Some thoughts on starting the school year!!!

Hi everyone…. Thank you for caring for me as I had my annual cancer follow-up. As Dennis said, the results were negative and that is positive!!!

Next week, Wednesday, we have our opening convocation of the faculty to begin the school year at East Tennessee State University. Classes start the following Monday. This semester I will have two in-class and one on-line class – all of my classes are full – This year, I will teach, or try to teach, approximately 225-250 students…….

This will be my 24th year at ETSU and my 30th year teaching overall. I taught for 6 years at the University of Louisville before coming to this university and these wonderful mountains… I am a really good teacher, I have done a really good job at university service, but my research productivity hasn’t been that good. That is the main reason why, after all these years, I have not achieved the rank of Professor, I remain an Associate Professor.

I love to teach and have made the transition from chalk boar, dry erase board, TV classes, and now to Internet classes…I have taught on the main campus mostly with some classes in Kingsport and some in Bristol…

Over the years, I have taught somewhere between 7,000 and 8,000 students…. When I came to ETSU we were teaching mostly first generation college students. That is, students who parents did not go to college… Sometime their parents didn’t understand the importance of going to class… I remember one student who said to me, when the tobacco crop comes in I will have to be gone for several days when we harvest it….. Sandy has done that and she tells me it is truly not any fun………. That is not something students seem to do any more, thank God. Now, I am teaching some of my students children, that is too weird.

I tried administration at a low level, and really did not like it or do well. I was the Director of the College of Business Honors Program, the Director of Assessment for the College of Business. I found that those kind of administrative duties did not suit my personality, I would wake up in the middle of the night thinking about this little duty or that report… I love teaching and it does not wake me up in the night.

I have been the Faculty Senate President and did a decent job of that. I also have been something called the NCAA Faculty Athletic Representative. That is a position that connects the academic community with the athletic… That allowed me to be very active in athletics and also to be very active in the Southern Conference. ETSU belonged to the Southern Conference before we did away with football and had to leave to join the Atlantic Sun Conference.. That is a whole other story.

While I make a very good salary, I am significantly underpaid relative to those just entering the teaching profession…. That is called salary compression… Even with the new raises we will get this year, I will be somewhere between $15,000 and $20,000 below market for a person at my rank and years of service…. I am sad about that as I begin to close out my career, but I am blessed to make the salary that I do make…

I want to thank God for the opportunity to do this job all of these years. I want to thank God for allowing me to touch so many people and help to educate them. I want to thank God for keeping me healthy enough to have only missed a few days through the years to illness – remarkable considering that I have had cancer three times. Thank you God for sending the Holy Sprit to me with the gift to teach…… I have been truly blessed.

Peace to you all, john

Well, first of all, what I called a frozen section of my urine is really called a cytology test. So, live and learn.......... Now - my cytology tests are back and they are negative.... Praise God. That is wonderful news and I am so happy..... Blessings to all, john

Ok - I have still not heard from the frozen section of my urine.... It will not be two weeks until tomorrow.... so I decided to write something.......... My new neighbors have moved in - remember, they moved in last year and then went back to CA because his Mother was, is, ill.. well they are back..... Yesterday, they were running errands and decided to go to ChicFilet in North Johnson City..... They were walking up the hill and Carol slipped and fell head-over-heals down the hill and broke her ankle.... She had to have surgery today... I haven't heard how she is doing... There son is in second grade and he came over at a few minutes before 6 and stayed with Sandy and I until the bus picked him up at about 7:30.... I now know that not only am I not smarter than a 5th grader, but I am not smarter than a 2nd grader either!!!!

Today I cut the grass at church..... Next week, Ruth will help cut the grass at church..... I hope it is not quite so dry... I was afraid there would be a grass fire it is so dry.........

Here is a picture of my sun flowers.......... actually two pictures.

They did not grow on those fence posts!! I bet you knew that...........

Here is Jill dog eating an elephant.... It used to be Maddie's but she didn't want it any more so Marie gave it to Jill.... Jill was so interested that she was able to get the insides out...

This is Jill dog having a nap - she probably had a nap after getting the insides out of the elephant too, but this was not it!!!

She and I compete for the most naps.....................

Have a great day and remember to take good care of yourself so you can take good care of someone else. Peace, john

Annual bladder cancer checkup today!!!

Today I had my annual bladder cancer follow-up examination!!!

In 2003 I was diagnosed with bladder cancer, had successful surgery for the removal of the tumor and have had regular follow-up exams since...... Actually, that was the third time I have had cancer.... The first time, 1984, was seminoma, a brand of testicular cancer. We did surgery and radiation that time.... The second time, 1987, was metastatic seminoma in my lung.... testicular cancer in my lung... (that sounds a little odd, doesn't it). We did chemotherapy and I was cancer free until the most recent bout with the bladder cancer.

The examination consists of a urine sample, which is checked by my doctor in the office and then shipped off to the lab for a more extensive evaluation of whether or not there are any cancer cells; a cystoscope of my bladder; and a prostate exam...... Here is a picture of the cystoscope:

After having the first exam without medication, I take medication every time now!!!! My exam today was I still have to wait for the lab results. The initial results were a-ok and I am good for another year....assuming the lab work is okay

Here is a picture of me in 1987 when I was having chemotherapy:

Yesterday's gone..................

Remember, take good care of yourself so you can take good care of another. Peace, John

From the beach....................................

Sharks on the right......... na,na,na,na

Sharks on the left!!! na,na,na,na
They'er the best babes in town!!!!!That is also our house at the beach - Mitche's Haven..........

An a couple of pictures of a sunrise from the deck on a hazy morning!!!

Wow, what a trip, what friends................. We had a wonderful time!!!

Remember to take good care of yourself so you can take good care of another..

Peace to you all, john

News about Matthew...... http://www.mattfay.blogspot.com/ please send your thoughts and prayers... Thanks, John

The exams are graded, the grades have been submitted to the Registrar's Office electronically and I am trying, as Roz says, to reenter normal society.........

To help with that reentry, Sandy and I are going with the Cope's to dinner at Carter at Main in Elizabethton tonight.......... we are going to eat on the upstairs patio and have a good relaxing time............

This was the first time that I taught summer school school on-line and I have to say it was a most interesting teaching experience, a most interesting time. Tom Selleck, in Magnum P.I., would say that it was an ancient oriental curse that we live in "interesting" times. HIHO, which is a quote from Kurt Vonnegut, is about all I have to say right now. I learned much about the on-line summer process that will make my classes better in the regular terms as well as the summer next year. If there is a summer next year........ You never know with summer school until the enrollments occur.

I am thinking about writing a short story - Tales from the Mails: E-mails that is!! I am sure it has already been written many times, but I think I will try to add to the literary nonsense category - I have received some of the most "interesting" e-mails in the last year and at least I should try to get a paper out of them - my boss wants publications so here I go!!!

On a more serious note - I have heard nothing about Matthew Fay and will let everyone know when I do.

Blessing to those who put up with me during summer school, especially Sandy.

Remember to take good care of yourself so you can take good care of another. John

Mowin' maniac........

Today I was a mowing maniac.... I started before breakfast loading the mower and trimmer and then I went and ate a cheese omelet at Beasley's....... then, at about 9:30am I cut the grass and trimmed at church, the parsonage, and at home........ I finally came in the house at 3:30 and took a shower, graded some final exams, and put grommets in a purse.... then I had a glass of wine and Jill and I greeted Sandy when she came home. I bet I sleep well tonight..... Oh yah, I am cooking meatloaf on the grill and Sandy is making mashed potatoes and gravy and peas for dinner.........bet there will be some bread too... I forgot to eat lunch so I am hungry...

I hope you all had as good a day as I had............... remember, take good care of yourself so you can take good care of another. Love, john

In MC's blog about quiting smoking I was reminded about a couple of my favorite prayers - the first is a prayer by St. Francis and the second is the Serenity Prayer:

A prayer by Saint Francis:

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.

Where there is hatred . . . let me sow love

Where there is injury . . . pardon

Where there is doubt . . . faith

Where there is despair . . .hope

Where there is darkness . . . light

Where there is sadness . . .joy

Divine Master,grant that i may not so much seek

To be consoled . . .as to console

To be understood . . .as to understand,

To be loved . . . as to love

For it is in giving . . .that we receive,

It is in pardoning, that we are pardoned,

It is in dying . . .that we are born to eternal life

--St Francis


Serenity Prayer:

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change;

courage to change the things I can;

and wisdom to know the difference.
Living one day at a time;

Enjoying one moment at a time;

Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace;

Taking, as He did, this sinful world as it is,

not as I would have it;

Trusting that He will make all things right

if I surrender to His Will;

That I may be reasonably happy in this life

and supremely happy with Him Forever in the next.

Amen.

--Reinhold Niebuhr

Remember, take good care of yourself so that you can take good care of another.

Peace, john

Tomorrow, June 29, is the day Matthew Fay has his scans done following his last chemotherapy treatment. Please pray for Matthew and his family. Please pray that his cancer is gone. Thank you. Peace, John

Well - that light house that Dennis made is something else!!!

As for me it is grade, grade, and grade some more - the classes end on July 6 and vacation starts on July 13......eeeeeehaaaaa

How about this for excitement - our well started to sputter on Saturday.... it almost quit. After letting is sit for awhile, is seemed to have water... but we realized it is time to hook up to the Town of Jonesborough water.......... Oh my ga!!!! I just paid $1500 for the tap... For those of you who do not know, that is the connection that the water department makes so that you can run the water to your home... The water department has to do it - you cannot do it.

After they do that, a plumber runs a line to the house.... don't know how much that will cost. A plumber is coming this evening to give us an estimate........ The good news is that the pressure for this water is going to be great, it is an 8" water line going down our street.... we have to get a 300psi water valve to control the pressure in the house.... We can still use our well water for yard work...but the two systems cannot be tied into each other they have to be completely seperate... sounds like more work for the plumber!!!

Well, pray that the well lasts until we are hooked up - and remember to take good care of yourself so you can take good care of someone else. Peace, john

There is new information on Matthew

http://www.mattfay.blogspot.com/

Please check it out and keep praying, thanks, john

This and that - Hello everyone... Life has been hectic - our previous pastor at church left yesterday and our new pastor is arriving on Wednesday.... my 60 some odd students in two Internet classes are busy doing assignments and taking tests.... three weeks to go!!! 60 assignments and an essay final in the Datamanagement class to go and somewhere in the vicinity of 1oo computer assignments to go in the Management Information Systems class to go.... I'll have a quarter pounder to go!!!

I was inspired by Ruth's blog and her pictures so I thought I would try to share the enjoyment of my garden with you..... Her flowers are really elegant - thank you Ruth. My flowers are more workmanlike... (that is not actually a word, but it will do in this case) I am probably not smarter than a 5th grader, but I do love that show!!!

So here are some pictures from the yard and the garden.

This is a brown eyed car niv or - growing in the straw - nick name - Jill

This is my tomato garden surrounded by marry golds!!

These are tomato hopefuls!!!

This is our perennial garden - I really love echinacea - cone flowers. There are threen varieties here - Sunrise, Twilight, and Sundown..

Here is one up close - it is being eaten by the Japenese Beetels that arrived last week - I will put our traps for them in a day or two....

There are sunflowers. I had a really hard time getting that yard stick to grow!!!!

This is a day lilly - we planted the roots over a year ago and it finally grew - Now, I think it was worth the wait.

You may recall the mullian that I had in a blog a few weeks ago. You may not as well..... anyway, this is it and you can see by the yard stick that it has grown quite a bit... it is not finished yet.

here is Scag man!

with a bug catcher!!!

Thanks for letting me share.... Have a great week and remember to take good care of yourself so that you can take good care of someone else. Peace, john

Please pray for our friend Matthew and his family.

http://www.mattfay.blogspot.com/

Thank you all, peace of Christ, john

Hello everyone -

I wanted to share with you that this week, Wednesday, I was presented with my 7th grandchild.... This was my daughters third child. One of my sons has three and another son one has one. Of course their spouses are involved in all this as well. And, I had nothing to do with it............ There are four girls and two boys. The sad news is that they all live away.... Williamsburg VA and West Hartford CT - so I do not get to see them very much. Soon my son with three will be moving to Washington DC - That is where I was born.

Anyway, I was thinking that news about grandchildren would be a more happy blog than pictures of dead moles...............

This Sunday, yesterday, after church, Sandy and I did nothing. We enjoyed each other's company and sat around the house....... We cooked a "beer can" chicken, potatoes, corn on the cob, and bread on the grill and just had a quite day. The Lord's day!!! Oh, yah, I did water my newly sown grass seed, which is beginning to sprout!!

Next Sunday our pastor and his family are leaving for a new assignment. We will miss them.

The Sunday after that our new pastor and her family are arriving. This is an exciting time in the life of our church. This is a time of renewal and the wonderment of change. I cannot wait!!!!

Remember, take good care of yourself so you can take good care of another. Blessings, john

I just wanted to report that Jill just tried to come in the house with a dead mole in her mouth!!! We discussed it, and she spit is out and let me throw it into the woods.... while she was not happy, she seemed to understand that dead moles were best left outside! No pictures although I may try to find it later and post one.... Cheers, john

This and that!

Well - I have been absent. I have been doing work around the house and keeping up with my 63 on-line summer school students...........all day today I communicated, corrected, and created new stuff for my on-line classes......................... Sandy was at the beach with her girl friends for 5 days and while she was gone, I did house/yard work....... I hauled 1600 lbs of dirt, spread it around where it was needed, spread grass seed, and covered it with straw and straw-like roll outs................... here is Jill chilling out on some of my work!!!!!!!!!!!!

The pic is a little fuzzy because of the screen - but, clearly, she is in charge of the new seedlings............... a mother's instinct!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I hope you are all well - God bless you......Remember, take good care of yourself so you can take good care of another... love, john

Around the yard...................

day lily!







Around here these are called red hot poker.....

real name.....Kniphofia Alcazar....

Easy to see why they are called red hot poker!!!!

close up..................well dah?

This is a wild flower called a mullian - I think they are great, Sandy dislikes them a lot. They remind her of tobacco plants and she has had to harvest tobacco in the past...........ugh.

This plant will have a tall spike, yellow, flower later. Mullians are biennials.....they do not bloom the first year; then they bloom the second year and die!!! I am glad I am not biennial!

This is a columbine plant - pretty yellow flowers. I had a hard time buying a plant called columbine..... but I am glad I did!!

That is Jill. she is playing with her rope ball... She gets an A+ for plays well with herself!!!!

That is a butt hole beer can.... How do I know it is a butt hole beer can? Well some butt hole threw it out their window into my yard.......... anyone who throws stuff out of there vehicle window is a butt hole!!!!

Japanese fern.

Strawberry - oops, it is not quite ripe. There were a couple of really ripe strawberries in the garden when I watered yesterday evening, I didn't get them then. I think the rabbits beat me to them, they were gone today!!

Our new grill....................

Remember, take good care of yourself..........so you can take good care of someone else. Peace, john

Howdy everybody - haven't blogged lately because I was getting ready for the start of summer school..... I have two classes and they each run for 8 weeks... both classes have 28 students and they are both on-line courses..... I have been busy the last couple of days answering e-mails and posting lecture notes for the students.

Both of these classes are information systems classes - one is called Management Information Systems and the purpose of this class, a core class in the BBA curriculum, is to expose students to the strategic advantages of using a wide variety of information systems in organizations - the other class is a Management elective and is called Data Management. In that class we discuss using information as on organization asset and we study the relational database approach to the creation of data models in the organization.

Both classes are heavily weighted toward the successful completion of information systems assignments. In the MIS class, 30% of the grade is derived from 13 assignments the rest of the grade is from four exams and participation in on-line discussion forums. In the Data Management class 20% is from an exam and the other 80% is from ACCESS database tutorials, Internet assignments, a database that is the same for everyone, and a database the each student creates to solve some problem that is important to the student.

Summer school moves at an amazing clip. There is almost no chance of getting in trouble by being bored... In fact, it is an exciting time because of the pace.. I cannot afford to get behind in either class. The great thing about on-line classes is that the student is responsible for keeping up with their work without me looking over their shoulder.... no hidden cameras, so to speak.....

My friend Matthew his having his last, prayerfully, chemo therapy treatment this week. My friend Dennis is having his last radiation treatments this week.... Thank you all for all the prayers you have offered for these two wonderful people. May God shine his light upon them and their caregivers...

Well, that's about it for today... no snappy pictures today, just words....

Please, take good care of yourself so you can take good care of someone else. God bless you, john

Ok - here goes.... Give me an H - give me an A - give me a PP - y...... what do you have.... HAPPY.... give me a BIRTH.... give me a DAY..... what do you have.... HAPPY BIRTHDAY.....

Tomorrow is RUTH's birthday

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

RUTH

ain't is great, Ruth is __ __!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ps: she is still younger then I am..