Which witch?

This past week I had my English 150 students respond to a local news report that a 20-year-old male had accused his teacher of being a witch. He threw "holy water" on her, and he had a lighter with which to "burn the witch." I asked students whether they believed in witches and/or in the supernatural. The results were pretty much as expected. No, they didn't believe in witches or the supernatural. Instead, they believed in god and angels. Gee. Maybe someone needs to define "supernatural" for them. That bothered me, but what bothered me even more were the students who stated with confidence that witches worshipped Satan. I have a lot of experience with classmates and students who are Wiccan, and I know that Wiccans do not worship Satan.

Sadly, despite my having the word "witch" correctly spelled on the writing prompt, a number of students still wrote the word as "which." I've lived and taught in Louisiana, Georgia, Missouri, and Michigan. Only Michigan students routinely confuse the words whether, weather; witch, which; were, where, and other w/wh semi-homonyms. It's the way they pronounce the words. I recall clearly when I was an elementary student, we practiced making the wh-sound in class by putting our hands in front of our mouths to feel if we expelled air when saying the sound. If no air blew out, then we weren't saying the wh-sound properly. Here, students are taught to say the sounds w and wh as if they were both "w." (That's the lovely nasality of the region.)

Obviously, I'm back from Big Rapids for the weekend. It was a good week, productive. I'm almost caught up with grading papers, just in time for a new batch on Tuesday. I'd gotten my hair trimmed last Monday, and the woman did a horrible job (it's the one my husband hated so much last time), so I'm wondering if I shouldn't find a more competent barber to even it out a little. Otherwise, I think we'll spend the weekend doing something relaxing, catching up with recorded tv shows, maybe seeing a movie.

I did have a close encounter of a smelly kind during the week. I was at Betty's, in my bedroom, and was engaged in my nightly phone chat with my husband. Suddenly I shrieked as a large bug scooted out to the middle of the room from somewhere around the chair I was in. My husband, of course, said, "Kill it," and I dutifully stepped on it. It was a stink bug. My room was nearly unbearable for a couple of hours. Such a strange odor! Nostril-piercing!

Wednesday evening I visited my colleague Bernadette's apartment to see whether it was something I might consider for myself. The apartment is large, but the outside of the huge complex was dirty and dark. Her apartment was three flights up, so we dutifully trudged up the rusted iron steps. She has no dishwasher but there's a ton of room for storage. The bathroom is big, and even the LR/DR is large enough for my needs. However, I don't really think I'd like having an apartment with so many students living there. She's much younger and single, so she probably is used to a more active social life than I'd have. I think I'd be concerned about students discovering I lived there. Yahoo, free tutoring! Groan.

My department chair and I had our post-observation chit-chat. She had nothing but good to say and assured me that she'd be signing the papers that ensured my contract for the next year. She doesn't plan to remain department chair; the dean of Arts and Sciences, knowing she doesn't want to keep the department chair position, is going to do a national search.

I have a doctor's appointment Monday morning. I hope he can do something about my painful shoulder. It's getting hard to wash my hair. Last night I nearly fainted from the pain when I had to reach out to slide my card through the slot so the arm in the parking garage would go up. Several actions that I normally do have become hard to do. Getting old is not for sissies.