Darlene, the Engish Department secretary, is correct: I'm a "Joiner"

So, last night, as is my wont, I attended the annual CCSU Student Activities/Leadership Development (SA/LD) Awards Dinner because:

1) I like getting free dinners at the University (Once, a year or so ago, I had every meal for two straight days at CCSU! Fear not, I live close to the university, so I don't ignore my wife and daughters during the busy seasons.)

and

2) It's always fun to start a running commentary on the awards.

(For example, I ask, how can the Pep Squad win the Student Spirit Award, which is supposed to be for the student club that most exemplifies spirit -- above and beyond its mission as an organization. Isn't spirit the core mission of a Pep Squad?! I'm not saying they aren't a wonderful club and don't deserve an award, but the Spirit Award shouldn't be an option. It would be like WFCS winning an award for being the radio station.)

Last night, for some reason, I got it into my head to annoy the head of SA/LD, Scott, by asking him when I was gonna win an award.

"I can't win that award, Scott."

"I didn't win that award, Scott."

"Am I gonna win this award, Scott?"

"We're at the bottom of the first page of the program, and I still haven't won anything, Scott."

To which he replied, "Well, you may as well leave now."

(I had won Advisor of the Year back in 2000 or 2001, so I really was being quite facetious.)

Well, guess what? I went home with the Blue Devil Spirit Award, which goes to a faculty or staff member who, apart from any specific duty as an advisor, contributes in a substantial way to CCSU and its students. (Yes, in New Britain, CT, the Dukies are the other Blue Devils.)

I was surprised and quite touched. The remarks during the awarding of the plaque read, essentially, "It woudn't be CCSU without Dr. Gigliotti."

How swell is that?

That's the thing about my life here in the Blue Devil Land: I've very rarely felt unappreciated. (And what more could one ask in a job?)

Call me Philo (or Pseudolus)

On Monday, a colleague of mine mentioned to me the NY Times Book Review piece on the new translation of the often bawdy but ever-entertaining Roman epigrammatist Martial by Garry Wills, Martial's Epigrams: A Selection (Viking 2008).

It got me to perusing my own copy of Martial's poems (Loeb Classical Library, 1979)

The epigram below struck me as particularly relevant because one of my staffers brings in great food every day to share with the department and is patently unhappy if I don't eat.

"Boss, LUNCH," she cries.

I obey.

Her generosity is a wonderful perk, I cannot deny it, but it is problematic. In those rare instances when she isn't around, I'm truly at a loss for what I'm supposed to do. I've become one of the local geese who's grown so used to being fed by park-goers that, on those rare days when people actually obey the posted "No Feeding" signs, he just goes hungry.

Or, on a more literary note, I've become a Roman stereotype: the sponger!*

V.xlvii

Numquam se cenasse domi Philo iurat, et hoc est:
non cenat, quotiens nemo vocavit eum.

Philo swears he has never dined at home, and that's right!
He doesn't eat if no one invites him.


*See also the title character of Plautus' Pseudolus.