YAYAYAYAY!
Wait. Does this mean we don't get a live blog?
To quote the late John Gregory Dunne on such occasions: Dominus vobiscum.
Nuptials, hooray! Have as much fun as possible!
Woooooo marriage! Woooooooo stand mixers!
Take every opportunity to ask people to do stuff for you. People love doing stuff for brides and grooms. The world is your lady-in-waiting. Yay!
Yay! Consider tin cans tied to the back of your old jalopy, and old shoes flung.
My dad's best man smeared limburger cheese on my dad's engine block. I'm not suggesting anything, I'm just saying. M/lls.
See you all Monday!
Consider 'Show your work! In pencil!' written on the front windshield of the getaway vehicle.
max
['Cue the organ dude playing 'Charge!'']
Will no one think of Emerson? (Happy nuptials anyway.)
And then you move to Farmington, New Mexico. Right?
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Actually, first I need help writing a civil e-mail, because I am completely irate.
I submitted a paper in 2004. The referee always takes 6-15 mo. to return it, and I generally re-submit it in 6-12 mo. In the spring of 2008, I got it back with comments: "This needs a complete overhaul." I re-wrote it from scratch and resubmitted it in January '09. It was massively improved - the '04 version was the first paper I'd ever written, and it was pretty bad. (You guys helped me with an e-mail back and forth to the editor, back then.)
I got it back in August, with a note from the editor: "The review is attached and I ask you to prepare another revision asap. I very much hope tat this revision will take you considerably less time than the last."
I said "Will do."
The thing is, nobody that I know of at a teaching institution with 4-4 course load ever does research during the semester. We just don't have time. It's conventional wisdom that at teaching colleges, you do reseach during the summer and winter break. So my intention is that "considerably less time" mean "return it at the end of this Christmas break" instead of taking a full year again.
I just got an e-mail from him. A one-word e-mail, no heading or sign off. Just "When?"
I want to scream at him about the swine flu and baby and wedding and family illness. But it hasn't even been any sort of window that I would have returned it, in the most tranquil of times.
I'm sure I'm taking anger out on him because I hate this paper. Nevertheless, can you guys help me compose a cordial reply?
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"January" (if that's your target).
And then you move to Farmington, New Mexico. Right?
Jammies grew up there. So... no.
"January. I've had a baby, the swine flu, and a serious illness in the family. My wedding is this weekend. I teach a 4-4 load which makes it impossible for me to do research during the term.
Best,
Heebie"
(Also, speaking for myself, congratulations.)
Oy.
"I hope to have a revision to you by the end of Winter break. As I am in the midst of preparing for my wedding, am taking care of my newborn daughter, and amteaching a heavy course load, however, I cannot promise to have anything further for you before Spring Break." Probably still too terse, but I'm kind of pissed on your behalf.
On a separate note, I received a bottle of Texas vodka today as a gift. I can only assume this is because the fates would have me raise a glass in your honor! Happy wedding!
Go for steely politeness. If the reviewer's comments are in fact substantial: "The reviewer makes a number of excellent suggestions; I will be able to give these points the consideration they deserve when my teaching duties are lightened for winter break. I anticipate sending you a revised manuscript in January."
Optional postscript: "Have a nice day, jackass."
Two questions: does this guy know what your teaching situation is, and does he have any social skills whatsoever? If the answers to those two questions are "yes," he knows perfectly well he's being dickish, and if that's the case you don't owe him anything more than a terse response.
does this guy know what your teaching situation is
I've certainly mentioned it several times, but I assume he has many submissions and he might have forgotten.
Contra beamish and Di, I would steer clear of mentioning personal obligations. A 4+4 load is plenty of justification all by itself, and in any case I don't think handing over information about your personal life would work; judging solely by the emails you quote, I would guess the editor would take mention of HP et al. to be the dreaded request for special treatment.
a bottle of Texas vodka
Is it Tito's?
How badly would a simple response of "Up yours" damage your career? Cuz seriously, that's some serious jackassery.
Irritating and rude, yes, but if it makes you feel any less irritated, he may really mostly just want to know when -- like, which issue might I imagine this going in?
"Up yours" doesn't strike me as a intelligible response to the question "When?"
The suggested reply in 21 sounds about right.
Happy day, Heebie and Jammies! Do let everyone else do as many things for you as possible! You've got a virtual hug from the unfoggedtariat.
I agree with GB--no need to bring your personal life into it. Also, whenever I get a question that is 99% asshole but has a 1% chance of being sincere, I try to respond to the tiny possibility that the asker is actually wondering. If he's going to be an asshole, make him repeat it, in a completely up-front way. No need to engage with the other stuff.
And hooray wedding!
"Up yours" doesn't strike me as a intelligible response to the question "When?"
"January. Fuck You Clown."
(17 or 21 seem like better options)
"Fuck you" is the appropriate response.
(To the editor, that is. "Congratulations! Have fun!" is the appropriate response to the OP, I think.)
I sort of agree with GB disagreeing with me in 25. But I go back and forth on this. On the one hand, yeah, there's the risk that people will turn up their noses and harumph about how this woman wants special treatment because she had a baby and wedding and family illness. But on the other hand people damn well should be permitted to have fucking lives outside of their careers and maybe, just maybe, boldly asserting that you do not for a moment intend to sacrifice the things that matter on the altar of career advancement strikes a blow for work life balance?
I like GB's draft best so far, though. Or maybe Chopper's.
the dreaded request for special treatment.
I agree that a 4-4 load is a sufficient excuse, and if there's a drawback to mentioning the personal stuff, then don't. But none of it counts as a pernicious request for special treatment and the editor would have to be obtuse to the point of stupidity to not back off apologetically at that point.
Alternatively, what di said.
"I promise that this revision will take less time than it took for me to hear that it was needed."
Congratulations on the wedding, HBGB! Unfortunately, I know very little about academia, so all I can say is good luck. I like the look of 19 better than 21 - it has more politeness as social lubricant, while at the same time being more up-front about how unreasonable any short time frame would be - but then, others are right, personal is personal.
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On the shuttle bus from the office to the metro station after work today, a truck or something festooned with wingnut talking points passed by while we were stopped at an intersection. "Nobama health care will lead to homo sex" framing a picture of two men kissing - and while that's technically not a direct quote, all the parts were there. My first inclination was to laugh derisively, until I noticed that sentiment among other people on the bus was mixed or even supportive overall of the message. This was an unpleasant reminder of three things that are normally very easy for me to forget. (1) Right-wing nuts exist in real life in substantial numbers, in addition to the ones I encounter online; (2) I do work for the MIC, however indirectly, and that's not likely to change any time soon; and (3) arguing with strangers IRL is harder than online. I did speak up a bit, but still, noticeable heart rate increase.
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21 is good. And perhaps academics should have to meet some sort of continuing ed requirement in basic civility before they can renew their professing licenses.
36, 37: It drives me up the wall that one can't write this sort of email without Taking A Position On Work-Life Balance. I care about the issue, a lot, and I do see the appeal of naming the reasons for the delay, but sometimes all you need to do is tell an editor when he (yes?) can expect a draft.
To me it feels too much like asking permission for your chosen work-life balance to say "January, because I have a child and a wedding and sickness in the family and all in all I'm taking care of a lot of people right now; please understand that this is horribly stressful". In this position, I'd prefer the subtext to be, "I am a busy person; having evaluated my schedule, I conclude that you will not be first in line for my time until January." The latter makes me feel more in control (whatever the reasons for my being busy), and people respond to that with respect. You want to position yourself as a peer and colleague, not a petitioner. Once you've got the power relation clear in the jackass editor's mind, by all means do the big reveal. But I don't think I'd do it before.
Congratulations. No revising papers on your wedding weekend.
Ooh, I like 41.
I did know one professor in grad school who was forced to take a management training class after droves of students left her lab. It helped.
42 gets it exactly right. Except maybe for the respect part--approximately 50% of the population just sucks--but even the sucky ones will suck worse if you let them personalize it.
On rereading 19, it has less "politeness as social lubricant". I still like its tone more than 21, what with the prefunctory "best", but obviously I phrased it wrongly earlier.
To me it feels too much like asking permission for your chosen work-life balance.
Maybe. But if you feel like a colleague and a peer, you can talk about what's going on in your life.
44: that would be nice. My thesis director lost three of his first seven and four of his first ten. Almost entirely for being a douche.
Part of work-life balance ought to be that your life doesn't have to get permission from your work, which seems like a reason not to mention it on top of the 4-4 load. It's not like you *used* to return papers while teaching; there's nothing extra to be explained.
Also, congratulations!
47: But the initial email to which Heebie is responding doesn't treat her as a colleague and a peer, so the response needs to assert that status rather than letting the reviewer to treat her as a supplicant.
GB is wise.
Yeah, as everyone is saying, whatever specific details you do or don't offer, starting from the presumption that you are setting the timeframe makes a big difference.
42 In this position, I'd prefer the subtext to be, "I am a busy person; having evaluated my schedule, I conclude that you will not be first in line for my time until January." The latter makes me feel more in control (whatever the reasons for my being busy), and people respond to that with respect.
Ooh, this is a good point. My real response would probably be to ignore the email completely, or to do a half-assed job immediately, neither of which are great ideas. I generally feel like I'm not in control of my time, and constantly running around doing things other people expect me to do rather than managing my time in a sensible way to do the things I think are important. Maybe I should start telling people projected dates when I'll get around to things.
"As soon as possible. I expect that will be January."
But if you feel like a colleague and a peer, you can talk about what's going on in your life.
Yes, sure, if you choose to. All I'm saying is that you often have to do the dominance display first, to remind your interlocutor of your standing. Say Heebie gives a blunt response of January now and successfully conveys that she's not to be trifled with. Then, in January, she sends in her revisions on schedule and comments, "Gosh, what a busy time this has been, what with the baby and the wedding and the serious illness! I hope you agree that this round of revisions has brought the MS to publication quality." Subtext: I have a lot going on, yet I am on top of my shit, as demonstrated by my delivering rigorous work exactly when I said I would. My family obligations are not a liability; they are further proof of my awesomeness.
I don't think I would actually do this---I'm generally private about my life when talking with my colleagues---but I don't think I would argue against the wisdom of someone else's doing this.
52: My time management skills are rotten; this is an idea I've picked up from watching savvier friends, and I'm trying to remember to abide by it. One nice thing is that it makes me remember that my time is a valuable commodity, and consequently that I should treat it as such myself---procrastinate less, etc.
Ignore the part where I'm commenting from work right now.
If you're good at what you do and not terribly ambitious, there's something to be said for just not worrying too much about it.
All I'm saying is that you often have to do the dominance display first, to remind your interlocutor of your standing
This is the kind of bullshit I hate. I mean, not arguing that you're wrong, GB. Not suggesting we could realistically avoid it. But I have no stomach for the games, the need to angle for position, puff out your chest, etc. I hate it. I don't know how to play those games, and to the extent I do know how,I'd really rather not.
60: We know. That's why we're here, too.
Congratulations, Heebie! Have a great weekend.
Di, I understand. I think what works best for me is not angling for position---with all the maneuvering and scheming that conveys---but simply staking a claim to it. Does that distinction make sense? I'm just talking about asserting your own worth, quietly but persistently. I'm not interested in stomping on people who are below me in the ladder; I am scrupulously on time to meetings with undergrads, do scut-work in the lab alongside them, etc. But I'm also not interested in getting stomped on, and if someone is clearly poised to stomp, I don't see that it's wrong or ugly or too much game-playing for me to point out, politely, that it's not actually appropriate for them to do so.
In other words, "display of dominance" was infelicitous.
I think you'll find more support for 65 if you wedge your face into my crotch.
Off-topic: anyone using Google Wave yet?
49: Part of work-life balance ought to be that your life doesn't have to get permission from your work
I really this like formulation. I've been having a problem in that area lately.
69: Okay, I'm glad that makes sense outside my head. I would really like for academia not to turn me into a complete jerk.
70: I know people who had fool-proof protection against being turned into a jerk by academia.
Congratulations! Have a wonderful, delightful, and memorable weekend.
71: What, being a jerk to start with? I really especially hope I don't have that kind of protection, but I feel like I come off as impatient enough often enough here that now I'm all self-conscious. Can we go back to talking about Heebie's wedding? Yay wedding! Woo!
73: I addressed 71 to your comment, not your person.
70: oh, and it's not just academia. For crying out loud, it's not even just a career thing. All that posturing and the power struggles, it infects everything down to park district soccer and the PTA. It really is hard to keep your head when everyone around you is playing that game.
Happy Wedding Day to Heebie, Pajamas, and Hawaiian Punch.
Ugh, what a cliched grouping of words.
76: I've come to belive that the politics are very often WORSE in environments that are less dominated by highly capable people. That was a sobering realization for someone who's dreamed now and then about an easier job and a simpler life.
Off-topic: anyone using Google Wave yet?
No, but man, have I been hearing bad things about it. Mostly that it's designed for working in a way that no one actually does. But I work solo, so what do I know?
78: Huh. I'd never really thought about it that way. Wow, I think you are right. It explains perfectly why my first job was so fabulous -- small shop, incredibly competent crew. But in work and life, the insecure are the ones you should fear most.
78. Huh. I know what you likely mean, but sorting through my various experiences in differing environments, I can't really generalize in that way. I've seen things sort out in every way: highly capable person(s) meet, er, medium talents; highly capable persons go head to head; a bunch of, er, medium talents go head to head. It doesn't really sort to any pattern.
54 and 64 are both great. Woo GB!
And bigger woo, Heebie and Jammies and HP! The awesomest weddings are the ones where the kids get to be there, even if she is too young to truly remember it.
But the initial email to which Heebie is responding doesn't treat her as a colleague and a peer, so the response needs to assert that status rather than letting the reviewer to treat her as a supplicant.
I know, and I don't think that Heebie should apologize or negotiate. I'm not arguing against a "blunt reply" of January. The email was rude and inappropriate, no matter what Heebie had going on. But the editor won't feel bad about it, unless Heebie lets him know. Saying that you're getting married, or have a sick parent, or that you've had a baby isn't an expression of submission.
Everyone seems to think that GB's answers are right, so they probably are. This is just what I'm thinking.
Also, if the editor's e-mail was just "When?", you can e-mail back, "Laterz, edz." It's totes in all the stylez manualz.
Happy nuptials! May you always be right!
Have a great weekend, HB and Jammies.
I thought it was very touching when he said, "I want my kids to have HB's genes!"
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This weekend may be Heebie and Jammie's but "Tonight... We Are All Rush Limbaugh" (well, last night actually).
Earlier this evening, as most of you now know, one of our own, Rush Hudson Limbaugh, while taking withering fire, crashed and burned.
Tonight, Rush is no longer 'just' a radio personality.
Tonight, Rush is no longer 'just' a NFL owner denied
Tonight, Rush is us. And we are him.
Tonight Rush became the metaphor for all of us... every man woman and child in this great nation of ours.
And yes, it later gets around to the "first they came for the ..." poem. Wolverines!
(from Red State via TBogg).
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Those underage sex slaves in the DR must've been swamped.
|| You know what the stupidest Hallmark holiday ever is? Boss' Day. Really, a day to celebrate bosses? Bosses are catered to every fucking day. Because they are bosses. They do not need an extra day!!
(Brought to my attention by my secretary,who wants to take me to lunch for Bosses' Day. We will go to lunch because I've been meaning to go to lunch with her forever, and she's really a great person, but please not for Bosses' Day.)
91: I totally agree. I was at a job interview for a job I don't want, and the higher up person said that they'd be back in touch with me after national bosses' day. I said that I didn't know that there was such a thing. Wasn't every day bosses' day?
I can't take the job even if they offered it to me, because the travel they want the person to do isn't feasible without a car (and it wouldn't pay enough to own a car). I did send a proper thank you note though.
I went with GB's steely politeness in 21. Thank you all so much for discussing and hashing this out - I was so livid.
94: What I like imagining in these ghostwriting situations is "What if the recipient turns out to be a lurker?"
The lurkers abuse heebie in e-mail.
96: which, I should add, would be awesome here because HG still has all the dignity of having handled herself professionally yet all the satisfaction of knowing everyone has denounced lurking editor guy for being a jerk.
Congrats, Heebie. I hope everything goes smoothly. Or at least that those parts that inevitably don't go smoothly will yield good stories.
91: We will go to lunch because I've been meaning to go to lunch with her forever, and she's really a great person, but please not for Bosses' Day.)
Pick up the tab. This is a winning move.
I am also glad HG took GB's advice.
max
['That sounded v. brit diary.']
Kobe supes totes nups FTW times eleventy woo hook 'em Geebers!
Me: ['Cue the organ dude playing 'Charge!'']
BTW, a video thingy safe for work involving a rabbit and TR and charge music.
max
['There's another one, but I couldn't find it. Still right mood for CHEERY HAPPY WEDDING w/ HG's mom.']
if the editor's e-mail was just "When?"
I'd be awfully tempted to reply "When what?" But if I managed to check my first impulse to be a dick, then I'd probably go with steely politeness.
Mazel tov!
Pick up the tab. This is a winning move.
Actually, I considered this. But my boss used to insist on picking up the tab when we'd go to lunch because "I make a lot more money than you." (Yes, occasionally out loud, not just implicit.) This always came off to me as a very squicky dominance move, so I prefer to go with the nice, egalitarian, split the tab. Of course, I have vast, possibly irrational neuroses surrounding who pays the tab.
I saw that I got a reply already, and my heartrate went up, anticipating some adversarial remark that would allow me to go all Don't-Patriarch-me-asshole on him.
But all he said was "Good! I look forward to receiving your revision in Jan., 2010."
So maybe he is more socially inept than jackass.
"Did I say anything about 2010, jackass?!"
I'm telling you, he's a lurker. This thread opened his eyes and revealed to him the error of his ways! Good on you, lurking editor, for being willing to learn!
Truthfully, I get into these discussions with my boss about terse emails like that which set off my "quit being a jackass" alarms. And periodically I get really frustrated and blurt out something about how the tone of his emails is really rude and imperious and then he gets all stricken and tells me he didn't *mean* to be rude and imperious and then I partly feel bad for getting mad and partly feel annoyed because, come on, we've had this conversation before and can you not learn to just take an extra 30 seconds and make sure that hasty email you dash off contains a please or a thanks or a when-you-get-a-chance-and-have-a-nice-weekend?
I have to say that I get E-mails like this and send them all the time at work so this is pretty much how I expect work related E-mails to look. Usually it would at least be a sentence fragment since just "When" wouldn't be specific enough in most circumstances.
108, 109.1: Not a lurker, but there's a blog discussion somewhere that has someone advising him, "Politely thank her but add the year to get in a dig that you feel it necessary to specify the year."
And periodically I get really frustrated and blurt out something about how the tone of his emails is really rude and imperious and then he gets all stricken
If only this worked on my collaborator with a penchant for saying things like "well, I disagree, and I'm the one doing all the work" or "please take a look at my revisions and see if you can add something useful for once". I don't think "stricken" is in his repertoire.
(Yesterday's fun conversation involved me asking "why did you go through the draft and systematically delete everything I've written about Case A?" "Oh, I redefined Case A to mean the limit of parameter space where such-and-such a parameter is infinite, and in that particular limit all the work you did doesn't apply." "Um, don't you think we should avoid taking that limit then, since the work does apply to most of the parameter space?" "Well, that's not how I choose to define it. Your work isn't relevant for the definitions that I spent a whole day thinking up.")
Sorry, enough venting. I should get back to the editing wars.
If only this worked
If you want to define a momentary stricken look as "working." Current exchange: Someone in office emails question; boss manages to find relevant section in recent brief I wrote faster than I can, boss cuts and pastes said relevant section into email to group in response to question. I email boss "Way to plagiarize me and not give me any credit!" Boss responds with a winky emoticon.
Huh. Although a word of credit would have been nice, in a law firm context, I'd not have understood bosses behavior in 115 to be inappropriate. (The winky emoticon is prima facia inapprorpriate, of course, but not the first email.) Now I'm concerned that I, too, am a jackass.
I hate the "He used the word 'I' this many times, thus he is a narcissist" school of political commentary, but in science it works. Since each "scientist" (faculty member) is the leader of a team, you can tell what kind of leader he is by whether, during a talk, he habitually says "I did this" or "We did this". The former is uncommon.
re: 115
I agree with 116. Maybe I, too, am a jackass. ;-)
116, 119: Really? I mean, it's not ridiculously out of bounds, but you don't think it's even a little obnoxious?
I suppose there is one other possibility: is there someone putting pressure on Reviewer? Most of the really assholish emails I send are at my boss's direction.
And to Di's question, yes, a bit obnoxious, but well within normal bounds IME. My boss, whom I like on a personal level but whose methods sometimes frustrate, seldom credits others' work. I think it's largely on the theory that by enhancing her own power she enhances her ability to protect her team, or something like that.
Hmm, I too agree w/116, but this may be a sign of bad socialization
122: Fair enough. I probably wouldn't have said anything to any other partner who did that, but this guy has a very bad habit of letting me do the work and forgetting about my contribution when he takes the victory lap. But he did wind up feeling guilty enough to send out a follow up -- "By the way, Di wrote that." So all's well that ends well.