ScienceWoman is a first-year assistant professor in -ology. She blogs about the intersection of science and real life - primarily based on her first-hand experiences. Her older posts can be found 
Alice Pawley is an assistant professor of I had a meeting yesterday at 4, but was stood up (by a colleague who is now completely apologetic). I had another meeting today I thought at 1:30, but no one appeared. I went back to my office, saw I had got the time wrong and it was at 2:30. The meeting had been scheduled for 2, and I had misread the change of time email. In addition, I scheduled another meeting at 3 so I would have ended up talking to the 2:30 person for only 30 minutes. So I swapped my 3:00 meeting with the 3:00 person's 3:30 meeting, which worked out well for the 3:30 meeting person as she had the meeting on her calendar at 3:00 not 3:30 anyway.
When I went back for the meeting at 2:30, guess what? No one appeared. I'm waiting to see if the 3:30 formerly 3:00 person appears. If not, I may just go home early to make the best of it.
Is there anyone else out there who, when someone is late, first you get irritated, and then you think of all the things you could be doing instead if they fail to show up, and then you start hoping they don't show up and trying to decide how much time is decent for you to wait but still in the hopes you can just go do all those things you just thought of? I do this; I also sit there and worry that I've screwed up my calendar, gotten the time wrong, gotten the place wrong, and the person I'm to be meeting with is sitting there getting irritated.
I should just hope they're really looking forward to getting something else done instead.
Update at 4:22 pm: My 3:30 has not yet showed. Not sure what happened. *Sigh*
Update at 4:24 pm: She appeared. Yay!
Comments
I hate it when someone cancels a meeting 5 minutes before the meeting is to start. Throws off my whole 'mojo'.
Posted by: Carrie | June 11, 2008 4:34 PM
next time bring a paper to read while you wait...
Posted by: hypoglycemiagirl | June 11, 2008 4:43 PM
I like to keep a folder of work for these types of situations. Stuff I've been meaning to read, notes that need reviewing, that sort of thing. Stuff that I can get into so that I'm not watching the clock, but not so brain-intensive that I can't be interrupted.
I absolutely can't stand to be stuck with nothing to do. I remember once, when I'd volunteered to proctor an exam, was running late, and ended up without any reading. In desperation, I wrote poetry (bad poetry) for an hour just to keep my brain engaged. Never again.
Posted by: Karen | June 12, 2008 8:26 AM
I also get really irritated. And ever since my mom took me to 7th grade orientation on the wrong night (it was 8th grade that night!) I always worry I'm in the wrong place or something. :) But I carry books around so my irritation can be subsumed.
Posted by: Jenny F. Scientist | June 12, 2008 9:18 AM
I actually did bring a whole bunch of stuff to do to the first meeting. The second time I went, I didn't bring anything because I somehow figured the chance my meeting-mate would be late would be less because I had already screwed up the meeting time. The other late meeting times I was in my office, apparently occupying myself by blogging about how my timing was off. ;-)
I like the folder idea, though. And the bad poetry. ;-)
Posted by: Alice | June 13, 2008 11:57 AM