Starting over (again)
Happy Halloween, everyone!
There aren't any parties for me to go to this year, so my "celebration" is going to be pretty passive, although this is one of my favorite holidays. Putting together a costume I wouldn't mind wearing takes more planning, money, and effort than I have to give if I have nowhere to wear it, so I just let myself eat a little more candy than usual.
I also let myself get eight hours of sleep last night and dropped my French class. I desperately need to learn French, but that course was a huge time-sink. In fact, I've been pleased today by how much I've been able to get done simply because I didn't have French class to go to or hours' worth of homework to do. I felt a bit guilty at the beginning of the day, but I think I've gotten over it. Morgan and I are planning to take a more stripped-down, less time-consuming French course together next quarter, anyway.
I have been dealing with several issues which are pretty much unbloggable during the past couple of weeks and which have been making me a bit of a head-case: hence the sparsity of posts. It's been a bumpy ride, and I think one of the best reasons for opting out of the class was simply to give myself a more time and less stress to contend with, as well as allowing me to take care of old business and start hacking my way into this dissertation thing I have to write.
Since the class began early in the morning, this gives me a chance to try the principle of allotting time right at the beginning of the day to my most important project. My new plan is to keep getting up at about the same time, taking about 20 minutes to do a little yoga before leaving the house and then starting right in on something dissertation-related for at least 30 minutes as soon as I get to campus. On Friday mornings, I'll read at home before beginning work at the dojang, and on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and weekends, I'll be able to give longer stretches of time to working on administrative tasks, fellowship applications, article submissions, and the dissertation. So maybe that will help.
One of my plans for tomorrow is to draw up a new weekly schedule that accounts for my time in blocks: I have to figure out a way to make this all happen. This is, after all, the only year when I know I'll have a fellowship to work on this stuff. And this is the stuff that will get me a degree and a job.
Today, I've actually managed to finish some niggly little administrative tasks that were left over from old teaching assignments, clean some stuff off one of my desks, get rid of several dozen irrelevant emails, and begin doing a little research for the dissertation. I still do not feel as though I've accomplished enough, but it's more than I was getting done before, and I think I may be able to sleep reasonably well tonight.
There aren't any parties for me to go to this year, so my "celebration" is going to be pretty passive, although this is one of my favorite holidays. Putting together a costume I wouldn't mind wearing takes more planning, money, and effort than I have to give if I have nowhere to wear it, so I just let myself eat a little more candy than usual.
I also let myself get eight hours of sleep last night and dropped my French class. I desperately need to learn French, but that course was a huge time-sink. In fact, I've been pleased today by how much I've been able to get done simply because I didn't have French class to go to or hours' worth of homework to do. I felt a bit guilty at the beginning of the day, but I think I've gotten over it. Morgan and I are planning to take a more stripped-down, less time-consuming French course together next quarter, anyway.
I have been dealing with several issues which are pretty much unbloggable during the past couple of weeks and which have been making me a bit of a head-case: hence the sparsity of posts. It's been a bumpy ride, and I think one of the best reasons for opting out of the class was simply to give myself a more time and less stress to contend with, as well as allowing me to take care of old business and start hacking my way into this dissertation thing I have to write.
Since the class began early in the morning, this gives me a chance to try the principle of allotting time right at the beginning of the day to my most important project. My new plan is to keep getting up at about the same time, taking about 20 minutes to do a little yoga before leaving the house and then starting right in on something dissertation-related for at least 30 minutes as soon as I get to campus. On Friday mornings, I'll read at home before beginning work at the dojang, and on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and weekends, I'll be able to give longer stretches of time to working on administrative tasks, fellowship applications, article submissions, and the dissertation. So maybe that will help.
One of my plans for tomorrow is to draw up a new weekly schedule that accounts for my time in blocks: I have to figure out a way to make this all happen. This is, after all, the only year when I know I'll have a fellowship to work on this stuff. And this is the stuff that will get me a degree and a job.
Today, I've actually managed to finish some niggly little administrative tasks that were left over from old teaching assignments, clean some stuff off one of my desks, get rid of several dozen irrelevant emails, and begin doing a little research for the dissertation. I still do not feel as though I've accomplished enough, but it's more than I was getting done before, and I think I may be able to sleep reasonably well tonight.
posted by Ancrene Wiseass | 5:10 PM
<< Home