This past summer was dominated by my move across campus into a new house after 27 years in the same dormitory apartment. This took place while I was teaching summer school classes (two high school courses, one middle school course, and a mini-course online for adults) as well as taking a few classes as a student. So it was a busy time, to say the least. The process of packing up and sorting through all my accumulated stuff was much more of an ordeal than I had anticipated, but even though the move itself turned out to be exhausting, now that I’m on the other side of it, I feel I accomplished a lot by purging what needed to go and re-organizing the possessions I kept. Once I got settled into the new abode, I invested in new indoor and outdoor furniture as well as rugs, bookcases, closet shelving, art for the walls, and other needs to make the place feel like home. It’s likely I still will be pulling stuff out of boxes for the rest of the fall, but I am very comfortable in the new digs at this point. And life got considerably better once the air conditioning equipment—delayed for weeks in the height of the summer due to supply chain issues—was installed at the end of August.

Some quick takes on other stuff going on of late:

• Dealing with movers and furniture deliverymen in my house regularly the last two months made me realize the extent to which I largely live a cashless existence. I had to go out of my way to the ATM a few times in order to keep some bills on hand for gratuities. I rarely use cash anymore. I’m too much of a points junkie not to whip out the plastic at every point of purchase. And even that image doesn’t capture my spending habits, as most credit cared expenditures are carried out digitally, either as online transactions ot with my smartwatch via ApplePay. When traveling abroad I change as little currency as I can, since the exchange rate is better with credit cards and I hate getting stuck with the local money when I head home. As the big deliveries are now winding down, I’ll soon be back to carrying around the same small wasd of bills that I never spend. My only cash needs will be for tipping hotel staff when I travel. And checks? Forget that. I might write a check once, or possibly twice, a year.
• I spent a lot of time watching U.S. Open tennis matches, taking advantage of the big screen and surround sound of my new living room setup. This year’s tournament was a particularly compelling one, starting with the Serena Williams farewell drama, and concluding with the star turn from Carlos Alcaraz winning his first major title (and presumably there will be plenty more). Plenty of gripping matches throughout the two weeks, too. Though I didn’t make it down to Flushing Meadows this year, I felt pretty engaged by the action in the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center throughout.
• The spiffy new home theather setup resulted in me watching a LOT of films this summer, too, as the list below indicates. Plus, I was taking two film classes online and teaching another, so that led to a cinematic immersion of sorts.
• One of the highlights of the summer was attending my high school reunion. I always head to these occasions with a bit of trepidation beforehand and end top having a blast reconnecting with folks I’ve know since boyhood. I left wishing I had more time to spend with these people beyond just a few hours some July afternoon.
• A colleague and I have liberated ourselves from the tyranny of the textbook in our government course sequence for juniors and seniors. We just got fed up dealing with the publishing companies: outrageous prices, too-frequent edition updates, and difficulties getting the books we want to use. It was a bit of work to overhaul the readings in the syllabus, but we have found we can tackle the same topics through close readings of documents like the Federalist Papers, materials from the Case Method Institute, and an assortment of contemporary articles.

What I’m Reading