins Flats on Thursday and landed five rainbows, 10-13". The biggest came when I was just rowing along dragging my fly in the water. Heard a thump and looked around to see my rod bent. Maybe I shouldn't bother casting. I did hook a number of other trout that stayed on for a bit, but worked off before I could net them. Maybe it's time to sharpen hooks.

Got to run upstairs and badger the department secretary for giving students my cell number. I get two or three calls a day from people wanting to add a class. None of them want to drive out to the lake for one, though.