The End of the Beginning

It is almost time to write my mid-course report to the Council for International Exchange of Scholars (C.I.E.S.), who manage the Senior Fulbright Program. And this week has been the last week of classes in my first term at Babeş-Bolyai University. Hence, I am in a reflective mood. What have I learned? What have I accomplished? What have I still to do, to ensure that my Fulbright Year is all that it might be? I'll let you know when I find words that are not soaked in sentiment or trite.

Jesse McDougall Goes for the Dunk (Winter 2008)
I have just Skyped Shirl. She reports that it is -20 Degrees F. in New Hampshire at 2:00 A.M. That is -29 Degrees Celsius. Welcome to a typical New England winter. No wonder the French pioneer Acadians re-migrated from the Maine Coast to New Orleans and became the Cajuns.

Want some proof? Plymouth State has a famous meteorology program. Here is their web report on Friday, 17 January, 2009 (http://vortex.plymouth.edu/):

Conditions at Plymouth State University

-17.2°F
Wind Chill: -17.1°F
Humidity: 71%
Dewpoint: -23.8°F
Wind: SW at 1.0 mph
Sunrise/Sunset: 7:17am/4:36pm
Current Conditions at 6:02am

Loading Weather Information...

Today I plan to learn how to use the Banca Transilvania's Internet banking system. I got the necessary PINs from the bank on Monday, but the "login" link on their website seems broken, as it doesn't take me to anyplace where I can enter those codes. And I will be chasing my January Fulbright grant payment, which has reportedly been sent to my New Hampshire bank (where the balance is fast approaching zero), but has yet to show up in my account. I am still hopeful that they got the routing and account numbers right, but am starting to get antsy about that.

The UBB tasks that remain are to write one more exam, to meet with Prof. Alexandra Mutiu and prepare a spring term syllabus for Management Accounting, to meet with the professor in charge of American Studies at the Faculty of European Studies and learn the ropes of teaching my spring course there on the American Economy, to meet with the Office of International Cooperation regarding the planning of a joint program between UBB and Plymouth State University, to deliver two exams in each of my two "fall term" courses, just completed, grade those exams, then compute the students' semester grades, and turn them in to the administration.

My PSU tasks are to prepare a budget for the ACBSP Annual Conference next summer in San Antonio, and to continue working with my department chair Trent Boggess as his liaison person on the proposed joint program with UBB.

Of course, I also have to prepare to teach in Finland, and at the end of next week go there to do so.

All of which makes me wonder what Barack Obama's "To Do List" looks like. I have it easy, I guess.