I've said it before and I'll say it again: I have no idea how full-time teachers are able to keep exuding such focus and energy every day of the week. Two days of it completely exhausts me . . . though in a very good way. The participants were marvelous, the quality of the drafts was stunning . . . really, the weekend couldn't have gone better, and I'm thrilled. But I am tired.

I tried to take last Friday off, but ended up having to edit and clean house and otherwise not rest from any labors at all. So today I'm going to try again; and though I'll still have to grocery-shop and wash clothes and such, maybe I can cobble together a partial rest day before returning to my desk tomorrow.

With the Homer class under my belt, I have to turn my teaching attention to another 3-session chapbook seminar, which is starting in the first weekend of December. And now I've got a stack of first drafts to deal with too--what I wrote during the Homer class, plus what I wrote during the Thursday salon. Maybe today I can start sorting through some of that.

And the yard is full of leaves . . . I can see already that this is not going to be a day off.