Happy Bastille Day!
Let's talk about what happens when something goes wrong while you're cooking: maybe the recipe is wonky, or you forgot to add an ingredient, or your stove isn't hot enough, or (much too common) you don't know what the problem is but the dish is . . . not as hoped. What do you do?
- try to adjust on the fly (say, add another potato to absorb salt)
- throw it out and start over
- re-purpose it (as in turning dry cake into trifle)
- doctor it by adding new materials (custard sauce, or vinaigrette, depending on the type of dish)
- take some other action
And how did you do with last week's goals? Is this recipe working? If not . . . what approach will you take this week?
Daisy
Five days in the field
Write giant curriculum document first draft
Write web articles, short but annoying task
Update organization page, send planning emails
Dame Eleanor Hull
- make weekly schedule for the rest of summer
- two campus days, meet with two grads, spend 30 minutes tidying my office, visit potential "field trip" sites
- swim x 2, yoga x5, cardio x 4
- identify and contact reviewers for edited volume (v much past due: what's more TRQ than TRQ??)
- take notes on articles read last week
- create syllabus for one to-be-proposed course
- organize the guest room closet and shelves
- get a massage or facial or something self-indulgent
- think about fall courses
heu mihi
1. Complete and send in book review
2. Complete revision of article (that will finish up all of my required academic/research-related work for the summer!)
3. Next 50 pages of Italian novel
4. Read dissertation
5. Update graduate handbook on website; reply to student
6. Make progress on one home/life goal
JaneB
1) building better habits: one creative thing with the hands, keep reading for pleasure, start a new yarn project, journal
2) Environment: do week's chores, start decluttering study etc. room
3) blocks: one teaching block
4) writing: do some work on the collaborative paper with a deadline
5) grad students: catch up on feedback to PhD students; meet with all students.
Julie
1. Inspired by JaneB, write July plan for three weeks that are left before holiday.
2. Outline the chapter!
3. Read chapter for PhD student.
4. House/life admin: SIL's birthday, update calendar, chase patio furniture, contact shed man, tidy desk, book hairdresser
5. Self-care: exercise, reading, try again on sleep, journal, enjoy hosting dinner for friends.
Susan
1. Read microfilm
2. Read essay for journal, expedited emergency read
3. Plan later summer trip to archive
4. Follow up on Famous Author
5. Enjoy various social things
6. Walk to work every day, home at least once.
7. Finish the novel I'm reading.
On the topic, it depends a lot on what sort of food/what mistake. Accidentally adding lemon extract instead of vanilla to chocolate pudding was a throw-it-out situation. Cake that stayed gooey can sometimes be salvaged by putting individual pieces in the microwave. At this point I have a good sense of what will work, when I look over a recipe, but that takes a lot of experience with cooking. Adapting recipes for my specific requirements can take a lot of experimenting, even though I have some general principles and experience with different types of non-wheat flour. Bread is just not going to happen at home, but fortunately TJ's gluten-free white works for me.
ReplyDeleteHow I did:
- make weekly schedule for the rest of summer: I'm not sure what I meant by this, TBH. A syllabus? NO. Plan for work hours? YES.
- two campus days, meet with two grads, spend 30 minutes tidying my office, visit potential "field trip" sites. YES TO ALL.
- swim x 2, yoga x5, cardio x 4: YES, and I got to swim x3, for a total of a bit over 2.5 miles.
- identify and contact reviewers for edited volume (v much past due: what's more TRQ than TRQ??). NO (on the schedule for this week!)
- take notes on articles read last week: NO (schedule also has space for reading/note-taking)
- create syllabus for one to-be-proposed course: YES but not the one I meant to do! Something else came up . . . and then promptly got shot down, at least for the term I hoped to do it in.
- organize the guest room closet and shelves: NO
- get a massage or facial or something self-indulgent: YES. BOTH.
- think about fall courses : NO
ALSO: had annual physical (got PT referral for nagging hip/back pain), went to a sort of thrift store for art supplies (fun! though dreadfully slow city driving was involved), finished the book for this week's book club, mended two garments.
New goals:
- try to figure out some sort of "syllabus" for the rest of summer (interim due dates, etc)
- one campus day, meet with grad, spend 30 minutes tidying my office, scan essay and return book
- swim x 3, yoga x5, cardio x 4
- identify and contact reviewers for edited volume
- take notes on articles read 2 weeks ago
- create syllabus for one to-be-proposed course
- organize the guest room closet and shelves
- think about fall courses
- make some measurable progress on 2 research projects (M and W)
- get fasting blood draw (ugh, I hate going out w/o breakfast)
I am very bad at adjusting recipes. I will usually google to see if there is a fix, or throw out and start over if the mistake isn't fixable. I have a bad memory for the kind of life tips that are useful in these situations. I tend to have a jar of pesto on standby for when a recipe is ruined and we need dinner quickly.
ReplyDeleteLast week:
1. Inspired by JaneB, write July plan for three weeks that are left before holiday. - YES
2. Outline the chapter! - YES and started writing.
3. Read chapter for PhD student. - STARTED
4. House/life admin: SIL's birthday, update calendar, chase patio furniture, contact shed man, tidy desk, book hairdresser - YES TO ALL
5. Self-care: exercise, reading, try again on sleep, journal, enjoy hosting dinner for friends. - SOME, YES, NOT REALLY, YES, YES
Last week seemed to go quite well in that I got a fair amount of writing done, until it got really hot on Friday. So sticking to this recipe for now.
This week:
1. Carry on writing chapter.
2. PhD student's chapter and possibly more.
3. Add some references to my reading list.
4. Read article for a post-doc.
5. Do some boring work admin.
6. House/life admin: prep for holiday, nephew's birthday, sort out home insurance renewal.
7. Self-care/fun stuff: read, exercise, keep trying on sleep, watch Tour de France.
That's a lot of YES, but I'm sorry the sleep isn't going so well. So far this morning I've stuck pretty well to my "recipe" for scheduling work, and I hope that's a good sign for the rest of the week!
DeleteSleep is so difficult in this weather! The humidity! It's like the worst perimenopause nights but there's not really anywhere properly cool to go to....
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ReplyDeleteAdjusting recipes is something I am pretty good at – some not doable, but if you catch a cake in the oven before it sets you can stir in all kinds of left-out ingredients! Including sugar, salt, baking powder… Timing is everything. Many savoury things can become stews or soup. Except for the burnt ones, no saving those. Keeping things to repurpose does not work well for me, it usually just means throwing them out a few days later instead of immediately, so if I cannot save it right away it goes. Some mistakes I’ve buried, literally… Like the green curry made in a field camp using a whole jar of curry mix instead of the 2 tablespoons (in my defense, the other type of curry required the whole jar, but different brand, different rules…). Burial was the only option, to keep away bears… Mind you the curry on its own probably could have doubled as bear spray, it was that bad!
Last week’s goals
Five days in the field DONE, GREAT
Write giant curriculum document first draft DONE, NOT GREAT
Write web articles, short but annoying task NOT DONE OR GREAT
Update organization page, send planning emails DONE… MEH…
Goals were ok, field work was great, but I do with that regular office things would stop when I'm out. But they don't, so they still need to get done at nights and weekends, but I get to hang around in lovely areas during the day so it all works out ok in the end. More this coming week, and a few office days to catch up on reports.
This week’s goals
Two office days for all the office things….
Three days in the field, plus weekend, plus first three days of next week…
Edit giant curriculum document first draft
Write web articles, short but annoying task
Grant report
Keep on top of student tasks
I LOL'd at the curry bear repellent!
DeleteIt is nice to get to be outside in a lovely area. Yesterday was surprisingly pleasant here, and I went for a walk by the river.
Glad some things went GREAT!
DeleteI'm also quite good at fixing or repurposing things, but don't always have the willpower to deal with it. Making stuff that doesn't quite work out is a very common experience but I think it's as much to do with my brain as my cooking, if that makes sense - the brain squirrels WANT a certain thing but can't always communicate what they mean, and get very upset if it's not quite right so something I enjoyed last time can be blah or ick this time. I'm a very improvisional cook (even with baking I get a bit experimental) so that may not help!
ReplyDeleteThe weather is draining me at the moment - it takes me a few days to actually recover from the over-25-degrees-and-humid periods, then that's usually just long enough for it to start again, and it makes me feel about 90 years old and disgusted with myself and utterly incompetent. I do not enjoy summer outside of very narrow parameters of both weather and level of bugginess, because I am also super tasty to many bugs (and collected three itchy bites whilst walking the maybe 2 minutes from my office to my car when i went on campus) and whilst according to my Canadian former boss insects only let mammals evolve to have walking summer buffets, I do not accept that fate without a lot of griping!
And just got some really ANNOYING news (does it never stop?) - I have to teach one quarter of a first semester first year core module (basically "Intro To Our Entire Subject" kind of tour-of-the-map). The former leader of the module retired, and I don't get to lead it because "we have to give X things to do" - X was to teach one quarter, and then Y and Z were to teach the remaining parts. Y and Z are both a pleasure to work with. X is a lump-on-a-log type colleague, they do what they are told in a rather lackluster last minute way UNLESS it's directly about their research, they resist change and blame students for not getting things, but they aren't actively unpleasant or actually doing stuff late/not doing things at all, I've just run out of capacity to deal with them (BEC time for readers of Ask A Manager). And I found out this morning that both Y and Z are no longer on the module, X will take on another quarter of the module, and W is now allocated to the alst piece. W is a nice person but an active nightmare to teach with, cannot follow rules, meet deadlines, do what they agreed to do. Students like them because they are funny and "lads-lads-lads" personable, and I'd like them uncomplicatedly if they taught in a different set of programmes, but AARGH! So I'm really sad about that, and also mad that I don't have the capacity to step up and take over the module plus X's new component since I could do it better (yes, arrogant, but, also true based on over a decade of working with X). I was looking forward to that module... and now I am low-key dreading it. Sigh.
LAST WEEK:
Delete1) building better habits: one creative thing with the hands, keep reading for pleasure, start a new yarn project, journal bought a cheap painting by numbers kit & am making an enjoyable mess with the cheap paint and cheap brushes, slowly read a book that was perfectly enjoyable, but a) it was a high pollen count week so my eyes were very unhappy and b) I found a new-to-me podcast and began to consume it, so I spent a good chunk of "reading time" lying down with my eyes shut/contact lenses out listening to the podcast - Ologies, for anyone interested. I think it will wear off soon, but at the moment I'm really enjoying it despite it's very west-coast-US focus. Still no new yarn, too hot. Minimal journalling, a lot of work
2) Environment: do week's chores, start decluttering study etc. room no and no - decluttering person was due on a day that was forecast to be hot and swampy, so we agreed to reschedule as we knew we wouldn;t get much done
3) blocks: one teaching block made a start, but then my laptop refused to connect to campus and I spent a couple of hours failing to fix that
4) writing: do some work on the collaborative paper with a deadline yes, and this was rather fun. Even if it happened outside my actual work hours...
5) grad students: catch up on feedback to PhD students; meet with all students. done and done
COMING WEEK:
1) building better habits: one creative thing with the hands, keep reading for pleasure, start a new yarn project, journal
2) Environment: do week's chores. Sort out post pile of doom
3) blocks: two teaching blocks - one sorting out the laptop, second looking at the module I am now fed up about so I can a) regain my equilibrium and b) get going EARLY on "non-nagging nagging" the others as we are supposed to be completely changing the assessment to make it more AI-resistant which requires coordination and planning, and I want to do my share of the work before the semester starts (and now know the others won't want to, so I need to start NOW).
4) writing: do some more work on the collaborative paper with a deadline, go to a meeting about same.
5) grad students: do substantial paperwork for two students, send a couple of emails for third. Only ONE meeting this week, in the diary at least!
Heavens, your uni/school sounds like a composite Alison made up out of a whole bag of letters to illustrate everything that could possibly go wrong in an academic setting! If I were in charge I'd hand the whole first-year module over to you. I wish I could do something about the weather as well: humidity is the worst. Oh well, a month or two and it will be back to cold/humid instead of hot/humid. At least you have a good podcast!
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