In case you were wondering

This is what I’ve been doing, instead of blogging, of late:
~ marking
~ finding new and inventive reasons not to mark
~ cleaning the home office
~ packing up the work office (see below)
~ watching my garden grow
~ making the guest room inhabitable (it’s currently inhabited by my good friend Heather, in town for the weekend. The world’s best mother-in-law will be inhabiting the room in July and August.)
~ laundry
~ despamming
The office saga
I’ve heard tales of teachers at other colleges sharing office space with up to five other people – and by ‘sharing office space’ I mean there’s one room, one phone, one computer, and six people. So for the past year and a half I’ve been remarkably lucky to have an office all to myself; furthermore, said office overlooks the football practice field, and does so from a large, sunny window.
I have this office because its actual ‘owner’ has been on leave, working for CIDA in Europe. The single-person office next to mine has been similarly occupied by a relative newbie (we were hired at the same time) because its occupant was on leave, teaching at Bishop’s in the Education department.
The rationale behind our occupation of these offices was that since the official occupants were expected to return, there was no point in installing a more senior teacher and then forcing that person to move if and when the office was reclaimed.
Now, my office has been a source of envy, not only because it’s a single, but also because I am, in the words of one of my colleagues, the “Martha Stewart of the English Department.” (Mum, I can hear you laughing. Stop that.) I have made my office comfortable and personal, true, but as I have explained to those who express their covetousness, if I leave the office, the contents are coming with me.
This spring, we lost a colleague after a horribly prolonged illness. The original occupant of my office was a close friend of this colleague, and has specifically requested his office when she returns to the college this fall. In the meantime, the original occupant of the neighbouring office is definitely not returning, preferring to stay at Bishop’s and chair the Education department. The upshot is that the two offices are now officially available. So my neighbour and I have been asked to move into a double office together, thus allowing the current doublers, who both outrank us, to have single offices. Now, this is only fair, and neither my neighbour nor I raised any protest whatsoever. However, my neighbour, whose very good friend is an archaeologist just down the hall, has asked if he can share with the bone guy.
So as it stands, I not only have an office to myself, now I have a double office to myself.
Yes, the office gods do indeed smile upon me.