From June 1 until July 29 (today) I have been on my summer break.  As a professor with a (standard) nine-month contract, I have the opportunity and privilege to use my summer as I chose. In recent years, I have used my summers to work on my writing… not technical writing but fiction writing.  Summer 2010, for example, I spent a week at the writer’s conference at Santa Fe College, under the tutelage mystery writer Michael McGarrity.  I learned a lot.

    This summer I have spent revising my book manuscript which I have now titled “Briefing for Life on the Neo-Diversity Frontier.”  That book takes on in longer form some of the ideas I have been writing about on this blog.  I’ll let you know when I find a publisher.

    Otherwise this summer, I have been reading for fun.  In fact, one of the last things I did as the Spring semester was ending was make a list of books I intended to read this summer.  I don’t usually do it that systematically, but I got a request from our library to let them know what I planned to read.  Marian Fragola, the librarian making the request was doing so to put together a webpage that would highlight what selected faculty members planned to read over the summer.  Ms. Fragola did a great job with that webpage idea.  To see my reading list go to:

http://news.lib.ncsu.edu/wolfpacksummerreads/

    If you haven’t yet read them, I highly recommend the novels of Mary Doria Russell. At the beginning of the summer I read her newest, “Doc”; historical fiction about the true Doc Holliday; wow! I also read her science fiction novels “The Sparrow” and the follow-up “Children of God.” Religious science fiction of the highest caliber; not orthodox and preachy, but a good story filled with theological quandaries; also, wow!  

    I am telling you this to explain why I have been away from this blog. I needed a break to refresh myself, to give my brain a different focus.  So now I will again be posting regularly.  There’s a lot going on to comment on.  But first, my posts will be mostly about the evolution of “Wake Up! It’s Serious: A Campaign for Change.”

    My summer interlude is over.

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