Posting for Oct. 12-14

Life has been interesting so far this week. I went to school on Monday and worked on several things--preparing for Tuesday's HR class, working on a literature search for a paper Rainer and I want to write, etc. I also finally was able to work with Professor Herzig, who teaches HR. You should have seen the 2 of us, working with a translation program, where we discovered that I don't have to teach nearly the material I thought I did. HR is apparently a 2 part class, and I'm only teaching about aspects up until a person gets hired. Safety and health, performance appraisals, pay, benefits, and all kinds of things will be in the next course. I told the students this on Tuesday and said I'm happy that we now have time to move slowly and go through things well. This class started with 9 students and now has 22.

I came home last night knowing I had a cold, but by about 8 p.m. I was absolutely freezing. I took Brandi out, put every blanket on my bed that I could, and was in bed by 9:15. I got up at 8 this morning feeling much better!

The org. behavior class today, starting at 4, then 9, is now 13. We changed the time today to take advantage of a free hour where students don't have classes and various faculty groups can meet. There were 3 students today who were brand new, and so rather than heading for a test next week, I've put it off another week. I hated having to go through things again, but these students don't have books (the library had bought 5), and without explanation of the foundation material from Chapters 1 and 2, they'd be really lost. The way classes are run here certainly causes some different outcomes.

For the first time since I've been here, there was evidently a breakdown on the u-bahn system and the u-bahn leaving the university was late. People really packed themselves into the train. I was late getting here to meet Wolfgang and Coco, who were picking up Brandi. They'll take care of her while I'm in France. I leave on a train at 6 tomorrow morning to go to Dusseldorf, then have 2 planes to Lyon, France, then a bus, and finally a train. An American, Betty Beeler, who is involved in international students stuff at one of our partner schools, St. Etienne, will meet me at the train station in St. Etienne. I'll call her with my new phone when I get on the last train!

So, it appears to me that everything is moving along fairly well. I hope I make it to France and back! Hopefully, my next posting will include some pictures of things at St. Etienne.