Not to repeat myself, but 4 work email addresses is the absolute WORST. I’m bad enough with 1 work and 1 personal. This is insanity.

spiritually and emotionally I am these lions from a 1500s painting

A nice job has opened in my department at Cambridge: Assistant Prof. in US History since 1920. Please share widely! No references letters required up front. Applications close 27 Oct. 2025.🗃️ www.cam.ac.uk/jobs/assista...

One of my first year students just asked “would it be weird if I asked to read your dissertation?” When I explained, no, but that dissertations are essentially book-length, they went “YOU WROTE A BOOK!?” Is this what celebrities feel like?

In my FYS class, I had my students read "The Summer Day" by #MaryOliver. They didn't think much about the poem or the other text they read for the day. It was a Monday, the start of school. It was a blah sort of class period. A little of a bummer to me for a favorite poem of mine.

That’s not how a Venn diagram works?

Never to early to think about Halloween costumes

Some days are hard. And then I have my students use social annotation software (high five to #Hypothesis) to read Columbus's letter to Isabelle & Ferdinand & some of their comments start with "OMG, THE ABSOLUTE EGO OF THIS MAN!" and I just know that there is truly hope for this world.

Is it just me, or would this generation of students rather be lectured at than engage in any sort of seminar-style dialogue? And how long do I beat my head against the wall before I stop trying to make discussions happen?

The DMV is going on my list of "places where I get WORK DONE" - Just graded 3 assignments for two classes in like an hour because I have nothing else to do but wait. Let's hope my battery holds up.

I try so hard to not let them, but rude/mean/accusatory student emails just crawl under my skin in the worst way.

Walking through the library and seeing so many computers with Ch@tGPT up on them breaks my heart for this generation.

That millennial urge to delete all socials and sink back into the primordial ooze of the “before times”

What’s the point of paying for Spotify premium if you get a (VERY) limited number of audiobook hours per month?

What’s the point of paying for Spotify premium if you get a (VERY) limited number of audiobook hours per month?

I’ve gotten very accustomed over the past three years to teaching 75min classes. I forgot how to teach 50min sections and it’s killing me.

At a minor league AAA baseball game and one of the players on the opposite team is booing the MASCOTS. Who does that? Who hated whimsy that much?

Trying to normalize not answering "Things are good!" when asked how I am and things are, in fact, not good.

Cancer drug Revlimid is one of the bestselling pharmaceutical products of all time, with total sales of over $100 billion. It’s also extraordinarily expensive, costing nearly $1,000 for each pill, even though that pill costs just 25 cents to make. (Published May 2025)

Have to love bright sun weather delay (and yes, the storm came in massively a little later).

I’ll take your “ running into a student at the store is awkward” and raise you “taking a class at the gym and being stationed next to a student”

"I asked chatgpt" "I asked grok" Well, have you consulted a historian who says ‘it’s a bit more complicated than that’ and gives you an overly detailed narrative of the last 800 years?

Is trying to negotiate the syllabus the new …. Something old?

I now have an hour commute 3x a week for one of my jobs - audio book recommendations?

In today's episode of "Millennials are the Only Generation Who Actually GETS Technology," I had to teach students how to hotspot their laptops when the campus internet went down.

I am in a constant state of overwhelm this semester. I feel consistently behind, unprepared, and unconfident in a way I haven’t felt since my first semester teaching in grad school. I don’t think I’ve truly processed what happened in April.

In the chaos of (a) losing my job, (b) finding work for the fall, (c) figuring out how to teach 6 classes, and (d) write solid and intriguing applications for new jobs I have missed the deadlines for the conferences I wanted to attend. So, anyone need a friendly medievalist of medicine for a panel?

I dislike/hate GenAI for a lot of reasons, but I hate it most of all (at least today) because it makes me see an em-dash and automatically assume whatever it is was written by AI. RIP The Em-Dash? Free the Em-Dash!

I am in a constant state of overwhelm this semester. I feel consistently behind, unprepared, and unconfident in a way I haven’t felt since my first semester teaching in grad school. I don’t think I’ve truly processed what happened in April.

One of the hardest things to address in an asynchronous class for me comes after teaching how to analyze primary sources. Inevitably, they get stuck on either the notion of "bias" (so all sources are BAD) or the idea that nothing written is ever truthful because of a bias (so all sources are LIES).

Just saw a bumper sticker: “more trees, less assholes”

Note to future self: If you can avoid teaching the Crusades in an online/asynchronous format in a World Civ/Global History-type course, avoid it.

Monitoring for AI use for students looking for easy way to cut corners is exhausting on the best days and downright maddening on the worst.

Had a history major, drop one of my upper level history corse this semester because there was “too much reading” — maybe 20pp per class? If that? They told me they wouldn’t have that much reading a WEEK in law school, between all their classes. Oh my sweet summer child.

Two completed and sent of. These are exhausting. I’d forgotten.

“(Influencers are the cowboys of algorithms.)” is a sentence I never thought I’d read. Ever. Thanks to #Filterworld by #KyleChayka. It’s a decent read, if you’re into thinking about how much the internet and social media have impacted and reshaped the physical and mental structure of our world.

Just submitted my first TT application for Fall 2026. My heart is still bruised from this last year, but it's also feeling hopeful. Cross your fingers for me, friends.

A top-10 conversation from this week: “So, will you tell us what we need to read before each class?” “I already have, it’s on the syllabus.” “Yeah, but can you like, email us or something the day before and just tell us what to read?” 1/2

There are two things I've decided I dislike about being an adjunct (beyond being paid adequately for my time & work): 1. I miss my colleagues. It's hard to connect with ppl when there's no regular time & place to do so. 2. I miss my office. A space on campus that is mine for between classes.

I curate the history series at public media's journal Current. We're looking for pieces on the history of NPR & PBS, educational, community, and affiliate stations. We accept academic articles repurposed for wide readership. Plus, we pay. Please circulate! current.org/series/rewind/

Everyone seems SHOCKED that I do not have big, instagram-worth plans for my 40th birthday tomorrow. A. It’s a TUESDAY. B. We just planned a wedding. I never want to plan anything ever again.

A cute, little dog from the late-thirteenth-century Huth Psalter. British Library, Add MS 38116, f. 73r.

Balancing and staying on top of 4 university schedules, emails, and students, is about as challenging as you think. Promise.

Yesterday taught 10+ college students what else you can get with a town/city library card beyond books. Can we bring back Arthur now?

I have two life long learners in one of my classes and I am THRILLED for their energy and presence. One was thrilled FOR me: “I just audit - so one less paper for you to grade in the chaos that is your fall semester!”

Three different on-campus adjunct positions. Two of which I have to pay for a parking permit. Sigh. I legit don’t get paid enough for this.

Every woman I know with advanced degrees has dated this guy/met this guy at a party and he has implied how ignorant/stupid she actually was because she didn't recite the History of the Peloponnesian War from memory. And then he's been blocked/avoided by every one of those women.

going to go out on a limb and imagine this guy's not actually very good at conversations

I am … not ready for the semester to start. Moreover, I am not ready to have to pay attention to and follow the schedules of FOUR different universities.

It’s gotten even more out of hand. When is too late to send in a review? I’m definitely going to finish it and send it in with an “I’m sorry, this is not my usual work ethic - it’s been a YEAR.”