This really was a great submission. I also am an adjunct instructor (albeit at a 4-year university), and I can attest to this guy's experiences. The line that

This really was a great submission. I also am an adjunct instructor (albeit at a 4-year university), and I can attest to this guy's experiences. The line that really lit me up was this: Our dialogue had turned oblique, as though we now inhabited a Pinter play. This is golden. If anyone here has ever seen a Pinter play acted out, you know exactly what this means, and it is totally spot on. It's when you totally have begun to talk beyond each other, each sentence containing only enough of the subject continuum to keep you in the conversation, but apart enough to make it clear that nothing is being exchanged at all.