Time is limited, so I'm going to write this page in the "100 Things" format that was so popular on blogs a few years ago. I've noticed that I'm getting more frequent visitors, so I thought I'd add some semi-personal info. I've also enabled comments on the blog, so feel free to comment away.
Here we go ...
1. I have an M.A. in English from a large university in the South. When I started grad school, I had visions of someday writing my thesis on some aspect of William Blake's poetry, or Milton's; however, after I took my first rhet/comp course, I knew I wanted to focus on rhet/comp instead. This was a big deal because I was such a literary nerd as an undergrad.
2. My one "B" in grad school was in a class called "Technical Writing Methodologies." I went on to become a technical writer. Go figure.
3. I took my first tech writing job as a temporary break from grad school; I had just started work on my Ph.D., but I needed the money. I never made it back to school. With the exception of a couple high-school teaching stints over the years, I've been a technical writer ever since.
4. I'd still like to get my Ph.D. "someday," but I'm not in any hurry to do that right now.
5. I don't love technical writing, but I like it. If I hated it, I'd have gotten out of the business a long time ago.
6. As I grow older, I find myself wishing I hated tech writing. I'd rather have spent my best years doing something I loved, rather than doing something I merely liked.
7. The "somethings I love" are writing, and teaching writing. In that order.
8. I have a bad habit of using quotation marks when they're not necessarily warranted. It annoys me to no end, but I do it anyway.
9. I'm a poetry nut. Drama's fine and fiction's great, but poetry's what truly stirs my soul.
10. I don't know what I really mean by "soul," or what I really believe, spiritually speaking. I'm well into middle age, and I'm still trying to figure all that out.
11. I've become very burned out on the corporate "cubicle life" in the past couple of years. When an ad for an adjunct English instructor showed up on the employment pages of the local community college, I applied. I got the job. So now I'm a technical writer by day and an English instructor by evening.
12. I'd like to teach English full-time and leave technical writing behind someday. But we have bills to pay off, so it looks like I'll be working both jobs for a while. Sigh.
13. It's okay because I like both my jobs. The only thing I don't like is that I'm tired all the time.
14. Did I mention that I have a kid? Yeah. I have a kid. If I taught English full-time, I'd have a lot more time for her. She's the reason I checked the community college's employment website in the first place.
15. Life's gotten so much better since I started teaching. I'm doing something I love for at least a few hours a day, plus I'm home more (rather than in the cubicle), so I'm seeing my kid more. That's good.
More "About Me" snippets to be added later ...
