Success!

So I woke up way too early to be well-rested, but managed to get started working on the article for SS anyway. I wrote/revised 2,170 words. The section I was working on is something that I've written a lot about so I had lots of versions of this idea in a number of different files, so I had a lot of material to choose from, so it's not quite as amazing as it sounds. At least, the article is still a complete mess with lots of placeholders. But I've handed it off. Not much to show for working on it for two weeks, but at least there was a significant revision to a big section. OY!

Again, this morning I forgot how to get started, but I only wasted about an hour. Which is pretty good. But here's the secret: I need to write. Like in a journal. And then gets me warmed up. I can't start cold on the open document. Too scary.

Now I feel so good about having gotten up in the morning to write that I want to take the rest of the day off! At least give myself some kind of treat. (Can you say vegan chocolate muffin? Or perhaps a soy latte?) Of course, I have tons of errands to run today. But right now, I can't quite remember what they are. Oh yes -- I need to go to the post office and mail a couple things off and before that I have to arrange them, get information, take a shower, get dressed blah, blah, blah.

Today I feel like a scholar, an academic, a person who can wake up in the morning and get some writing done because it needs to be done rather than because there's someone with a gun to my head. (Shame is a great motivator.)

Of course, now there are few excuses for not getting back to the dissertation. I need to read all those comments and respond to them. This is my process for taking the dissertation back. After everyone writes so much all over it, I kind of feel full of holes. So I write in pen in response to their comments. It gives me the illusion of control. Yes, it's a neurosis. But it works. That's all that matters, right? I'm going to need to write them up for Peppy Advisor anyway, because already I saw that some of them disputed changes she had asked for.

So now I have to go shower. Do I have to? How about a little breakie, see what else is going on in the blogoverse. I'm so bad.

Day in Review

Today is one of those days I have to focus on what I did do, because it's totally obvious to me what I did not do, which is work on the article for SS. Just when I thought I was becoming a serious scholar, able to form my own research agenda and my own deadlines, I reveal myself to be the kind of phony who will only get tenure by panicking at the last minute. Hell, I don't even believe in my own deadlines! What happened to Boice's brief daily sessions, I ask you?! OY! I'm determined to wake up early tomorrow and get some work done before sending it to SS around -- oh, midmorning. All right, maybe after lunch.

What I did do today:

• Went to school and picked up Reader 2's comments. Also saw that new passport had come, thank the State Department.
  
• Went to the Health Center for lab results. (Nothing to report, but at least that's done.)
• Spent a ridiculous amount of money on computer geeky stuff: new power charger and, more important, a back-up drive. (Because I am no longer spread out over three computers, there have got to be plenty of copies.)
  
• Came home. Received outside reader's comments which made me want to go lie on my bed and twitch.
• Listened to WSF on phone explain that the comment that really stuck in my craw will make me better able to explain my ideas to those who don't share them while I pretended to believe him, while really lying on bed and twitching.
  
• Figured out back-up system and associated software (though not how to have it back up automatically once a week -- yet).
• Did whole bunch of emailing to friends, faculty, conference staff firming up lodgings, etc.
• Made vet appointment for Mr. Tabby. Totally alarmist, but he seems to be breathing a bit heavily. (Actually this was totally inspired by Dr. Four Eyes's Man-Kitty. I remembered that we found out about my Great White Hunter Cat's cancer only through chest x-rays. So Mr. Tabby's getting a chest x-ray on Friday. And yes, calling my cat who died last year a great white hunter is troublesome; on the other hand, he was all of those things. Think of it said with a wink and a nod.)
• Talked to landlords about extending my lease through August. The rental manager said she'd check with the Big Manager, and if there were a problem, she'd call me. My phone has been silent. (Oh dear, is it on? Oh yes, no calls.)
• Got sleepy around 7, but thought it was totally ridiculous to take a nap, so, realizing that I hadn't eaten all day, I made food and watched Out of Africa.
• Watched the special features of the Out of Africa DVD in preparation for my usual post-movie research.
• Took TylenolPM in an effort to rid myself of a terrible headache and go to sleep at what is to others a totally reasonable hour but to a person who stays up until 3 or 5 is a totally unreasonable hour.
  
• Blogged this fascinating post!
  

Will Blogging Jump-Start the Work Process, or Is It Just Procrastiblogging?

So the reason for my uncharacteristic bloggy silence is that I spent the rest of Memorial Day Weekend not doing any work, except for those 250 words. I've actually been reading a non-work book. Of course, I should be reading the review book, but. . .well, I deserve a break. And I need to return to my procrastinating ways in order to reclaim myself as a person instead of a machine. (Ooh, good sign. Rationalization of desires. I am Earnest English after all.)

SO was here, so we spent time watching movies (Fay Grim -- go see; Little Children -- UGH, painful on so many levels) and, of course, Avanti! since I talked myself into it. We also spent much time working on transfering computer stuff so that I will stop being spread out over multiple computers. Of course, this has had the unfortunate effect of screwing up my laptop -- and now will have to call the wretched Support Staff universe. (I try to avoid Tech Support at all costs -- my ex-husband and many techie friends have worked in that universe. It's bad. A bad bad universe where most customers lie. I like to solve my own techie problems or take them to my friends, but this is beyond most of them.) It's also just kind of scary to have one's whole life tied up in something so small. So now I'm all techie paranoid.

To distract myself from other things, I have a huge editing job to work on. So hopefully this job will inspire me to do something besides pine at the lack of caramel mochas in my world, stay up until 5am reading non-worky book, and nap with my cat. (Mr. Tabby is on my lap, purring. He'd shout out to all y'all in the blogoverse, but he's busy.) Also, had weird dream about WSF last night. Hmm. Maybe before I settle down to work, I should call.

Trying to Address Graduate Student Spread

So I'm beginning to feel normal for me -- that is, I start browsing the blogosphere when I wake up and can only convince myself that I should even bother to get up when I start to get hungry. I'm in a Coffeehouse in order to work and instead I'm blogging, with no desire whatsoever to do anything on that article that SS and I are working on. Pretty normal. Or I would be normal, except that I'm detoxing myself from all the chemicals and bad foods I usually eat -- coffee, sugar, dairy, basically everything that makes getting up even remotely worthwhile. And now I am at the site of my last caramel mocha -- and I.is.grumpy! What is even the point of living if you don't get to eat yummy creamy liquid chocolate? Okay, so I feel decent in my body for the first time in months. So maybe I'll actually lose some weight and won't feel like a graduate student whale. But I'm not sure that the lack of caramel mochas in my life is actually worth it. Waaaaaaaa.

Otherwise I'm just overwhelmed with the amount of crap that I put on the backburner when I was dissertating and has now become visible to me. I'm making slow progress on the vast list. Which is the only way for a list this size.

But for the record: I HATE DIETING! The question is do I hate it more than not being able to fit into my clothes? Shouldn't I be allowed one small pesky cup of chocolatey goodness? Sigh.

***Update 5:48pm***

Okay, I've written 254 words. I've decided that 250 words is my bottom limit. So I'm done, throwing in the towel. I must get back to the excitement of reading about other people's wacky weekends.

Turning into a Cat

Has anyone seen the Billy Wilder movie Avanti! with Jack Lemmon and Juliet Mills? Jack Lemmon's father has died in Ischia and Jack has come to gather the body and get it back to their televised Baltimore funeral in record time. And everything goes wrong. There's this wonderful part where Clive Revill, as Carlo Carlucci, director of the hotel Jack (and his father) is staying at, comes to tell Jack about latest developments about the complicated export license and the acquisition of a hard-to-find zinc-lined coffin.

"I'm here to give you a progress report," Carlo says.

"How are we doing?" asks Jack.

"We are making progress," he retorts.

Okay, it's funnier in the movie. (There's this other part where Carlo says, "I have good news and I have bad news," then proceeds to tell him about how all their plans for getting Carlo's cousins to do things have fallen through and a fogged-in airport has grounded the plane that has the coffin. "Okay, so what about the good news?" Jack asks. Carlo answers: "That was the good news.")

Anyway, that's how I feel right now -- yes, that I'd like to pop my antiquated VHS into the player and watch the movie now -- but also that we're making progress, but still little is getting done.

So one reader has read my diss and given me comments. I'm elated! Nothing I couldn't do in a couple days!!! Maybe we can push up the defense! But the other reader hasn't read it at all. Can't push up the defense because of schedule conflicts. Sigh. The long-and-involved moving project is the same way. Two steps forward. One step back.

But I'm happy that one reader thinks that there's not too much work left to do. And though I had not been able to get my butt in gear to work on the draft for Senior Scholar until this morning, it turns out that SS won't be able to get to it until next week, so there's still some time for me to do a bit of work on it. And it seems clear that I won't get comments from Reader #2 before then. So -- the only problem is that I haven't been able to make myself get to work!!! What have I been doing the last few days? Going to the doctor, fielding phone calls, checking my email 400 times per day, watching a couple movies, looking out the window with Mr. Tabby, taking naps. The other day I was pretty sure I had become a cat, waking up, checking blogs, eating, then going to sleep. I'm not saying it's hard to be me by a long stretch, but where exactly did that productive, focused, hardworking writer-scholar-dissertator go? The machine has apparently left the building.

There are some things that it would be very nice to do if I could just get myself to do them. I'll put them on the to-do list, in the hope that shame will make me work. But really, right now, I'd like some food, since SO's plane is delayed and it's possible we won't have time to go to dinner (since Grad City's kitchens tend to close at ten), and then maybe a wee nap. I swear I was once productive, running around and getting the impossible done. But now I don't even plan on doing laundry before SO comes. Too tired. Mraaarrrrow.

What Happens to the Voice When the Body Is in Pain: A Kvetch Session and Resolution

I'm absolutely determined that tomorrow will be a better day than this one was. Sometimes you've got to blog the kvetching and sometimes the blessings. This one is a little bit of both. Here are reasons to cheer that this day is almost over (well, I have to give the cat both his pill and his ear paste, so there's still potential excitement before I waddle off to bed):

1. I don't have to go to the nurse and jog in place for a couple minutes, gasping and sputtering about how I don't know how my fabulous friend just managed to run the half-marathon.
   
2. I don't have to pee in a cup. Maybe this is TMI and not appropriate for an academish blog, but hey, you're over at my house now! You can leave if you want to. I have this totally shy bladder. She just won't go on demand. I've always been like this. Doesn't matter if I drink liters of water. And in the lab they have this bathroom where you can hear people on all sides! Totally no go. So tomorrow, I won't have to wait while they test the dribbles to see if there's enough there.
   
3. I have no appointments at any time tomorrow -- not in the unreasonable morning or in the more reasonable anytime. This is good. Very good. Because it means that if I can't sleep because my blasted back (!!!!) hurts all night again and I can't get in a good position, then at least I can doze throughout the day.
4. I have food in my house. This is most excellent because I found out how full of hate I was today as the result of ongoing pain, low blood sugar, and lack of sleep. I really cannot deal with anyone. After chatting with a colleague for a while, I had this incredible sensation of claustrophobia. I must get out. A day off from being in that place where there are still people who are all excited and passionate about what's going on there will be very good for me. (By this, I of course mean Grad City U. Would you believe Summer School is already in session???) (Also, I don't want to run into anyone, except Similarly Self-Reflective Fab Friend. I just don't quite understand this; I thought with the dissertation stuff out of my hands I'd be generally happy again, able to enjoy the people here. But I just want to flee. Next best thing? Hide in my house. Excellent notion.)
5. I got movies. Very good for hiding in the house.

There were good moments today, well, okay mixed. I learned that my mother is totally wonderful and she is totally going out of her way to do something for me ASAP because I'm so obviously crippled and falling apart. (Those were not her words. She said that I've been doing such good work and I shouldn't have to deal with extraneous stuff.) I also totally overreacted when SO did something annoying. I had this epiphany about the whole thing: I'm really lucky to have such good people in my life. Here's the bad part: I really should be gracious, because they are making my life so much easier. The really bad part: I am totally not being gracious at all. Rather, I've been spreading my foul mood over hill and dale and barking at people.

I am just a black cloud. A twisted crabbed old graduate student with a hurting back. I'd like to keep this post going because I've found a good position in this chair, a pillow sort of wedged in a good spot so my lower back is supported and doesn't hurt. But Mr.Tabby does need his meds. I guess there's no avoiding going to bed. (Aren't I an adult? Can't I not go to bed if I want to?) I really need to learn how to sleep on my back with my knees up.

Here are my resolutions:

• I will work on the piece that I said I'd start for SS for at least ten minutes tomorrow.
• I will stay in the house where other people are safe from my pain-induced and graduate student-induced evil.
  

Denial Is Not Just a River in Egypt

So, I realize now that my feeling of sort of bored freedom was actually total denial. Yes, I feel a bit freer than I have in a long time. But that is only because the dissertation, which has totally monopolized my brain in recent months, isn't demanding any immediate work. (I stayed up until 2am last night reading blogposts documenting my accrual of the symptoms of Dissertation Crunch Disease -- especially the part where nothing else is important and you don't even want to watch movies!) But really I have tons to do and yesterday I was just ignoring that. Basically procrastinating by another name. But without even the itch that I should be doing something else.

So just in case I forget again and turn again into that pompous ass (why whatever shall I do?), here's the list of things I should do:

• Go through the accumulation of five years worth of papers.
• Clean out school office and get rid of some books.
• Go through clothes.
• Write email to Adventure U.
• Free-write notes for Dissertation Epilogue.
• Work on Conclusions in Chapters.

But the most ridiculous thing is that I have to have a draft of the article that we're rewriting for Senior Scholar on Thursday!!! No time to talk. Panic!!! (That's the real denial. I can't believe I just sort of didn't even think about it!!!)

But first I have to go to the doctor. So afternoon self: Get to work!!!