Subject: first week of school
Date: Mon, 26 Aug 1996 14:19:10 -0400 (EDT)
From: Sally Greene <sg5p@faraday.clas.virginia.edu>
To: Sarah Greene <Gilmer@dal.cleaf.com>

Momma,

I just looked out my window and saw a Jack Russell Terrier runnign through
the parking lot--on a lead, pulling some poor woman along.  Looked like
Wishbone.  Thanks for the clippings about him et al.  Sad to hear about
the Buckhorn.  It won't be the same without the brewery.

I can't believe, by the way, that Ronnie Wade had the nerve to try to get
press credentials from you.  But I guess there are some people who go
through life blissfully ignorant of how obnoxious they are!

School starts in two days.  Since I only have one class I'm not panicked,
although Paul is (he is teaching an undergraduate seminar because he can't
stand not to teach, but it's something he has to do outside of his other
40-hour job, and he's not through making a syllabus yet). I'll try to get
Russ' camera mailed this week, somehow.  I think I know where a UPS place
is, and I hope they'll pack it.

Our dinner party was fine.  With the deck and the curtains it's looking a
lot more lived-in.  But the house is badly arranged in some ways--mostly
my compalint is that the kitchen, big as it is, which is nice, is not
connected to anything else.  On ordinary days I would like to have it
closer to the TV room and the stereo, and for parties I'd like it closer
to the dining room.  But the dining room is lovely.

The cabernet franc from Greene County was very good. I also had that
bottle of sauvignon blanc that I'd gotten at Prince Michel on Rt. 29; it
was OK but not great.  I think everything was a hit especially the deadly
chocolate dessert.  With the basil pasta I had some kind of fresh parmesan
I'd never heard of before but bought at Fresh Fields (like Whole Foods but
isn't) because when I tasted it it was better than any I'd ever had.  That
very day my new Gourmet came with a feature on this cheese, parmigiano
regiano (or something like that)--about how spectacular it is.  That was
worth some self-congratulation!

Yesterday we went to visit the four-year-old boy and his parents who came
to visit us for Fourth of July; he and Tucker are in the same day care
although not in the same class, and the parents are both English
professors here.  They had a great time.  Tucker cried all the way home
becvause he didn't want to leave (it was also nap time).  They live in a
renovated old house right in town; we walked to a park nearby.

I finally got an answer from Syracuse Univ. Press regarding my Woolf and
Renaissance essay collection:  no.  They'd had it since February and it
was driving me crazy.  It shouldn't have taken anywhere near that long.
The acquisitions editor said she really liked the proposal but the press
is less and less interested in essay collections. This seems to be true
everywhere.  But I have other places to try.  I'm just havppy to have an
answer, finally.

In better news, I got an answer from the e-mail I had written to Julian
Bond, who teaches history here.  I had asked him if he had any personal
experience in court with Frank Johnson, the Alabama judge my seminar is
focused on, and if so, or even if not, would he be interested in talking
to my class.  He said he did not but that his wife, a lawyer, had been in
Johnson's court and had even witnessed a Justice Dept. lawyer faint there;
he asked her if she would be interested in talking to us, and she said yes
(she commutes down here from D.C. for part of the week--luckily, the part
that includes my class days, WEdnesdays).

It was the fact of that man's being from Gladewater that I found so
startling.  And his wife, well, she may be pleased that God is punishing
him so much, but she's done quite a number on herself to stay with him!
But I did find that line of hers pretty chilling.  I wonder if he went to
Rice long enough ago that it was all paid for.  He did have good judgment
not to go into teaching literature.  Hal's column is easy to agree with,
by the way--it has suddenly become very fashionable to rail against
academic jargon!  Personally I don't tend to write that way--I learned to
write from journalism professors.  But note that that doesn't make me
especially that much more employable.