In which I make a (triumphant?) return

I have to go down to campus today, for various and sundry reasons, but one is the Beginning-of-the-Year Reception. Whee. I suppose I'll make an appearance, if for no other reason than to make sure that Flaky Advisor gets the materials she needs to write me a letter for conference funding. But I'm spooked, for the first time ever, by the idea of the reception. I know fewer and fewer people every year. I have no idea who the people are who are heading the grad social-ish committee, the same committee I myself served on just a couple of years ago. I honestly thought that I'd avoid the diss-years alienation problem, but, alas. I've become that ghostly sixth-year haunting the department, quivering slightly in the light, scurrying back to the safety of the library (metaphorically, that is; I hate our awful, brutal library and avoid it as much as I can).

Let's pretend, however, that my on-campus absence is due not to hermetical ways but due to my having a life outside the academy. In fact, part of the reason I can't stay long at the reception and lead a drunken contingent of first-years to the local pub for further revelry (the highlight of previous receptions) is that a friend is coming in from out of town tonight and I have to pick him up at the airport. Yay for visits! (Never mind that I still need to plan the first two classes of my UChaos class that starts on Monday. I'm sure I'll have time... sometime? On the bus to class on Monday, maybe?)