My First Day

Today was my first day at the new campus and I really couldn't be happier. The driver showed up right on time this morning to pick up the Radisson Blu Five (Tony [British], Peter [British], Tanya [Serbian], Liane [New Zealand] and yours truly) right on time. The campus seemed to be around twenty minutes away. Right now it's just in the jmiddle of a big stretch of desert, but I suspect, much as with our first house in Atlanta, very quickly the city will catch up and bypass the campus. It is huge, especially considering the fact that there are less than three-thousand students. If you haven't taken the opportunity to watch the video embedded in an earlier posting be sure to do so. It's still pretty chaotic and a lot of things are being delivered on the fly, but I think it's going to be a great experience. I'll post more pictures of the building itself later. Right now I'll just post a few pictures of myself (breaking one of my cardinal rules of never posting pictures of myself, although my friends are always scolding me for not doing so) and my new office. Because, in addition to teaching a couple classes, I'm also serving as the Assistant Dean for Curriculum I received a really nice office. Zayed, and especially my friend Jyoti, have made it clear that they want me to stay and they are doing their level best to make a compelling argument. A couple of my new friends were giving me a little grief over how big my office is, and I responded with a) telling them that they'll really be impressed when I have the wall knocked out as part of my expansion plan, and b) they were still welcome to come by at any time to watch me from a distance behind the velvet rope (and anyone who has ever taught we me could see that coming). I do have to say that the adjoining office where my secretary is housed is pretty posh as well - apparently, from what I can gather, I have the Zayed equivalent of Darlene McGrath, which means I've hit the jackpot. There's also a picture of the bizarre view outside my window, which is sort of a microcosm of the generally surreal feel of this entire adventure. I'm amazed at how happy I look in that picture, although, doubtless, very soon I will cause mischief and it will be everybody else who is frowning. If history teaches us anything this wll turn out much like "Ransom of Red Chief," with Zayed paying Champlain to take me back.