Recommendation Letter Friday

It's another Friday when I'm meant to be working on my book, but with departmental stuff (and my recent Boston excursion), I'm behind on all sorts of things. Most notably, recommendation letters. I think I've got six to write today. It'd be alright if they were all grad programs, but a couple are for a star student we lost because they couldn't afford the tuition here. And there are a couple for internships. Internships need recommendation letters now?

Can I say, "Please, kind employer, take my hard working student and pay them nothing, work them hard, and - if you're feeling kind - work them in ways actually appropriate to the internship. I cannot recommend them enough for this system of exploitation strongly enough."? Granted, not all internships are this way, but some of them do take themselves so seriously. I'm probably a bit grumbly about this because I'm reflecting all internships in light of the opening chapters of "The Bell Jar." Also because we once had a student who got an internship at Disney where they dressed as Minnie Mouse. Valuable experience, to be sure.

Even that seems manageable, though, since there's Ray Charles on the .mp3 player. I wonder whether the neighbor with super hearing will find this distracting, and I wonder what will happen when a student walks by and catches only the phrase "bend over, let me see you shake your tail feather" come pouring out of my office.