From flat to flighty

I'm convinced that the primary purpose of the time change is to allow teachers of early-morning classes to see more of their students' eyelids. At least I know that's what I saw this morning at 9 a.m. The class was, frankly, a bit dull, despite the presence of Faulkner in our midst; the afternoon class was more alert, but by then we all had something to be alert about: high winds, the-sky-is-falling clouds, and a genuine tornado warning. "Can we cancel class since there might be a tornado?" asked one eager student. "Sure," I said, "and tomorrow we'll cancel class since there might be an invasion of Ravenous Bugblatter Beasts." We stayed put and talked about Melville.

Who is doing quite well, thank you very much. I had one of those moments of pure transcendence during the class, when I was suddenly standing to the side watching the professor lecture and it was pretty darn scintillating, and not only that, but that professor was me. I. Whatever.

Then I came home and baked a cake that did not rise correctly, or at least I'm assuming that's what happened. It is supposed to be a light, delicate white cake that I will slice into three layers into which I will spoon homemade lemon curd. The lemon curd is perfect but the cake--well, if I'm supposed to cut that puny little thing into three layers, I'll have to get a knife that cuts on the molecular level.

I blame the weather, or the time change, or the impending invasion of Ravenous Bugblatter Beasts (who like their cakes flat). Or maybe sometimes cakes just fall flat, and sometimes eyelids just don't have the energy to stay open, and sometimes a lecture just takes wing.