Out of town for the holidays . . .

This afternoon I'm heading to Topeka to spend some time with the Mrs.' family, thence to Austin for Christmas with my mother. Somewhere in there a post or two might appear here.

In my mind I am still assessing the just-past semester. I mentioned in my last post about seeing more needy students than in times past--by that, I mean that they seemed to be lacking that whatever-it-is that students need to have apart from the basic academic skills in order to be successful. They are weighing on my mind and, I know, on many of my colleagues. More about this later.

On to something else now.

The best recognitions are those we've not consciously sought; the most blush-inducing ones are the ones we least deserve. Last week, good old Blog Meridian received both of each at one time. Last week I was informed via e-mail that this blog had been selected for inclusion on Onlinecourses.org's list of excellent scholarly literary criticism blogs. At first I thought it was one of these "Your name will appear here if you pay us $50" kind of things, but no. Especially given the names of the other blogs linked to there, I figure that this blog's inclusion is some kind of mistake and that someone will come along and rectify it. Until that happens, though, I encourage visitors here to do this: If you've come here looking for expert, informative commentary on literature and other such things and feel, after you've poked around here a bit, that surely there has to be better stuff than this, let me assure you that you are correct and that you may very well find it here on this list.

The very merriest of Christmases and happiest of holidays to you and yours.