More Blogging Through Email: How to Embarrass Your Friends

hey girl.

do you know how i spent yesterday?  feeling my way around the house, running into walls, actually cooking a huge meal for fred's wednesday evening dinner with kitty (and 7 other people of the militant lesbian existentialist feminist types) -- using very sharp knives, hot oil, boiling water, the whole shebang -- while SEEING DOUBLE!

it seems like every wednesday i am supposed to double or increase one of these new meds, and whoa, nellie, does that make wednesdays (and thursdays and fridays) interesting.  "am i about to cut into this lovely dancing chicken breast or am i about to slice my shimmying index finger off?"  "is that a bouncing mushroom or the jumping bean of a wine cork?"

so... while fred was out turning on the local dykes and i was trying to watch the seven televisions in the bedroom, while petting the always multiplying number of cats ("there's marmy. there's dobby, there's buddy, there's buddy again, wait, there's dobby one more time, and look!  another marmy, no, two more marmies!"), feeling dizzy, dreading what going to the bathroom was going to be like... i ripped off my fentanyl patch, and passed on my 9 o'clock and midnight meds.  then, apparently, i passed out and slept from about 8 pm to 7 am.  if i had spasms, i didn't know it.  plus, i shut the door -- which is like putting an upside down crucifix as a sign -- open this door, wake me up, and your ass is the proverbial grass.  chasing out the dozen cats was hard, though.

and would you believe...?  i am still seeing at least one-and-a-half, if not double!  it's like everything has a visual echo. one and a half wheelchairs.  one and a half café presses to pour boiling water into...  but i can finally see well enough to type. with, praise the lord, spellcheck.

while i am gabbing about eyes -- i saw the eye doctor -- a lovely, romney-like (as in "all business"), whirlwind of a teeny woman who runs at 100 mph on the most beautiful italian stilettos, in mini-dresses, all doctored-up, of course, by a long prim white coat (tailored).  her name is dr. k and she is very good.  i could kick myself in the booty for sticking with that guy we used to waste an hour on the highway to get to... and then, he would never answer my questions, and used to laugh when i asked about a plan.  the straw that broke that camel's back came when i asked him when he planned to remove my cataracts and he said, "never, if i can help it." and laughed.  so i almost ran to good old dr. MDVIP go-to-guy, begging for a referral.  i am mad at him, too, though, because for all those years i would tell him how the guy made me feel minuscule and unimportant, and that my only option was to slowly go blind. or to go slowly blind. whatever.  see? it's the blindness behind my bad grammar.  or am i confuising french weeth zee anglais?

well, now that  i AM going blind, it's largely that a-hole's fault.  he let my eye pressures stay much too high for much too long, did not track the damage to my optic nerve often enough, etc.

anyway... she does more testing than any doctor i have ever visited (and yes, i admit that impresses me, particularly because she explains -- quickly, very quickly -- what they mean), compares results, and even runs additional tests because "the data shows a tie... we must break the tie!"

she has a drably dressed female flunky, who is apparently her Scribe, who hovers behind her writing down all the numbers, parameters, and codes that the good dr. k barks out in a voice much larger than her person.
i had to visit five different rooms for the visit, no biggie, unless you are in a wheelchair and have to transfer an ungodly amount of times, in the presence of medical techs unused to people so impaired.  nothing more fun than plunking one's ass down on an unsecured rolling office chair, for example.

also, who knew that having to put your chin in the thingy, while pressing your forehead against the other thingy puts horrid pressure on the area where you used to have a shoulder?  useful trivia, eh?

BOTTOM LINE:  removing a cataract is normally a 15-minute l'il operation with local anaglesia.  "you have terrible glaucoma. everyone experiences a huge rise in eye pressure after any eye surgery... but for a glaucoma patient that can mean blindness... also, you still have this p.acnes infection in your body.  we would need to use general analgesia, and perform two surgeries at once, a glaucoma surgery as well.  and so... the decision willl not be mine [dr. k's] but the anesthesiologist's at the hospital. let me go make some calls..."

and no anesthesiologist would agree to touch me.

so... she said i could at least go ahead and get new glasses, so they tested my vision, which could easily have been a comedy routine in and of itself.  "okay, read that line for me." "what line?"  and so on...

anyway, i get to have some 9-inch thick glasses in lieu of having my cataracts removed.  she said to let her work on the anesthesiologists.  i figure all she has to do is pick a young, feisty, unmarried one, take off her white coat, and invite him out for some fresh squeezed carrot juice at the local health food store.  sit on a bar stool, cross her little legs, and show those million dolllar shoes...

now i need to figure out whether to wait until i adjust to this freaking medication increase before i go try to try on glasses and get that script filled.  hank could be my fashion adviser, i guess.  oh, god.  he gets excited when i wear something besides an oversized men's short-sleeve button-up, button-down shirt -- they happen to be the kindest tops i can wear after losing one shoulder and having the other in constant pain from overuse.  it's oh-so-attractive!  oh... and they go over neutral-toned oversized scrub pants because they are the easiest for me to put on, and kindest to my legs. so hank gets excited and compliments me when i turn up in my faded "cal" t-shirt and sweat pants!  "you look nice, honey!"

what a sweet boy.  of course, some idiot at the first existentialist church of angry lesbian feminists gave him TWELVE kelly green tees promoting the local elementary school down the street.  this thrills my snazzy dresser, and now all i see are HIS sweat pants (complete with air holes) topped by these green well-made-so-as-to-NEVER-wear-out EXISTENTIAL ELEMENTARY -- WE LOVE LEARNING t-shirts.

the good news, and i imagine you would like some:  the memantine is helping the neuropathic pain -- by maybe 20%?  and the mobic, my god, a drug that has been around forever!  why wasn't it ever offered, or even mentioned, before?  okay, so it may make me bleed to death... but that aside, it is helping at least... 30%. some days more, even, but some days not at all.

it's the dantrolene that is kicking butt. and supposed to be stopping the seizures, and it AIN'T.  but i am not yet at the full dosage.  i've gone from 25 mg a day to 150 mg (as of yesterday) and next wednesday?  300 mg.  at that point, my vision may resemble what one sees looking through a kaleidoscope.  so someone come up with enough money for a week of joints, and i will just lay in bed and dooby on down...

what else, healthwise?  my depression is better. i only think of suicide after about 4 pm.

my right leg is still leaking.  so yes, i have a huge kotex pad from the mitt-romney-50s (since holding an aspirin between my knees would accomplish nothing) wrapped around my leg at all the spout spots.  you haven't lived until you wake up and try to figure out why your bed is wet... not under your bottom, not with urine, not from a spilled water bottle, not a cat contribution, but from a leg that has sprung a leak...

hank and i are doing the best we can to be together.  he is scared.  i am scared.  so we meet in the middle of scared.  and joke around a lot, which -- if we have any brilliance to us at all -- is our brilliance.  the presidential race provides a lot of material.  i know, i know, you are either a republican or a libertarian (my bet is libertarian) and i am a socialist, and hank is mr. independent (he thinks)... so i should leave politics alone.  but really, when you can't see and you're about to perhaps lose your health coverage AGAIN, and you are descending wayyyyy into poverty -- along with your fellow 47 per-centers -- and after 4 pm you consider applying a dozen fentanyl patches and taking 500 mg of baclofen?  2012 amerikan politics is your friend!  i do have to stray from foreign policy because then i just get overwrought.

so.... HOW THE HECK ARE YOU? are cindy and amber still on The List?  and would you come deep clean my bathroom (no one should be allowed in there...)?  ruby the honda needs help, too.  whenever i climb insdie ruby the honda, i start grabbing tissues and wiping... which does nothing beyond make fred give me the stink eye.  "i know, i know," he says.  then he forgets, forgets.  i scrambled in there last week, for the eye appt, and it REEKED of pesticide.  he said he got in the night before and there were ants everywhere.  duh.  he eats in the car and i just cannot figure why ants would be all over my dear baby ruby.

okay, who knows when i will be able to write again.  i will try. and i send you love and hope, love and hope.

profderien

How to e-mail a professor -- From Orange Crate Art

It downright behooves me to republish this post at this, the dawn of many a new and glorious collegiate career:

At Orange Crate Art, the most read of Michael Leddy's posts dates from January 2005 and deals with "How to e-mail a professor." It caught my eye, as my bosom still resonates with sisterly angst on behalf of my brother, Grader Boob. You can read about his most recent travails here.  We are expecting an onslaught of fresh email recounting fresh travails from Grader Boob this week, as both Huge Public University and Small Private Religious College are hosting "departmental orientations."  The joys of part-time professorships!


These things have induced psychosis in the past.  We pray that his hands do not snake their way into the air, as can happen in these cult-like beginning-of-the-academic-year round-ups.  That was how he came to represent the English Department -- back in '08 -- on the Physical Plant and Campus Planning Committee, as well as suddenly becoming Parliamentarian to the Multicultural/Minority Issues Work Group.      

"Point of order!" he was heard to cry, as they led him away on that balmy May afternoon.  "I am steward of your physical assets and the standard for civic spaces!"

Professor Leddy's post, its addenda, and commentary, should be required reading for incoming Frosh, and is a good refresher in common sense netiquette for most anyone.

I've read enough e-mails to know that many college students could benefit from some guidelines for writing an e-mail to a professor. Here they are:


Write from your college or university e-mail account. That immediately lets your professor see that your e-mail is legitimate and not spam. The cryptic or cutesy or salacious personal e-mail address that might be okay when you send an e-mail to a friend is not appropriate when you're writing to a professor.


Include the course number in your subject line. "Question about 3009 assignment" is clear and sounds genuine, while "a question" looks like spam. "Question about English assignment" or "question about assignment," without identifying the class you're in, may leave your professor with the chore of figuring that out. For someone teaching large lecture classes, that might mean reading through hundreds of names on rosters. But even for a professor with smaller classes, it's a drag to get an e-mail that merely says "I'm in your English class and need the assignment." All your English professor's classes are English classes; she or he still needs to know which one is yours.


Consider, in light of this advice, the following examples:


An e-mail from "qtpie2005" with the subject line "question."


An e-mail from a university account with the subject line "question about English 2011 essay."
Which one looks legitimate? Which one looks like spam?


Think about what you're saying. Most students are not accustomed to writing to their professors. Here are some ways to do it well:
Choose an appropriate greeting. "Hi/Hello Professor [Blank]" is always appropriate. Substitute "Dear" and you've ended up writing a letter; leave out "Hi" and your tone is too brusque.


Avoid rote apologies for missing class. Most professors are tired of hearing those standard apologies and acts of contrition. If you missed class because of some especially serious or sad circumstances, it might be better to mention that in person than in an e-mail.


Ask politely. "Could you e-mail me the page numbers for the next reading? Thanks!" is a lot better than "I need the assignment."


Proofread what you've written. You want your e-mail to show you in the best possible light.


Sign with your full name, course number, and meeting time.


Maggie Simpson
English 3703, MWF 10:00


Signing is an obvious courtesy, and it eliminates the need for stilted self-identification ("I am a student in your such-and-such class").
One don't, and one last do:


Don't send unexpected attachments. It's bad form. Attaching an essay with a request that your professor look it over is very bad form. Arrange to meet your professor during office hours or by appointment instead. It's especially bad form to send an e-mail that says "I won't be in class today," with a paper or some other coursework attached. Think about it: Your professor is supposed to print out your essay because you're not coming to class?


When you get a reply, say thanks. Just hit Reply and say "Thanks," or a little bit more if that's appropriate. The old subject line (which will now have a "Re:" in front) will make the context clear. I don't think that you need to include a greeting with a short reply, at least not if you refer to your professor in your reply. And you don't need to identify yourself by course number and meeting time again.


Many e-mail messages end up never reaching their intended recipients, for reasons of human and technological error, so it's always appropriate to acknowledge that someone's message got through. It's also plain courtesy to say thanks. (Your professor will remember it too.) When you reply, you should delete almost everything of your professor's reply (quoting everything is rarely appropriate in e-mail). Leave just enough to make the original context clear.


So what would a good e-mail to a professor look like?
Hi Professor Leddy,


I'm working on my essay on William Carlos Williams and I'm not sure what to make of the last stanza of "Spring and All." I'm stuck trying to figure out what "It" is. Do you have a suggestion? Thanks!


Maggie Simpson
Eng 3703, MWF 10:00
And a subsequent note of thanks:
> "It" is most likely spring, or life itself. But have you
> looked up "quicken"? That'll probably make
> "It" much clearer.


It sure did. Thanks for your help, Professor.


Maggie Simpson
[How to e-mail a professor is licensed under a Creative Commons 3.0 License. Revised September 26 and October 29, 2005; February 4, 2006. ]


More useful stuff for students:
Beware of the saurus
Granularity for students
How to answer a question in class
How to do well on a final exam
How to do horribly on a final exam
How to punctuate a sentence
How to punctuate more sentences
How to talk to a professor
How to unstuff a sentence
Is this honor society legitimate?
Rule 7
Seeing professors clearly
Syllabus week
Yo, professor!
And if you want to read the most recent posts on Orange Crate Art, here's the front page.


[Some further thoughts: I'm astonished by the amount of interest in this post--over 1,600 visits in the past two days. Then again, there really isn't anything very similar on-line--or if there is, I haven't found it--so if what I've written is useful, well, I'm happy.


My one purpose in writing these guidelines was to help college students write to their professors with greater ease and maturity and a better sense of audience (instead of "i am a student in your class"). They're guidelines for writing to a professor, any professor, in the absence of other guidelines. And they're meant to keep the e-mailer in the high esteem of any professor to whom he or she is writing.


Most of the reasoning behind the guidelines is omitted for concision. But I'll elaborate a little here. Why, for instance, write from a university account? A professor filtering spam will almost certainly also have a filter to okay mail from addresses from her or his "edu." So if you want your mail to get through, an "edu" account is a smart choice. Many schools require students to use those accounts for official school business already. Writing from an appropriate address is smart practice for the future too. (I always say something when I see a tacky or juvenile e-mail address on an otherwise polished student résumé.)


Why say "Hi/Hello Professor [Blank]?" Well, what should a student call a professor? Some people like "Doctor"; some don't. Some people don't have a doctorate. Some people don't explain any of that to students. There was a great piece in the Chronicle about this subject not long ago--"What Should We Call the Professor?" Professor, in the absence of any other guidelines, seems like a good choice.


Having received many telegraphic one-sentence e-mails, often with no greeting, no thank-you, and no signature, I find them weirdly depersonalized: "I need the assignment." I do think a question is better, better even than a polite "Please send the assignment," because the question is more conversational, more human. (But if a student e-mails me and says "I need the assignment," I send it.)


Why sign with your name, class, and meeting time? It's a courtesy, yes, but it also avoids the awkward "My name is . . . , and I am a student in your such-and-such class," all of which is taken care of in the signature. It occurs to me that "My name is . . . , and I am a student in . . ." is telling evidence of the unfamiliarity of e-mail as a way for students to communicate with professors.


I appreciate the point several commenters have made about a follow-up thank-you being unneeded. Still, a lot of e-mail doesn't get through, and the follow-up, to my mind, closes the loop. Many people do a follow-up by using the subject line to say thanks, often followed by the abbreviation "eom" (end of message). That seemed to me too arcane to recommend. But I do like the idea of closing the loop by saying yes, I got it, thanks.


I hope that this post leads to much more talking on the part of professors and students about communicating by e-mail. All reports from the business world point to enormous problems of clarity, correctness, and decorum with e-mail writing. Maybe things can start to go better in college.

Fred Responds//The Rest of our IntraManorial Conversation

So last night I fired off an email to Sweet Fred, allowing as to how I had a serious case of the blues and that he was not to take my reticence personally.  We email each other fairly frequently, despite also having numerous opportunities to exchange greetings live-and-in-person throughout the day and night.

Living in a place like Marlinspike Hall can make keeping up with one another a challenge.  There are so many details to which, as caretakers, we must attend, that the minutia of our relationship tend to fall by the wayside, often landing smack-dab in the middle of our algae-choked moat.

Never one to mistake seriousness for levity, but definitely the sort to confound a joke for something really sober, Fred decided to cover his [innocent] bases with a blanket apology:

From: fancy_fredster
Sent: Sunday, April 17, 2011 2:47 AM
To: prof-de-rien
Subject: Re: saturday evening


My Dear Prof


My dear, Prof! I'm sorry you're not feeling well. It's 2.30AM and I just checked my email for the first time since this afternoon. I had no idea you were or weren't any of those things. I hope you feel better by the time you read this.


I'm sometimes unable to tell when something is meant to be humorous rather than serious. Snarky and rude though I may be, I wasn't aware that I'd crossed over to the dark side today. If I did I apologize. It was unintentional.


I'm going to read your blog post now.


Ta Ta (the greeting, not the breast)
Fred

I concluded our flurry of communication this morning as I sipped on some coffee and considered the day before me.  Next to getting a long, handwritten letter from the President of the United States, an email from Fred is a nifty way to kick things off. 

It occured to me, though, that I needed to let him off his imaginary hook. 

Very truly yours, Hollis Greene.
[I love the Hollis Green character from Big Love -- and I am never going to have a fitting occasion to say that -- primarily, of course, because I am not Hollis Greene, but secondarily because it doesn't seem as remarkable a bunch of five words when seen in print.]

Darling SweetButt


Your timely response brought a gentle grimace to my scaly visage. A propos of naught but the opportunity to use “à propos”: It’s 8:33 AM.


Perhaps calling you snarky and rude was a bit over the top, especially given that the accusatory adjectives were, as you surmised, tossed about entirely in jest.


Part of me (We’ll call her Brunhilda **) wants to say: “Here’s a quarter. Go buy a sense of humor!”
Another part of me (Rebecca Anne) rushes to reassure you that you now have A Spare in the Apology Account.


The Either/Or blog post seems stupid today. It seemed insightful and clever yesterday. Too bad I just couldn’t say: Man o man, these assholes keep doing the shittiest things... Look how they want to stick it to the environment. All those babies that they’re gonna force to be borned won’t have a planet to live on!


I hope you have a marvelous Sunday with the Militant Feminist Existential Lesbians.(cleverly disguised as “diverse” by comingled male heterosexuals and transgendered Little People).

courtesy of The Cimmerian

Titties to you, too.
Love, The Prof


** “A large, disgusting, dangerous white girl (preferably German) who loves sex and likes to manhandle unsuspecting white males.” – courtesy of The Urban Dictionary

"Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud."
(1 Cor. 13:4)