Up and at em’

My husband said something this morning while I was still asleep along the lines of “its as cold as it’s ever been,” meaning our outdoor thermostat was somewhere around -1degF. I mumbled something about what time was it. It was 630am. Wow I thought I have 30 minuets of internet* time and I really need to go to Web of Science and look up those refs to finish this manuscript. SO I got out of bed. I put my robe on, grabbed some water and was online by 637. In addition to getting all my references and checking my e-mail I opened all the new entries from Google reader so I could read them later when my internet was off line and the coffee was made. Husband even turned on the hot water pitcher so I could make coffee. He likes it when I wake up early and honestly it’s nice to see him in the mornings. Also, it’s only 11am and I’ve both finished my manuscript*** and answered the questions for the position** I’m applying to. And my second load of laundry is in the drier. Damn, and I also juiced carrots and made banana bread. Working from home can rock.

**I’ve noticed this week that my dream job, in dream place is open. It’s at a federal institution where I worked while an undergrad and for a year after my bachelors. But it seems I’m one year behind their requirements.

Question 1 makes sure you have your Ph.D. or equivalent work experience. The problem is that the deadline to apply is Friday and I’m pretty sure one is suppose to meet the requirements before applying, as it states this somewhere. But I checked that I had phd as my CV states when I’ll get it.

Question 2
In addition to meeting the Basic Education Requirement, you must have professional experience. Select the one response below which best describes your experience.
1. I have 1 year of professional experience in the field of -ology equivalent to the -11 level. Examples of such experience may include planning and executing complex -ologic studies that usually involved intensive investigations into recognized phenomena; applying conventional methods & techniques (going beyond clear precedents); and adapting methods to the problems at hand and interpreting findings in terms of their scientific significance.
2. I do not meet the requirement as described above.

Basically I feel that this (answer 1) was all I did for my graduate work, yet that was covered by question 1. I’m pretty sure, again I don’t quite qualify. I’m still applying (actually I've applied).

The position says that they have one position open but may open up other positions. So I’m crossing my fingers that they see how awesome I am and decide to hire me at a level lower, the 11 instead of the 12.

**Manuscript 1
As I mentioned above, I finished a manuscript this morning, although every time I read it I rewrite portions and think of new figures, but I swear I’m only going to read it one more time before sending it to my adviser (actually it's sent).

Initially this was going to be a short communication/letter about this awesome spike we see in the data but coauthor said to just include all the other data, as it’s an uniquely large data set, and make one large paper. I thought sure this will make life simpler but now that it’s all together I feel like this awesome spike is lost in the data. So I’m debating the letter again and will see what co author and adviser think.

I’m also thinking of submitting this paper to a new sub-journal of a major impact journal but I don’t think the writing is concise enough. Hopefully adviser will help with this. First I just want him to see the paper because we haven’t discussed a lot of this data yet.

This manuscript also has four tables and four figures. One of the figures has six plots, wow! As I said I keep thinking of new figures and new tables. I think two of the tables would do fine as supplementary tables but all of the figures are unique. I tried to just include two of the plots on the six plot figure but then I just said these other plots are similar to these two plots but different. That didn’t seem good enough so I just decided to dump everything in and then see what co authors think. This is a major dilemma for all my manuscripts and talks. I have too many FIGURES and it’s not that I’m repeating data in a different way it is actual data that supports the study. It’s so difficult to decide what is most important. . . .. I guess that is why there are co authors and reviewers.

* In addition to getting up early I worked more last night after dinner. I’ve still been having slight troubles falling asleep but I think it’s because there is so much on my mind.

I installed the MeeTimer on my laptop and am interested to see how that works for me while in dissertation town where the internet is endless (read excitement). Then I think when I get back to Midwest I’m going to request my husband change and increase my internet time. It’s getting a little frustrating that when I want to do actual work online I can’t, although I told my friend that I just write a list of things when I think of them and she commented how it was cool that my time online was structured-good point. Also I tend to even run out of things to do during my hour’o’internet. Also, the timing is not very evenly spread out. No internet from 7am to 1:15pm-6 hours 15 mins, then my next break is 2:30 to 615pm- a little less than four hours. The time was initially set since I would meet with my adviser online during that time in the afternoon. I’ll set up a time with adviser for this semester when I see him next week. He’ll likely want a similar time so I’m thinking that I’d just increase the middle time period to start at noon. Then I can browse while I eat lunch.

It would look like this:
Midnight-7am INTERNET
7am-Noon NONE (5 hour break)
Noon-2:30 INTERNET
2:30-6:15 NONE (less than 4 hour break)
6:15-8:00 INTERNET

I think this is a pretty good schedule.

This was a pretty diverse blog entry but I felt there was much to discuss. Hope I didn’t ramble too much.