Rock n' roll marking

What a strange week! The first two days were spent marking first year essays. The marking load was pretty heavy this term but it's now all done. Cue sigh of relief! While I love seeing and experiencing student work, marking is not my favourite part of the job. Giving a set mark to judge a student's performance is, for me, not a perfect way of doing things...even if it is the way education has worked forever. If I had my own slightly hippy way, I would try and do courses without assessment, set up simply for the joy and excitement of learning about cool stuff. Ahem, sorry I will put my anarchist strain back in the box. Anyhow, all the marking went well and I've completed all the admin. Some good work this term. Very much looking forward to this next term - we're on to Modern European Drama again. It is my absolute favourite course. Every class is super fun.

But coupled with this was a very bizarre day. A few months ago on this blog I mentioned a potential exciting project and then left it. Since then this project has taken many twists and turns until Wednesday when something amazing happened. On Wednesday I travelled down to Leighton Buzzard with three Lincoln media grads and filmed part of the EPK for one of my favourite progressive rock bands Asia with the legend that is Carl Palmer (as in Emerson, Lake and...). We had a pretty wonderful day filming. Carl was as kind, generous and passionate as I had hoped and expected. Halfway through the interview (I asked the questions!) it suddenly occured to me that I was interviewing Carl Palmer! Had you told me this last year then I would have dismissed you as a lunatic. We'll see what comes of this over the next year.

I briefly mentioned new year resolutions in my last post (as I recall). Well, my central resolution is just to say yes to stuff. I want to accept every opportunity that comes my way, however odd it might be. Coupled with this, I'm determined not to get anxious about stuff and just to embrace it all. So far this has led to a day with Carl Palmer so it's going pretty well! I have a ton of plans and objectives for 2014 and am genuinely excited about this year.

Hope all's well with you wherever you are. Particularly hello to Uncle Charlie :-)
CSW