The wife had been walking around with wet feet, and I was struck by this perfect footprint of water.

Given the atrocious lighting and my iPhone camera, you cannot see each toe print perfectly, but the arch is appropriately cut away, and I thought it was a nice image.

She has cute feet and footprints!

So I stared at the ceiling all day.

Lovely.

I feel, quite literally, as if I were hit by the proverbial truck. It generally happens to me this time of year, although this time I swore I wouldn’t let it happen again.

Too many projects. Good projects every one, but an overwhelming number nonetheless. When this happens, everything seems to begin to slip away. There’s no time for working out, I fall even farther behind on grading, and life seems like a high-speed blur.

The funny thing is that I swore it wouldn’t happen this year. It was a promise that I made to myself. And then I broke the promise. And March pulled away like a Kentucky Derby horse running away from an old mule.

That makes me the mule, I suppose. An apt analogy for right now.

I got to spend Spring Break in Dallas with my family, and I even got to see a former student. It was a great getaway with the family.

The projects were great. One of the highlights of 2009 already has been my work with TTU doctoral student Bob Schaller on a book project. Unfortunately, we’ll lose Mr. Schaller soon to an assistant professor position at Stephen F. Austin State University, but I was lucky enough to learn from him along the way. If all went well, he learned a thing or two from me along the way, too. That’s when graduate education works best: when’s it a two-way street.

I also finished up — not counting the few edits I have this weekend — a research methods textbook with my former boss, Don Jugenheimer. I got to catch up with Don in March at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Advertising in Cincinnati.

Due in part to my hatred of flying, I drove 2,515 miles to Cincinnati and back. I was accompanied by TTU master’s student Brandon Nutting, who took an undergraduate course from me at Ohio State in 2006 before coming to Tech. It was a long but excellent journey. We stopped by Bloomington, Indiana, on the way home to say “hello” to old friends. We also got the good news that Brandon will be a Ph.D. student with us in the fall. 

Finally, we are in the process os submitting a major health communication grant with the United States Department of Agriculture. My part is 90% done, and I am hopeful that the project will be funded, as I genuinely believe we can help people lead healthier lives.

The lab could not be going better. We have a truly amazing group of graduate students. I just found out that lab manager and soon-to-be Xavier University assistant professor Wendy Maxian has won an outstanding graduate student award at Tech. Given that she truly is outstanding, this is well deserved.

One of my favorite colleagues and favorite people, Johnny Sparks, is joining our faculty in the fall. He’ll be here house hunting next week.

So, that’s it. Sounds like a great year. But in truth, it was a great year packed into a little more than a month.

Luckily today we’re headed to New Mexico to rest a bit with my parents and celebrate Easter and a few family birthdays.

Sorry for the Christmas-letter like blog post. Schaller sent me the link to this great post, which convinced me that an occasional existential blog post was all right.

We popped a top too early.

Come on, posting of final grades.