Back to Work

Today was my first day back at UCLA after having been away for a month.  No interesting snail mail arrived.  I had hoped that somebody would send me a free book (maybe I'm not a prominent blogger?) to read but that didn't happen.

As I walked the campus, I realized that I was actually happy to be here.  This is the start of my 6th year at UCLA.  I have never spent 5 years in a row at any University (whether as a student or a faculty member).   I can now claim that I'm a real Bruin.

At the faculty club today at UCLA, I didn't have to give the cashier my faculty identification number to pay for my lunch.  While the faculty club has over 500 members, she knew who I was and knew my ID number (I must eat a lot). I liked that!  I walk the campus and I recognize dozens of colleagues from various departments. I give directions to people who are lost on campus and I speak to parents who are touring the campus.  I want to be part of the solution.  I want my UCLA to be great and I'm going to step up my game.  What about you?

In the middle of summer, I had been a burned out 45 year old professor.  Six weeks later, I now have the eye of the tiger .  I'm quite excited about my China projects right now.  I can sense that this work will be influential and bloggers will have something new to blog about!  Zheng and Kahn (2013) will interest you!