Ponderance: The Jack Bauer Guide for Early Career Academics

The Jack Bauer Guide for Early Career Academics

Tuesday, August 30, 2005

As a comical interlude in a rather serious CSAA list discussion, Terry Flew posted the following 24-inspired guide which I found rather amusing:

THE JACK BAUER GUIDE TO SURVIVAL AS AN EARLY CAREER ACADEMIC

1. Don't sleep;

2. Don't eat. Drug use only permitted when working undercover or undertaking ethnographic fieldwork;

3. Find out what a computer does between when you press the On button and when Cntl+Alt+Del comes up. You may not prevent a nuclear meltdown (as Jack did 2 weeks ago), but you will impress your IT staff enough for them to pay some attention to your requests to get the computer fixed;

4. If you print any material, get it off the printer ASAP. Under no circumstances leave it for your Dean, Head of School or Centre Director to find;

5. If you have an ex who is an Early Career Academic, keep a close check on their movements (This is doubly important if they are a Senior Academic). If your ex commences work at your School or Centre, they will almost certainly be an agent of your enemies, so you may have to kill them.