Joys in da Hood

I graduated again yesterday. It was my nicest commencement since Vassar; I say this because the Loyola one was nothing short of hideous on nearly all fronts. I was unhappy with the degree, the ceremony took hours, it was impersonal, the chairs were uncomfortable and there was no chance to flee the area at any point during the process. IUPUI, on the other hand, strives for the slick efficiency of a well-oiled machine. The hooding ceremony was at 10, and every graduate candidate (a couple hundred of us I think) was hooded by 11; lunch was done by noon and it was off to the School of Liberal Arts commencement. This featured an actual commencement speaker--the mayor--whose speech topic seemed to be, "Why you shouldn't regret majoring in the Liberal Arts, although you probably will anyway." (Frances Fergusson gave a similar speech at the Vassar Alumni event back in November, and hers was a bit more inspirational and reassuing to me... but it's hard to compare with Fran, really. I don't hold that against the mayor.) The liberal arts commencement took only an hour or so, even with all the undergrads walking across the stage to get their rolled-up piece of paper that isn't a diploma but a letter congratulating you on eventually getting a diploma. The next event was the all-school commencement in the Hoosier Dome, but by this point I was done. Not even the lure of possibly seeing my own visiage on the Jumbo-tron (TM) was enough to get me to stick around longer. I was strongly tempted to keep my Masters' hood--after all, no one was checking them back in, and the rental was $34--but honesty and lack of closet space won out.

Wonder what I'll go back to school for next...?