Well, I can’t actually say it’s “back to the grind,” because, just like with different coffees, each semester is unique.

I realize I haven’t posted in ages, and getting back into that habit will be particularly tough given how busy I’m going to be this semester. Not that my classload is particularly onerous: I have only one class focused on writing, and another class which will involve written homework with any regularity. The other two courses are more related to speaking and presenting and so on. This is a change of pace for me, since I prefer the content-related courses over those that are more speaking- and skills-focused, but I have a lot to do this semester and the choice of classes is meant to facilitate that.

A lot to do? Why yes, yes indeed:

• I’ve got a freelance educational writing gig I need to finish up in the next few weeks.
• I just got an editing job from the university, something to do with research support or something. Will look at it tomorrow.
• I need to draft a paper on The Singularity for the MMLA conference that will be held in St. Louis, Missouri in November. I’ve been thinking about it a lot, got some research done, but there’s a lot left to go.
• I need to continue researching my paper on the formation of an SF canon in Korean translation this semester, too. I’m at the point now where I need to start looking at lists of texts and picking out specific features that made them likelier to be translated, as well as talking to people who are working in Sf translation now (as well, if possible, as talking to people who were translating in the past) to get some idea about specific issues involved in text selection. I also need to get a little more info on textual reception, too.
• Then there are the papers off on the horizon. I’ve got another proposed paper being considered for a presentation in Seoul in 2010, on the use of creative multimedia projects in the TEFL classroom. That won’t take as much research, but I’ll need to do some. Likely I’ll be writing that over the winter holidays. And there’s another which I’m thinking of asking a Korean scholar I know who is into SF to coauthor with me, about postcoloniality in Korean SF with a focus on gender and victimized sexuality. I can suggest two texts and two films, but I think we could probably find another text or two to write about. I’d like to pitch this for the academic track at Wiscon at some point.
• I have some other research to do, mostly on Southeast Asian history and culture, focusing on Burma, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Indonesia, and the Phillipines. This is for the novel I’ll be writing over my winter holidays, which, yes, is that thing called “A Killing in Burma” that’s been turning up on my blog over the last three years. Yes, it turns out this thing wants to be a novel.
• I have a few short stories I absolutely need to get out there into the world, as they’ve sat and sat. A few of them need rewriting before they go out.
• There’s the exercise regime to reestablish. The gym I used to use has apparently been shut down, and I don’t know if the new one on campus — a giant one that’s located in the new building known only as The International Hub — is open yet. So tomorrow, it looks like a mountain hike and maybe, if I can really get up early, a trip down to the swimming pool.

One more thing I’ve vowed to do is get my grade-recording system set up electronically so that I don’t need to spend the last week of semester faffing around with scraps of paper and entering grades into this system for a week straight. It should be a big relief to have only a modicum of grade-related work left to do at the end of semester. Beyond the stress reduction, I also have another good reason I’ll need to be less-busy during the last few weeks of semester, and anyway, this is a habit I’ve been trying to acquire for a long time now. So I’m glad to have it started, finally.

Beyond that, there’s only basic stuff left to go: planning my first few lectures of the semester, getting the readings booklet set up for my multicultural lit course, and so on. That’s cool — I think I should be able to do that and tidy up my house tomorrow, and get my laundry done too, all in time for my first day of classes on Monday. (The first day of classes was last Tuesday, but I couldn’t go because of doctor’s orders, as per my last post.)

But you know what? I’ve been stuck in my house now for a week, and I was supposed to hear back today about my test results, but I’m not sick and haven’t been for several days so, tonight, I’m going out. I’m gonna eat something nice and see a movie, not necessarily in that order. And that’s that!