Update

Thanks for all the comments on the last post. What started as a surprising result to an internet quiz turned into me lamenting again about writing. It is easy to do, I guess.

To answer unbalanced reaction's question. I have one publication in an obscure and local journal. It's nothing I feel very proud of. It got rejected from two other journals before we gave up and submitted to the local journal. The letter said it was peer reviewed but I didn't get any comments from reviewers about it. I have a lot of non peer reviewed items on my CV, a few government reports of which I'm first author on one of them and about one and a half pages of conference proceedings and I'm first author on 90% of them. I didn't do any collaborating as a graduate student so I didn't get a change to "share" publications with people (including my adviser who does none of his own research anymore).

I also wanted to clarify that I mostly enjoy the beginning stages of a manuscript. The organizing and coming up with what to plot and what to talk about. I dislike the review stage and not so much the journal review stage (since not many of my papers have even made it this far I don't have a good idea of this stage) but the adviser review stage. It's long and drawn out and I don't always agree with my adviser. I just want to get the papers submitted so they get to go through the "real" review.

What has inspired me to write today is my husband. He has been telling me that I need to get into a better mood. That I have nothing to complain about. It's like what Candid Engineer said in the comments, I need to have a good attitude (to paraphrase).

I've been in a funk for the past couple of months (maybe counting nine now) and I don't know how to get out. I've always been that person who looks at the brighter side of life. The go getter. The happy girl.
Maybe I put on that persona for too long now I can't hold it up any longer?
Maybe I truly just don't feel that way anymore?
Maybe I'm just being lazy?

I think it's the lazy part. I think my adviser has taught me that things take forever so why rush them. But maybe that is me being lazy again and blaming my laziness on someone else.

I've been doing this food challenge in hopes of helping me loose weight by not buying junk food. Well, both Wed. and Thus. I went to the grocery store and bought a pint of ice cream and ate the whole pint in one sitting. *Sigh*
I need to loose 20 lbs and just can't seem to do it. Even when I think I'm having a great week the scale doesn't show any difference. *Sigh* Ok this post is getting depressing.

What I want to say is that I need to have a better attitude on everything not only for my own mental sanity but for the sanity of my marriage. My husband also has a lot he is going through but he stays strong and it doesn't help for him to come home to a gloomy household.

He also keeps telling me that I need to submit manuscripts without worrying about my coauthors. This seems unethical to me.

My feelings of depression this week come from lack of direction. I have two talks I'm working on: conference talk and dissertation talk. Other that this I don't know what I should be doing!! I sent my adviser, what I feel is a final draft of our resubmit and then what. Should I be working on making the chapters into manuscripts? If so how? The chapters are in pretty good shape from my end I feel I need the coauthors (or committee) to give me comments for improvement. Or should I just prepare and submit one without any one knowing?

[thanks for reading this long post, which I feel likely lacks a theme or direction]

Holy Crap

I was going to write a post about how I'm bored with my research when I saw this Quiz at Propter Doc and decided to give it a go.

You Should Get a PhD in Science (like chemistry, math, or engineering)

You're both smart and innovative when it comes to ideas. Maybe you'll find a cure for cancer - or develop the latest underground drug.

What Advanced Degree Should You Get?

This is just scary. So much over the past year I've thought that maybe a Ph.D. was a waste of my time, that maybe I'm only cut out to do other peoples research and that I'm so bored of sitting at my desk and thinking and writing.

I'm still working on the resubmit. I'm going to discuss it with my adviser tomorrow but I don't think it needs anything more. I'm sure he will disagree. It is this paper that I'm mostly bored with.

I still have a letter in review. We submitted it as a letter because those are suppose to have quick turnaround time. We submitted it in early February.

There are two chapters of my dissertation (besides the letter) that I believe are important to the scientific community and would like to submit. There is another chapter that is exciting but I'm not sure I have enough data to warrant a manuscript. Then there are two other chapters that I could give a crap about. This makes me sad. I also feel that the two chapter worthy of publication (in my eyes) will take too much time and thus frustration to polish up for journals. One of them I've been trying to submit since December but there has been so many revisions we decided to just call it quits until the defense.

I've spent so much time with this data. Designing the projects. Executing the field work and lab work. Thinking about the data. Collecting more data. Presenting it at conferences.
I HAVE LOVED ALL OF THESE STEPS.
Then I got to sit in my house all alone for 10 months and write, and write some more, and have my adviser tell me we need more data, or that we need to reinterpret the data.

Argh. During this process I've become less and less in love with my research. It is more like the red headed step child (sorry if you are red headed, but you get the analogy). I just want to ship it off to boarding school and move on with my life.

But I've discussed this before. Is this process of writing the same for everyone? with all advisers? am I just a horrible writer? am I not a dedicated scientist? I don't know. What I do know is that I hate this feeling of boredom. This lack of focus. It makes me unhappy. This makes me then eat and drink more than I should, which makes me fat, which makes me lazy and then, yes, more unhappy.

*Sigh*

Week 1-Confessions

As part of the No Eating Out Challenge I am having weekly confessions. Today is the last day of the first week so if I falter between now and falling asleep I'll have to amend my confession.

I did very well with the eating out rule.
1. We are allowed to eat out once a week as a social outing. This means that it has to include more than just yourself or yourself and your significant other.

My husband and I went out to dinner only once this week, on Friday, with the couple that we hang out with here. We celebrated that I turned in my dissertation on Monday. I stuck with my two drink minimum for dinner and my husband and I shared some bread pudding. Yum! Then the four of us walked around the town. There was a car show and a band playing. We then decided to hit up the wine bar and we shared a bottle of wine. So, technically I exceeded by two drink minimum. :(

I almost broke the challenge by going out to eat on Saturday with my husband to celebrate our 5-yr anniversary. We had gone grocery shopping that day and I thought it would be nice to stay home and eat. So we did. And it was so much fun. We watched a Hitchcock movie, made Phai Tai, drank the bottle of sparkle wine we got a local winery last month, and we got to stay in our comfy clothes and just chill out. My husband and I are true homebodies.

My last confession is at the grocery store. It was Tuesday or Wed. and I bought a chocolate muffin and a donut. I really desired the yummy chocolate and the carbs. *Sigh* So that broke my Rule B, but I'm not that disappointed about it because it was only once. In previous months I would do this multiple times a week.

I'm going to Trader Joes today so hopefully I'll stick to my list and not have to confess anything more.

How did you do this week?

Give away

A women just left my house. She took my Target bookshelf, office swivel chair (i'm now sitting on my balance ball), office supplies, random kitchen things, a magnetic dart board (cheesy kind) and my box full of goodwill clothes (mens and women). When she was leaving she was talking about eating on styrofoam plates which reminded me that I still have plastic plates, cups, bowls and silverware that we used/reused when we first moved here. I gave those to her as well. After she left I was sad I didn't offer her all of my half used bathroom items such like aspirin, Mylanta, some lotions, ect.

You maybe saying, Jennie she isn't your dumping ground I'm sure she wouldn't take half used bathroom supplies.
And you would say that because you don't know the background of this women. We met via craigslist because I posted about my bookshelf and chair. It seems in the 30 mins we were together I learned her entire life history, the abridged version.

Recently her apartment caught on fire. It was electrical and she had been complaining to the land (slum) lord about the problem for months. Her microwave caught on fire which wasn't enough to get the landlord to fix the issue. Then, one night when she and her family were home sleeping the entire complex caught on fire and after she tried to put it out and couldn't she had to get her <6yr old son and daughter out of the place then carry her husband who is in a wheelchair down the stairs.

Her husband is in a wheelchair because a few years ago on their sons birthday he was outside fixing the tire on their car and heard another car pull up. As he stood up to see what was happening he got in between a fight that ended with a gunshot in his spine. Paralyzed for life.

She told me that she moved around a lot as a kid because her dad was a good for nothing alcoholic and that she isn't very close to her mother and that she is the black sheep of the family because she is really the only one that turned out half way decent.

She had such a positive outlook on life. She now lives in a decent neighborhood where a pastor runs the apartment complex and gave her the position of apartment manager which takes off money from her rent check. She just has an empty apartment.

I was sad I gave away my books already because she said her and her son love to read.

She also keep saying how much God has blessed her. She asked if I believe in God and I had to say most of the time. So we talked a little about our faith.

I don't have a lot of reflection about this post. I mostly wanted to share my experience.

I still can't help looking around at my things wondering what else I should have given her.

Woot!!

Step 1) Give dissertation to committee members. CHECK

Yes, I just e-mailed my dissertation, all 136 pages and 7 chapters to my five committee members. It was so nerve racking. I kept thinking, “I should read through it one more time.” However, I don’t think my brain could pick up any more grammar or editing errors. The dissertation needs fresh eyes. I’m very happy with the content but I’m extremely nervous about careless errors. I don’t want my committee to think I’m careless.

But it’s in the past, now I need to focus on the future.

Step 2) Make power point presentation. Needs to be 20-30 mins long. I love this part and am not too worried about it.

Step 3a) Cross fingers and hope committee is on top of things and will chose June 26 or 27 like we previously discussed. Otherwise I will have to fly to dissertation town after I move out west.

Step 3b) Fly to dissertation town.

Step 4a) Defend dissertation.

Step 4b) Hopefully pass and celebrate.

Step 5a) Make suggested revisions.

Step 5b) Turn in dissertation to graduate school by Aug. 15^th. I’ll need to double check with the graduate school about all the requirements since I won’t be handing in my final copy but my adviser will. I will need to make a folder with all such paperwork and tack it up to advisers wall so he won’t loose it. My school now does electronic submission so I’ll probably burn the CD’s myself and FedEx them to adviser.

Step 6) Pass out.

I know list are boring but I need to get all of this out of my head.

Additionally this month I need to

WORK RELATED

1) Make power point for conference in dissertation area June 23/24^th. I’ve given a similar talk elsewhere so I’m not worried about this. P.S. if my defense date isn’t June 26/27 I am withdrawing from the conference since I don’t want to pay to fly to dissertation town twice this summer. My adviser could just give the talk.

2) I’d like to sort out all the references in my dissertation and make sure I’m fully acquainted with them.

3) Apply for a few internships, job stuff***

MOVE RELATED

4) We need boxes. This was a worry but I think this is covered now. I’m not too stressed about packing because we have sorted through our belongs pretty well.

5) Sell my desk. It hasn’t been very popular on craigslist and I’m attached enough to it that I don’t want to give it away to someone unknown. I’m still posting ads and if it comes down to it not fitting in our POD I guess donation will have to work. No one has been interested in our guest bed. I even posted an ad at my husbands job. So we are moving that to give to my sister. She sleeps on a twin and this is a full size and the frame has four drawers for storage.

6) Do change/forward of addresses and transfer of utilities. I should start that today.

There maybe more but I’m going to try not to worry.

*** Husband has a temp. job where we are moving to. A friend of a friend of a friend (that's all) owns a consulting company there. My husband has been e-mailing with him and it turns out the company got a new piece of equipment that they'd like help on. The company knows my husband will likely be going back to school and that this might not be a long term position so it's great they are willing to invest time training my husband despite this.

I'm also happy that it means we will have some type of income when we moved, plus I'm still paid as a student until Aug. 15th.