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Φ Star

(Sung to "Rock Star" by Nickelback--and dedicated to my friend and cooleague

--no typo--Dean Kowalski, who in "Phi Star" fashion earned early tenure in 6/08!)

Enough applying for jobs

to schools I wouldn't attend--

it's like a doctoral exam

that I can't comprehend--

my track hasn't tenured in a

major university.

(Tell me your career goals.)

Give me an endowed chair

amanuensis for ad libs

and an office that I can hear echoes in

with a desk big enough

for my egocentricity.

(So cite me your CV)

Get a JP lead for my MA thesis

voted Delphic Genius by Phronesis

get a Carus lecture

and a Festschrift at thirty-three.

(NYU or Princeton?)

I'll have an email box just for Oxford dons

my name badly sung on “Philosophy Songs”

and slipped between Hume and

Lewis, appropriately.

(So what's the stratagem?)

I'll publish so much that they'll perish

thought I'm anything but cherished-

Cause we're all just gonna be big Φ stars

and have our views raked over on a blog like TAR's

our quips are pithy and our footnotes neat

we'll all be mentioned from a usage feat

and coo over who our mentors are

as some magnitude of a Leiter star

we'll give good wishes with reflexive stares

get tenure granted with a year to spare

hey hey I'm gonna be a Φ star

I want to be late like Ludwig sans the hassles

have lots of assistants that I call vassals

get a lot of invitations

where I live opulently

(Another margarita. . .)

I will gloss my work

with newest language

get a cross-listing with friends I reference

a codependent

referentiality

(So what's the stratagem?)

I'll publish so much that they'll perish

thought I'm anything but cherished-

Cause we're all just gonna be big Φ stars

and have our views raked over on a blog like TAR's

our quips are pithy and our footnotes neat

we'll all be mentioned from a usage feat

and coo over who our mentors are

as some magnitude of a Leiter star

we'll give good wishes with reflexive stares

get tenure granted with a year to spare

we'll cry critics as wildest fools

excluded from our pluriverse by Sider house-rules

they'll toll your corpus with a death-bed knell

but supply you a clickable URL

hey hey I'm gonna be a Φ star

I'll publish notes

that flout tradition

and teach Russell with erudition

Have eighth-year TAs edit stuff so long

they accept all the blame when I'm proven wrong!

Cause we're all just gonna be big Φ stars

and have our views raked over on a blog like TAR's

our quips are pithy and our footnotes neat

we'll all be mentioned from a usage feat

and coo over who our mentors are

as some magnitude of a Leiter star

we'll give good wishes with reflexive stares

get tenure granted with a year to spare

we'll cry critics as wildest fools

excluded from our pluriverse by Sider house-rules

they'll toll your corpus with a death-bed knell

but provide you a clickable URL

hey hey I'm gonna be a Φ star

egw eimi I'm gonna be a Φ star!