Home Stretch!

Bundle up! In the middle of a cold recovery (hacking up some good stuff!), correcting exams, creating a class for online delivery, and correcting Senior portfolios. Before heading home for the holidays, I will make one more appearance to see the River Rats play, clean up the house, and have a few more drinks. Bringing home some good wine, too. Picture is from Saturday full of the cold. That's my new "Jose Mourinho" coat. Looks like I will be need some Fabio Capello glasses instead.








Life as a professor. I have 5 weeks off. Five!? Yes, Five. I will come back to New England at some point to prepare my winter semester classes. 16 weeks later it will be summer. Yes, so out of the next 37 weeks, I am off for 21 of them. Yes, I often wonder why I put myself through the Ph.D. experience myself. Oh yeah, I will likely finish that thing off in March now. My career has been perpetuated well enough on my own. I can only imagine what the final experience will be like with my doctoral defense.

Memories of last year... what a difference a year makes. The tide always comes in. As you you can see, I am still standing. Achilles tendon healed, I am even standing on my two feet. See you on the Island in 6 days.

Thanksgiving Complete

The run for Christmas is on... Birthday week was fun even if it was more low-key than other years. I got all my preparations for Thanksgiving done earlier in the week so that come Wednesday, I was able to watch England versus Croatia. I paid $24.95 for the Match on Pay-Per-View. While it was an epic battle, the Motherland went down and now I am finding myself in my new navy style overcoat (New York City- $129 at H&M) with my new grey scarf ($7.25 at Kenneth Cole Wrentham Outlets) hoping that the "Special One" himself, Jose Mourinho, is hired by England to wear his similar special garb for the homeland. Parents arrived the next morning and a mild Thanksgiving afternoon was spent on the dock. A great day with the Turkey going to be consumed until I go home for Christmas. Friday, we watch the game's second star score his second goal of the season in Lowell as Mark Flood and the Albany River Rats came to town. With Mark playing like that, I only hope that when the time comes that the Hurricanes are playing close enough for me to watch for his first big game at the highest level. Rest of weekend was spent shopping and putting on my new Christmas lights at the dock.

Exams in 10 days, final papers to grade, and another revision to my dissertation to submit. Plane ticket is bought for December 18th. Time is flying...

Birthday Week is Here!

Fresh from Dr. Nathan Martin's visit, tired but quite pleased to say it was not a bad time hitting Providence, Worcester, Boston, and New York- four nights in a row. Pictures are from Worcester where we were going to incorporate a pinky theme in all of our pictures for the weekend (it didn't seem to catch on... thank goodness for that!) Before hitting the Sam Adams Brewery tour, we let a speech pathologist from Western Michigan take our picture in front of Sam Adams himself. We then hit New York City reuniting with Dr. Major Mark Clifford while staying at the New York Athletic Club. What a city. Nuff said!

I taught for two days... and now it's Thanksgiving Break! Birthdays have been a bit of a "gong show" over the last few years. This week my parents arrive on Thursday for Thanksgiving. I picked up the turkey that was pre-ordered along with plenty of wine this afternoon. I have the PPV ordered for England's football match against Croatia tomorrow. Pictures from Birthday Week to come later...

Mixing Business with Pleasure

Busy week... Tuesday was spent in New York City where I got the chance to visit with the Rangers, Knicks, and the MSG Entertainment. Wednesday featured my first role as a "celebrity judge" at a slam dunk contest. Last night I visited the hartford Civic Center where I visited with the AHL Hartford Wolfpack and discussed future internships for our students. Then I got to watch my next door neighbor, Mark Flood (#4), play. As much as I like to think my putting a hockey stick in his hands at the age of 6 months, "It was all you, Mark!"... a night of getting chills up my spine watching a pre-game warm-up.

Fall Colors ("Colours" for my Canadian Friends)

A recent view from the backyard... Red Sox on the brink of a World Series Championship (Game 3 party with Nichols Athletics staff last night came complete with a "Papelbon Irish jig"- pictures to come? Not likely on here!), my dissertation with MORE revisions to do, and a simple quiet day in New England.

The Reason I Moved Back to the Northeast...

Canadian Thanksgiving at its best. Late night shenanigans on Friday with the family. I can't show the other pictures from this file with the Mom and Craig on Friday night but the 3 AM catch up of all the news with my brother was indeed a highlight. I was a king for a day meaning I could do no wrong on Saturday with my nephew Thomas at my side. Family photo day was followed by some pre-flight leaves raking with Papa on Sunday morning. Samuel once again had me wondering if it's possible if something that damn cute could be related to me. Then finally, one more night of debauchery with the Arsenault lads in the Byward Market on Sunday Night/Monday morning... yeah, I think getting closer to home was a great decision!

Heading Home for Canadian Thanksgiving!

When I first started this blog, one of my first blog entries was about heading home for Canadian Thanksgiving. With the closer proximity to home, I am not exactly getting to PEI but I will be spending some time with the family in Ottawa. When my parents went to Portland, Maine 2 weeks ago, I drove two and half hours to get to them (picture above).

Off to Ottawa on Friday to see the family. Slowly plugging away at the dissertation... it hasn't been forgotten about. Red Sox open up at home tonight. I have been doing some traveling to Cambridge lately and hope traffic isn't too bad...

Will have some pics later...

At Home in New England...

Nesting... is that what the psychologists call it? I got my cable, my new Weber (Nichols College homecoming next weekend), and as you might gather, the days of the throw-away camera are gone, as I also bought myself a new Canon A560 yesterday. 21st Century!

It's a slow process settling in somewhere new. I am slowly finding the little places to grocery shop, grab a drink without students being around, and the little routines that make up your day. It's a rainy day in Massachusetts as I organize my lectures for next week... enjoy the pics. Many more to follow.

First Week Complete!

Life as a full time assistant professor began this week. Life began on Monday when I taught my first set of classes and then attended convocation. I appeared in a campus news release somewhere around the bottom of this story.
http://www.nichols.edu/news/conv_2007.html

Early indications are that of Coach K when he described his dream to become a college coach when he said "the reality was even better than the dream." There is a lot of hard work but it's work that I enjoy.

I moved into my cottage on the lake yesterday. After getting a sample of the food that is offered on Shrewbury Street at their college promotion in Worcester yesterday, I came back and made myself my first homecooked meal in two weeks. I was greeted by a nice Blue Heron on the lake last night. Without cable or internet...or even Sprint's great connection (will soon be on Verizon), that Heron was my only source of live entertainment last night.

Getting my paycheck and 2 months of backpay in 5 days. New laptop and likely a new digital camera to keep this blog up to date with my ugly mug...

Hello, New England!

I have arrived... not exactly the way I visioned myself for homecoming or to Nichols College but I have made it! Somewhere around my last entry in New Mexico wondering if my time there would ever end, I decided one last game of indoor soccer would do me good. Long story short is I went home with a partially separated achilles tendon and currently in my new office with a cast on.

Home time was fun. Despite my short time on PEI, I managed to get my visits in with most people and even found myself in the middle of the "Pink Shirt One-Punch" incident. There are something in my new status as an Assistant Professor that I cannot publish on a public blog. Especially when I am home on the Island. Indeed. Gold Cup and Saucer was well enjoyed with Silent Swing taking home the big prize.

I made it across the border decently well... red tape as usual. For classes to prep apartments to find, orth specialists to see, and tons of information overload. Special thanks to Nate with his help keeping in the country yesterday!

Cheers from Nichols College