i simply cannot believe how sad i am about the following thing. i mean really. it's no big thing and is even slightly unethical. but i am sad. that i cannot match the handwriting on my class's (from last summer! yes, i only got the teaching evaluations just now! the bureaucracy is shockingly slow! indeed!) evaluations to the handwriting on their final exams (which only one of them ever picked up, and he did so today). i want to know who wrote what! and not even for any real reason. i mean, i don't really care, when you get right down to it, who thinks i'm the most brilliant woman and who thinks i'm a sucky lecturer.

one interesting link: i'm not one for loads of links in my diary, but here's one i really liked. this is linguistics, baby (though, to be honest, it's not at all rigorous linguistics).

so i'm getting trained for bar and grill on monday night at the restaurant. and yesterday i spoke with mark, the server liason, about it being unfair to hire new people directly to dinners while there are existing waiters who are still on lunches. he gave me only a semi-good answer, which was that a bunch of dinner servers quit at once, they had holes in the schedule, they promoted those they thought were ready, and filled the rest with new servers who had lots of experience and who came in, unpaid, for an evening to follow an existing server around and show off their mad waiter skillz. however. when they were doing this hiring, i had been working there for 5-6 weeks. and regardless of how much waiter experience these new people had, they didn't have *white dog* experience. which i did, even if only 5-6 weeks. there's nothing to do about it now, of course. it's not like they're going to fire the new people. but i expect to be given the first dinner shift that opens up, gosh durn it. alright. enough work ranting.

tonight karl and i are going to dinner with laura and david at vientianne, a vietnamese/cambodian/laotian restaurant that has just opened a block from my house. it used to be the "shanty tent" restaurant at 45th and sansom. the family had put up a blue tarp over the empty lot next to their house and started serving food. it was always packed, always crawling with cats, and always delish. there were no menus--you just asked for something and they'd make it, or they'd surprise you. dinner, including drinks and dessert, ran about $4. anyhow, they got shut down by the health board (one day, it was just closed, with a violations notice posted (you know the kind, the health board violation ones, with all the violations listed, with little check boxes next to them? the inspector is supposed to check the reason(s) why the place was closed) with ALL the boxes checked. no license this, no license that, no fire this, no cleanliness that, animals this, no walls that... it went on and on. anyhow, this new place is that family's new restaurant, and i haven't been there yet even though it's a block, maybe a half block, from me. mostly, i haven't been there because i don't think karl is particularly fond of vietnamese food. but goddammit, we're going tonight. and following that, we're going to a going-away party for a colleague whose moving back to houston to re-become a lawyer and do social psychology research on the side until he's built up enough reputation for some university to hire him at an outrageous salary and with promises that he will never have need for grant money (and i actually think he will accomplish this feat. just you watch. his name is j a s o n.w e e d o n. anyhow, the party has a southwestern theme, and everyone's supposed to bring something southwestern themed. you know, like that dusty bottle of tequila you've got sitting around, or a batch of that fabulous guacamole you make. i'm bringing beef jerky.