Of course I thank God for any day of the week, but I thought today deserves special mention. It has been a long day, beginning with the colloquium and ending with an excruciating long trek in the Macritchie Forest.
Not that I am complaining. The 8-minute speech ended months of speculation on what sort of exotic animal a colloquium is. My performance anxiety, tied with the fear of making a fool of myself in front of many discerning pairs of eyes, or rendering some other pairs of eyes shut with aimless, droning discourse, dissipated with the end of the speech.
I would not have got through it without the tender encouragement of many of my students, who believe in me when I would not. Such is the state of my own self deprecation that I should prescribe myself the same penalty which I exacted on my students.
When the jubilation ebbed away, it was time for a relaxing tree top walk with my beloved scouts. Due to my lack of insight and the popcicle charm of our bus driver, we landed at the site some 6 km away from our destination. The arduous trek in the forest thus began, with 44 less than enthusiastic teenagers in tow, all wondering why their maids are less satisfactory substitutes for their personal attendance. As the walk grew dreary, the discourse turned to the merits of turning back, and failing to convince me, I feared the prospect of being lynched by a mob of dissatisfied 14 year olds.
But the Lord delivered my from the clutches of angry scouts. The angels came in the form of taxi drivers ferrying us back to civilisation. Lest I thought my misery has ended, my celebration pizza came 2 hours late, unilaterally turning dinner into supper.
It has been a calamitous April day, and my joy is to see it over.
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